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Jigsaws: A Meditation on Chaos, Calm, and Gubbins, by The Curator

There is something faintly ridiculous, yet quietly uplifting, about a jigsaw puzzle. People think of jigsaws as mild entertainment for rainy Sundays, but I have long believed they operate as a form of philosophy in cardboard. A jigsaw is the universe in manageable form. A thousand tiny problems scattered across the table, daring you to bring them into coherence. I have spent many evenings hunched over a box of mismatched shapes, muttering to myself like a minor wizard and wondering why I ever began. And yet I always return. Jigsaws are one of the few pursuits where frustration and serenity can occur in the same breath.

Jigsaws are particularly good for anxiety, which is ironic, because they also cause it. There is an initial burst of panic when you lift the lid and discover the chaos within. It mirrors the moment in life when you realise you have absolutely no idea what you are doing. But slowly, piece by piece, you discover that the overwhelming mess can indeed be tamed. You start with the corners, because the corners are your anchors. They tell you the world has boundaries. Then you handle the edges, because everything needs a frame. And before long you find yourself tracing colours and patterns, following tiny clues until order finally emerges. There is a quiet dignity in this. Even if the finished picture is of a cat dressed as a pirate.

I once knew a philosopher who insisted that jigsaws reveal the true condition of the human soul. When life becomes too much, we gravitate towards activities with clear rules but no real stakes. Jigsaws, in this view, are symbolic reassurance: they say, “Everything is solvable, eventually.” I am not entirely convinced, but there is something pleasingly melodramatic about the idea. The philosopher in question could not complete a jigsaw larger than 300 pieces, which may have compromised his authority, but his point still holds. A jigsaw allows you to confront your anxieties while pretending you are simply tidying cardboard.

My own relationship with jigsaws is tangled up with all manner of gubbins. My study is full of half-finished puzzles, abandoned when life demanded something more urgent, or when I discovered a missing piece and suffered an existential collapse. One drawer contains nothing but stray jigsaw pieces from puzzles I have not owned for years. I suspect the gnomes are responsible. They insist on reorganising my belongings when I am not looking, and they have very strong views about colour gradients. I once caught three of them debating the metaphysical implications of a sky-blue piece with a suspiciously curved edge. A lively discussion ensued.

Jigsaws also occupy a curious place in the culture of fandoms. For example, there is an entire sub-genre of jigsaws themed around Doctor Who. When assembled, these images often feature the Doctor brooding in a mysterious landscape, staring off into the temporal abyss while various monsters lurk behind him. Completing a Doctor Who jigsaw is an experience strangely similar to watching the programme itself. You begin with excitement, then confusion, then dread, then elation, and eventually you declare that the laws of time are clearly nonsense but you enjoyed yourself anyway. I once completed a puzzle depicting the TARDIS materialising in the middle of a London street. The final piece was part of a lamppost, which struck me as oddly poetic. The universe, in all its absurdity, distilled into one tiny grey rectangle.

The relationship between jigsaws and Dungeons & Dragons is subtler, but no less intriguing. A D&D campaign is, in essence, a narrative jigsaw. The Dungeon Master scatters clues, challenges, and oddities across the world, and it is up to the players to assemble them into something meaningful. If you have ever tried to herd a group of adventurers towards a central plotline, you will know how much patience this demands. It is a lot like working on a thousand-piece puzzle with four people who insist they know where everything goes, despite the evidence. The wizard wants to sort by shape. The barbarian wants to force pieces together that clearly do not match. The rogue steals the edge pieces out of spite. And somehow, against all reason, the final picture eventually emerges.

Anime jigsaws, meanwhile, are an art form unto themselves. They tend to feature implausibly beautiful characters with hair that defies physics and clothing that disregards all laws of climate suitability. I completed a puzzle once that depicted a serene anime landscape with cherry blossoms falling in delicate spirals. It took me three days to realise that twenty of the pieces were nearly identical shades of pastel pink. I questioned every decision that had led me to that moment. But there was also something satisfyingly meditative about the process. Anime art often blends tranquillity with emotional intensity, and the jigsaw captures that contradiction perfectly.

Then there is Final Fantasy. The series lends itself well to jigsaws, because it embraces visual excess with such enthusiasm. Gigantic swords, improbable airships, glowing crystals, capes that billow in ways incompatible with physics: all ripe for cardboard reinterpretation. I once undertook a monstrous 2,000-piece puzzle of Final Fantasy IX. The characters were arrayed dramatically across the sky, looking pensive and heroic. But the background consisted entirely of swirling blue clouds, meaning that half the puzzle was indistinguishable from the other half. It became a battle of willpower. I think I levelled up several times in endurance. The completed image was magnificent, although I still maintain that jigsaws featuring mostly sky are a form of psychological warfare.

Music pairs well with puzzle-building, especially goth music. There is a peculiar comfort in sorting delicate fragments of cardboard while being serenaded by haunting vocals and atmospheric basslines. Perhaps it is the contrast: the gloom of the music balanced by the wholesome domesticity of the puzzle. I have solved many jigsaws to the sound of mournful guitars, and the result is soothing rather than macabre. You can place the final piece with the smug satisfaction of someone who has triumphed over entropy while wearing black eyeliner and elbow-length lace gloves, metaphorically speaking.

In all this, jigsaws retain an enduring charm because they allow us to momentarily escape the pressures of life. They give us a task that is both pointless and meaningful. They provide just enough challenge to distract the anxious parts of the mind without overwhelming them. They offer moments of triumph that feel disproportionately glorious. And they give us an excuse to mutter phrases such as “Where on earth does that go?” without anyone questioning our sanity.

I sometimes imagine that the universe itself is a giant jigsaw. The pieces are scattered across time and space, some lost behind sofas, others wedged under bookshelves, and a few lodged in pockets where they do not belong. We spend our lives trying to find the corner pieces so that everything makes sense. Occasionally we do. More often we manage only a small cluster of matching colours before the next puzzle arrives.

Yet there is comfort in the attempt. Because even when the picture seems impossible, we continue sorting, testing, and placing, driven by the quiet hope that order can emerge from chaos. And when, at last, the final piece clicks into place, there is a moment of clarity that feels almost transcendent.

Until, of course, you discover that the box contains an extra piece from a completely different puzzle. But that, as every seasoned puzzler knows, is simply part of the gubbins of life.