Week 1 Storytelling: Three Men in a Bowl

Foreword

In the town of Gotham were once three men, good friends who were all wise in their knowledge of philosophy and natural science. All the townspeople looked up to them, consulting them in matters as far-ranging as astrology, the best land to farm, spiritual questions, and remedies for colds. Chester, Prester, and Nestor were their names. For years, the trio contented themselves with reading their myriad books of arcane knowledge and discussing them together. They appreciated how the simple townspeople acknowledged their intellectual superiority by seeking out their help, even if it was only for such mundane matters as doctoring a milk cow or interpreting their tea leaves. It gave Chester, Prester, and Nestor something practical to do during the day.

But eventually, the three men grew tired of the same routines. “Really, what we do is so easy that anyone who can string his ABCs into words can figure it out!” Chester complained. “These people are imbecilic, always coming to us for the simplest matters instead of doing things themselves!” Prester added. “What good is all of our knowledge if we don’t do anything impressive?” asked Nestor. “It’s time we did something dramatic, unprecedented, inconceivable to their simple minds – something that reaches the world, not just our small village!”

So the trio hatched an epic plan. Travelers frequently published accounts of the trips they took through the sea on the shores of which stood Gotham. These tales were popular, but how much could they actually differ from one another? The men wanted to find something they could do in this same vein, but with one big difference that would shock all those who heard of their trip. Chester (or was it Prester?) came up with the idea that they would do the impossible – make the sea journey not by boat, but by bowl! The men made the mathematical calculations, figured out the physics required, and together built a giant bowl not only large enough to carry all three with their provisions, but also steerable and of the correct design and buoyancy to float with its considerable weight on the sea.

Chapter One

The three “wise men” of Gotham, having purchased all their necessary provisions and outfitted their bowl-boat, set sail on the great sea on a bright, cheerful morning in April. They were delighted to find that their bowl did indeed float once loaded and placed in the water. In fact, all their scientific calculations seemed to have been quite accurate, and their voyage promised to be a fantastic success, the results of which they would publish in this book to widespread fascination and acclaim. They congratulated each other on a job well done, thanks to their superior intellectual knowledge and prowess.

They spoke too soon, however. As the bowl left the calm harbor for the open sea, they realized there was one thing for which they had not accounted: the pressure placed on the oversized bowl as it was buffeted by waves. The walls of such a large ceramic piece had to be thin for it to remain buoyant, which at the same time made the piece extremely fragile. It soon broke apart in the sea, and the three men desperately swam back to shore, now mortified that for all their planning, they had failed to take into consideration such an obvious problem of practicality. Thus ends this brief account of three men in a bowl.

 the Wise Men of Gotham in their bowl

Author's Note: This story is based on a nursery rhyme collected by Andrew Lang:

Three wise men of Gotham

Went to sea in a bowl:

And if the bowl had been stronger,

My song would have been longer.

For more on the Wise Men of Gotham figures (and how they may relate to Batman), see this Wikipedia article as well as this blog post. My idea was to provide a backstory for the tale told in the nursery rhyme, then give a sudden, humorous ending as in the original. I thought of the nursery rhyme as telling an ironic fable about the strength of wisdom. People may think they are wise, and may actually have great learning, but they can still fall prey to folly and try to do things that turn out disastrously embarrassing for them. Indeed, this seems a common theme for other tales regarding the "wise men" of Gotham.

The title of this post and the concluding line, as well as the idea of common accounts of boat voyages and of structuring the story with a foreword and chapter as in a regular book, are a nod to Jerome K. Jerome's novel Three Men in a Boat (1889), though there is no dog in this version.

Bibliography

story: "Three wise men of Gotham," in The Nursery Rhyme Book, ed. Andrew Lang (1897)

image: from The Editorial Board of the University Society Boys and Girls Bookshelf (New York, NY: The University Society, 1920); found on Dawn of the Unread