By: Sutton Lee Seymour, Jake Spear, Bismo Falcor

In a forgotten classroom in the basement of Sycamore Hall, a humble public and oral communications professor sits at his desk, ferociously flipping through his notes. Some speculate that this man is more than 3000 years old and wiser than most biblical figures. His name is John Arthos.

Born in Ancient Greece, Arthos’ birth was anything but ordinary. Springing forth from the head of the goddess Athena, fully grown, he left Olympus to teach mankind how to speak, sharing the gift of rhetoric with humanity. Arthos first moved to Athens where he befriended Socrates and became the first person to ask him “Why?”
Following Socrates’ death, Plato betrayed him, bashing Arthos over the head with the Rosetta Stone, putting him in a coma for several centuries.
Arthos was finally revived by none other than William Shakespeare, who accidentally re-discovered the word “Ideoplex” while writing one of his plays. Arthos then assisted Shakespeare in writing several of his most famous works, including Hamlet, which is loosely based on Arthos’ life.

After Shakespeare’s death, Arthos engaged in a series of torrid affairs, ranging from Queen Elizabeth to Mary Shelley. Some legends say that Arthos even took Emily Dickinson’s virginity, but Arthos denies these rumors, despite having a loving (and slightly erotic) picture of her hidden in his office. His adventure in Europe came to an end when he was sentenced to death for inventing the phrase “Let Them Eat Cake”. He narrowly escaped by filibustering his execution with his famous Conversion speech, which moved the crowd to tears.
Fleeing to the United States, Arthos started a new life, but his legacy followed him. He was asked to copyedit the declaration of independence, which he later signed under his pseudonym, “John Hancock.”

His presence in U.S. politics didn’t end there. He demonstrated his capacity for community-building when he coached Martin Luther King, Jr. on invitational rhetoric minutes before King delivered his famed “I Have a Dream” speech.
In this century, Arthos has been more involved in politics, having hand-picked the last four presidents based on their powers of persuasion, even introducing Monica Lewinsky to his good friend Bill Clinton.
When asked about his future plans, Arthos claimed that he intends to upload his consciousness to Zoom, if his body ever chooses to give out from under the podium. In the meantime, he’s working on his longtime goal of getting “Ideonode” and “Ideoplex” into the Merriam Webster’s Dictionary.

At present, John Arthos teaches Speech and Rhetoric at Indiana University, having been hired on the spot after coining the term “Hoosier.”