Two Thousand Years of Puzzling with Chris Maslanka
Our College Enigmatist, alumnus Chris Maslanka (1973, Physics), hosted a new series on the history of puzzles and puzzling on Radio 4 last week.
Two Thousand Years of Puzzling saw Chris trace the history of mankind’s seemingly insatiable delight in puzzles, with five twelve-minute episodes following the developments of the Maze, of riddles, of mathematical puzzles and the use of grids, as well as covering the period of the 19th century during which the middle class established enough leisure to grow puzzling into a business.
Chris is a writer and broadcaster, who designs puzzles for the Guardian and New Humanist as well as St Catherine’s College. At St Catz, he provides the annual clue (in a series of fifty) published in The Year for the contents of the time capsule buried under the College.
You can listen to the entire series of Two Thousand Years of Puzzling now, on the BBC website.