What has seemed so clear to me since I first read the story of Daedalus and Icarus is that the story is not a moral tale warning about over-ambition, as it is now popular for. I believe that the interpretation of Icarus being ambitious is attained when the story is seen only as a story of Icarus rather than of him and his father. In fact, it is Daedalus’ story more than it is the son’s.
When Icarus appears in the story, he is playing “with his own peril” by being a child, unaware of the danger of the journey to come. As his father goes about the serious business of fixing wings on him and instructing him on how to survive the journey, the boy tries to catch the feathers floating in the breeze.
The most affecting passage of the story to me comes during that time when the father is instructing the son on how to fly safely through the sky. He tells Icarus to stay in the middle path, not too high, not too low, and to follow his lead. And as he does this, “The old man’s cheeks were wet, the father’s hands/ Trembled. He kissed his son (the last kisses/He’d ever give) and rising on his wings/He flew ahead, anxious for his son’s sake.”
It’s a story about the pain of exile and imprisonment, the trappings of genius, the destructive power of the state and the perilous choices those who are abused by it are forced into making, but what holds it all together for me is that of a father being unable to protect his son. His genius and his instructions were not enough. He goes out before Icarus to lead the son forward, and calls out to the boy constantly through their flight, but that was not enough.
When the two of them were in the open, when the son was out in the world where the father could only hope that he had created the proper conditions and gave the right advice for the son to go down the proper path, all Daedalus can do is hope that what he did was enough. But it wasn’t. Icarus flies up to roam “the ranges of the heavens” not because the child has some deep ambition, but because he was enjoying the freedom of flight and the open world. He died playing with his own peril like trying to catch a feather in the breeze. Because he was simply a child having fun, even as his father was filled with anxiety.
Icarus dies, and it was his father who led him out to the sky and to his death. It was the father who called out to him and could not find him, and then finding the feathers on the waves, cursed his own genius before having to fish out the body of his son for burial. It was Daedalus who had to finish the journey alone, and live the rest of his days in grief.
Coincidentally, on my way from the mosque yesterday, I heard the voice of a man and a child behind me. I could tell that they were riding on bicycles because each time they spoke, they seemed to get aggressively closer to me. I set a challenge to myself. I wanted to see whether I could time it so well, just by the sound of their voices, for me to move out of their way as soon as they reached me without ever having to look backwards.
Between answering questions and giving encouragement to his son, the father would also gently instruct the son on how to navigate the path ahead of them. When the boy fell behind, he either slowed down a bit or encouraged the boy to speed up. He warned the son about the raised parts of the sidewalk, and told him which side to curl around to avoid them, and even demonstrated it for the child.
When they reached the intersection ahead of us, he used the time of the red light to tell the boy that he had to be extra careful and aware because there were so many cars turning and the drivers were not always paying attention. The word that he used for the nature of the intersection was “tricky.” The father spent the whole time at the red light giving his son instructions and information. He kept looking at the traffic, then looking back at his son. He was clearly anxious.
Then when the light changed to green, the father did something that delighted me. He rode his bike out the part of the intersection where the cars were turning into, and he stopped there before telling his son to cross. When the son reached him, the father rode side by side with him, positioning his body as the potential shield if a car should turn into them. After they made it past, the father congratulated the son, and then switched positions from how they were initially riding. Rather than being out in the front and having to look behind him to make sure that his son was keeping up, he let his son lead and spoke to him from behind. I presumed that the thinking was that he can at least keep an eye on his son if the boy is in front, and he could always take the lead position again when they reached the next intersection.
They were father and son, and the boy was asking the man questions and making childish observations about their surroundings, particularly about the houses that they were passing. After each question or observation that the boy made, the father would answer or respond with words of encouragement. They did this a few times until they were close enough that I stepped aside just in time before the man could ask me to, and the father riding ahead of me, asked the son to hurry up because the nice man was letting them through.
I watched father and son down the street, past another intersection and head towards their path, talking and laughing about the houses, their colors, the trees and cars in front of them, and how they looked different from the others they passed at the beginning of their trip.
Written by Sulyman B. Sulyman