The Cube is approximately - it's around the same age as the Internet, and in that time, we had no personal computers yet.
I am really not a speedcuber. My best time when I was practicing was about a minute. Usually people say if you can create a piano, you must be a good piano player, but it is not true. They are different type of human activities and need different capabilities.
Like after a nice walk when you have seen many lovely sights you decide to go home, after a while I decided it was time to go home, let us put the cubes back in order. And it was at that moment that I came face to face with the Big Challenge: What is the way home?
I was somewhat out of place among my classmates; I could not be as bohemian as they were.
And, not only in Budapest. I worked very closely with a very powerful government organization, which shall remain unidentified, to develop the mass marketed version of the Cube.
In the mid-1970s, I was teaching design at the Academy of Applied Arts in Budapest.
I do not truly consider myself an icon, but the Cube has been quite successful.
Once I completed the Cube and demonstrated it to my students, I realized it was nearly impossible to put down.
We turn the Cube and it twists us.
I did not plan to make the Cube.
Now, after the Cube, I still don't have any plans to make anything like it.
Yes, but with the Cube there are many flashes, there are many aha's.
The Cube is an imitation of life itself - or even an improvement on life.
The Cube can seem alive as it heats up in your hand. The fact that each face of the Cube is made of three layers of three blocks has an important meaning.
The Cube was a wonder - a wonder for itself and a wonder for myself. To me, it was much more strange than to anybody else.
I don't want to say too many words about the magic of the Cube, because it's basically a mystery. It's like the Mona Lisa smile. It's both complex and very simple at the same time. And, well, people like it. Even today.
I was searching for a way to demonstrate 3D movement to my students and one day found myself staring into the River Danube, looking at how the water moved around the pebbles. This became the inspiration for the cube's twisting mechanism. The fact that it can do this without falling apart is part of its magic.
I feel more like a father to a child: my Cube inspired thousands of 'twisty puzzles,' and I'm amazed how it continues to excite new generations.
I'm calling the Cube, it's a piece of art. At the same time, it's an intellectual task as well.
I didn't give that name, the Rubik's Cube, and I called it Magic Cube because it's magic.
