Sun Ra made a great point for me with the wordplay on „His Story“.
Being in part from Martinique makes my heritage in part Creole and as such most likely part slave. The island was purged in 1660 from the Carib by the french and used to grow sugar cane. It was mainly „staffed“ with slaves imported from Africa and partly from India.
The whole myth about Caribbean pirates that unfolds in the mind’s eye is rather the tale of white opportunistic privateers commerce raiding opposed to the tale of people seeking freedom. Most people at the time experienced oppression. Just as an example the famous and feared Blackbeard raided a slave ship and sold most of his slaves in Martinique (around 1718) instead of freeing them.
The untold story of all these people is overwritten by the imposed story by the forces in power. This repeats it self in the present day as much as it did in those dark days.
Seeing His Story indulged in modern day entertainment portraying the fait of „great“ rulers leaves a stench of bewilderment. These depictions are loaded with struggles of freedom and idealized protagonists proclaiming modern and politically corrected values. Cleansing His Story from its true shades of evil and atrocities these people actually stud fore and believed in.
Sun Ra makes a point to this end and playfully questions us to embark on our Own Story rather than living for and believing in His Story.
Sun Ra
Le Sony'r Ra (born Herman Poole Blount, May 22, 1914 – May 30, 1993), better known as Sun Ra, was an American jazz composer, bandleader, piano and synthesizer player, and poet known for his experimental music, "cosmic" philosophy, prolific output, and theatrical performances. For much of his career, Ra led The Arkestra, an ensemble with an ever-changing name and flexible line-up.
Born and raised in Alabama, Blount became involved in the Chicago jazz scene during the late 1940s. He soon abandoned his birth name, taking the name Le Sony'r Ra, shortened to Sun Ra (after Ra, the Egyptian god of the Sun). Claiming to be an alien from Saturn on a mission to preach peace, he developed a mythical persona and an idiosyncratic credo that made him a pioneer of Afrofuturism. Throughout his life he denied ties to his prior identity saying, "Any name that I use other than Ra is a pseudonym." His widely eclectic and avant-garde music echoed the entire history of jazz, from ragtime and early New Orleans hot jazz, to swing music, bebop, free jazz and fusion. His compositions ranged from keyboard solos to works for big bands of over 30 musicians, along with electronic excursions, songs, chants, percussion...
Definition from Wikipedia – Sun Ra
Carib expulsion from Martinique
The Carib Expulsion from Martinique was the French-led ethnic cleansing that removed most of the Kalinago (Island Carib) population in 1660 from the island of Martinique. This followed the French invasion in 1635 and its conquest of the Caribbean island that made it part of the French West Indies.
Definition from Wikipedia – Carib expulsion from Martinique