Lily Tomlin in The Search for Signs of Intelligent Life in the Universe, tells of a unique figure. She witnessed Trudy, a bag lady, from whom there lived the “kind of madness Socrates talked about, a divine release of the soul from the yoke of custom and convention. “ She is a modern-day Wise Fool, whose loss of sanity opened her mind to the cosmos. Pearson interprets the character a Trudy as one who explains “reality” as nothing more than a “collective hunch” which is “the leading cause of stress among those in touch with it.” She decides to let go of it through the natural use of humor—jokes. (Carol S. Pearson, Awakening the Heroes Within: Twelve Archetypes to Help us Find Ourselves and Transform our World. New York: Harper Collins, 1991)
