WOODEN HORSE

In the summer of 1989, I took a three-week vacation trip to Germany to visit my aunt, my cousin and some of the friends I'd gotten to know when I lived in a dorm in my hometown Marburg from 1970-1973. While on vacation, I heard on the radio an American folk singer named Suzanne Vega whose songs made a profound impression on me, especially her song Gypsy. Her voice had a haunting, mystical quality that stirred my soul to its depths.

When I returned to the U.S. I immediately headed for the nearest record store to buy her latest album which was called Solitude. While listening to it, I discovered another song that also moved me profoundly. It was called Wooden Horse and told the unique story of a mentally handicapped, abused man named Kasper Hauser. He was not only abandoned by his parents but kidnapped as a child by some evil-doers. They placed him in a dungeon where he spent his entire youth until he was eighteen. He had no human contact, and his food was handed to him anonymously. His only companion was a small wooden rocking horse with whom he bonded by placing colored ribbons on its back.

When Kasper turned eighteen, a strange man burst into his dungeon room and showed him how to walk clumsily. The man then took him to the town square of Nuremberg where he propped him up, and placed a letter into his hands which read something to the effect: "I want to ride a horse like my famous father in the cavalry." After standing there stiffly for the entire day, Kasper was finally approached by a kindly teacher who took him into his home and taught him social skills such as eating normal food, conducting himself at the table, speaking, reading, and writing. Kaspar eventually learned not only how to read and write, but even penned his own autobiography. But unfortunately, an attempt was made on his life. A few months later a second attempt was made in which he was murdered.

I first learned abou this unusually striking story from a German film I viewed at the Bell Museum directed by Werner Herzog. When I heard Suzanne Vegas song Wooden Horse, I realized that she had probably seen the same film. This film, like Suzanne's song, stirred up powerful feelings since I could relate to his story of being abandoned.