STORIES ABOUT SEEING THINGS FROM DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVES
(excerpts from posts)
(If you want to retell any of the stories listed below, be sure to obtain permission from the copyright holder if the material is not in the public domain)

1) The Red and Blue Coat
Central Africa - Congo
Once their were two childhood friends who were determined to remain close companions always. When they were grown, they each married and built their house facing one another. Just a small path formed a border between their farms. One day a trickster form the village decided to test their friendship. He dressed himself in a two-color coat and that was divided down the middle, red on the right side and blue of the left side. Wearing this coat, the man walked along the narrow path between the two houses. The two friends were working opposite each other in their fields. The trickster made enough noise as he traveled between them to cause each friend to look up from his side of the path at the same moment and notice him. At the end of the day, on friend said to the other, "Wasn't that a beautiful red coat that man was wearing today?" "No," replied the other. "It was blue." "I saw that man clearly as he walked between us!" said the first. "His coat was red." "You are wrong!" the second man said. "I saw it too. It was blue." "I know what I saw!" insisted the first man. "The coat was red." "You don't know anything," replied the second angrily. "It was blue!" "So," shouted the first, "You think I am stupid? I know what I saw. It was red!" They began to beat each other and roll around on the ground. Just then the trickster returned and faced the two men, who were punching and kicking each other and shouting, "Our friendship is over!" The trickster walked directly in front of them, displaying his coat. He laughed loudly at their silly fight. The two friends saw his two color coat was divided down the middle, blue on the left and red on the right. The two friends stopped fighting and screamed at the man in the two colored coat. "We have lived side by side all our lives like brothers! It is all your fault that we are fighting! You started a war between us." "Don't blame me for the battle," replied the trickster. "I did not make you fight. Both of you are wrong. And both of you are right. Yes, what each one said was true! You are fighting because you only looked at my coat from your own point of view."

2) The Elephant and The Blind Man
One day, a rajah's son asked, "Father, what is reality?" "An excellent question, my son. Come, everyone, we will go to the marketplace." So the rajah and his son went outside and mounted their royal elephant. The rest of the entourage followed on foot. When they got to the marketplace, the rajah commanded, "Bring me 3 blind men." When the blind men arrived, the rajah commanded, "Place one blind man at the elephant's tusk, one at the elephant's leg and one at the elephant's tail." When that was done, the rajah said, "Describe the elephant to me, blind men." The man at the tusk said, "It's like a spear." The man at the leg said, "It's like a tree." The man at the tail said, "It's like a rope." As the men started to argue, the rajah said to his son, "Reality, my son, is the elephant. And we are all blind men."

3) Nasrudin entered the Mosque andsaid to the people: 'Do you know what I am going to tell you?' There were shouts of 'No'; so he said: 'Then I shall not bother with such ignoramuses.' The following day he asked the same question again, from the pulpit. The answer was 'Yes. 'Then I don't need to tell you!' he said and went out. The third time, when he repeated his question, the people cried: 'Some of us do, some of us do not!' Nasrudin said: 'Then let those who do tell those who do not know!' And he left he building. Idries Shah links this story with the ancient one about the blind men describing an elephant, in a discussion about the unity of knowledge and various 'expert' views on the nature of folktales.

4) I have a copy of a book called, They Saw The Elephant : Women in the California Gold Rush, by Jo Ann Levy. It has this to say: To forty-niners and those following, no expression characterized the CA Gold Rush more than the words "seeing the elephant." Those planning to travel West announced they were "going to see the elephant." Those turning back claimed they had seen the "elephant's tracks" or the "elephant's tail," and admitted that view was sufficient. Wagon drivers painted colorful names on their canvas covers and one scribbled: Have You Saw the Elephant?" Another 49er observed: "As matters turned out, this last legend, notwithstanding its bad grammar, was the most appropriate & prophetic of all." The expression predated the Gold Rush, arising from a tale current when circus parades first featured elephants. A farmer, so the story goes, hearing that a circus was in town, loaded his wagon with vegetables for the market there. He had never seen an elephant & very much wished to. On the way to town he encountered the circus parade, led by an elephant. The farmer was thrilled. His horses, however, were terrified. Bolting, they overturned the wagon & ruined the vegetables. "I don't give a hang," the farmer said, "for I have seen the elephant." For Gold Rushers the elephant symbolized both the high cost of their endeavor - the myriad possibilities for misfoirtune on the journey or in California - and, like the farmer's circus elephant, an exotic sight, an unequaled experience, an adventure of a lifetime.

5) One day six wise, blind elephants were discussing what humans were like. Failing to agree, they decided to determine what humans were like by direct experience. The first wise, blind elephant felt the human, and declared, "Humans are flat." The other wise, blind elephants, after similarly feeling the human, agreed.

And speaking of perspective the version of Blind Men and Elephant that Odds Bodkins does on a tape is based on a son asking his father, "What is 'truth'?" (OR something like that!)

Comment: As I recall, on the Odds Bodkin tape, the son asks, "What is reality?" At the end of the story, the father finally replies, "The elephant is reality, my son. And we are all blind men."

6) The story of the blind men and the elephant has many variants, usually from the Middle East. There are also several children's picture books of it including one by Ed Wood which changes the blind men to blind mice. I can be more specific about the phrase "going to see the elephant" which came out of the '49ers trek west to look for California gold. The story arose out of Iowa first. A farmer was packing up his year's harvest on his wagon to sell at the county fair. He saw a poster advertising the arrival of the Barnum and Bailey circus starring a real live elephant named Jumbo. The farmer had never seen an elephant, nor had most people in the US in 1849, so the farmer hurried to the fair with his wagon-load of produce. On the road he met the Barnum and Bailey parade, led by the elephant, all decked out in gold harness and fringe. Well, the elephant spooked the farmer's horses. They reared and upset the wagon. Pumpkins, squash, potatoes, melons spilled all over the road. The farmer's whole year's harvest was crushed under the feet of the golden elephant. But when his neighbors tried to commiserate, the farmer shrugged them off. With a blissful smile, he said, "Aw, it's nothin'. Hey, I got to see the elephant!" Legend says that the farmer was so gold-struck that he set out for California, and soon conestoga wagons bore signs reading "Going to see the elephant!" and everybody knew what that meant. Legend also tells us that a couple of years later wagons going west would meet wagons going east that also bore signs. The eastward wagons' signs read :"I done seen the elephant and it's a jackass!" This is a familiar tale here in California and especially in Sacramento where I live amid the history of the Gold Strike and the Pony Express. I'm sorry. I don't have a source. It's truly a part of the oral tradition here that surfaces at celebrations of the Sutter Gold Strike site, the railroad museums, etc. I've always thought it is a wonderful story because it shows our willingness to dream, our susceptibility to the art of lying to ourselves, and our ultimate willingness to laugh at ourselves. Those who stayed and flourished, like my family, would swear the elephant was 24-karat; those who suffered would call the dream a jackass. They were both right.

7) American poet John Godfrey Saxe (1816-1887) based the following poem on a fable which was told in India many years ago. Its an example of how limited sensory perceptions can lead to misinterpretations.
The Blind Men and the Elephant
by John Godfrey Saxe
It was six men of Indostan
To learning much inclined,
Who went to see the Elephant
(Though all of them were blind),
That each by observation
Might satisfy his mind.
The First approached the Elephant,
And happening to fall
Against his broad and sturdy side,
At once began to bawl:
God bless me! but the Elephant
Is very like a wall!
The Second, feeling of the tusk,
Cried, Ho! what have we here
So very round and smooth and sharp?
To me tis mighty clear
This wonder of an Elephant
Is very like a spear!
The Third approached the animal,
And happening to take
The squirming trunk within his hands,
Thus boldly up and spake:
I see, quoth he, the Elephant
Is very like a snake!
The Fourth reached out an eager hand,
And felt about the knee.
What most this wondrous beast is like
Is mighty plain, quoth he;
Tis clear enough the Elephant
Is very like a tree!
The Fifth, who chanced to touch the ear,
Said: Een the blindest man
Can tell what this resembles most;
Deny the fact who can
This marvel of an Elephant
Is very like a fan!?
The Sixth no sooner had begun
About the beast to grope,
Than, seizing on the swinging tail
That fell within his scope,
I see, quoth he, the Elephant
Is very like a rope!
And so these men of Indostan
Disputed loud and long,
Each in his own opinion
Exceeding stiff and strong,
Though each was partly in the right,
And all were in the wrong!
Moral:
So oft in theologic wars,
The disputants, I ween,
Rail on in utter ignorance
Of what each other mean,
And prate about an Elephant
Not one of them has seen!

8) The Six Blind Men and the Elephant
A tale retold
One day, six blind men decided to go to the zoo. They hired a guide to tell them about all the exotic animals they couldn't see. When they came to the elephants, the zoo keeper wanted them to have more than a verbal description, so he allowed them each to feel the elephant. Since the elephant was large, and since the zoo keeper had limited time, he let each man touch one part of the giant mammal. The first blind man reached out and his hand grabbed the elephant's tail. "Aha," he exclaimed, "the elephant is like a big rope." The next man felt a massive elephant leg. He looked strange, no rope was that big. "No, the elephant is like a large log or tree." He was sure of this. The third blind man walked forward and ran straight into the elephant's side, whereupon he pronounced that, "The elephant is really a big wall." Next, another of the blind men reached out and took hold of one of the elephant's ears. It must have tickled, because the elephant wiggled the large ear, causing the fourth man to exclaim, "Oh, see this, the elephant is like a big fan." The fifth blind man decided that the first four were all slightly daft and they couldn't be describing the same creature, so he carefully walked up and put out his hand, the elephant raised his trunk to the man who felt it and grinned in wonder. "My friends, it is obvious the elephant is like a huge snake." The final man was totally confused, he walked forward and reached out, hoping to find the truth, and encountered a tusk. He paused and brightened, "I understand, the true nature of the elephant is this, he is a sword." The zoo keeper and guide smiled at one another, knowing that none had seen the big, elephantine, picture.

9) The Blind Men and the Elephant is thousands of years old and I am still being healed by it. This is my version of it
Five wise blind men went to see the elephant.
The first grabbed the tail and said, "I see the elephant is like a rope."
The second felt a leg and said, "I see the elephant is like a tree."
The third walked into the side and said, "I see the elephant is like a wall."
The forth was cooled by the breeze of an ear and said, "I see the elephant is like a fan."
The fifth held the trunk and said, "I see the elephant is like a snake."
The five wise blind men returned to their villages and told what an elephant was like.
A storyteller collected all the stories and thought he knew what an elephant looked like.
A wise blind man said, "even if you know all the stories, you still will not have captured an elephant."
"But if you do your work as a storyteller
And weave all the stories into one
Then people will see more of the elephant
Even though you will never see all of the elephant."

10) One story I do that is fun is The blind men and the elephant. Synopsis: 3 blind brothers who use a train track for a shortcut into town. Train comes along, sees 3 men on the track, train screeches on brakes, stops just in time, but derails. Golly gee, it's a circus train, with the cages popping open. The blind brothers come upon the elephant. First one feels tail, second feels leg, third feels trunk. I made a 'feely' box, with 3 cut out openings, the first has frayed rope taped inside, covered by a piece of felt (with the number 1 on it), the second opening has a roll of paper towels in it, again with felt and number 2( a tree trunk is traditional, but it was too heavy to haul to my story hours!), and the third opening had a tubular foam pillow that I covered in vinyl. The brothers feel rope,(we're at the hardware store?) paper towels (we're at the market) and a hose (we're at the fire department). The elephant is annoyed and sprays them all with water. (I suppose if you wanted to go "all out" you could get a plant sprayer???) Everyone helps get the train righted, the animals back, and for the effort get free tickets to the circus. And the blind brothers vow to never to take the train tracks as a shortcut again, even though it is easier.

This was part of my program, 'come to your senses!!!', I started with passing spice bottles around the story circle (vanilla, cinnamon, thyme), talking about what our eyes see or don't see, I had them close their eyes and played a tape recorder with different sounds on it ( I went to the train station when the 4:05 arrived, a local restaurant I worked at formerly to record cooking sounds).

11) This as a folktale from other countries, but the older two boys saw things in a different perspective. I stop and ask the audience what they would fill the room with before I go to the third son.
Who will Fill the House?
A story from Latvia and Lithuania
A farmer had three sons.The two older boys always bragged to the youngest brother about how much stronger they were. When the boys grew up, their father built a brand new house and said "Whoever can fill this house will be the one to own it." The oldest son was sure he could fill it up. He brought in a horse, a cow, and a pig, but they only took up one corner of the house. The second son smiled to himself because he was sure that he would win the house. He brought in bale after bale after bale of hay. But they only filled half the house. It was the youngest brother's turn. He brought in a small sack. His brothers laughed and laughed when they saw it. He then took a candle out of the sack and lit it, and the whole house was filled with light. So in the end it was the youngest son who got the house.

12) The Blind Elephants and the Three Men.
The first blind elephant asks, "What is man?"
He feels the first man, "Flat."
Second man, "Flat."
Third man, "Flat."





(This web page updated 10/21/05)