Curiosity

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On her death bed, Gertrude Stein lifted her head and asked: "What is the answer?" When no one spoke, she smiled and said: "In that case, what is the question?"

—Donald Sutherland, Gertrude Stein:

A Biography of Her Work ^

I am curious about curiosity.

One of the first words that we learn as a child is why. Partly because we want to know something about the mysterious world into which we have unwillingly entered, partly because we want to understand how the things in that world function, and partly because we feel an ancestral need to engage with the other inhabitants of that world, after our first babblings and cooings, we begin to ask "Why?"1 We never stop. Very soon we find out that curiosity is seldom rewarded with meaningful or satisfying answers, but rather with an increased desire to ask more questions and the pleasure of conversing with

(Opposite) Virgil explains to Dante that Beatrice sent him to show Dante the right path. Woodcut illustrating Canto II ofthe Inferno, printed in 1487 with commentary by Cristoforo Landino. (Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library,

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