Zozobra, The Original "Burning Man"

Last night, we attended the annual burning of "Zozobra", also known as "Old Man Gloom", here in Santa Fe. Since 1924, the Santa Fe Fiesta has begun with a public ritual of burning up the past in a civic exorcism and conflagration, with a 50-foot bogeyman as the central figure. Citizens are encouraged to bring divorce papers, photo albums, mortgages, anything they want to release to the fires of transformation, and Zozobra's body is filled with the detritus of the past year as a way to make way for the new. Hosted by the Santa Fe Kiwanis Club since 1963, this is grand public theater in which the citizens of "The City Different" come together for a party like no other.

Zozobra looms over Fort Marcy Park, with a mini Old Man Gloom in the foreground....

Meanwhile, security are out in force on the ground and the rooftops as 30,000 revelers make their way to the park for the festivities....

Children relish cotton candy and other treats......

And everyone has fun in anticipation.....

And as the sun begins to go down, the cast of characters emerge in order to enact Zozobra's demise.....

Fireworks underscore that this is the 400th anniversary of Santa Fe, the oldest state capital in the United States, a capital whose beginnings were marked by bloodshed, the Pueblo Revolt, and the conquering and subduing of the Indians by the Spanish....(and it is this very history that makes the Fiesta somewhat controversial since it commemorates the suppression of the Indians who revolted against Spanish rule, and those tensions exist to this day)....

The fire dancers emerge, taunting Zozobra with their torches.....

Zozobra flails his limbs and makes his voice heard in a plaintive roar that goes on for ten or fifteen minutes......





And suddenly his head bursts into flames......

And he begins to burn and the crowd cheers and applauds his demise.......



It is quite a spectacle as Santa Feans of all walks of life scream "burn him!" as Old Man Gloom goes up in flames and collapses into a heap on the ground, with scores of papers, photographs and all manner of ephemera from the past year burning along with him. It is a ritual, a collective letting go of the past, a ritual that coincides with the beginning of the Jewish New Year and the celebration of Rosh Hoshanah prior to the dignified solemnity and reconciliation of Yom Kippur. We burn up the old, ring in the new, and give up our fears, angers and regrets to the flames.

And so Old Man Gloom meets his demise yet again..........