Or, in which the pesky graduate student is pitifully unprepared for proposing project theses and thoroughly wastes the time of her dutiful professor:
1. Why riddles?
2. Are riddles different from other poems?
3. Are riddles similar to any other art form?
4. What is the relationship between the writer and reader in riddles?
5. Why imitate the form of the anglo-saxon riddle?
6. Why use accentual verse when modern english uses metre?
7. How are the oral folk roots of the riddle tradition related to this project?
8. How are riddles related to our perception of the world?
9. Why do people write poetry?
10. Why do people read poetry?
...So I have some reading to do.
Luckily, when it became evident I had been struck dumb by the prospect that I would actually have to form coherent notions about my little pastime in order to fulfill the requirements of my graduate degree (you mean I can't just write poems?), I received the following insight:
A riddle is a trick, but it is a trick that does not lie. It tells the truth in a way that is different from the way you ordinarily perceive truth. It seems untrue, but is revealed as true. Something familiar, but not in a way you've looked at it before.
Right. Something like that.
(good thing I was taking notes, if nothing else!)
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