The puzzle of life

Not clues to be solved, Christianity is a Word to be accepted | Gene Edward Veith

Most stories—whether written or onscreen—are about a character who faces conflicts. Today another kind of story is in vogue: The character—and with him the reader or viewer—has to solve a puzzle.

The hit TV show Lost is not just about castaways on a desert island, on the order of Robinson Crusoe or Gilligan. A strange sequence of numbers keeps showing up—in a mental patient's ravings, on a winning lottery ticket, inscribed on a mysterious bunker, and in lined-up police cars. And then the characters have to enter those numbers into a computer every 108 minutes or something unspecified but bad will happen. And that's only one strain of a labyrinthine plot that defies explanation, with each episode dropping clues as to what is going on, with viewers weighing in on the internet as to what it all means. Lost is an elaborate puzzle.