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Titans. As punishment for stealingfirefrom the gods for the human race, Zeus had Prometheus chained to a rock where an eagle fed each day on his liver, which grew back each night. He was eventually rescued from this torment by Hercules, who shot the eagle with his bow and arrow. • See special entry

• PROMETHEUS 0/7 p. 311.

Sisyphus In Greek mythology, Sisyphus was a king of Corinth, punished in Hades for his misdeeds in life by being condemned to the eternal task of rolling a huge stone to the top of a hill. Every time he approached the summit, the

stone slipped and rolled down to the bottom again. • See special entry u HADES on p. 172.

Tantalus In Greek mythology, Tantalus was the king of Phrygia who was punished for his misdeeds (including killing his son Pelops and offering his cooked flesh to the gods) by being condemned in Hades to eternal thirst and hunger. Tantalus stood up to his chin in water which receded whenever he tried to drink it and under branches of fruit which drew back when he tried to reach them.

It may condemn us, Tantalus-like, to reach evermore after some far-off, unattainable good.

Harper's Monthly, 1858

Tartarus In Greek mythology, Tartarus was the lowest region of Hades which was reserved for the punishment of the wicked for their misdeeds, especially those such as Ixion and Tantalus who had committed some outrage against the gods. •See special entry • HADES on p. 172.

Your soul gets judged, then it's punishment or reward. Tartarus or the Elysian fields.

CHARLES HICSON Getting Rid of Mr Kitchen, 1996

Thyestes In Greek mythology, Thyestes was the brother of Atreus, with whose wife he committed adultery. In revenge, Atreus invited him to a banquet and served him the flesh of Thyestes' own children to eat. Thyestes fled in horror, laying a curse on the house of Atreus.

Tityus Tityus was a giant of Greek mythology, punished with eternal torture in the underworld for attempting to rape Leto, the mother of Apollo and Artemis. Vultures continually devoured his liver.

Quest

The quest, universal in storytelling and myth, has evolved from the idea of a journey or expedition in search of a rare object to that of the pursuit of some elusive goal or intellectual discovery. •See also Adventure.

Captain Ahab Captain Ahab is the captain of the whaling ship Pequod in

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Herman Melville's Moby Dick (1851). •See MOBY DICK.

Argonauts The Argonauts were the group of heroes who accompanied Jason on board the ship Argo in the quest for the Golden Fleece. • See GOLDEN FLEECE.

• See also special entry D JASON AND THE ARGONAUTS on p. 220.

El Dorado El Dorado (literally 'the gilded one') was the name of a fabled country (or city) abounding in gold, believed to exist somewhere in the region of the Orinoco and Amazon rivers. It was sought by 16th-century explorers, including the Spanish conquistadors and Sir Walter Ralegh.

Thousands of mushroom pickers . . . stomp through British Columbia forests every fall looking for the mushroom picker's El Dorado: a bed of Canadian matsutake, or pine mushrooms—massive white mushrooms for which Japanese buyers are willing to pay $55 a pound.

Equinox, 1989

Fermaf S Last Theorem Pierre de Fermât (1601-65) was a French mathematician, a founder of probability theory and number theory. In 1640 he formulated the proposition: 'There do not exist positive integers x, y, z, n such that xn + yn = zn when n is greater than 2.' Intriguingly, Fermât noted that he had 'a truly wonderful proof of this proposition but it does not fit into the margin of this page'. For the next 350 years mathematicians tried to furnish a proof for what became known as Fermat's last theorem (or Fermat's theorem), until Andrew Wiles finally succeeded in 1995.

You know this infallible system I have for becoming very rich by judicially investing in the velocity and stamina of horses with legal names? Ascot was going to provide the ultimate proof of its validity, a sort of Fermat's Last Theorem for racing.

MARCEL BERLINS in The Guardian, 1997

Fountain of Youth The Fountain of Youth was a legendary spring which was supposed to have the power of rejuvenation and in which Alexander the Great and his army were said to have bathed. In the early 16th century it was sought by the Spanish explorer Juan Ponce de Leon.

Golden Fleece The Golden Fleece was thefleeceof pure gold taken from the ram that carried Phrixus through the air to Colchis. It hung from an oak tree in a sacred grove in Colchis and was guarded by an unsleeping dragon. Jason set out with the Argonauts to find and recover the Golden Fleece, which he did

with the help of Medea. • See special entry • JASON AND THE ARGONAUTS on p. 220.

All along, the company's engineers pursued TV's Golden Fleece, the elusive 'passive' audience meter, a device capable of recognizing each TV viewer and recording even his briefest exit, without his having to lift a finger.

Atlantic, 1992

Holy Crail The Holy Grail was an object of quest in medieval legend. It was supposed to be the dish or cup used by Christ at the Last Supper and in which Joseph of Arimathea had caught some of the blood of the crucified Christ. By the early 13 th century it was closely associated with the Arthurian cycle of legends as a symbol of perfection sought by the knights of the Round Table. The term 'Holy Grail' is often applied to the object of a long and difficult quest.

How many months he will be away we don't know yet, but he is setting out with all

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the air of a knight in search of the holy Grail.

LAWRENCE DURRELL Mountolive, 1958

I've won the America's Cup. It's considered the Holy Grail of yachting. STUDS TERKEL American Dreams: Lost and Found, 1980

There was a widening picture of me looking young and in racing colours: a piece of old film taken years ago of me weighing-in after winning the Grand National. I was holding my saddle in two hands and my eyes were full of the mystical wonder of having been presented with the equivalent of the Holy Grail.

DICK FRANCIS Come to Grief, 1995

Mecca Mecca (in Arabic, Makkah) is a city in western Saudi Arabia, an oasis town in the Red Sea region of Hejaz, east of Jiddah. It was the birthplace in AD 570 of the prophet Muhammad. Mecca is held to be the holiest city of the Islamic world and is the destination for Muslims undertaking the hadj pilgrimage. In general usage, a 'Mecca' is hence any place which attracts many visitors or the enthusiasts of a particular activity.

'But here we are at the Mecca of English cricket; said Lord Ickenham, suspending his remarks as the cab drew up at the entrance of Lord's,

p. c. woDEHOusE Cocktail Time, 1958

Where 125th Street crossed Seventh Avenue is the Mecca of Harlem. To get established there, an ordinary Harlem citizen has reached the promised land.

CHESTER HIMES Blind Man With a Pistol, 1969

Moby Dick In Herman Melville's Moby Dick (1851), the great white whale of that name is the object of Captain Ahab's passionate and obsessional quest, driven by revenge for the loss of his leg in a previous encounter with the whale.

Philosopher's Stone The Philosopher's Stone was an imaginary substance, sought after by alchemists, that was supposed to have the power of changing base metals into gold and sometimes of curing all diseases and prolonging life indefinitely. The term can be used to describe a universal cure or solution that proves elusive.

Any opiate that relieves pain is habit forming, and the more effectively it relieves pain the more habit forming it is. The habit forming molecule, and the pain killing molecule of morphine are probably identical, and the process by which morphine relieves pain is the same process that leads to tolerance and addiction. Non habit forming morphine appears to be a latter day Philosopher's Stone.

WILLIAM BURROUGHS The Naked Lunch, 1959

Snark In Lewis Carroll's nonsense poem 'The Hunting of the Snark' (1876), the snark is a fabulous animal, the quarry of the expedition undertaken by the Bellman and his crew. The word can be applied to any elusive goal.

If Truth is the Snark of Westminster, it is most effectively pursued by those ambitious journalists who will seek to scoop each other and make their names by peddling the spin, delivered to favoured trusties by spokespeople, spin-doctors, sources and 'friends'.

SHEENA MCDONALD in The Guardian, 1998

Yellow Brick Road In L. Frank Baum's children's story The Wizard of Oz (1900), Dorothy follows the Yellow Brick Road to Oz in the hope that the

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Wizard will help her to get home. She is joined on her journey by three companions she meets on the way: the Scarecrow, who wants a brain; the Cowardly Lion, who wants courage; and the Tin Man, who wants a heart.

For this group of divers their 'yellow brick road' will take them along a professional route towards the PADI Divemaster and PADI Open Water Scuba Instructor ratings.

Sport Diver, 1999

Realization

ARCHIMEDES and his cry of 'Eureka' have become synonymous with a

sudden discovery or revelation. Other stories in which there occurs a

similar moment of realization involve ISAAC NEWTON and St Paul on the

ROAD TO DAMASCUS. • See also Detectives, Explorers, Knowledge.

Archimedes Archimedes (c. 28 7-212 BC) was a Greek mathematician and inventor, born in Syracuse in Sicily. There is a famous story relating to his discovery of the principle of fluid displacement. He had been given the task of finding a method for determining whether a crown was pure gold or alloyed with silver. He is supposed to have made the crucial discovery when taking a bath and seeing the water overflow. Archimedes ran naked through the streets shouting 'Eureka! Eureka!' ('I have found it! I have found it!').

I did not jump up and shout 'Eureka!' like Archimedes did.

BART KOSKO Fuzzy Thinking, 1993

Damascus (the road to) According to the Bible, Saul of Tarsus, a committed persecutor of Christians, set out on the road to Damascus planning to take prisoner any Christians he found there. On the way he suddenly found himself the centre of a blinding light and, falling to the ground, heard God's voice crying 'Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?' (Acts 9:4). Saul, later known as Paul, became a powerful and influential Christian. Saul's conversion on the road to Damascus can be alluded to in the context of a sudden realization or change of opinion or belief.

There was no Damascus experience for me, no great leap for mankind (or womankind for that matter), only a series of small shifts, each insignificant in its own right, but each making possible the next.

ANDRÉ BRINK Imaginings of Sand, 1996

Mum had been to church and suddenly realized in a St Paul-on-road-to-Damascus- type blinding flash that the vicar is gay.

HELEN FIELDING Bridget Jones's Diary, 1996

Isaac Newton Isaac Newton (1642-1727) was an English mathematician and physicist, considered to be one of the greatest scientists of all time. According to a famous story, first told by Voltaire, in 1665 or 1666 Newton watched