He was a creator of crosswords— those popular word puzzles featured in practically every newspaper and are considered a means of relaxation and expanding one’s vocabulary, knowledge and interest in every area of life.

He was a creator of crosswords— those popular word puzzles featured in practically every newspaper and are considered a means of relaxation and expanding one’s vocabulary, knowledge and interest in every area of life.

Some even say solving crosswords helps one to realize how little they know of the world outside, and makes one a little bit more humble and better able to deal with day-to-day problems of life. No wonder a wag once said:“Life can be so much like a crossword puzzle. It’s perplexing and tiring and you’re never quite sure if you got the right answer.”

“30yrs

Period cruciverbalist Githara has drawn crossword puzzles”

(Click to veiw his memorial)

James Kabui Githara was a practitioner of the occult art of crossword creation, known as ruciverbalism— a term coined from the Latin for word for “cross” and “word”. He was a cruciverbalist, to be exact, what people more commonly call a crossword creator, constructor, setter or compiler.

A history and economics graduate of the University of Nairobi, Mr Githara started creating the popular Nation “Simple Crossword” in 1982, tailor-made for Kenyan readers. Every day, rain or shine, for close to 30 years, he delivered the crossword to Nation House on Tom Mboya Street, and later to Nation Centre on Kimathi Street, in Nairobi, until June 12, 2012 when he passed on.

Mr Githara Africanised the crossword, which until he came on the scene was as English as tuppence, and as American as apple pie.

He literally rescued Kenyan crossword solvers from cultural imperialism— no more crossword puzzles that asked for obscure names from English history or of little known rivers in Scotland or boroughs in New York.

He served up quick crossword puzzles that were culturally neutral if not Kenyan-centric or African- centric, in Kenya’s most-read newspaper.

He was buried on Thursday  last week in his Thimbigwa shamba near Banana Hill, Kiambu County, without the fanfare befitting a crossword culture hero.

Like William Shakespeare, that famous and respected English wordsmith, he was buried with little attention paid to his passing on by his fans—the thousands of dedicated Nation crossword lovers who daily solved or tried to solve his puzzles.

But the funeral of the crossword compiler did not go unnoticed. Hundreds of his relatives, fellow villagers and friends trooped to his graveside to pay their last respects. And the well-produced 16-page funeral booklet issued to the mourners carried in all its inside pages a background motif of the various crossword grids that Mr Githara used for his Nation puzzles.

The glossy, well-edited booklet illustrating his life exploits was a collector’s item for his fans.

Mr Githara will be remembered as the man who brought joy to thousands of crossword solvers— Nation readers, who felt more at home providing solutions to clues such as “Tea growing area in Kiambu County of Kenya”, “Eastern Ugandan town near the border with Kenya”, “River forming the boundary between Tanzania and Mozambique”, “Practice in Southern Africa in which the bridegroom makes payment”, and so on, than in figuring out words and names in English culture, history and geography.

His fans are like other crossword fans anywhere in the world.

They like to have their brains challenged so they can stay sharp and learn a thing or two about the world around them, to say nothing of improving their vocabulary and communication skills and, as some  medical experts say, lessening the risk of degenerative diseases of the brain, such as Alzheimer’s.

Crossword solvers know that with every crossword they have an opportunity to refine their thinking process and pattern and have fun assessing themselves, testing their knowledge and interest in every area of life, and thinking out of the box.

Mr Githara, no doubt, knew the beauty of a good crossword lies in the quality of its clues; clues that  challenge the solver in his own culture and environment.

His crosswords were the first genuine efforts in developing local content in the media.

If his family had allowed me, I would have chosen the following wording for his graveside memorial:

“Here Lies The Nation Simple Crossword Grid, Six Down And Three Across, It Is Kabui The Kidd Who Brought The Joys Of The Crossword Closer Home”

(Nation:  FAIR PLAY | Peter Mwaura, gigirimwaura@hahoo.com)