INTRODUCTION
My official name is the Rubik’s Cube. “Cube Rubik” sounds more natural to me, but nobody has really asked me about my feelings. If I were of noble blood, you could call me the “Hungarian Magic Cube von Rubik,” but I’m not. Personally, I prefer “Magic Cube” because it reminds me of my childhood, but my friends just call me “the Cube,” and you may call me that as well. We probably have met already, since I’ve traveled all over the world and many millions have touched me and been touched by me over the decades. Even if you weren’t one of them, please don’t worry. (I never worry, by the way.)
You’ve probably seen me in the hands of people, or my image sometime, somewhere: on TV screens, T-shirts, magazine covers; in movies, YouTube videos, books; as part of tattoos, sculptures, album art; maybe in school … and I could go on and on. They say that one in every seven people in the world today has played with me! That is more than a billion. Can you imagine?
Even though you certainly have seen me, it must be strange to actually hear from me, so let me explain. You are reading a book by Rubik, the person who gave me life in 1974. There is nothing conventional about this book—especially the man who wrote it (he believes the contrary)—and it became clear while this was going on that I needed to be included. I wanted to help him tell the story, because I’m its most authentic witness! (He hates to write and has a poor memory.) And since every puzzle has rules, here are mine: I can’t think, but I can express myself. I can’t read or write, but I hear a lot and never forget. I am very simple/complex. I am colorful and happy. I met a young Hungarian fellow a long time ago (and now we are not so young…) and since then, we’ve been a team.
Teamwork has been my life. If you’ve ever picked me up and played with me, you and I formed a team. Now that you are reading, we are another team; you the Reader, and me with Rubik, the Writers. A group of three. As a 3x3x3, I think that the number three is magical. It has such perfect symmetries.
If all this seems bizarre to you, simply relax and open your mind. As Albert Einstein said, “The true sign of intelligence is not knowledge but imagination.”
So let’s play!
—The Cube
1
Who in the world am I? Ah, that’s the great puzzle.
—LEWIS CARROLL
I GUESS MANY PARENTS have had the same experience I have had: Suddenly observing their own children with a moment of curious detachment and wonder, and not at all from the perspective of being a mother or a father. In these revealing and sometimes beautiful moments that I have had with my children, it is as if I were meeting them for the first time, and I see them being deeply involved in a world that has nothing to do with me. When that happens, and it is never planned and does not occur often, I am startled to see in them qualities that I have never appreciated before. A tone of voice, perhaps, or a way of thinking that is totally unpredictable, surprising, or maybe even the sudden revelation of a strange interest or a curious hobby I had never suspected they had.
It has been the same with my eldest child: the Cube. There are some languages that have genders, and in these languages the word “cube” is almost always masculine—le cube in French, or der Würfel in German, for example—so when I refer to the Cube, I will use that distinction. He is my boy, my son. If you take a ball in your hand, it is a totally different feeling: soft, supple—a cube is a boy with edges and muscles.
Even as much as he has defined my life for nearly half a century, I can still be caught off guard by discovering some unexpected quality or character in him. Sometimes it is as simple as when I am playing with the rigid plastic pieces, but I am struck again and again by how they behave. The interplay of forces, the cohesive strength of all the elements, remind me of a drop of water floating weightlessly on a table, contained into a spherical shape by surface tension. I like the possibilities the Cube contains, and simply adore the visual pleasure of its shape. Often, the cubical shape is associated with an item that we have no control over, like dice. But there is nothing haphazard or out of control with the Cube. That is, as long as you are willing to give it some patience and some curiosity.
* * *
I HATE TO WRITE. Yet here I am, writing this book. There is no way back. Writing as an exercise is both technical and intellectual. Maybe being left-handed added some awkwardness to learning to write in a right-handed world. In retrospect, I was fortunate to have a teacher who did not force children to go against their natural proclivities. There was no pressure at all beyond the encouragement that I do the required work. My more pressing question with writing is abstract: How can we possibly capture in words all the dimensions of our lives?
That is not to say that I am not an avid reader. But when the writing involves a life—specifically my life—I find the medium almost paralyzing. This is not the first time I have confronted the challenge of writing about my experiences, my time with the Cube, and, inevitably, my life story. So far I have easily yielded to the temptation of not writing at all. But there is also the equally strong temptation of doing something well, of attempting to do something that feels authentic. Finally, I decided to approach the task of writing as if it were a puzzle, and I considered the model that I know best of all: the Cube, which I discovered in 1974. As an object, it shares many characteristics with the kind of writing I like best. It is simple and complex; it has movement and stability. There is what we see, and then there is its hidden structure.
Simple and complex. Moving and stable. Hidden and exposed. I believe contradictions are not opposites to be resolved, but counterpoints to be embraced. Rather than becoming frustrated by what seems irreconcilable in a contradiction, the better option is to appreciate that a contradiction helps us make connections we may never have considered. One can never fully capture three dimensions on a page. And yet, framing the many themes in my work and in my life in terms of contradictions could add dimensions that may make it easier for me to write.
* * *
IT PROBABLY GOES without saying that the Cube has attracted more attention than I could have ever imagined. It is a curious fact—one that surprises me as much as anyone—that for so many decades, during a time of an unprecedented technological revolution, fascination with such a simple, “low-tech” object has survived. And, in fact, this fascination has evolved. The Cube has been a toy for children, an intensely competitive sport, and a vehicle for high-tech explorations and discoveries in artificial intelligence and bewildering mathematics. Blame has been cast on the Cube for divorces (and marriages), and for ailments known as “the cubist’s thumb” and “Rubik’s wrist.”
With all this attention has come … questions. Journalists, fans of the Cube, or casual acquaintances around the world, often ask me the same questions, as if I could easily provide answers that would reveal all the mysteries of my puzzle. They have hardly changed over the years, so let’s dispense with them at the outset, shall we?
Q: How did you invent the Cube?
A: I sat down to think about a geometrical problem and how to illustrate it. I made something that became the Cube.
Q: How long did it take?
Copyright © 2020 by Ernő Rubik
