The Minotaur in House of Leaves The Minotaur in House of Leaves The Minotaur or Minotauros was the son born of lust to Queen Pasiphae of Crete and a bull. He had the body of a man and the head of a bull and was more beast than human. The creature was banished by King Minos to reside in the centre of a labyrinth in Knossos built by the ingenious architect Daedalus and his son Icarus. The Minotaur was nursed by Queen Pasiphae as a child but grew to devour humans, so he was safely put away in the maze contrived so carefully and trickily that
Middlesex (novel) compared Cal's condition to mythical creatures described by the ancient Greeks. The author alluded his protagonist's nature and heritage to the Minotaur, the half-man and half-bull creature. Cal's father is conceived after his grandparents' attendance of a theatric play entitled "The Minotaur". The puzzle of Cal's genetic identity is akin to the creature's labyrinth, and the thread that leads out of the maze is held here by his paternal grandmother, a former silk farmer. Frances Bartkowski, a scholar of English, named Callie in her puberty as a chimera. The mythical monster is an analogy for a complex personality, a mixture