(The 500th Ximenes Crossword will appear next Sunday)
FIVE HUNDRED crosswords, over 18,000 clues, over 72,000 letters in the diagrams —and more, for before this series, which started in 1945, there were fifty-nine of mine, dating from 1939, called, unworthily , enough, "Torquemada Crossword," and fifty-one more called "Torquemada Style, by Ximenes "; this austere Cardinal, less brutal than his predecessor in history at least, first had his name thus abused in 1943. So there will have been 610, about sixty short of Torquemada's total. The wonder is that neither solvers nor I seem yet to be tired of it.
What first attracted me to crosswords? An uncle in Montreal sent me an American book of them when I was at Cambridge in 1922: their clues were all definitions, but I was soon bitten and trying to compose them. A year or two later, when the craze had reached Britain, I won my first prize for composing a crossword, for a local Leicester paper. Soon cryptic clues began; and it was more fun: with them came Torquemada, and with him came at first complete perplexity and then immeasurably greater fun, although it was still stern fun, even when one got the hang of his brilliantly elusive and witty mind.
I was his devoted victim from that time until his untimely death in 1939, which was a bitter blow to many thousands. Greatly daring, I sent up a " Last Tribute to Torquemada " in crossword form with a diagram embodying an unclued quatrain and clues, as I hoped, on his lines: it was published and, still more daring, I inquired if there was to be a successor. At first there were three of us, and I know that I for one began with far too close a mimesis of my model: my efforts were a wan shadow of the real thing, but his habitués stood them somehow.
After two years a solver, to whom for this, and many other things since I owe much, introduced me to the crosswords of Afrit in the Listener. Here, I saw at once, was a master of the craft. He had stern principles of composition and cluemanship: he was as scrupulously fair as Torquemada had been: the wit was different, but it was there, and so in full measure was the difficulty. It is easier to learn a craft from a genius who curbs himself with principles than from one whose wayward flights, fair though he is, know no bounds; and much as I loved Torquemada, I know I learnt more from Afrit. The process was slow, though, and many of my clues I written even in the late forties now I make me shudder.
When people hear that I am Ximenes and feel, after a suitable show of polite awe, that they ought to ask something about it, they nearly always say, " How long does it take you to make one up? " It is a difficult question, for I have never composed a crossword at a sitting and seldom in less than half a dozen spasms, nor have I ever timed myself. I start on a " Plain " puzzle — and these outnumber the variegated by five to one — by searching Chambers, our crossword bible (unless I already have a rod in pickle), for four long words that will fit together and lend themselves to my type of lunacy in writing clues: I build a symmetrical diagram to suit them, putting unchecked spaces where their letters look likely to be tiresome, and then try to fill it, starting with the N.W. corner
If I am lucky and there are no setbacks, the diagram may take about two hours and only one spasm (not including the initial search): if it fights, it may take four hours or more and several spasms. The last quarter, generally the S.E., is the worst arid is apt ultimately to contain the highest proportion of common words: herein lies a tip for solvers, if they have not discovered it already.
The total time for clues also varies considerably. Sometimes, especially at the beginning of a spasm and in the morning, they come quickly: sometimes, especially at the end of one and in the evening, they come sluggishly; then it pays to stop and come back fresh. I may finish a set in three hours: I may take six — not often more.
Variegated types of puzzle usually take longer, but not always. The kind of torture which includes deliberate misprints in the diagram is the quickest of all to compose: when in difficulty, have a misprint! The type that takes longest is that known as " Wrong Number " and the special atrocity for next Sunday took the best part of a week at about five hours a day. It won't keep solvers busy for as long as that, for they are becoming more and more skilful: my most regular solver-correspondent over the years now regards one hour as bogey, and I doubt if bogey even for this hotch-potch will be much more than three.
*
I KEEP well ahead in composing, largely because I have plenty of time for it three times a year, partly because I like to see after an interval whether I can solve my own' clues: if I can't, I generally do something about it.
I have been lucky indeed in my solvers, and crosswords have made me many friends. Twice I have had the honour and pleasure of meeting representative - gatherings at Ximenes Dinners, and there is talk of a third: to their organisers I cannot be too grateful. On the occasion of the first of these Pendennis wrote in his column " Not all tormentors are so rewarded " I would assure my willing victims that I appreciate this, that I enjoy tormenting them, and that, if I may pervert my profession's traditional sentiments, " It hurts me as little as it hurts you."
Ximenes
The Ximenes book-plate, designed by Enid Marx