Puzzles
The Enigma specializes in the types of puzzles that flourished in the 19th century; the crossword, invented as late as 1913, is spurned by the journal, which relegates it to the category of "extras". However, all of its puzzles are based on wordplay and linguistics.
The NPL groups puzzles into four primary categories. The oldest two are the "flat" (which has a one-line answer) and the "form" (which has a multi-line answer). Flats (verse puzzles and anagrams) were a leading type of wordplay before black-squared crosswords were invented. They seem strange to modern puzzlers, because they require inferring words from context, which is not now a familiar solving technique. Nonetheless, flats today still make up most of the puzzles in The Enigma. Cryptograms and extras, as well as catchall categories for rule-breaking puzzles, were added later. More information on these puzzle types can be found at the NPL's official website.
Read more about this topic: National Puzzlers' League
Famous quotes containing the word puzzles:
“Woman and fool are two hard things to hit,
For true no-meaning puzzles more than wit.”
—Alexander Pope (1688–1744)
“Nothing puzzles me more than time and space; and yet nothing troubles me less, as I never think about them.”
—Charles Lamb (1775–1834)