Through the wondrous power of oral tradition, we have learned about the Wild Man since we were kids in Jack and the Beanstalk through high school with the Odyssey and The Epic of Gilgamesh. Having read these stories in sequence now that I’m in college have brought to light some of the extreme ethnocentricities that have previously gone unnoticed.
Although these three “wild men” are seen as foreign peoples to the protagonist, Enkidu, the Cyclops, and the Giant do not possess the same qualities as one another. The only correlation between these characters is the exploitation of them by the leading figure. Together, the three wild men make up characteristics of individuals of dubious origins and cultures to a typical white person. Enkidu’s lifestyle of dwelling in the forest with untamed hair and animal-like tendencies is simply not permissible for modern society and longs to be just like Gilgamesh. Who wouldn’t? The assimilation of Enkidu to civilization reminds me heavily of what the Native Americans were put through during the 1800s in America to help them become more like white people by going to specialty boarding schools. The Giant in Jack and the Beanstalk is also reminiscent of the early relationship of Indians and whites in America. The Indian, the savage (The Giant) has something that is desperately sought after, land (gold coins) and is stolen by America (Jack). Does that sound familiar? Eventually the early settlers end up driving them out or going by way the Cyclops in the Odyssey. The Cyclops remains an enigma to me, but I think this can be attributed to one of the biggest characteristics of the wild man--misunderstood. The Greeks didn’t understand a lot of things so I guess in order to explain a group of people who didn’t follow their gods or traditions; the easiest thing to do is to make them giant and scary. The unknown is always the most frightening and I think even today we push a lot of what we don’t understand about people, religions, and lifestyles to a scary place in our brains.
The storytellers behind these ancient tales are the most confusing of all. Where did these stories come from? Who told these stories first and for what reason? I believe a lot of it stems from oral tradition from the Greeks. Homer could have been any person from antiquity with knack for prose and poetry, but nonetheless he shaped an ancient society with a heavy influence on ethos, instead of pathos. Later on as religion began to spread through the world, Gilgamesh, took its reigns and cuneiform became the method of storytelling; it began to influence other sects like Roman Christians and in fact have similar tales and characters. Jack and the Beanstalk has its origins with the fairytales from the 1640 Brothers Grimm tale, The Valiant Little Tailor. Fairytales were often used to evoke some kind of moral values for children in simple, easy-to-understand terms, and often outlandish events and characters.
Folklore and myths, these three in particular, are used as a vehicle for translating a set of principals for children and later adults to live by. If you want something take it, like in Beanstalk, if someone doesn’t look like you or act like you, try and fix your Enkidu-like friend, or even just get him drunk if he gets in the way of progress like Cyclopes Polyphemus, just poke him in the eye and tell him Noman did it. No, man. No, man.
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