Fonts as puzzles: Can you solve them? A font created by Erik and Martin Demaine. The Demaines, a father-and-son team of algorithmic typographers, have confected an entire suite of mathematically inspired typefaces. Erik Demaine, Martin Demaine and Katie Steckles via The New York Times. by Siobhan Roberts (NYT NEWS SERVICE) .- The verb puzzle to perplex or confuse, bewilder or bemuse is of unknown origin. That kind of fits, said Martin Demaine, an artist-in-residence at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Its a puzzle where the word puzzle comes from. His son, Erik Demaine, an MIT computer scientist, agreed. Its a self-describing etymology, he said.