美國國歌的前世今生

It began humbly[1] and rose to great heights over the course of 150 years. Our story begins in London in 1780 with a social club named after a fun loving Roman poet said to have died at 86 while choking on a grape seed.

Most of the members of the Anacreontic[2] Society were amateur musicians, though a few of them were professionals. They met every two weeks at the Crown and Anchor Tavern in the Strand.[3] The evening’s entertainment consisted of a concert, dinner, and drinking songs. The society began each evening with a song tailor-made[4] by two of their members. Poet Ralph Tomlinson provided lyrics and antiquarian and musicologist John Stafford Smith contributed a genteel melody.[5] Their song “To Anacreon in Heaven” celebrated the mingling[6] of love and wine.

Not everyone loved the society though. The Duchess of Devonshire made a habit of eavesdropping on the proceedings from a secret room in the tavern, and she was no lover of bawdy songs and ballads.[7] No doubt the possibility that she might be listening in at any time had something to do with the demise[8] of the Anacreontic Society in 1786.

For the next twenty-eight years its theme song floated from one side of the Atlantic to the other, and in 1814 it turned up in a setting that was anything but convivial[9].

During the War of 1812, as the British retreated from Washington, a well-known Washington lawyer and amateur poet was on a prisoner exchange ship in Baltimore Harbor. The lawyer, Francis Scott Key[10], spent a night nervously watching the British bombardment of nearby Fort McHenry. At sunrise, seeing the American flag still flying over the fort, Key was inspired to write the poem known as “The Star-Spangled Banner”. Key later forwarded his poem to a Baltimore printer, coupling it with a slightly less singable arrangement of “To Anacreon in Heaven”. In 1931, 150 years after its modest beginnings in a London tavern, the quaint old drinking tune became officially the national anthem of the United States.

起初，這首曲子毫不知名，誕生150多年后，卻達(dá)到了偉大的高度。故事發(fā)生在1780年的倫敦，當(dāng)時有一個社交俱樂部，是以一位喜歡找樂子的羅馬詩人命名的，據(jù)說，那位詩人在86歲時被一粒葡萄籽卡住喉嚨窒息而死。

盡管這個名為“阿那克里翁社”的成員中有幾位是專業(yè)人士，但大多還是業(yè)余音樂愛好者。成員們每隔兩周都會在位于海濱的“皇冠•錨酒館”聚會。晚上的娛樂活動包括音樂會、晚宴和飲酒歌。每次晚上的聚會都會以演唱一首由兩位會員特意譜寫的歌曲而拉開序幕。這首歌曲由詩人拉爾夫•湯姆林森作詞，古文物家、音樂學(xué)者約翰•斯塔夫德配上優(yōu)雅的旋律。他們的這首《致天堂里的阿那克里翁》贊美了愛情和美酒的交融。

然而，并不是所有人都喜歡這個音樂社。德文郡的公爵夫人就總是習(xí)慣在酒館的一間密室里偷聽音樂社的活動，她不喜歡那些低級下流的歌曲和情歌。毫無疑問，1786年阿克那里翁音樂社的解散和公爵夫人那無時不刻的監(jiān)聽不無關(guān)系。

在接下來的28年里，音樂社的這首主題曲漂洋過海，傳到了大西洋彼岸。1814年，這首曲子出現(xiàn)在了非宴飲的場合。

在1812年的(美英)戰(zhàn)爭中，當(dāng)英軍撤離華盛頓時，華盛頓一位著名的律師、業(yè)余詩人正在巴爾的摩海港的一艘戰(zhàn)俘交換船上。整個晚上，這位名叫弗朗西斯•斯科特•凱伊的律師都在緊張地注視著英軍對不遠(yuǎn)處(美軍)麥克亨利要塞的炮擊。天亮?xí)r，當(dāng)凱伊看到美國國旗仍飄揚在城堡上空的時候，突然靈感勃發(fā)，寫下了一首題為《星光閃耀的旗幟》的詩作。隨后凱伊將這首詩交給了巴爾的摩的一名印刷工，還配上了不太上口的《致天堂里的阿那克里翁》的改編曲。150年后的1931年，這首在倫敦小酒館里誕生的不起眼的古老飲酒歌正式成了美國國歌。