Dear Reader,
Remember asking a star what is was, as it twinkled? That was probably the first puzzle in a poem we encountered, as kids -- Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star.
Then there's this famous one;
The beginning of eternity
The end of time and space
The beginning of every end
The end of every place.
(The answer, of course, being the letter 'e'. It's interesting how answers sometimes are to do with the formation of the word, instead of a physical object. We see this againin the Sphinx riddle given below.)
Why are riddles in rhyme, puzzles in a poem, so popular for creating miniature mysteries? (Aside from the fact that it all alliterates rather well, that is  !)
I guess, first, that being in rhyme,they're easy to remember.
Then, perhaps because they need have lines to rhyme, they contain multiple parts, which have to be linked together.
But I think, at a more basic level, they have rhythm, and rhythm is what keeps living things going. It echoes the heartbeat. Heartbeat and brainpower -- and the puzzle is solved!
Which is why, perhaps, authors use riddles in rhyme with something big at stake.
Take JRR Tolkien's 'The Hobbit' for example. The Hobbit, Bilbo Baggins is stuck alone underground, not knowing the way out, and the riddle game with Gollum means he either gets eaten (should he lose), or is shown how to exit the place (should he win).
The riddles of Bilbo and Gollum
JRR Tolkien
Gollum:
What has roots as nobody sees,
Is taller than trees,
Up, up it goes,
And yet never grows?
[A mountain]
Bilbo guesses this one immediately. (It is asked before the game officially begins -- in fact, Gollum suggests the game because Bilbo says it's easy.)
Bilbo:
Thirty white horses on a red hill,
First they champ,
Then they stamp,
Then they stand still.
[Teeth]
This is an old one, Gollum is almost disgusted to be asked a 'chestnut', as he puts it.
Gollum:
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.
[Dark]
Since the answer is 'all around him', Bilbo guesses it immediately.
Bilbo:
A box without hinges, key, or lid,
Yet golden treasure inside is hid.
[An egg]
Gollum takes a while, but finally remembers thieving from nests and teaching his grandmother to suck eggs.
Gollum:
Alive without breath,
As cold as death;
Never thirsty, ever drinking,
All in mail never clinking.
[Fish]
Bilbo almost gets eaten at this one, but luckily a fish splashes out of the water and on to his foot, giving him his clue.
Bilbo:
No-legs lay on one-leg,
two-legs sat near on three-legs,
four-legs got some.
[Fish on a table,
man on a stool,
cat gets the bones]
Since the earlier one was 'fish', the no-legs part was easy, and the rest followed.
Gollum:
This thing all things devours:
Birds, beasts, trees, flowers;
Gnaws iron, bites steel;
Grinds hard stones to meal;
Slays king, ruins town,
And beats high mountain down.
[Time]
Bilbo thinks of giants, and cannot find one who has done all this -- wants to ask for more 'time', can't get all the words out and simply screams 'time', which saves him.
The final victory isn't, ironically, with a rhyme at all, but 'What have I got in my pocket?' (He is talking to himself and Gollum thinks it's a riddle, can't guess, and Bilbo wins the game. Gollum doesn't show him the way out, though, Bilbo follows him secretly.)
So, a series of mini-mysteries, with Bilbo's life at stake.
(Note: for those who are very familiar with the book, a couple of riddles may have been left out!)
Those who know me must've found it mysterious that I haven't mentioned Harry Potter yet! Well, Tolkien did write before Rowling, didn't he?  So yeah, Harry Potter. I'm getting there.
Remember, right in the first book, when Harry, Ron and Hermione are trying to save the Philosopher's Stone from Voldemort? They encounter a series of obstacles, one of which is in the form of a riddle in rhyme.
Here goes:
Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone:
Snape's Potion Puzzle
JK Rowling
Danger lies before you, while safety lies behind,
Two of us will help you, whichever you would find,
One among us seven will let you move ahead,
Another will transport the drinker back instead,
Two among our number hold only nettle wine,
Three of us are killers, waiting hidden in line.
Choose, unless you wish to stay here for evermore,
To help you in your choice, we give you these clues four:
First, however slyly the poison tries to hide
You will always find some on nettle wine’s left side;
Second, different are those who stand at either end,
But if you would move onwards, neither is your friend;
Third, as you see clearly, all are different size,
Neither dwarf nor giant holds death in their insides;
Fourth, the second left and the second on the right
Are twins once you taste them, though different at first sight.
So -- move ahead, go back, stay here ... and maybe, if you swallow poison, die. A lot at stake! Hermione works it out -- Harry has to drink from the smallest bottle to go forward, and she has to drink from a rounded bottle at the right end, to go back.
In the fourth book, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Harry has to solve a couple of riddles during the Triwizard Tournament.
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
Triwizard Tournament
JK Rowling
1. Mermaid Song
‘Come seek us where our voices sound,
We cannot sing above the ground,
And while you’re searching, ponder this:
We’ve taken what you’ll sorely miss,
An hour long you’ll have to look,
And to recover what we took,
But past an hour – the prospect’s black
Too late, it’s gone, it won’t come back.’
This is in the form of a song, which he hears with his head under water, in a bathtub. Harry listens three times, learns it by heart, and works out that merpeople are going to take something precious to him, which he has an hour to recover.
The second riddle is put to him by a sphinx, lying across his path in a maze. He must either answer correctly at the first attempt, or leave without answering. Should he answer incorrectly, she threatens to attack. A correct answer means she moves aside, enabling him to walk that path in the maze and possibly win the tournament. He hears it a few times, puts the clues together, and guesses at 'spider' which, to his delighted surprise, is correct.
2. Sphinx Riddle
'First think of the person who lives in disguise,
Who deals in secrets and tells naught but lies.
Next, tell me what’s always the last thing to mend,
The middle of middle and end of the end?
And finally give me the sound often heard
During the search for a hard-to-find word.
Now string them together, and answer me this,
Which creature would you be unwilling to kiss?'
So -- yeah -- riddles in rhyme, for the characters to guess, and the readers as well, with a lot at stake. A device used by writers since time immemorial, and one that, it seems, will never go out of style.
Thanks for listening!
 
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Mystery: May 29, 2019 Issue [#9566]
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