Why do we take pleasure in gruesome death, neatly packaged as a puzzle to which we may find a satisfactory solution through clues - or if we are not clever enough, have it revealed by the all-powerful tale-teller at the end of the book? It is something to do with being reduced to, and comforted by, playing by the rules.
A. S. Byatt
I have never been able to read Agatha Christie - the pleasure is purely in the puzzle, and the reader is toyed with by someone who didn't decide herself who the killer was until the end of the writing.
But a lot of shows, they pose questions and they give you a puzzle where there's no solution.
Aaron Stanford
I would still describe China as a vast, invigorating puzzle that will never make sense to my western upbringing.
Abigail Washburn
I just consider myself a piece of the puzzle and I'm lucky enough to be asked or invited to the party, if you will. I hope I can bring some laughs and grimaces to the fans.
Adam Baldwin
To diagnose and treat a brain disorder accurately, it would be necessary to look at the brain directly. Looking at behavior alone can miss a vital piece of the puzzle and provide an incomplete, or even a misleading, picture of the child's problems.
Aditi Shankardass
My favorite puzzle is trying to work out the parts myself, after all it is a solo effort.
Adrian Belew
I was just thrilled to get the gig to begin with. Ten years later to still have it is not only thrilling but also somewhat of a puzzlement.
Al Roker
I have restaurants, bookshops... but it's not an empire, more... a puzzle. If it were an empire, all my restaurants would be the same.
Alain Ducasse
Gravity Falls' is a riddle wrapped in an enigma tucked in a mystery deep-fried in a conundrum slathered in hickory-smoked puzzle sauce.
Alex Hirsch
I'm not a great student, so I don't know that I would have been a great detective. Part of my brain sort of works that way, like wanting to figure out puzzles and figure out what happened and why people do the things they do and who they are and how it happened.
Alexandra Daddario
Noir focuses on the criminal mind, not a whodunit: more why they did it and will they get away with it. The abnormal psychology is what fascinates me rather than the puzzle-solving aspect.
Allan Guthrie
My favourite thing is to do crossword puzzles. I do the 'New York Times' one every morning. Then I go to the barn to see my horse.
Amber Heard
When you're teaching a hard concept and the students all have puzzled looks on their faces and then suddenly you can see that 'aha' moment, that they got it, that's just an incredible thing.
Anant Agarwal
I was fortunate to be able to do two movies with Harold Ramis. He was the kindest of any director with whom I worked. Harold was a genius. On top of his talent, he could do the 'New York Times' crossword puzzle faster than anyone! I am lucky to have known him as well as I did. I will miss him.
Andie MacDowell
I would like a boyfriend. I'm a very happy person and it is the final, final piece of the puzzle. I'm looking for that shout-it-out-from-the-mountaintops, fall-in-love person.
Andy Cohen
Nobody gets excited when they see me. If I put on my wizard outfit and walk around the airport for a couple of hours, I get a couple of puzzled glances.
Andy Kindler
When I look at designer books I am sometimes puzzled why they don't share their inspiration, when it's obvious somebody had such great inspiration.
Anna Sui
I get intrigued by a puzzle, and writing a book is the best way to solve it.
Anthony Storr
Usually, when people watch magic, there are two levels: the people who walk away accepting that there are things they don't know, and the other group, who wants to know, 'How did it work? How did that happen?' They want to unravel the puzzle.
Apollo Robbins
Once I started getting paid to be a writer and not having lots of other gross responsibilities, like making the puzzle or whatever, then my ambition changed, and I thought, 'Now I want to be a good writer.' And that became my ambition.
Acting is a smaller piece in a big puzzle. There are charity things I want to immerse myself in and want to have the time to go and give back to people who don't have the opportunities I have. It's a very important thing to me.
One of the questions that always puzzled human history is, what are we, and everything around us, made of.
It's hard to appreciate success in modeling, because it's not something you feel like you've earned, so there is a little bit of bread of shame that comes with that. It's like somebody giving you a puzzle that's already put together.
Writing a mystery is like drawing a picture and then cutting it into little pieces that you offer to your readers one piece at a time, thus allowing them the chance to put the jigsaw puzzle together by the end of the book.
One common puzzle for the security-minded is how to work with confidential data on the road. Sometimes you can't bring your laptop, or don't want to. But working on somebody else's machine exposes you to malware and leaves behind all kinds of electronic trails.
There's more things that I'd like to do. You know, each song is a little bit of a puzzle. I see most of them as just failed attempts.
I have to constantly work on my reflexes and hand-eye coordination. I do a lot of puzzles. I play chess.
They came out over the highway and they stopped and that's when Barney got out, with the binoculars to try and identify the craft. I mean, he'd been in the military in World War Two, he's puzzled.
I am interested in a lot of things - not just show business and my passion for animals. I try to keep current in what's going on in the world. I do mental exercises. I don't have any trouble memorizing lines because of the crossword puzzles I do every day to keep my mind a little limber. I don't sit and vegetate.
I love words. Sudoku I don't get into, I'm not into numbers that much, and there are people who are hooked on that. But crossword puzzles, I just can't - if I get a puppy and I paper train him and I put the - if all of a sudden I'd open the paper and there's a crossword puzzle - 'No, no, you can't go on that, honey. I'll take it.'
My wife thinks she's better than me at puzzles. I haven't given in on that one yet.
When I studied graphic design, I learned a valuable lesson: There's no perfect answer to the puzzle, and creativity is a renewable resource.
As a kid, I loved doing puzzles, solving riddles, and reading mystery books. I also loved animals and always had pets.
I realized that lab research was the perfect path for me. It allowed me to spend every day figuring out mysteries/puzzles that have to do with what make us alive. What could be a bigger mystery or puzzle?
Whenever you start working on something, you have to go about it with the underlying assumption that this puzzle has a solution, right? If you started a jigsaw puzzle not knowing whether all the pieces were in the box, it would not be a fun exercise.
I want to listen to my Apple Music on my iPhone. I also want to listen to it on my iPad. I want to play it on my Apple TV; I want to be connected everywhere I go. It fits into the puzzle of everything that is Apple, and, therefore, it should not be seen as some sort of separate entity that is trying to find its way.
Writing is sort of putting a puzzle together halfway. Then, performing it has always been the completion of it. Once that happens, I'm feeling verbally communal with other people. It's out there and I feel so much better about it.
Music is a lot more like solving an intricate puzzle with moments of pure, random creative bliss... whereas painting is much more purely random creative bliss with moments of problem solving.
We need a clear plan to put radical Islamic terrorism out of vogue, and it should be eliminated at its roots. American SOF are part of the puzzle, but they do not, by themselves, complete the picture.
I'm patient with crossword puzzles and the most impatient golfer.
When I was first elected I was puzzled why they were holding events in my honor as a mere freshman. I asked myself, why is a federal entity so involved in political activity?
Black holes, we all know, are these regions where if an object falls in, it can't get out, but the puzzle that many struggled with over the decades is, what happens to the information that an object contains when it falls into a black hole. Is it simply lost?
I enjoy walking my dog and completing crossword puzzles.
I just love characters that are complex, that you can dig into and keep itching the scratch and never quite be satisfied because they have enough going on with them that it's like a giant puzzle.
'Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid' was my favorite of all the things I ever did, because it was like doing a Sunday crossword puzzle and beating it.
Where was I going? I puzzled and wondered about it til I actually enjoyed the puzzlement and wondering.
A jigsaw puzzle is my form of meditation. In New York, I glued all of the ones I did together and hung them up on the wall.
I do the 'New York Times' crossword puzzle every morning to keep the old grey matter ticking.
It's like a jigsaw, there's a piece of the puzzle at the beginning and it's the only one and of course it had a lot to do with the way you look. And then you have to have the time to add pieces of the jigsaw.
