The White Man’s Burden Translation—Period 6
AP European History
Mr. Cicerchi
1 Take your superiority and civilize backwards countries,
Send the best people you have,
Put your sons into the backwards countries,
To help the uncivilized people there.
2 You must wait, bound by the native people
In the new wild terrain,
The people of the country you overtake,
Who are not as civilized.
3 Do our responsibility,
Stay patient,
Control the fear,
Prevent revolts.
4 With easy and free speech,
Made obvious many times,
Attempting to take someone else’s money,
Use what other people have gotten.
5 Take up the white man’s burden,
The difficult battles for peace,
Feed the hungry,
Cure the sick.
6 When you’re close to the end,
The end that others looked for,
Watch your laziness and foolishness,
They will make your hope amount to nothing.
7 Take up the white man’s burden,
Don’t live garish lives like kings,
Just the struggles of servants and slaves,
And basic necessities for life.
8 You don’t need to travel there,
You don’t need to see the land,
You can make your living without seeing the place,
They’ll see your superiority through their death.
9 White man’s burden is civilizing savages,
The benefits of conquering, perhaps religious
Manifest destiny?
White men protect others but no one appreciates them so that’s the burden.
10 The natives or abused people of color are crying out because the whites are treating them with little care as if they’re children…
Whites take them away from their “savage” customs and try to civilize them.
Their pleas did not have to conform to whites’ ideals,
They want to keep their power and their own sense of self.
11 Take up the white man’s burden,
You shall not be undermined
Or depend on your liberty
To mask your weary mind.
12 No matter what you say
No matter what you do
The lesser peoples
Will still not appreciate you.
13 Take up the white man’s burden,
Enough with the childish behavior,
The lightly acclaimed honor,
The simple benevolent adoration.
14 Now is the time to take up this duty,
Though the inferior peoples will not appreciate it now,
It will be worth it in the end,
And your friends will praise you for it.