All 3 Uses of
enigma
in
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
- She, who had never been more than fifty miles from her birthplace, learned to traverse the maze of Spanish-named streets in that enigma that is Los Angeles.
p. 203.1 *enigma = something that baffles understanding (seems unexplainable)
- He was away in a mystery, locked in the enigma that young Southern Black boys start to unravel, start to try to unravel, from seven years old to death.†
p. 198.6
- Would Momma, who knew the ways of the whites and the wiles of the Blacks, try to answer her grandson, whose very life depended on his not truly understanding the enigma?†
p. 198.9
Definitions:
-
(1)
(enigma) something mysterious that seems unexplainable
-
(2)
(meaning too rare to warrant focus) meaning too rare to warrant focus:
The word may also be seen in the proper noun, Enigma Machine. It refers to an encryption device used by Nazi Germany during the second world war. Britain eventually learned to unencrypt messages sent with the machine, but kept that ability a secret.