Her diagrams were wide open, which means there’s a lot of really good, solid words in there. “She was just extremely private … an enigma in a way,” said Merl Reagle, who also constructs puzzles for The Times and other publications.īut, he added, “To describe her as a puzzle maker? That’s easy to do…. Even her editors and those inside the puzzle-making world knew little about her. Public records show she was born outside the United States on Oct. Sylvia’s entry reads thus: “Bursztyn’s bio: She writes puzzles.”īy most accounts, that was a typical response from Bursztyn, who guarded the details of her life. In the resulting chapter, Barry’s section goes on for nearly five pages. In “Crossword Crosstalk,” which is written in a chatty, back-and-forth style between the partners, Tunick described how they pitched the publisher on the biographical section of the book: “Barry, the devil-may-care, two-fisted amiable zany … and Sylvia, the inscrutable mystery woman, the Greta Garbo (J.D. Not only did the duo have different puzzle duties, they also had divergent personalities. Since joining the organization a year earlier, she had been crafting verse word puzzles that ran in its monthly magazine. He found Bursztyn, who was working as a legal secretary, through the National Puzzlers League. Tunick, who in early 1980 already had a contract with The Times, was searching for a partner to divide the labor and to work more efficiently. The puzzle makers explained how they met and how they worked together in their book “Crossword Crosstalk,” published by Capra Press in 1988. Proof the cat ate the canary? Down in the mouth. They were known for their clever wordplay featuring puns and anagrams. She would construct the grid and fill in the words according to the theme she had conceived, then send the game to Tunick, a high school English teacher from Culver City who would write the corresponding clues. Her last puzzle will appear this Sunday.ĭespite their long working relationship, Bursztyn and Tunick rarely met face to face. Their Puzzler first appeared in the Book Review, then moved to the Sunday magazine and finally landed in Sunday Calendar.

Sylvia Bursztyn creator of the Los Angeles Times Crosswordīursztyn collaborated with her puzzle partner Barry Tunick on The Times’ word game from April 1980 until his death in 2007, then continued on her own.

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