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The Unending Mystery
Author: David Willis McCullough
Publisher: Pantheon
Labyrinths and mazes have always been sources of fascination. Some critics of James Joyce’s Ulysses even mapped the Dublin of the book to show that it’s a maze that Stephen Dedalus must walk and escape.
The most famous story about labyrinths must be the one of Theseus, Ariadne and Minotaur. It is so well-known that there is no need for me to repeart the story here. (The English word 'clew' - a ball of yarn, such as the one Ariadne gave to Theseus - evolved into 'clue', something that helps you solve a riddle.) For me, the horror of a maze came from reading a short story by M.R. James titled ‘The Maze’. The Maze in the short story was an ‘penetrans ad interiora mortis’ – the path to the centre of death. The lesson is that mazes are dangerous.
Wait. Is there a different between a labyrinth and a maze?
For centuries, the two words have always been used to refer to the same thing. But lately, they have different meanings: a labyrinth is a whirling, puzzling but not branched path heading towards the center, the goal; a maze has branches, traps and dead-ends, designed to make you difficult to get to the center or even to get out. A maze requires your decisions and memory, a labyrinth requires your patience and dedication.
( Does it stem from our collective unconsciousness? )
Author: David Willis McCullough
Publisher: Pantheon
Labyrinths and mazes have always been sources of fascination. Some critics of James Joyce’s Ulysses even mapped the Dublin of the book to show that it’s a maze that Stephen Dedalus must walk and escape.
The most famous story about labyrinths must be the one of Theseus, Ariadne and Minotaur. It is so well-known that there is no need for me to repeart the story here. (The English word 'clew' - a ball of yarn, such as the one Ariadne gave to Theseus - evolved into 'clue', something that helps you solve a riddle.) For me, the horror of a maze came from reading a short story by M.R. James titled ‘The Maze’. The Maze in the short story was an ‘penetrans ad interiora mortis’ – the path to the centre of death. The lesson is that mazes are dangerous.
Wait. Is there a different between a labyrinth and a maze?
For centuries, the two words have always been used to refer to the same thing. But lately, they have different meanings: a labyrinth is a whirling, puzzling but not branched path heading towards the center, the goal; a maze has branches, traps and dead-ends, designed to make you difficult to get to the center or even to get out. A maze requires your decisions and memory, a labyrinth requires your patience and dedication.
( Does it stem from our collective unconsciousness? )