Today we consider riddles!
Definition: Riddle
(from Old English roedel, from roedan meaning
"to give council" or "to read"): A universal
form of literature in which a puzzling question or a conundrum
is presented to the reader. The reader is often challenged to
solve this enigma, which requires ingenuity in discovering the
hidden meaning. A riddle may involve puns,
symbolism,
synecdoche,
personification
(especially prosopopoeia),
or unusual imagery (from Dr. Kip Wheeler).
* Judges 14:14
- And he said to them, “Out of the eater came something to eat. Out of the
strong came something sweet.” And in three days they could not solve
the riddle.
* Oedipus and the Sphinx
- "A thing there is whose voice is one;
Whose feet are four and two and three.
So mutable a thing is none
That moves in earth or sky or sea.
When on most feet this thing doth go,
Its strength is weakest and its pace most slow."
* Let's read them and note particulars together.
* Anglo-Saxon Riddles
#1 Thousands lay up gold within this house,
but
no man made it.
Spears past counting guard this house,
but
no man wards it.
#2 From hand to hand
About the hall I go,
Much
do lords and ladies
Love to kiss me;
When
I hold myself high
And the whole throng
Bows
before me
Their blessedness
Shall
flourish skyward
Beneath my fostering shade.
* Original Charades
"My first, tho’ water, cures no thirst,
My next alone has soul,
And when he lives upon my first,
He then is called my whole."
"When my first is a task to a young girl of spirit,
And my second confines her to finish the piece,
How hard is her fate! but how great is her merit
If by taking my whole she
effects her release!"
* Next: Tolkien's "Riddles in the Dark"
Riddle: What has
roots as nobody sees,
Is
taller than trees,
Up,
up it goes
And
yet never grows?
Riddle:
Thirty white horses on a red hill,
First they champ,
Then they stamp,
Then
they stand still.
Riddle:
Voiceless it cries,
Wingless flutters,
Toothless bites,
Mouthless mutters.
Riddle: An
eye in a blue face
Saw
an eye in a green face,
"That eye is like to this eye"
Said
the first eye,
"But in low place,
Not
in high place."
Riddle: It
cannot be seen, cannot be felt
Cannot be heard, cannot be smelt.
It
lies behind stars and under hills,
And
empty holes it fills.
It
comes first and follows after,
Ends life, kills laughter.
Riddle: A box
without hinges, key, or lid,
Yet
golden treasure inside is hid.
Riddle: Alive
without breath,
As
cold as death;
Never
thirsty, ever drinking,
All
in mail, never clinking.
Riddle:
No-legs lay on one-leg,
Two-legs
sat near on three-legs,
four
legs got some.
Riddle: This
thing all things devours:
Birds, trees, beasts, flowers;
Gnaws iron, bites steel;
Grinds hard stones to meal;
Slays
king, ruins town,
And
beats high mountain down.
* Journal: Riddle
- Compose a riddle to stump the class.
- Make it rationally possible.
- Provide rhyme.
- Have fun!
