Aye, what a fate has befallen the poor riddle! Reduced to child’s play, this once important form of wordplay is now but a series of gross-out punch lines and the means for setting up a bad pun. But many years ago, a riddle was not just a joke.Back in the day, you’d be on your way to Thebes, minding your own business, and some lion/human hybrid would show up and riddle you. If you failed to answer, not only would you be denied entry to the city, the creature would eat you. A bit of a bummer really. As you could guess, Theban tourists were few and far between until some smarty-pants came along and solved the riddle. The sphinx, being the sore loser that most mythical animals are, threw herself off a cliff in response to being outsmarted. Interestingly, most Greek representations of sphinxes show them with wings. So while the exit is great for melodrama, it smacks of being illogical.
And then there is Pericles. In Shakespeare’s play (well, at least it is mostly his play), the poor guy is given a trick riddle from a king. To speak the answer would get him killed and to not answer would result in the same fate. Crafty fellow that he is, he says he needs some time to think and pulls a Houdini. From that point on, just about every possible calamity befalls the young prince.
Should you be interested in viewing said calamities or finding out just why a riddle’s answer could be so dire, San Francisco’s Free Shakespeare in the Park will be performing Pericles this weekend at Memorial Park in Cupertino.
posted by -jw-
