Mythos: A Retelling of the Myths of Ancient Greece

Crimsoning with shame and mortification, Midas turned and fled the meadow, the taunts and jeers of the crowd sounding all the more clearly in his great furry ears.

His life as a camp-follower of Pan was over. Tying his head in a kind of turban, he returned to his wife and family in the palace of Gordium and – his carefree experiment in country living decidedly done with – settled back down into the life of a king.

The only person who saw his ass’s ears was, necessarily, the servant who cut his hair every month. No one else in Phrygia knew the terrible secret and Midas was determined it should stay that way.

‘Here’s the deal,’ Midas told the barber. ‘I give you a bigger salary and a more generous pension than any other member of the palace staff and you keep quiet about what you have seen. If, however, you breathe a word to anyone I will slaughter your family before your eyes, cut out your tongue and leave you to wander the world in mute poverty and exile. Understood?’

The frightened barber nodded.

For three years each side kept to the bargain. The barber’s wife and family waxed fat and happy on the extra money that came in and no one found out about the king’s asinine auditory appendages. Turbans in the Midas style caught on throughout Phrygia, Lydia, Thrace and beyond. All was well.

But secrets are terrible things to have to keep. Especially such juicy ones as that to which the royal barber was privy. Every day he would wake up and feel that the knowledge was writhing and swelling inside him. The barber loved his wife and family and was in any case loyal enough to his monarch not to have any wish to humiliate or embarrass him. But that bulging, ballooning secret had to be released somehow before he burst. No unmilked cow with swollen udders, no mother of overdue twins, no gut-stuffed gastronome straining on the privy, could ever feel such a desperate need for relief from their agonies than this poor barber.

Finally he hit upon a scheme which he felt sure would rid him of his burden without endangering his family. Awaking from a tortured night in which he had dreamed that he revealed the secret to the gaping populace of Gordium from a balcony in the main square, he went out at first light deep into the remote countryside. In a lonely place by a stream he dug a deep trench in the ground. Looking about him in all directions to make sure that he was alone and that there was no possibility of being overheard, he knelt down, cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted these words into the hole:

‘Midas has ass’s ears!’

Scrabbling frantically to close up the hole before the words could escape, he failed to notice one tiny seed floating down and settling at the bottom …

When the backfilling was done, the barber stamped fiercely up and down on the earth to seal in the dreadful secret. He skipped all the way back to Gordium, headed straight for his favourite tavern and ordered a flagon of the house’s best wine. He could drink now without fear that the wine might loosen his tongue. It was as if he were Atlas and the sky had finally been lifted from his shoulders.

Meanwhile, over the next few weeks, back in the remote field by the stream that tiny seed, warmed by the soft breath of Gaia below, began to germinate. Soon, a delicate little reed was shouldering its way through the topsoil and pushing its delicate head into the air. As the breeze caught the reed it softly whispered ‘Midas has ass’s ears.’

The faint words reached the rushes and sedges that fringed the riverbank. ‘Midas has ass’s ears …’

The susurration of rushes and the hiss of sedges was swept on by the grasses and leaves of the trees and swiftly the soughing of cypresses and sallows sent the sound through the breeze.

‘Midas has ass’s ears,’ sighed the branches.

‘Midas has ass’s ears,’ sang the birds.

And at last the news reached the city.

‘Midas has ass’s ears!’

King Midas woke with a start. There was laughter and shouting in the street outside the palace. He crept to the window, crouched down and listened.

The humiliation was too much for him to bear. Without stopping to wreak his vengeance on the barber and the barber’s family, he mixed a poisonous draught of ox-blood, raised his eyes heavenwards, gave a bitter laugh and a shrug, drained the drink and died.

Poor Midas. His name will always mean someone fortunate and rich, but truly he was unlucky and poor. If only he had kept to his roses. Green fingers are better than gold.

Afterword

I have assembled below a few thoughts on the nature of myth and a brief outline of some of the sources I have had recourse to in the writing of this book.