Well, not exactly—though given recent trends,
Hollywood will surely, at some point or other, consider him for a future blockbuster.
This is actually one of a series of artworks in the Puffin Sculpture Park, in the parking lot behind the Puffin
Cultural Forum in Teaneck, N.J., not far from where I live. This particular
fellow is known as the “Warrior of Cadmus.”
Cadmus, if you’d really like to know, was, according
to Greek mythology, a Phoenician prince who killed a dragon, then sowed its
teeth. (Why he did that, I dunno. Stop with the hard questions, willya?)
Anyway,
what happens but that, instead of only one dragon, there’s now a whole slew of
warriors that spring up all the earth, all loaded for bear and ready to kill
him (like this fellow), and they set off clattering and making the most unholy disturbance you’ve
ever seen. Someone tells Cadmus that the best thing he can do if he wants to
live is throw a precious stone among them, and with no other useful ideas at
hand he figures why not? All of a sudden, they’re so anxious to grab that stone
that they begin killing each other, until there are only five left, and these
survivors help Cadmus build Thebes.
Ever since, “sowing dragon’s teeth” has come to mean
the law of unintended consequences in matters of war and peace, applied to such
situations as Germany’s seizure of Alsace-Lorraine from France in 1871, the
punitive peace of the Allies against Germany after WWI—and, more recently, the
Iraq War.
I wish I had written it down so I could tell you the sculptor's name, but now you have an excuse to go to the park
and find out for yourself. When you’re done checking out this and the other
outdoor artworks, you walk behind them into the Teaneck Creek Conservancy. I’d call it a nice way to kill an hour
or so, except that this warrior fellow here looks like he has the “killing”
part well in hand, thank you very much.
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