The Man In The Bath-Tub

The story starts with a stodgy banker.

Who was entrusted with the money of his state.

Then greed and temptation get the better of him.

And he decides to do some monkey business (English for hera pheri) with the money entrusted to him. (My, how history repeats itself!)

The Stodgy Banker Becomes a Dodgy Banker

He tampers with the coins in his care. (there being no CDOs in those days).

And unfortunately for him, his crime is discovered.

Soon he is on the run.

Along with his son, who is also implicated.

Here’s where the father and his son’s stories diverge.

The Son Goes to Bangalore In Search of Answers

Oops - what am I saying!

The son goes to Delphi to consult the Oracles. 

(If time travel were available, he might have chosen to be teleported to Bangalore, where Kamalu could read his Tarot Cards, Anita his I-Ching, or Guruji Rajat Nayar his astrological charts. Or he could have gone even further back in time for Dolores Pereira (who else?) to look into her crystal ball for him.)

The advice the son receives from the Oracles at Delphi shapes the rest of his life.

The Oracles tell him his mission is indeed to deface the currency.

However, it is not the physical currency that he and his father had tampered with and brought all this trouble on themselves by doing so, but the political and social currency of the times.

Thus begins a new life and a new mission for the son.

Wherein, he sets out, by living example, to change the mores and customs of his day. 

The Man In The Bath-Tub

At Athens, which becomes his new stomping grounds, he gets hold of a bath-tub from the temple of Cybele.

And makes this bath-tub his home.

Right in the middle of a busy marketplace.

At first, besides the minimal clothing he wears, his only other possession is a begging bowl.

Then he gives up even the begging bowl.

And eats and drinks only with his hands.

It was against the law to eat and drink in public places.

But this law he openly and deliberately disobeys – saying “I am hungry in the marketplace, and I will eat whenever I am hungry”

Cosmopolitan?  Isn't that the Women's Magazine made famous by Helen Gurley Brown?

The man's name was Diogenes.

And he was, you might say, a free spirit like Thoreau.

From the moment he left Delphi till his dying day, this man Diogenes lived with disdain for any kind of folly, pretense, vanity, self-deception or artificiality in human conduct. 

And neither did he have respect for any affiliations.

In those days, you were required to have an affiliation to one or other city-state. 

But if you asked Diogenes what his affiliation was, he would scoff at the question and declare he was a cosmopolitan.  
“Cosmopolitan as defined on Dictionary.com ... free from local, provincial, or national ideas, prejudices, or attachments; at home all over the world”

He would also go about the city with a lantern during daylight hours and when asked why, he would say “because I am looking for an honest man.”

Why do  provocateurs enchant us?

Is it because everything they say and do flies in the face of the normal?

Or is it because by questioning and challenging the majority point of view, they make us take a step back and look at our beliefs in a new light?

It sometimes takes a Diogenes to shine a light on society’s pretensions, prejudices and platitudes.

The Thorn in Plato’s Side

Even someone as wise as Plato, could find himself at the receiving end of a Diogenes take-down whenever he made a mistake.

Diogenes was known to disrupt the proceedings at Plato’s Academy on a regular basis.

Because as a philosopher himself, he never confused authority for truth. 

When Plato defined man as a “featherless biped” to Socrates,  Diogenes took him to the carpet on it. In style.

He carried a plucked chicken into the Academy and said  “Behold, I have brought you a man.”

Plato was forced to hastily modify that definition.

The One Who Said "Zip It" to Alexander the Great

Over time, Diogenes’ fame spread far and wide.

And Alexander the Great got to hear of him. 

Alexander was eager to meet with this bold, impossible and unusual man.

At that time, Diogenes was in Corinth, because while on a voyage, he had been captured by pirates and sold into slavery at Corinth.

He had become a tutor to his Corinthian master’s sons.

At the meeting between Alexander and himself, Diogenes was enjoying the sunlight.

Alexander asked Diogenes, “Diogenes, is there anything I can do for you?’

Diogenes replied “Yes, please move.  You are standing in my sunlight!”

The answer made an instant impression on Alexander and he said “If I was not Alexander, then I should wish to be Diogenes!"

These are just some of the vignettes of this colorful (colourful in the Queens English) historical figure who has captured my imagination.

He may not have had a golden voice.

But he had a golden mind!

This Ted Williams phenom, circa 420 BCE.

P.S. If you would like to view some of the artistic interpretations of this captivating man, (and he has been the subject of many, many paintings and pieces of art), you can check them out here.

P.S.2: The provocateur and philosopher part of Diogenes’ personality reminds me of my dear friend Chetan, whom I knew back when I was in Chennai, India. One does not have to assume a life of poverty and make a bath-tub your home in order to make a point. Chetan is an elegant testimony to that.  Within the context of a well-heeled life, he is very much the provocateur-philosopher. His plays give you some clues to that. You can read a review of one of them - The Lizard Waltz here.