As a child, Terry Landau used to look over her mother's shoulder as she did the daily crossword puzzle in the New York Herald Tribune. By age 15, she was hooked. Today, Landau still does daily puzzles, but quite differently from the way her mother did.
Every night about 10, the 52-year-old paralegal logs on to the Internet from her Manhattan apartment to do the next day's puzzle on The New York Times Web site. Using crossword puzzle software, she types her answers into the black-and-white grid on the screen.
When she finishes, Landau can immediately check her answers, and discuss the day's puzzle with other solvers in a chat room on the Times Web site, www.nytimes.com.
"I don't get ink on my fingers anymore," she said.
Landau's experience is just one example of how technology is revitalizing one of America's most popular games. The Internet and new software have changed how people create and solve crosswords.
Chat rooms and Web sites have created a community where none existed and attracted younger players. With the help of online tutorials and puzzle-making software, more novices have begun creating crosswords.
`Never more popular'
Today, more than 50 million Americans do crosswords, and at least one appears in almost every newspaper (The Sun carries two). The simple and ubiquitous game, which was never trademarked or copyrighted, is a 20th-century American invention. Crossword fans - also known as cruciverbalists, from the Latin - have been solving puzzles since the first one appeared in the New York World in 1913.
From the volume of mail, phone calls, and media attention he receives, Will Shortz, the editor of The New York Times crossword puzzle, believes that crosswords are enjoying a renaissance. "My feeling is that crosswords have never been more popular," he said.
A record number of people attended last month's American Crossword Tournament in Stamford, Conn. Shortz, who organized the tournament, said attendance was up 30 percent from last year to 401 participants.
This is not the first crossword craze. After Simon & Schuster began printing books of puzzles in 1924, Americans developed crossword fever. In New York City, the public library had to limit dictionary use to five minutes per person. Dictionaries were placed in each train car for commuters. Shortz's favorite artifact from this period is an abridged dictionary that could be worn on the wrist in place of a watch.
