Despite all the changes that the crossword has gone through, all of her rules stuck. She felt that anything else would be too easy to make and too simple to solve. Quigley: The first crossword editor, Margaret Farrar, came up with these rules to help her sift through the slush pile faster. Quigley: Odd number of squares on a side, grid should have 180 degree symmetry, no more than 1/6th of the grid is black square, word count something like 78 words for a 15x, 72 words if there's no theme, no repeated words-even in the clues. Reddit: What are the "rules" that a crossword has to obey? I read some of them once, I thought: diagonal symmetry, no more than some percent black spaces, etc. Eventually, you should be able to ask yourself what newfangled clue are they using to hide the most typical banal answer? We constructors do that a lot. You'll find that over time you'll be able to see through the tricks in the clues. It's like working out, you have to tear muscle if you plan to build any. Quigley: It sounds trivial, but doing it every day forces you to get better, even if you have absolutely no shot of even finishing any puzzle past Wednesday. Do you have any advice for improving my skills? I have never been able to complete one past Wednesday. Reddit: I've been doing New York Times crosswords since I was 16 and I'm 22 now. If we bump into each other, we might have a beer.Įditing typically means polishing up the answer grid to get rid of any lousy entries, then tightening up the clues. Quigley: I send him puzzles and he runs the ones he likes. Reddit: What is your invovlement with Will Shortz? What typical editting occurrs on a crossword? A marquee answer can a never-before used phrase, a name in the news, a consonant-heavy answer, etc. Just sayin': The consonant-heavy answers are much harder to work with. Quigley: Not a specific word per se, but typically each grid will have what I call a marquee answer. Reddit: Is there any specific word that you love putting into crossword puzzles? Either because of its difficulty level or number of vowels in it? Quigley: You start with the longest entries first, then you put in the entries that span the longest entries, then you work simultaneously across and down until you hit a corner. Reddit: How do you go about filling in the words? I would assume you do the longer words first, followed by theme words? Quigley: I come up with the theme to the puzzle first, then the grid. Reddit: Do you start with the clues and make them fit a template or the other way around? Reddit: How many of you crossword creators are there? Stand Alone for PDAs, etc. Will is a nice guy. Quigley: Crosswords are transitioning just fine digitally: Across Lite, Crossword Solver for laptops. Reddit: How do you feel about the outlook for printed media, specifically newspapers such as The New York Times? Do you feel that this will impact your career in the near future? Is Times puzzle editor Will Shortz a nice guy? Since I give away puzzles on my site, I’m afforded the opportunity, if something comes up today, for example, to put it in the Thursday puzzle." His least favorite part? That's a little more complicated, but fascinating: "There’s a little unspoken race among us constructors who can be the first one to get the new buzz word in there. "There are obviously crossword fans there." Quigley told us his favorite part of puzzle writing was debuting a new word before his competitors. I was completely shocked that it skyrocketed to the front of Reddit," he said via telephone. I thought I’d give it a shot and see what happened. "I didn’t have any preconceived notions for it. We had to call Quigley up to get his take on today's online exercise. Of course, we couldn't just leave the questioning to Reddit. But if you pull out just the pithy answers, they make for a neat FAQ that details how such puzzles are made. Today, a Times crossword creator (actually they call themselves constructors) named Brendan Emmett Quigley took to Reddit to answer questions about his craft, and the result was a fascinating bunch of information in the form of a dizzyingly long message board thread. But if you're anything like us, you do occasionally guffaw at a particularly brilliant clue, or sit befuddled at a stumper, wondering idly how they come up with those things. Unless you're the type who finishes The New York Times' Sunday crossword puzzle in ink every week, you may not spend a lot of time thinking about the science behind puzzle-making. This article is from the archive of our partner.
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