Cryptic crossword
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Cryptic crosswords are a particular type of crossword which have become widely popular in the UK, and several other Commonwealth nations such as Australia, New Zealand and India. Each individual clue is a word puzzle in and of itself (often involving anagrams).
In the UK, The Times is particularly noted for the difficulty of its cryptic crossword; however, all the broadsheets and tabloid-size newspapers in the UK carry both cryptic and concise crosswords on a daily basis. Cryptic crosswords are uncommon in U.S. publications, though they can be found occasionally in the New York Times, in the British-based Financial Times and in magazines with cultural pretensions such as The Nation, Harper's, and Atlantic Monthly—the latter two monthlies print in each issue a difficult puzzle with wayward rules after the style associated with The Listener. Other sources of cryptic crosswords (at all difficulty levels) are puzzle books and in Games magazine,
In essence, a cryptic clue describes its answer accurately but only when the clue is read in a very devious way. What the clue appears to say when read normally (the surface reading) is almost never anything to do with the answer and is there as a distraction. The challenge for the solver is to find a way of reading the clue that leads to the solution.
In a typical clue, the answer is described twice: One part of the clue is a definition and a second part (the subsidiary indication) describes the answer in terms of wordplay. (The subsidiary indication can be a second definition in the case of double definition clues.) One of the tasks of the solver is to work out where this boundary occurs and insert a mental pause there when reading the clue cryptically. (Sometimes the two parts are joined with a link word or phrase.)
Because a typical cryptic clue describes its answer in detail and often more than once, the solver can usually have a great deal of confidence in the answer once it has been found. This is in contrast to non-cryptic crossword clues which often have several possible answers and force the solver to use the crossing letters to distinguish which was intended.
Here is an example (taken from The Guardian crossword of Aug 6 2002, set by "Shed"):
- Very sad unfinished story about rising smoke (8)
is a clue for TRAGICAL. This breaks down as follows:
- "Very sad" is the definition.
- "Unfinished story" gives "Tal" ("tale" with one letter missing, ie "unfinished")
- "rising smoke" gives "ragic" (a "cigar" is a smoke and this is a down clue and so "rising" indicates that "cigar" should be written going up the page i.e. backwards)
- "about" means that the letters of "tal" should be put either side of "ragic", giving "tragical"
- "(8)" says that the answer is a single word of eight letters.
There are many "code words" or "indicators" which have special meaning within the cryptic crossword context (in the example above, "about", "unfinished" and "rising" all fall into this category) and learning these, or being able to spot them, is a useful and necessary part of becoming a skilled cryptic crossword solver.
Compilers or setters (or cruciverbalists as many term themselves) often use slang terms and abbreviations, generally without indication, so familiarity with these can be useful. Also words that can mean more than one thing are common, often the meaning the solver must use is completely different to the one it appears to have in the clue. Some examples are:
- Bloomer - often means flower (a thing that blooms).
- Flower - often means river (a thing that flows).
- Lead - could be the metal, or the verb.
- Novel - could be a book, or a word for new, or a code-word indicating an anagram.
- Permit - could be a noun (meaning licence) or a verb (meaning allow).
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Types of clue
Pure cryptic
The original cryptic clue, more commonly known as a double entendre or cryptic definition. Clues of this sort appeared in "straight" crosswords before cryptic crosswords existed. Here the clue appears to say one thing, but with a slight shift of viewpoint it says another. For example:
- A word of praise? (8)
would give the answer ALLELUIA, a word used by Christians to praise God, but not what first springs to mind on reading the clue. Notice the question mark - this is often (though by no means always) used by compilers to indicate this sort of clue is one where you need to interpret the words in a different fashion. The way that a clue reads as an ordinary sentence is called its surface reading and is often used to disguise the need for a different interpretation of the clue's component words.
Another one might be:
- The flower of London? (6)
which gives THAMES, a flow-er of London. Here, the surface reading suggests a flower, which disguises the fact that the name of a river is required.
Double definition
A clue may, rather than having a definition part and a wordplay part, have two definition parts. Thus
- Unseeing window covering (5)
would have the answer BLIND, because both "sightless" and "window covering" can mean blind.
These clues tend to be short; in particular, two-word clues are almost always double definition clues.
Hidden
This is when the answer appears in the clue, but it is hidden within one or more words. For example:
- Betrayed in part, she found ermine down there (10)
gives UNDERMINED, which means (or could mean - sometimes definitions are a little shaky) "betrayed" and can be found as "part" of "she found ermine down there".
Possible indicators of a hidden clue are "in part", "partially", "in", "within", "hides", "conceals", and "held by".
Another example:
- Canine, partially a dogooder (3)
gives DOG, which is a part of, or "partially", the word "dogooder", and means "canine".
Hidden backwards
Sometimes a word may not just be hidden but hidden backwards, such as in the clue:
- Net torrid? It's completely backward (6)
The answer to this clue is ROTTEN. Note that "It's" has two meanings here: the solver reads it as "it is" but it really means "it has" or "it contains". This is the hidden-word indicator in this clue.
If it was a down clue it might read: "Net torrid? Look up something." This works just as well, since the hidden word needs to be written "up" (that is, upwards).
Another example:
- Returned beer fit for a king (5)
The answer is REGAL. 'Beer', or lager, is 'returned' to make regal.
Other indicator words include "receding", "in the mirror", "going the wrong way", "to the left" or "left" (for across clues), and "rising" or "overturned" (for down clues).
Anagram
An anagram is a rearrangement of a certain section of the clue to form the answer. This is usually indicated by words such as 'strange', 'bizarre', 'muddled', 'wild', 'drunk', or any other term indicating change. One example might be:
- Chaperone undoing corset (6)
gives ESCORT, which means 'chaperone' and is an anagram of 'corset', indicated by the word 'undoing'.
Anagram clues are characterized by an indicator word adjacent to a phrase that has the same number of letters as the answer.
"Charade" clues
Here the answer is formed by joining individually clued words to make a larger word (namely, the answer).
For example:
- Outlaw leader managing money (7)
The answer is BANKING formed by BAN for "outlaw" and KING for "leader". The definition is "managing money". With this example, the words go next to each other in the clue as they do in the answer - it isn't specifically indicated. However, where the parts go in relation to others is sometimes indicated with words like "against", "after", "with" or (in a down clue) "above".
Homophones
Homophones are words that sound the same but have different meanings, such as "night" and "knight". Homophone clues always have an indicator word or phrase that has to do with phonetics, such as "reportedly", "they say", "vocal", "to the audience", and "is heard".
An example of a homophone clue is
- We hear twins shave (4)
which is a clue for PARE, which means "shave" and is a homophone of pair, or "twins". The homophone is indicated by "we hear".
The homophone indicator is always adjacent to the word that is not the answer; therefore, in the previous example, "we hear" was adjacent to "twins" and the answer was pare rather than pair.
Deletions
Deletions consist of beheadments, curtailments, and internal deletions. In beheadments, a word loses its first letter. In curtailments, it loses its last letter, and internal deletions remove an inner letter, such as the middle one.
An example of a beheadment:
- Beheaded celebrity is black cement (3)
The answer would be TAR, "black cement", which is a "celebrity", or star, without the first letter.
Other indicator words of beheadment include "don't start", "topless", and "after the first".
An example of curtailment:
- Shout, "Read!" endlessly (3)
The answer is BOO. If you ignore the punctuation, a book is a "read", and book "endlessly" is boo, a "shout".
Other indicators include "nearly" and "unfinished".
An example of internal deletion:
- Challenging sweetheart heartlessly (6)
The answer is DARING, which means "challenging", and is darling without its middle letter, or "heartlessly".
Combination clues
A clue may employ more than one method of wordplay. For example:
- Illustrious baron returns in pit (9)
The answer is HONORABLE. "Baron" "returns", or is reversed, and put inside "pit" or hole, to make honorable, or "illustrious".
Abbreviations in clues
Abbreviations are popular with crossword compilers for clueing individual letters or short sections of the answer.
Consider the following clue:
- About to come between little Desmond and worker for discourse (7)
There are two abbreviations used here. "About" is abbreviated "c" (for "circa") and "little Desmond" indicates the diminutive of Desmond, namely DES, is required. The "c" is "to come between" DES and ANT (a worker - note that compilers also use "worker" to stand for BEE or HAND), giving DESCANT, which means "discourse".
Compilers make use of a large number of these crossword abbreviations.
Ximenean clues
The compiler Ximenes drew up rules for cryptic crossword clues, designed to give clues of a good standard that are fair to the solver. (External link: Ximenean clueing (http://quicksitebuilder.cnet.com/neilshepherd/id51.html))
Compilers
The Guardian
The Guardian newspaper features cryptic crosswords set by the following compilers, among others.
- Araucaria
- Bunthorne
- Chifonie
- Enigmatist
- Janus
- Paul
- Rufus
- Shed
Further reading
Chambers Crossword Manual by Don Manley (3rd edition, Chambers 2001)
External links
- The Crossword Centre (http://www.crossword.org.uk/)
- A great British obsession (http://www.guardian.co.uk/weekend/story/0,3605,880719,00.html) (article from The Guardian, extracted from a book by Sandy Balfour)
- Description of cryptic crossword clues, guide to solving and examples (http://www.crosswordtools.com/cryptic-crosswords.php)nl:Cryptogram