1. The Robert Plant Clue

The One... The Only... Robert Plant As one of the greatest singers of our time, Robert Plant's career is marked by integrity, innovation, and artistic success unmatched by his peers. His voice and presence has the power to touch our soul and intrigue us like no other. The author of this Conundrum has been an ardent fan of the brilliant Robert Plant from the beginning; so that, coupled with the fact one my clues is the lyrics to a song written by him, made me decide to name the Conundrum after him ...and, it's a really catchy title. The Conundrum Constructor predicts that for all his former and current glory, the greatest glory is yet to come for this most glorious of artists. Without further ado, here is the first clue: Come Into My Life Hopes drift in higher places It's easier above the gloom Among the hollow faces, I know you're there - it must be soon And I must straighten up - review my disposition Pour the hope back in my eyes I thought I'd lost so long ago Come into my life - here where nothing matters Come into my life and roll away the gloom Come into my life - here where nothing matters Come into my life and roll away the gloom Always a love and beauty A lover's sighs content too soon Somewhere behind her heartbeat A breath of kindness hints of gloom So I must straighten up - review my disposition Pour the hope back in my eyes I thought I'd lost so long ago Come into my life [etc repeated] Oh, when you get there - you know I wanna be there When you get there - well, you know I wanna be there I wanna be there - I wanna be there Come into my life [etc repeated] Hopes drift in higher places It's easier above the ground, you know Hopes are drifting - hearts been lifting Somebody somewhere no, done you wrong - I don't know Come on, come on, come on, baby Come on, come on, come on, baby -Robert Plant Mr. Plant also wrote, many years ago: Many is the word that only leaves you guessing; Guessing about a thing you really ought to know... You really ought to know... I really ought to know... You know I should... you know I should... -Over The Hills And Far Away Links: The Robert Plant Official Website Lyrics copied Via Celebrity Noodle Art

2. The Cole Porter Clue

After Clue #1's Robert Plant, Cole Porter guides you through Clue #2. -I've been having a lovely time lately reading The Complete Lyrics Of Cole Porter. While he is justly famous for effervescent, witty, and sophisticated lyrics, my favorite Cole Porter lyrics are simple love songs:

It Was Written In The Stars Verse: Though the world may try its best To keep us far apart, We can always face the test. Because we know, sweetheart, Refrain: It was written in the stars. That our love would be born It was written in the stars. We'd meet early one morn. So when first I saw you appear, As the night left the sea, This was no coincidence, dear It was fated to be. In the heavens high above Where dreams flourish and flow'r. It was written that our love Would grow stronger each hour, So, remember when it last you are mine, And Venus is mated to Mars, It was written Always written in the stars.

LINKS: Cole Porter at Wikipedia
The Complete Lyrics Of Cole Porter at Amazon

3. The Heloise and Abelard Clue

The true flame of their Eternal Love continues to burn brightly after more than 900 years 12th Century France. Peter Abelard, was the most famous man of his age. He was a philosopher, teacher, composer and singer. Wherever he went, he was followed by hordes of devoted students and fans. During this period in history, monasteries and the emerging Catholic church were the only employers of educated men. Bound by the church's great pressure upon him not to marry, Abelard had never loved a woman until he met the beautiful and brilliant Heloise, she who was destined to be his own love for eternity. His beloved Heloise writes of him: What king or philosopher could match your fame? What district, town or village did not long to see you? When you appeared in public, who did not hurry to catch a glimpse of you, or crane his neck and strain his eyes to follow your departure? Every wife, every young girl desired you in absence and was on fire in your presence; queens and great ladies envied me my joys and my bed. You had besides, I admit, two special gifts whereby to win at once the heart of any woman — your gifts for composing verse and song, in which we know other philosophers have rarely been successful. This was for you no more than a diversion, a recreation from the labors of your philosophic work, but you left many love-songs and verses which won wide popularity for the charm of their words and tunes and kept your name continually on everyone’s lips. The beauty of the airs ensured that even the Unlettered did not forget you; more than anything this made women sigh for love of you. And as most of these songs told of our love, they soon made me widely known and roused the envy of many women against me. For your manhood was adorned by every grace of mind and body. Abelard had seduced his Heloise when he was her tutor, and they were living under the roof of her uncle, Canon Fulbert. They feel deeply in love with each other. Abelard, who could have chosen any woman in the land, recognized in Heloise, his true soul-mate. Abelard describes his beloved, adored Heloise as the highest ideal; the most beautiful, renowned, learned, woman in France. As he describes the early days of their love, their breathless, delirious passion is palpable to us even today: We were united first in the dwelling that sheltered our love, and then in the hearts that burned with it. Under the pretext of study we spent our hours in the happiness of love, and learning held out to us the secret opportunities that our passion craved. Our speech was more of love than of the books which lay open before us; our kisses far outnumbered our reasoned words. Our hands sought less the book than each other's bosoms -love drew our eyes together far more than the lesson drew them to the pages of our text. — — What followed? No degree in love's progress was left untried by our passion, and if love itself could imagine any wonder as yet unknown, we discovered it. And our inexperience of such delights made us all the more ardent in our pursuit of them, so that our thirst for one another was still unquenched. After the uncle found out, and much maneuvering to secure a place in their world, including a flight from the uncle's home to Abelard's estate in Brittany, the birth of their son, Astrolabe, their subsequent secret marriage and return to Paris, where Heloise, finding herself again under the roof of her uncle, denounced the uncle for revealing the marriage to the public. The discordant atmosphere at the uncle's home was untenable for Heloise. Abelard brought her to the convent in Argenteuil where she has been educated, believing his darling wife would be safe there. Fulbert, ostensibly believing Abelard was abandoning Heloise, took revenge on Abelard, by hiring thugs to castrate him. — After this horror, which was known of by all of Paris, they both, Abelard and Heloise, took religious orders, she at his behest, and their son was raised by Abelard's sister, Denise, in Brittany. -In subsequent years they exchanged poignant letters that demonstrated their deep devotion to each other. Heloise writes of her passionate love and desire for Abelard, and Abelard, in his post-castration state, tries to direct Heloise's passion away from him, and toward the all-powerful god of the catholic church. Abelard historian Constant Mews speculated: When he goes into the monastery after the affair, he becomes fascinated by the Holy Spirit. I have to say with such zeal that I’m wondering if there’s not a projection there of the passion for Heloise to the passion for God. So maybe that passion is still there, and it’s just now in a new language, a new framework. In 2001, a most extraordinary work was published. In The Lost Love Letters of Heloise and Abelard, Constant Mews presents a very convincing case for a newly discovered cache of letters being some of the early correspondence between Heloise and Abelard. A 15th century monk named Johannes de Vepria who was interested in salutations copied what we have of the letters, many just fragments. These fragments give a stunning new perspective to the lovers in the early days of their blinding passion and love for each other. These are the lovers who risked everything for each other; this is the passion that spellbinds us centuries later: Abelard: You are buried inside my breast for eternity, from which tomb you will never emerge as long as I live. There you lie, there you rest. You keep me company right until I fall asleep; while I sleep you never leave me, and after I wake I see you, as soon as I open my eyes, even before the light of day itself. To others I address my words, to you my intention. Heloise: Surely I have discovered in you, since I love you, undoubtedly the greatest and most outstanding good of all. Since it is established that this is eternal, it is for me the proof beyond doubt that you will remain in my love for eternity. Therefore believe me, desirable one, that neither wealth, distinctions, nor all the things that devotees of this world lust after, will be able to sever me from love for you. Truly there will never be a day in which I would be able to think of myself and let it pass without thinking of you. Know that I am not concerned by any doubt that I may hope the same thing from you. Abelard: I will always love you, I will always carry you in my spirit. Nor should you be surprised that twisted jealousy should turn its eyes towards such a conspicuous and fitting friendship as ours, because if we were miserable, we could undoubtedly live among others however we liked without any malicious attention. Therefore, let them backbite, let them drag us down, let them gnaw, let them waste away inside, let them derive their bitterness from our good things. You will still be my life, my breath, my restoration in difficulty, and finally, my complete joy. Farewell, you who make me fare well. Heloise: To her love most pure, worthy of any fidelity, through the state of true love the secret of tender faith. May the ruler of heaven mediate between us; may he accompany our faith. Farewell, and may Christ King of Kings save you my sweetest for eternity. Farewell in him who governs all things in the world. Abelard: To his brightest star, whose rays I have recently enjoyed. May she shine with such unfailing splendor that no cloud can obscure her. Because you, my sweetest lady, have so instructed me, or to speak more truly, because the burning flame of love compels me, your beloved could not restrain himself from greeting you as he can through the agency of a letter in place of his actual presence. Therefore keep well, just as I need your keeping your well; and farewell, just as my faring well depends on your doing so. In you is my hope; in you my rest. Never do I wake so suddenly that my spirit does not find you present within itself. Heloise: To my joyful hope, my faith and my very self with all my devotion as long as I live. May he bestower of every art and the most bountiful giver of human talent, fill the depths of my breast with the skin of the art of philosophy in order that I may greet you in writing, most beloved, in accord with my will. Farewell. Farewell, hope of my youth. Abelard: You often ask me, my sweet soul, what love is - and I cannot excuse myself on grounds of ignorance, as if I had been asked about a subject unfamiliar to me. For that very love has brought me under its own command in such a way that it seems not to be external but very familiar and personal, even visceral. Heloise: If a droplet of no ability trickled down to me from the honeycomb of wisdom, I would try with every effort of my mind to portray in the jottings of my letter, various things with a fragrant nectar of your nourishing love. But throughout all eternity no phrase has yet been found that speaks clearly about how intent on you is my spirit. For God is my witness that I love you with a sublime and exceptional love. And so there is not, nor ever will be, any event or circumstance except death, that will separate me from your love. For this reason, every day there is in me the desire and wish that I may be restored by your soothing presence, and one day will seem a month to me and a week a year, until that sweetest vision of your love appears. So much pain sprouts and thrives in my heart that not even a whole year would suffice for its description. My body too is sad. My spirit transformed from its usual cheerfulness. Farewell. Over the centuries, critics sometimes proclaim that Abelard's love for Heloise was returned in less measure than he received from her. They who criticize do not understand the times or the predicament Abelard was in. Not only did they live in a time when the catholic church ruled everything, and the only course for a philosopher and teacher like Abelard was to live his life was within it's constraints; after he was attacked, he was destroyed, -a broken man in spirit and body; if it seemed in the later letters that he ever tried to refute their love, it was because Heloise's physical and emotional desire burned as brightly as ever for Abelard, and in the state he was in after he was castrated, any semblance of normal relations between a husband and wife, was an impossibility. In instructing Heloise to turn her love and passion for him into passion for the god of the catholic church and her duties as Abbess, he saw it as the best way to bring peace of mind to his beloved girl, who had, along with him, been thrust into this impossible, tragic situation. -He not only gave the Oratory of the Paraclete to Heloise and her Sisters, his response to Heloise's entreaties for theological and practical instruction from him were replied to with all he had to give her; the treatises and hymns written for the Paraclete on Heloise's behalf, which were the tribute to and comfort from a loving husband trying to do the best he could for his beloved wife, irrevocably lost to him. To Abelard's critics: The pure, shining, faithful, glorious love of Heloise for her Abelard wasn't evoked in her from nothing; it wasn't evoked undeserved by Abelard. This is certain, and must be clear: Abelard adored his Heloise above all else. -This truncated account and a few quotations from these true lovers serves the purpose of conveying the message of this Clue in The Conundrum, but it does not well serve Abelard and his Heloise, for their story, one of Love that transcends all space and time, is one of the great love stories the world has seen. The links below provide a better picture of their story:

Lovers at the tomb of Abelard and Heloise, engraving after Henri Courvoisier-Voisin. c.1820
Lovers united for Eternity

LINKS:
Pictures copied Via
Excellent French wesbite about Heloise and Abelard (in French)
Transcript of a fascinating interview with Constant Mews at ABC Radio National, Australia

4. The Gallery Of Postcards And Ephemera Clue

5. The François le Métel de Boisrobert Clue

Marie de Médici as Bellona, by Peter Paul Rubens

François le Métel de Boisrobert (1592 – 1662) was a French poet; a favorite of both Marie de Médici and Cardinal Richelieu, as well as a close friend of Ninon de l'Enclos, Honoré de Balzac, and many other luminaries of the day. He was one of the founders of the Académie française, having proposed the idea to Richelieu. The following passage is from a poem written by Boisrobert about famed cryptographer Antoine Rossignol:

Il n'est plus rien dessous les Cieux Qu'on puisse cacher a tes yeux ; Et crois que ces yeux de Lyncee Lisent mesme dans la pensee. Que ton service est eclatant Et que ton Art est important ! On gagne par luy des Provinces, On scait tous les secrets des Princes, Et par luy, sans beaucoup d'efforts, On prend les villes & les forts ___________________________ Certes j'ignore ton adresse Je ne comprends point la finesse De ton secret; mais je scay bien Qu'il t'a donne beaucoup de bien Tu le merites, & je gage Qu'il t'en donnera davantage; Tousjours fortune te rira, Et, tant que guerre durera, Bellone exaltera tes Chittres Parmy les tambours & les fiffres

There's not a thing beneath the skies; That can be hidden from thine eyes; Those Lynceus eyes, which, I believe, Our most internal thoughts perceive. How marvelous thy skill, and bright, And how important thine art's might! For with it provinces are gained, All princes' secrets ascertained, Any by it, with an effort small, Are towns and forts compelled to fall. ___________________________ Indeed, thy art's beyond my ken And I shall never comprehend Thy secret; but I now can tell That it hath served thee very well. Thou dost deserve it. Have no fears-- Thy skill shall prosper thee for years. Too, Fortune will upon thee smile, And long as wars the land defile Bellona shall, in strife to come, Thy cipher praise, 'midst fife and drum.

-The virtues we acquire, which develop slowly within us, are the invisible links that bind each one of our existences to the others - existences which the spirit alone remembers, for Matter has no memory for spiritual things. -Honore Balzac

LINK: François le Métel de Boisrobert at Wikipedia

6. The Jackie And The Starlites Clue

Jackie & The Starlites were a one-hit wonder Doo Wop group -- "Valarie," cut for Bobby Robinson's Fury label in 1960, being their one hit; it was cut at the tail end of the Doo Wop era and, indeed, may have been among the first songs in that genre to appeal as an "oldie" in style. It barely brushed the national charts, but it was embraced by the community of Doo Wop singers as a standard. Jackie La Rue originally started singing with a group called the Five Wings in the early 1950s, and cut a pair of singles with the group for King Records in 1955 before breaking up that year. Two of their members went on to form the Dubs, but La Rue wasn't heard from again in music until 1960, when the Starlites coalesced, consisting of Jackie Rue, as he was then known, Alton Thomas, John Felix, and Billy Montgomery. Rue was the star of the show as a superb acting singer, whose feigned weeping was apparently utterly convincing to onlookers and listeners. Their records following their successful debut were a mix of soul and upbeat ballads that failed to capture the imagination in the manner of their only hit. By 1963, Fury Records was bankrupt, although the group managed to move on to Mascot Records in 1962 before disbanding sometime in the mid-'60s. Jackie Rue died of a drug overdose sometime in the late '60s or early '70s. Source: All Music Guide Listen to The Starlites:

7. The Herodotus Clue

Of the crocodile the nature is as follows:—during the four most wintry months this creature eats nothing: she has four feet and is an animal belonging to the land and the water both; for she produces and hatches eggs on the land, and the most part of the day she remains upon dry land, but the whole of the night in the river, for the water in truth is warmer than the unclouded open air and the dew. Of all the mortal creatures of which we have knowledge this grows to the greatest bulk from the smallest beginning; for the eggs which she produces are not much larger than those of geese and the newly-hatched young one is in proportion to the egg, but as he grows he becomes as much as seventeen cubits long and sometimes yet larger. He has eyes like those of a pig and teeth large and tusky, in proportion to the size of his body; but unlike all other beasts he grows no tongue, neither does he move his lower jaw, but brings the upper jaw towards the lower, being in this too unlike all other beasts. He has moreover strong claws and a scaly hide upon his back which cannot be pierced; and he is blind in the water, but in the air he is of very keen sight. Since he has his living in the water he keeps his mouth all full within of leeches; and whereas all other birds and beasts fly from him, the trochilus is a creature which is at peace with him, seeing that from her he receives benefit; for the crocodile having come out of the water to the land and then having opened his mouth (this he is wont to do generally towards the West Wind), the trochilus upon that enters into his mouth and swallows down the leeches, and he being benefited is pleased and does no harm to the trochilus.

Now for some of the Egyptians the crocodiles are sacred animals, and for others not so, but they treat them on the contrary as enemies: those however who dwell about Thebes and about the lake of Moiris hold them to be most sacred, and each of these two peoples keeps one crocodile selected from the whole number, which has been trained to tameness, and they put hanging ornaments of molten stone and of gold into the ears of these and anklets round the front feet, and they give them food appointed and victims of sacrifices and treat them as well as possible while they live, and after they are dead they bury them in sacred tombs, embalming them: but those who dwell about the city of Elephantine even eat them, not holding them to be sacred. They are called not crocodiles but champsai, and the Ionians gave them the name of crocodile, comparing their form to that of the crocodiles (lizards) which appear in their country in the stone walls.
From The History of Herodotus, Translated into English by G. C. Macaulay

The History Of Herodotus at Project Gutenberg

8. The Henry David Thoreau Clue

Friendship I think awhile of Love, and while I think,      Love is to me a world,      Sole meat and sweetest drink,      And close connecting link        Tween heaven and earth. I only know it is, not how or why,      My greatest happiness;      However hard I try,      Not if I were to die,        Can I explain. I fain would ask my friend how it can be,      But when the time arrives,      Then Love is more lovely      Than anything to me,        And so I'm dumb. For if the truth were known, Love cannot speak,      But only thinks and does;      Though surely out 'twill leak      Without the help of Greek,        Or any tongue. A man may love the truth and practise it,      Beauty he may admire,      And goodness not omit,      As much as may befit        To reverence. But only when these three together meet,      As they always incline,      And make one soul the seat,      And favorite retreat,        Of loveliness; When under kindred shape, like loves and hates      And a kindred nature,      Proclaim us to be mates,      Exposed to equal fates        Eternally; And each may other help, and service do,      Drawing Love's bands more tight,      Service he ne'er shall rue      While one and one make two,        And two are one; In such case only doth man fully prove      Fully as man can do,      What power there is in Love      His inmost soul to move        Resistlessly. ______ Two sturdy oaks I mean, which side by side,      Withstand the winter's storm,      And spite of wind and tide,      Grow up the meadow's pride,        For both are strong Above they barely touch, but undermined      Down to their deepest source,      Admiring you shall find      Their roots are intertwined        Insep'rably.

Thoreau's close friend, Ralph Waldo Emerson, wrote: The soul comes from without into the human body, as into a temporary abode, and it goes out of it anew it passes into other habitations, for the soul is immortal. --It is the secret of the world that all things subsist and do not die, but only retire a little from sight and afterwards return again. Nothing is dead; men feign themselves dead, and endure mock funerals, and there they stand looking out of the window, sound and well, in some strange new disguise.

LINK: The Eulogy of Henry David Thoreau by Ralph Waldo Emerson

9. The Titian Clue

Woman with Mirror, about 1515, Titian. Oil paint on canvas.

Woman with Mirror - Unraveling the Clues

When this picture was painted, viewers would have understood that this man and woman are lovers—married men did not help their wives dress. Here, the man holds up a flat mirror so the lady can see herself simultaneously from the front and the back. Look carefully, and you may be able to make out the shadowy reflection of the lady’s back in the convex mirror.

Notice how the convex mirror also reflects a bright square of white: a window. And if you look at the bottom of the painting, you’ll see that the woman is daubing her finger with a perfume bottle, which is sitting on a ledge of a window. We are watching this intimate scene through an open window, as if we were voyeurs.

Source

10. The Ferruccio Busoni Clue

Ferruccio (Dante Michelangelo Benvenuto) Busoni (April 1, 1866 – July 27, 1924) was an Italian composer, pianist, editor, writer, piano and composition teacher, and conductor. Busoni wrote: That which, within our present-day music, most nearly approaches the essential nature of the art, is the Rest and the Hold (Pause). Consummate players, improvisers, know how to employ these instruments of expression in loftier and ampler measure. The tense silence between two movements—in itself music, in this environment—leaves wider scope for divination than the more determinate, but therefore less elastic, sound. --Sketch of a New Esthetic of Music, by Ferruccio Busoni, translated from the German by Dr. Th. Baker

Link: Ferruccio Busoni at Wikipedia

11. Wagner Vignettes

I Brünnhilde: Dies Eine musst du erhören! Zerknicke dein Kind, das deinKnie umfasst; zertritt die Traute, zertrümmre die Maid, ihres Leibes Spur zerstöre dein Speer: doch gib, Grausamer, nicht der grässlichsten Schmach sie preis! Auf dein Gebot entbrenne ein Feuer; den Felsen umglühe lodernde Glut; es leck' ihre Zung', es fresse ihr Zahn den Zagen, der frech sich wagte, dem freislichen Felsen zu nahn!

II Stimme des Waldvogels: Lustig im Leid sing' ich von Liebe; wonnig aus Weh web' ich mein Lied: nur Sehnende kennen den Sinn! Siegfried: Fort jagt mich's jauchzend von hinnen, fort aus dem Wald auf den Fels! - Noch einmal sage mir, holder Sänger: werd' ich das Feuer durchbrechen? Kann ich erwecken die Braut? Stimme des Waldvogels: Die Braut gewinnt, Brünnhilde erweckt ein Feiger nie: nur wer das Fürchten nicht kennt! Siegfried: (lacht auf vor Entzücken) Der dumme Knab', der das Fürchten nicht kennt, mein Vöglein, der bin ja ich! Noch heute gab ich vergebens mir Müh, das Fürchten von Fafner zu lernen: nun brenn' ich vor Lust, es von Brünnhilde zu wissen! Wie find' ich zum Felsen den Weg? (Der Vogel flattert auf, kreist über Siegfried und fliegt ihm zögernd voran) So wird mir der Weg gewiesen: wohin du flatterst folg' ich dem Flug!

III Siegfried: Was du sein wirst, sei es mir heut'! Fasst dich mein Arm, umschling' ich dich fest; schlägt meine Brust brünstig die deine; zünden die Blicke, zehren die Atem sich; Aug' in Auge, Mund an Mund: dann bist du mir, was bang du mir warst und wirst! Dann brach sich die brennende Sorge, ob jetzt Brünnhilde mein?

Link: Der Ring des Nibelungen

12. The Final Clue

These are the 12 pieces to my puzzle... can you fit them together? The correct answer will state the common thread that runs between all the clues.

N.B.: This is a tricky and elaborate riddle, much more difficult than it may appear on the surface. The one who knows the answer will have a deep interest in and subtle knowledge of history and the arts bordering on the esoteric. No clue is a red herring. Each clue is intrinsic to solving the conundrum, but there are twists and double meanings, and sometimes, as in a lengthy song lyric or poem, only a line or two may be the clue and you must discern what is grain and what is chaff. Sometimes, I have chosen clues and titles specifically because I felt they would track well with search engines, and as such, no emphasis should necessarily be placed on the titles and keywords; the answers are all to be found in the bodies of the Clues. All Information in the sidebar: ads, pictures, poems, -are NOT clues, and reflect this blogger's personal interests only. They were added in part to fill up the sidebar, and especially in the case of the poems, meant to convey ...something of what I have felt... to someone very dear to The Conundrum Constructor. To that person: You are my inspiration in creating the The Robert Plant Conundrum, and it is dedicated to you. I hope it will find favor in your eyes. You are the one I know can solve this conundrum, and I look forward to explaining everything to you in detail.

OK. If you know the answer, please e-mail: ...because I'd really, really love to hear from you! The winner... will get their answer published here, along with your name (any username you choose), a spiffy graphic (I am good at digital graphics and will make something very nice for you), -and the satisfaction of knowing that at least in the Conundrum Constructor's not-so-humble opinion, you are a super-duper smart person, and worthy of much respect. Indeed, if you can solve this riddle, I shall have to consider you a kindred spirit! -I have been working on a new Conundrum, and the winner of The Robert Plant Conundrum will get first crack at solving it. Best regards from The Conundrum Constructor Link: What is a Conundrum?