literature

Panzerlied English Original Translation (Edited)

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Literature Text

In storm or in snow
Or the sun shining bright,
The day hot as hell,
Or as cold as the night!
Our faces covered with the dust,
To fight is what we lust!
Yes what we lust!
Our tanks in the battle,
Through storm winds do thrust!

With thundering motors
As fast as the wind!
We ride through defenses
And on our foes descend!
Though comrades may advance the flank
We're forwards in our tanks!
Yes in our tanks!
We thrust ever deeper
Into hostile ranks!

With blockage and mining
To halt our advance!
We laugh at their ruses
And thrust through like a lance!
The foe against us cannot stand!
Our tanks are in command!
Yes in command!
We guide through the trappings
To much safer land!

And if we’re abandoned
By fortune so vain!
And no more return
To our homeland again!
The hand of death will find us brave,
The fullest measure gave,
Yes fullest gave.
Our Panzer, in glory,
Will be our iron grave!
Hey everyone! Another song update!

If you are a WW2 enthusiast (which I know a lot of you are if you're here), you probably know this is one of the most famous German song of the war. (Hey Blut, it's that song from the "Battle of the Bulge! Yadda yadda, movie reference, don't really care). Yes, it is that song. THAT song.

There have been other translations of this song to English. The most prominent (and what one might call "keeping to the original meter) is found here: ingeb.org/Lieder/obssturm.html

That being said, I sort of felt intimidated translating this, because it is so well known. Only one problem though: it doesn't keep with the song. I tried singing that version and....well there are a lot of places where it scratches the ears and doesn't work.

So, with that in mind, I translated (as originally as possible) the song in my own rendition, paying especially to if it fits in the song or not, and to my great satisfaction, it does!

I consider this my best work yet, as there is nothing here where I had to admit "I couldn't find a better substitute". Go on, sing it yourself, please. If there are certain stressed points, please inform me. I'm always open to suggestions. :D

Finally, I hope you enjoyed it. Thank you so much for viewing. :)

*EDIT*

After having gone over my own translation these past couple of weeks, and receiving some comments, I realized that my translation of the Panzerlied was lacking, if not wholly off - mostly on the first and last stanza. I went back and re-did the two of them almost entirely, and produce a more accurate and more sensical translation - with some minor edits here and there in the rest. 
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I love this very singable translation. Google censored it and made me sign up to see it again. So I did. Thank you for the best translation of this lied ever.