wild man

Noun

wild man (plural wild men)

1. (European) A mythic or legendary primitive man inhabiting forests or wilderness regions, typically depicted as hairy all over and unclothed.
   • He had rescued the duchess from the very fangs of the monster, which, he assured the ladies, was neither a wolf, nor a bear, nor yet a wild man of the woods.1820, Washington Irving, “The Widow's Ordeal”, in The Crayon Papers
   • "So said Hair-Face, and they killed him, because, they said, he was a wild man and wanted to go back and live in a tree."1914, Jack London, The Strength of the Strong
   1. (European, In heraldry and art) A representation of such a figure, usually shown as a club-bearing, hairy man of the woods.
2. A rowdy, dissolute, rash, or violent man.
   • [H]e was a sinner, unregenerated, a wild man in her estimation, a being of quite another kind than herself.1879, Anthony Trollope, chapter 18, in John Caldigate
   • "David and I are very enthusiastic people, and we want to be able to make lots of noise. . . . David is quite a wild man when he gets excited with music."1901, Upton Sinclair, chapter 1, in King Midas

   Synonyms:

   miscreant, rascal, roughneck, ruffian

3. A man who advocates unorthodox or outrageous opinions or who behaves in an eccentric manner.
   • "They're saying I'm a wild man. If I turn the trick, they'll say I'm a genius."
     So said Royal Little, the mild, 50-year-old president of Textron Inc., whose unconventional production ideas have built a textile empire in less than three years.1946 May 27, “Textron's Trick”, in Time, retrieved 04 Jun 2015
   • In popular lore, Feynman often comes off as the wild man of physics, throwing out one crazy idea after another in a frenzied search for truth.2011 April 1, George Johnson, "Richard Feynman, the Thinker" (book review), New York Times (retrieved 4 June 2015)

   Synonyms:

   kook