Words with Jane

My name is Deborah, and I am a puzzle addict. My morning begins with a brisk jaunt through a trio of New York Times offerings—Wordle, Connections, and Strands—and a longer commitment to the instrument of torture known as the Spelling Bee, whose seductions too often consume every spare minute until bedtime.*

So it’s probably not a good sign that I have now added a Jane Austen challenge to my list.

Janewords offers up a daily quote from one of Austen’s six completed novels. Players have three chances to guess which book the line comes from, and then, in the bonus round, another three shots at picking the character who says it. (“Narrator” is among the options.)

Take it from me: The quotations are obscure enough to challenge even the most obsessive Janeite. (Although I really should have known that it was General Tilney in Northanger Abbey who said, “Modesty such as yours--but not for the world would I pain it by open praise.” Grr.) The fun lies in trying to work out how an unfamiliar line might fit into Austen’s oeuvre: Who does it sound like? Who could they be speaking to, or about? What could be the context?

Obviously, cheating would be child's play, given the easy availability of searchable online editions of Austen's novels. But what would be the point?

Janewords, which has been online for about a month, is the brainchild of a New Yorker named Rebecca who asked to keep other personal information private. “I really enjoy daily games and puzzles . . . and I love Jane Austen’s work. . . so I wanted to will a game like this into existence!” she told me in an email. It's currently an unmonetized labor of love, though Rebecca says she would be open to a future money-making opportunity "if it felt compatible with the spirit of the project."

A new Janewords quote appears every day at midnight (US Eastern), and Rebecca has compiled a database of future offerings, along with a semi-randomized process for posting them. “The goal is to move even further towards randomization and automation, using some rules to make sure there aren’t too many quotes in a row from the same book, mixing levels of difficulty, etc.,” she wrote. “But probably there will always be some level of curation in it—particularly when it comes to choosing quotes.”

The Janewords website is currently bare-bones: No solving-streak statistics, no archive of past puzzles, and no fancy graphics—although a correct answer to the bonus round does unleash a shower of golden stars. But the game is still a work in progress: Rebecca says she welcomes feedback from Janeites.

Personally, I’m looking for those stats. But not until I stop missing the easy ones.

* Way too often. Just ask my long-suffering husband, who has been known to quote the late Princess Diana on the subject: “There are three of us in this marriage. . .”