16. Crosswords – exercise of the Brain

The morning dose of crossword solving has become almost an addiction with us. A good addiction no doubt; it improves your vocabulary and knowledge and makes your mind and memory sharper. Between the two of us we manage to solve most of the crosswords of the few newspapers that we get every day.  The one in the TOI has become a cakewalk because most of the clues and answers are repetitive and on a few bad days it’s full of names which are totally unknown to us so we just dump it and promise ourselves a change of newspaper, but being creatures of habit…. Our financial- newspaper, carries the cryptic crossword which can really tax the grey cells and make them groan. The very purpose of cryptic crosswords is to confuse and confound you. Cryptic means secret or mysterious.  However, once you’ve got a hang of it, it can give you hours of pleasurable brain exercise much like a gym workout for your body. 

At first sight the clues read like gibberish and can throw you off completely but if you persist a little you will make sense of it. I took to it after I saw a visiting cousin solve some without any effort. She explained a few methods and then gradually, trying to make sense of it with both the clues and answers in hand, I was able to figure out how to decode them. The idea is to find out what kind of a clue it is – an Anagram, or Synonym or a Charade or there is a word hidden in clear sight. Believe you me it can be quiet thrilling. Let me dwell on each type to make it clearer.

SYNONYM is the most common technique used. But let me warn you that they are seldom straightforward and may not pertain to the most obvious synonym of the word/s. For instance, supporter of visual art (5). EASEL or fiancé doing a swap earning money (7, 2, 5) ENGAGED IN TRADE are some easy ones. Generally one part of the clue will provide the synonym and the other part will give you the hint to solve it eg. no place for horses that might fall down (8) UNSTABLE, here ‘that might fall down’ is the synonym and ‘no place for horses’ gives a broad hint to it.

Many a times the synonym clues are just a play on words, which are mostly easy and the first ones I get completed, eg you’re out of spirits when he leaves (8) EXORCIST or ghost of a drink (6) SPIRIT. This leads me to the –

&LIT (meaning ‘literally so’) clues (I just found out they are called that). These clues mostly have the ! (apostrophe) mark at the end and indicate that the whole clue is the definition. An example I am seeing now is – a bully for your astrologer! (7) That’s TAUREAN I guess. Incidentally, the tense of the clue and the answer as well as the number ie if it is singular or plural will grammatically, remain the same in the answer as in the clue.

CRYPTIC DEFINITION clues mostly denoted by ? (question mark) require you to think outside the box, for instance sample this – twice the man when given a beating? (6) TOMTOM or here’s another – behave like a very hungry bird? (6) RAVEN.

ABBREVIATIONS AND ROMAN NUMBERS are frequently referred to in the clues. Thus if ‘five’, ‘six’, ‘ten’ etc is mentioned it is hinting at the letters V, VI, X in the answer. Similarly unspecified numbers like ‘many’ ‘large’ etc may suggest the Roman numbers C, D, or M. The Queen, Ruler, Sovereign, Leader etc. calls for the abbreviation ER in the answer. ‘Bridge Partners’ calls for N S, E W or ‘Compass Points’ or ‘bearings’ the directions like SE, NE etc. ‘Stranger’  or ‘alien’ is ET; ‘Big City’ is NY; ‘troops’ is MEN etc.

The ‘French’, ‘Italian’ or ‘German’ refers to LE, LA, LES or DES (Fr), IL (It) and DER (Gr) , eg. the French go over a meadow (3) LEA. You will discover plenty of these as you start your crossword journey.

ANAGRAMS are also a common technique used but you have to learn to identify the word /s which constitute the anagram. You will know  the clue is hinting at an anagram if you see words like “anew”, “altered”, “bad”, “damaged”, “attack”, ”arrange” etc. Once you know it’s an anagram you have to look for the word/s which constitutes it. The length of the word (no. of letters) normally gives a hint to that, eg. They attack Red’s air of instability (7)  - here the word “attack” hinted at it being an anagram and clearly pointed at ‘Red’s air’ (7 letters) as the words in play, the answer being RAIDERS.

Many a times it is not so straight forward. In this one the words of the anagram are scattered – Unit is very unruly in this seat of learning (10) UNIVERSITY. Of course ‘unruly’ being the clue that it is an anagram and also, incidentally, that the letters are not in one place (good clue!).

Once in a while the compiler will give a two step clue. First you find a synonym and then make an anagram of that (these really get my goat!) eg. A sideways view of the tottering aristocracy (6) TILTED. Titled being the synonym of aristocracy and tilted its anagram for the synonym of sideways.

HIDDEN OR EMBEDDED WORDS also called CONTAINERS are indicated by hints like ‘in’, ‘inside’, ‘in part’, ‘held by’, ‘some’ etc. The letters of the word will be in the exact order but may be spread over 2 or more words. Once you get the hang of identifying them, they are perhaps, the easiest and bring the “Aha!” moment the fastest. Here’s one – what’s in the bag has Terry horrified (6) AGHAST.

CHARADES - you may have played the game. Well! Now you can use it to solve some clues. Similar to the game, the clue is split into many parts, which when taken together, form the answer. An example will clarify -  coming for the opening after seeing the publicity (6) ADVENT. The word is ‘coming’ and the charade – VENT=opening which comes ‘after’ AD=publicity. 

HOMOPHONES are another interesting technique used. In this the clue hints at words which ‘sound’ alike for instance – mail – male, sail – sale, rite – right, birth – berth etc. The indicators to it being a homophone would be words like, ‘it sounds like’, ‘reference to’, ‘on the radio’, ‘vocally’ etc. if the words are the same length I just wait till the crossing words are filled in to find out which one to fill. A sample would be, employ sound sheep (3) USE (EWES).

I have given the main techniques used by compilers and hope it will prove sufficient to get you started on this wonderful past-time.