Studio8 - Uniting the Arts

Going Native

“He’s gone native,” they said, when they found him. He was one of them, a man, and having come to this place on a scouting mission, to gather data, he’d become enamored of the land and its people, the natives, fallen in love with them, taken up their odd ways and become a part of them. He was no more a man. He’d gone native. Even his name was lost. He would not utter it. He called himself only what they, the natives, called him. They looked on him with disgust, contempt, some compassion, but no mercy. His crime was the worst any in their company could commit. He’d given up his birthright, his manhood, his integrity and all worth, in their eyes. But he looked from them, their eyes, to the land surrounding, and the people he knew were out there, and knew that he would and will, when the time came, die for them and this place.
He’d gone native.


This is inspired by one of my favorite movies of all time, Dances With Wolves, starring Kevin Costner, who along with Will Smith and some others, often is involved with movies that speak to me on a deep, personal level. I wrote it because I feel this way about myself. All my life I've never felt from here, from Earth, the physical plane, whatever. I don't think it's a unique or even uncommon feeling. But I have come to love this place, the people here, and I feel that when the time comes, it will be both I die for.
But maybe that's all just a dream, or a fantasy.

Peace,
Barry

ma man.

I'm gonna have to watch it again. i swore i would back in time.

.... Just waiting for the man to remind me, i guess.
it's time.
thanx Barry.

Possibly, the best line in the movie.

Though they make the process look too easy. One only goes native from the outside which makes one a permanent outsider wherever you go.

Back in 1991 or '92 I wanted to write a piece about an actor from a higher plane of existence. He came to Earth much like Krishna, to masquerade as a human, play a role, as entertainment for the "gods," the inhabitants of the higher plane of existence. All I ever did was make notes. This actor made the greatest mistake possible. He "went native." He became psychoticly "in character," as actors sometime do on our plane of existence. He forgot it was merely a role. He began to think of it as real.

The purpose of this writing was to ask the question, "Is that so wrong?"

Peace,
Barry

Barry you raise some fascinating points here. I read a book called, "The Story Teller", by Mario Vargas. Llosa years ago. It was about a Jewish student in Anthropology in Lima Peru. This man felt out of place both because he was Jewish and because he had a prominent birth mark on his face. The narrator of the book had befriended him. Years later, after leaving college, he was walking through Florence, Italy and saw a photograph of a red headed man sitting in a circle with some Indians. He immediately realized this man was his friend. So what followed was an exploration of how a man brought up in a scientific western tradition can actually become transformed into a pre-scientific Native American culture. When I say "transformed" I mean not only outwardly but inwardly as well. I can't imagine going through this process.

Thank you for bringing this to mind. Your writing takes me to other planes of thought which are rich with ideas and show an alternate path.

John