Cryptic Crossword Solving Guide

(I'm publishing this early. Don't tell anyone.)

Monday's post was a cryptic crossword puzzle. Apparently these things are incredibly popular in England, but most Americans have never heard of them. This makes me sad, because cryptic crosswords are awesome. Unlike typical crosswords, which often emphasize knowledge of trivia, cryptic crosswords are instead all about lateral thinking and decoding answer clues. That's not to say that a healthy vocabulary isn't still a powerful solving tool, but it's not the only weapon at your disposal.

In the hopes that more people will actually attempt the one I posted, I present here a solving guide, based solely on my own experience solving and creating these buggers. I claim no expertise.

THE BASICS

A cryptic crossword clue contains two parts - a standard crossword-style definition, and what's generally called a "wordplay" component. The wordplay component provides playful instructions as to how the answer might alternatively be discovered - we'll get to some examples below. Here's the catch: You're not told which part of the clue is which. The two parts are never mixed*, and at most there will be a preposition between them - there aren't any extraneous words, generally. That means you'll never find a definition in the middle of a clue; it will always be at one end or the other.

To further complicate matters, good cryptic clues have what's called "surface sense" - that is, they seem to have meaning as a whole, despite the fact that in reality they're actually two joined parts. (“Meaning” is a relative term, here, as some of my clues attest. “Something that turns powerless spud into R&R (7)” is not exactly Shakespeare.) To achieve surface sense, the puzzle creator is allowed to add any punctuation he or she likes, and often makes use of homonyms (words that mean two or more different things). Seeing beyond surface sense is one of the keys to decoding a cryptic clue.

Standard crossword fare applies. Question marks often indicate punny definitions, though they may also be used simply to maintain surface sense.

*I lied about the two parts of a clue never being mixed, but it was for your own good. 99% of the time, that's a true statement. If a clue ends in an exclamation point, however, it may be a signal that the entire clue is both definition and wordplay. The classic example is "Terribly enraged!" (7), giving the answer "angered" (see Anagrams, below).

WORDPLAY COMPONENTS

Technically, the material in the Basics section is all you need to know to get started. But uh. Good luck with that.

The truth is that though there are no hard and fast rules about what sorts of wordplay clues may use, there are a handful of common methods that show up over and over. Learning to recognize them is probably the single most important skill required to solve cryptics.

A list of common strategies follows. Note that many clues combine more than one of the elements described below.

Anagrams

Easily the most common wordplay element, anagrams are often cued by words that indicate destruction, movement, unusualness or change – look for adjectives like “dancing” or “bizarre” and verbs like “confuse” or “demolish.” Another thing to look for: If a word or phrase near a keyword like one of these contains exactly as many letters as the answer, it’s especially likely you’re dealing with an anagram.

Example from Monday’s puzzle:

Light flub ruined traditional Spanish entertainment (9)

SOLUTION

“Ruined” suggests an anagram; note that “light flub” contains nine letters, the same number as the answer. The rest of the clue, then, must be the definition. The answer, an anagram of “light flub,” is “bullfight.”

Bits and Pieces

Many people call these “additions and deletions,” but they’re so regularly cued by the phrase “bit of” or “piece of” that I prefer to think of them this way. Bits and pieces wordplay is when a single letter (most commonly the first, but sometimes the last or middle letter) is taken from a clue word and added or deleted from another clue word. In addition to “bit” and “piece” (both of which almost always suggest taking the first letter of the associated word), look for words like “front,” “start,” “ending,” “top,” “head,” “middle,”  “right,” or “left”—though be careful with that last one; “left” might also cue a reversal (see Reversals, below).

Addition and deletion logic doesn’t need to apply to a single letter, but the simple combining of words to form a larger word seems intuitive enough that I don’t think it needs detailing.

Examples from Monday’s puzzle:

Even footless, Adam loved her (3)

SOLUTION

"Footless" suggests a last-letter deletion; lop off the last letter of "even" for the answer, "Eve" - Adam's biblical wife.

Containers

Containers are words-within-words – for example, the word “cryptic” is contained within the phrase “decrypt icons.” Usually, though not always, contained words span multiple clue words, making them harder to spot. Look for cue phrases like “included in,” “wrapped around,” or “hidden inside.” A common trick is to combine a container with a reversal (see Reversals, below), so that the answer is hidden backwards within a clue phrase.

Example from Monday’s puzzle:

Whale secretion found in chamber—"Gr," I say (9)

SOLUTION

“Found in” is the cue, here, and it suggests that “whale secretion” is the definition part, since it’s what is apparently “found in” the rest of the clue: chamber—"Gr," I say holds the answer, “ambergris.”

Double Definitions

The most basic way to clue a word: Instead of offering a definition part and a wordplay part, these clues present two definition parts. Fairly easy to solve, but usually dastardly to create, since they don’t often leave much wiggle room for surface-sense-creation. Tip: If you ever have a two-word clue that doesn’t end in an exclamation point, it has to be one of these.

Example from Monday’s puzzle:

Toothpaste emblem (5)

SOLUTION

Do I even have to explain this one? The answer, which both words in the clue define, is “crest.”

Homophones

I mentioned before that homonyms are one of a solver’s worst enemies, but homophones (words that sound the same) show up on occasion, too. Fortunately, these are usually very easy to recognize, as the ways to cue them are limited to words that suggest listening or speaking something aloud: “to the audience,” “sounds like,” and “said aloud” are all common keyphrases.

Be warned, however, that devious clue-makers sometimes take advantage of this, and work these phrases into clues that don’t involve homophones. Tip: If you see a homophone keyword or phrase in the middle of a clue and presented in such a way that it’s not clear whether the text before it or after it should be voiced, it’s likely one of these false homophone clues. Otherwise, there’s no way to tell which version of the word is supposed to be entered into the grid. An exception to the exception: If the homophonic words are of different length, there’s no risk of this confusion.

Example from Monday’s puzzle:

Sounds like Shrek’s Mike Bogs (5)

SOLUTION

“Sounds like” is the obvious cue, here. “Shrek’s Mike” refers to Mike Myers, whose last name sounds like a word meaning “bogs”—the answer, “mires.”

Reversals

Reversals are exactly what they sound like. These clues involve reversing the order of letters in a clue word (or, more often, a word defined in the wordplay portion of the clue). “Turned,” “flipped,” “in reverse” and the like are common keywords; also look for references to “left” and “up,” especially in across and down entries respectively.

Example from Monday’s puzzle:

“Pop!” causes terminal uproar from back to front (4)

SOLUTION

This is an example of a clue with multiple wordplay elements, as well as a clue that exploits homonyms to throw off the solver. “From back to front” is the reversal keyphrase, though at first it’s hard to tell how much of the rest of the clue it applies to. Since it’s a keyphrase, the definition must be at the other end of the clue; it’s likely just “pop,” since “pop causes” or “pop causes terminal” don’t mean anything.

“Causes terminal,” then, must be part of the wordplay. “Terminal” here is a cue for an addition, specifying the last letter of “causes.” A synonym for “uproar” is “ado”; if we reverse that, we get “oda.” S + oda = “soda,” the answer—a definition of “pop” different from the one implied by surface sense.

Other Tricks

State codes (e.g., “Georgia” for “ga”), roman numerals (e.g., “10” for “x”), and other common abbreviations (e.g., “University” for “u,” “energy” for “e,” “1000” for “g” or “k”) are all fair game. If a clue mentions Rev. Spooner, it almost certainly contains a spoonerism—a phrase whose first sounds have been flipped, as in “plot hate” for “hot plate.”

That’s it! I’ll post the full answer set (with brief explanations) next Monday, along with a lateral thinking puzzle culled from an event my brother-in-law and I hosted earlier this year. If anyone manages to solve the crossword (or even most of it) before Monday, I’ll be happy to brag on their behalf for all to see.