![\"Doing](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Working-on-a-crossword-puzzle-6839381.jpg\" "\\"Doing")
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Over 12 million Britons do a crossword on a weekly basis (Image: Getty Images)<\/p>\n
More than 100 years ago the first crossword to appear in a British newspaper was printed on the pages of the Sunday Express. Tucked inside an advertisement for Selfridges, the numbered word grid puzzle \u2013 based on the first modern crossword created by Liverpudlian Arthur Wynne \u2013 delighted and infuriated readers in equal measure. A national obsession was born. Ever since that day, millions have scratched their heads, deliberated aloud and chewed the ends off of pencils in search of the right answers. But what of the puzzlemasters? How do they compile their intricate grids of white and black squares?<\/p>\n
Marc Breman<\/a> is one such setter or \u201ccruciverbalist\u201d, a term coined from the Latin words for \u201ccross\u201d and \u201cword\u201d. An undoubted puzzle grandmaster, the 64-year-old has compiled the Express\u2019s famous Crusader Crossword for 20 years. \u201cI got a job as a proof reader at the Press Association and one of their main compilers got head-hunted and in desperation they asked me if I could write puzzles,\u201d he tells the Express. \u201cI needed a job so I said \u2018yes\u2019. I didn\u2019t even take English A level and I dropped out of university because it wasn\u2019t for me but I had always been a big reader and loved words.\u201d<\/p>\n Arthur Wynne, editor and inventor of the crossword puzzle (Image: Bettmann Archive)<\/p>\n Read more: Only the sharpest minds can spot all five dogs in 19 seconds <\/a><\/p>\n Marc Breman compiles the Daily Express’s Crusader Crossword (Image: Supplied)<\/p>\n Growing up Marc loved The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster, the classic children\u2019s book, jam-packed with clever word play. It helped form his natural ability to set crosswords today.<\/p>\n \u201cPeople imagine I agonise over clues for days but it is a job of work,\u201d he smiles. \u201cI fill in the word grid and usually the clues come pretty quickly. Occasionally I might repeat myself. When I check back I see that I have written exactly the same clue before but that\u2019s how my brain works.\u201d<\/p>\n A decade ago he decided to make \u201cthe hardest puzzle I could, just for fun\u201d on his own website. \u201cIt was clearly not the world\u2019s hardest puzzle, although annoyingly it was sold that way \u2013 it was just the hardest puzzle I could make,\u201d he laughs. \u201cHowever it was only a matter of hours before the first correct solutions came in. Nearly a week later, 32 people had sent in completed grids. Even the ones who told me that it was \u2018hardly the hardest\u2019 still had fun and thanked me for it.\u201d<\/p>\n It is still available to try today on Marc’s website marcbreman.london\/benchmarc\/<\/a><\/p>\n While most of his work comes from writing these days \u2013 he is currently co-writing a series of farces for the stage \u2013 Marc adores setting brainteasers for the loyal readers of the Express. \u201cI do still really enjoy doing the Crusader after all these years,\u201d he says. \u201cWhen I first started it I was told to make it really difficult but then they got back to me and said \u2018er, not that difficult\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n What\u2019s the cryptic clue he\u2019s most proud to have written? \u201cSlip came off and decorum initially was lost, 9 letters\u201d (Misplaced),\u201d he beams.<\/p>\n Marc, who toured with the likes of Elton John<\/a> and Donovan in his younger years as a professional guitarist with the band The Stargazers, doesn\u2019t worry artificial intelligence will take his last two remaining national newspaper crosswords from him. Hattie French, a sub-editor at PA Puzzles. inherited her love of crosswords from her father (Image: Mirror picdesk)<\/p>\n Crossword setter and mum-of-two Nicola Quinton from Weston-Super-Mare (Image: Supplied)<\/p>\n That\u2019s true \u2013 it\u2019s hard to imagine AI writing the clue, \u201cBar of soap, 6, 6\u201d (Rovers Return<\/a>) for example. \u201cI love that one,\u201d Marc says, \u201cbut unfortunately I can\u2019t claim it as one of mine.\u201d<\/p>\n While being a crossword compiler is, in his words, \u201ca desperately solitary occupation\u201d, he is not alone in the field. Hattie French compiles the Sunday Express Pub Quiz, the Daily Express small crosswords and Make You Very Crossword. The 40-year-old also checks the Crusader crosswords compiled by Marc.<\/p>\n A former online business directory manager, Hattie got her job after answering an advert for puzzles sub-editor in 2019. \u201cMy dad taught me to do cryptic crosswords when I was 10 and I have always loved puzzles, quizzes and word searches,\u201d she says. \u201cI didn\u2019t realise though that what was a hobby could be an actual dream job for me.\u201d<\/p>\n Hattie is one of 20 people employed by the puzzles department at PA Media in Bristol<\/a>. On work nights out, she laughs that she and colleagues make \u201ca ferocious pub quiz team. The swathes of trivia we know between us!\u201d.<\/p>\n While Hattie enjoys total job satisfaction, she has to ensure she is always alert and on form. \u201cYou have to focus and concentrate but we have systems in place to make sure mistakes are not made and there is no repetition,\u201d she explains.<\/p>\n Nicola Quinton has compiled the Sunday Express Jumbo General Knowledge Crossword since 2007. The mum-of-two from Weston-Super-Mare, Somerset<\/a>, succeeded the role from legendary Sunday Express puzzles page compiler Valerie Lockwood who worked well into her 80s.<\/p>\n \u201cI use the same four grids on rotation that Valerie used,\u201d outlines Nicola of her approach. \u201cShe had a very specific style and was very wordy, which I have changed over the years.\u201d<\/p>\n Like Marc, Nicola, an English graduate, fell into puzzle writing by chance after starting at a press agency as a sub-editor.
Aside from being a puzzle fiend, Marc is an author, playwright, musician and composer who lives in Belsize Park, north London<\/a> with his wife Carol. And he only became a crossword compiler by chance 30 years ago.<\/p>\n![\"Arthur](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Arthur-Wynne-editor-and-inventor-of-the-crossword-puzzle-6839305.jpg\" "\\"Arthur")
<\/p>\n![\"Marc](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Marc-Breman-crossword-setter-6839416.jpg\" "\\"Marc")
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\u201cAs far as straight puzzles go, there is already software that completes a grid, clues and all, within seconds,\u201d he ponders. \u201cIt\u2019s possible that someone will come up with software that approximates cryptic clues sufficiently closely for newspaper editors to consider it.\u201cBut with cryptic crosswords I can\u2019t see AI being able to manage the humour which is injected into it.\u201d<\/p>\n![\"Hattie](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Hattie-French-a-sub-editor-at-PA-Puzzles-6839316.jpg\" "\\"Hattie")
<\/p>\n![\"Crossword](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Crossword-setter-Nicola-Quinton-6839326.jpg\" "\\"Crossword")
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She admits the internet has speeded up research of general knowledge questions but she never uses software to populate grids. She starts her grid by always filling in the longest word first.<\/p>\n