- "The orange needed to fall. Just like a bird needs to fly."
- ―Nikos Kazantzakis[src]
Nikos Kazantzakis was a Greek writer, philosopher, and poet from Crete. His most famous works are Zorba the Greek, The Last Temptation of Christ, and The Saviors of God.
Biography[]
- "Can you really accept something as being true without any proof?"
- ―Nikos Kazantzakis[src]
In 1910, he traveled to the hanging monasteries near Kalambaka to do some research in the library. While he was reading, he met a young Indiana Jones, who was working on a homework assignment on the relationship between logic and causality. Kazantzakis helped the young Jones by explaining the essence of causality to him, using an rolling orange as an example. After his student grasped the idea, Kazantzakis recited a poem he had written about the goal of nature, and Jones asked about the cause of nature. This prompted Kazantzakis to discuss the role of wisdom, which is greater than logic. Jones used the lessons he learned from Kazantzakis in his report, which later his father read. Henry Jones, Sr. felt that Kazantzakis was less a philosopher and poet, and more a romantic.
Behind the scenes[]
In Travels with Father, the role of Nikos Kazantzakis was played by George Jackos.
In real life, Kazantzakis used pen names during his early career, and Prof. Jones would not have been likely to have recognized his name in 1910, unless he had previously met or was told about Kazantzakis in the monastery.
