The Curious Collision of Crosswords and Pints
You know the feeling – the room is abuzz with chatter, pints of frothy beer in hand, and a hush falls over the crowd as the quiz master steps up to the microphone. Pens and pencils poised, minds whirring, the pub quiz is about to begin. But what if I told you that the very essence of these beloved pub pastimes – the crossword and the quiz – are intrinsically linked?
Let me take you on a journey through the curious world where pints and puzzles collide. The Up & Under Pub is about to uncover the untold story of the puzzle-loving, pub quiz masterminds who are shaking up the game.
The Crossword Craze
It all started with a simple grid of intersecting words – the crossword puzzle. These deceptively simple grids have captured the public’s imagination for decades, sparking a veritable craze that swept across the United States and beyond.
“Young people who want to increase their vocabulary should not deceive themselves with crosswords,” wrote Arthur Brisbane in 1925, “Let them read Shakespeare.” But the crossword puzzle would not be deterred. Newspapers and magazines warned of a “crossword craze gripping the country’s minds,” as hotels considered placing dictionaries next to the Bibles in every room and telephone companies tracked increased usage as solvers phoned friends for help.
The earliest innovators of the crossword’s form were women – from Mrs. M. B. Wood’s first published puzzle in 1914 to Mildred Jaklon’s pioneering crossword contests at the Chicago Tribune in 1929. These puzzle-loving women were seen as “flouters of Victorian gender conventions,” their seemingly innocuous grids representing a threat to the traditional social order.
The Puzzle Woman and the Crossword Craze
In the Jazz Age, the crossword puzzle and the so-called “flapper” became intertwined as icons of a changing culture. The “Crossword Mama” – a “puzzling woman” who “devotes herself to the crossword as a proxy for other fashions of the time” – was depicted as both “desexed in the fullness of her bodily and mental powers” and “oversexed with an unconscious desire to attract.”
This dangerous fantasy of the “puzzle woman” was perhaps best captured in the 1925 song “Crossword Mama,” which warned that “Papas gonna figure you out.” The crossword allowed for the breaching of verbal and physical taboos, as members of the opposite sex “say four-letter words to each other, cuddling around the newspaper page.”
But the crossword was not just a symbol of changing gender roles – it also became a locus for anxiety about the broader cultural shifts taking place. “The passion for crosswords was described as an epidemic, a virulent plague, and a national menace,” as the puzzle was seen as a “trivializing waste of brainpower” that threatened to usurp America’s “true” pastimes, like baseball.
The Anorexic and the Crossword
The crossword’s cultural resonance extended even to the realm of mental health. For me, the puzzle became a means of escape – a way to retreat from the material world and the struggles of my own body image. As a teenager struggling with anorexia, I found solace in the grid, where I could lose myself in a world of moving letters and associations.
“Crossword-puzzle constructor I found was an uncannily compatible identity-container,” I reflected. “She must be disciplined, I imagined people thinking. A little obsessive maybe – but the cultural residue of female hysteria a century later might have you convinced that this simply meant adorable.”
The crossword became a way for me to “escape into an abstract matrix of letters and words,” a replacement high for the “starvation” that had consumed me. It was a means of “bolstering my self-esteem by creating crosswords, something I knew to be difficult, precocious, and exceptional.”
But the crossword was not just a personal refuge – it was also a reflection of the cultural attitudes towards mental illness. As I later discovered in rehab, certain books were banned for “perilously read as instructional,” including those “detailing the conditions of Holocaust internment.” The anorexic’s attraction to these stories, it was believed, “could be seen as yet another symptom of her reading disorder – consuming descriptive texts as prescriptive.”
Cracking the Crossword Code
The crossword’s allure extends beyond its cultural symbolism – it is also a testament to the human desire to solve, to crack the code, to find order in the chaos. As Rosalind Krauss, the art critic and historian, observed, the grid “creates both order and expanse,” a “paradox – the promise of control and transcendence” that has drawn in puzzle-solvers for generations.
For me, the crossword’s delights “continue to reside in the contradictions of the grid, holding the limitless signifying power of language in temporary abeyance.” It is a game of associations, where the constructor must “rack her brain for all possible words and idioms associated with a desired answer.” Like a linguistic Rorschach test, the puzzle “creates meaning out of the chance encounters between words and images, proper and sometimes improper nouns.”
The crossword’s power lies in its ability to engage the mind, to tap into our innate desire to solve puzzles and uncover hidden meaning. As the puzzle constructor Merl Reagle put it in the 2006 documentary Wordplay, “When human beings see an empty square, they feel the need to fill it.” It is this “manifest destiny of the mind” that has fueled the crossword’s enduring appeal.
The Pub Quiz Connection
But the crossword is not the only puzzle that has captivated the public’s imagination. The pub quiz, with its eclectic mix of trivia and brainteasing challenges, has long been a beloved tradition in the world of pubs and bars.
“The room is abuzz with chatter, pints of frothy beer in hand, and a hush falls over the crowd as the quiz master steps up to the microphone.” This scene is familiar to anyone who has experienced the thrill of a pub quiz, where teams of friends and strangers alike come together to test their knowledge and problem-solving skills.
Just like the crossword, the pub quiz taps into our innate desire to solve puzzles and uncover hidden information. But the pub quiz takes this one step further, adding an element of competition and camaraderie that can only be found in the lively atmosphere of a local watering hole.
The Puzzle Masterminds
So, what do these two beloved pastimes have in common? The answer lies in the individuals who have dedicated their lives to crafting these mind-bending challenges – the puzzle masterminds.
These are the men and women who pour their hearts and souls into designing crosswords, pub quizzes, and a myriad of other puzzles that captivate audiences around the world. They are the unsung heroes of the puzzle world, using their keen intellects and creative flair to create the very challenges that captivate us.
Take, for example, the complaint about the game show People Puzzler. The solver took issue with the fact that the draw winner often won the game, as they were able to “snatch up the longer words first and then clean up as the last player.” This, the solver argued, “isn’t fair to the last player in the queue.”
But the puzzle mastermind behind People Puzzler would likely argue that this very element of competition and strategy is what makes the game so engaging. They meticulously crafted the rules and format to create a puzzle that is both intellectually stimulating and emotionally charged.
The Rise of the Puzzle Entrepreneur
And these puzzle masterminds are not just confined to the world of crosswords and pub quizzes. As The New Yorker article on crossword puzzles highlighted, the modern puzzle landscape is being shaped by a new breed of “puzzle entrepreneurs” – individuals who are using their puzzle-crafting skills to create innovative new challenges and experiences.
From online puzzle platforms to escape rooms and immersive events, these puzzle masterminds are pushing the boundaries of what a puzzle can be. They are blending elements of gaming, storytelling, and even performance art to create puzzles that are not just intellectually stimulating, but emotionally engaging as well.
And the pub quiz is no exception. In cities and towns around the world, you’ll find pubs and bars that have elevated the humble pub quiz into an art form. They recruit teams of puzzle experts to design intricate, multi-layered quizzes that challenge even the most seasoned pub quiz enthusiasts.
The Future of Pints and Puzzles
So, as you sip your pint and ponder the answers to the next round of trivia, take a moment to appreciate the puzzle masterminds who have dedicated their lives to creating these captivating challenges.
“The room is abuzz with chatter, pints of frothy beer in hand, and a hush falls over the crowd as the quiz master steps up to the microphone.” It’s a scene that has played out in pubs and bars for generations, and one that will continue to captivate us for years to come.
Because the beauty of the crossword and the pub quiz is that they are not just puzzles to be solved – they are windows into the human mind, reflections of our desires, our anxieties, and our enduring fascination with the unknown. And as long as there are curious minds and thirsty souls, the pints and puzzles will continue to flow.
