Franz Kafka / Edward S. Curtis: Divestment (The Wish to Be a Red Indian)

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Sioux Chiefs: very often two or three men would form themselves into a war-party and ride away to be gone weeks or months; sometimes they returned with scalps or horses, or women; and again the war-party, whether large or small, met defeat and none survived to bring back to anxious wives and children the story of the disaster: photo by Edward S. Curtis (1868-1952), 1905, from Curtis: The Teton Sioux: The Yanktonai, 1908 (Northwestern University/Library of Congress)

If one were only an Indian, instantly alert, and on a racing horse, leaning against the wind, kept on quivering jerkily over the quivering ground, until one shed one's spurs, for there needed no spurs, threw away the reins, for there needed no reins, and hardly saw that the land before one was smoothly shorn heath when horse's neck and head would be already gone.

The Scout -- Apache: photo by Edward S. Curtis , c. 1911, from Curtis: The Apache: The Jicarillas: The Navaho, 1910 (Northwestern University/Library of Congress)

Wenn man doch ein Indianer wäre, gleich bereit, und auf dem rennenden Pferde, schief in der Luft, immer wieder kurz erzitterte über dem zitternden Boden, bis man die Sporen ließ, denn es gab keine Sporen, bis man die Zügel wegwarf, denn es gab keine Zügel, und kaum das Land vor sich als glatt gemähte Heide sah, schon ohne Pferdehals und Pferdekopf.

Night Scout -- Nez Perce: photo by Edward S. Curtis , c. 1910, from Curtis: Nez Perces: Wallawalla: Umatilla: Cayuse: The Chinookan tribes, 1911 (Northwestern University/Library of Congress)

Artisan Ch’ui could draw as true as a compass or a T-square because his fingers changed along with things and he didn’t let his mind get away… The fish trap exists because of the fish; once you’ve gotten the fish, you can forget the trap. The rabbit snare exists because of the rabbit; once you’ve gotten the rabbit, you can forget the snare. Words exist because of meaning; once you’ve gotten the meaning, you can forget the words. Where can I find a man who has forgotten words so I can have a word with him?

-- Chuang Tzu (Zhuangzi), 19

Franz Kafka: The Wish to Be a Red Indian (Wunsch, Indianer zu werden), written between 1904 and 1912, from Betrachtung (Meditation), 1913, translated by Willa and Edwin Muir in The Penal Colony: Stories and Short Pieces, 1948