Anna Shechtman (born 1990/1991) is an American journalist and crossword compiler. Shechtman is film editor for the ''

Los Angeles Review of Books The ''Los Angeles Review of Books'' (''LARB'' is a literary review magazine covering the national and international book scenes. A preview version launched on Tumblr in April 2011, and the official website followed one year later in April 2012. ...

'', and compiles crossword puzzles for ''

The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...

'' and ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

''.

Early life

Shechtman grew up in a Jewish family in New York City's

Tribeca Tribeca (), originally written as TriBeCa, is a neighborhood in Lower Manhattan in New York City. Its name is a syllabic abbreviation of "Triangle Below Canal Street". The "triangle" (more accurately a quadrilateral) is bounded by Canal Stree ...

neighborhood. She earned a bachelor's degree from Swarthmore College, and in 2020 received a PhD in English Literature and Film & Media Studies at

Yale University Yale University is a Private university, private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the List of Colonial Colleges, third-oldest institution of higher education in the United Sta ...

Crosswords

Shechtman was 19 when her first crossword appeared in the ''New York Times''. Until she was 25, she created most of her puzzles by hand using graph paper and dictionaries rather than crossword software. Shechtman is the second youngest female crossword creator to be published in the ''New York Times''. After graduating college,

Will Shortz William F. Shortz (born August 26, 1952) is an American puzzle creator and editor and crossword puzzle editor for ''The New York Times''. Early life and education Will Shortz was born and raised on an Arabian horse farm in Crawfordsville, Indi ...

asked Schechtman to be his assistant at the ''New York Times''. In May 2019, ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

'' called her "the new queen of crosswords". She has been praised for including youthful references and lighthearted clues such as "'state of being awesome, in modern slang' (answer: epicness)."

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Shechtman, Anna Living people The New York Times writers The New Yorker people Crossword compilers Swarthmore College alumni 1990s births