Australian Crosswords

What kind of solver are you? A few of us from the Australian Crossword Club meet occasionally for lunch at the Harold Park Hotel to fill in the time between the official ACC functions every November. We don’t talk about crosswords all the time, but there is often a variety of puzzles available on the table for people to fill in leisurely. Sometimes we make a game of it and pass around a puzzle where a clue must be solved under time pressure. We are a small merry band, yet there are different solving abilities, and we are all different kinds of solvers, and I think this reflects the solving community at large.
Let’s look at a solver that I would call a completer: this solver is only interested in finishing the crossword – the journey doesn’t really matter. They are only satisfied when all the answers are in and may not be certain everything is right. Wordplays are checked casually, and so a few wrong answers may have to be fixed before the job is done. As the end is all the matters, quality of the clues and the crossword in general aren’t that important and difficulty is directly related to the time taken to finish the crossword. Crossword status is important and they are keen to announce that they have already completed today’s crossword. I know there are solvers out there like this as crossword blog postings reflect it. Personally, I like the fact that a cryptic crossword doesn’t have to be finished to be enjoyed as every clue, if properly constructed, can provide satisfaction in its own right. It’s nice to finish but also nice to enjoy the solving journey.

A few weeks ago a regular contributor and friend, Steve, pointed out a flaw in one of my clues: Author’s claim must be heard (5).  Take a look a the discussion here. It took me a while to understand exactly what the problem was, probably explaining how the flaw wasn’t spotted during clueing or checking. It was simple really, I’d combined two incompatible techniques but failed to notice. As I thought more about what Steve had highlighted, I realised this was a technical issue, not an error that would stop a solver, like a missing letter in an anagram or a misspelt answer. I believe 99% of solvers aren’t concerned about technical errors largely because they don’t hinder solving and the goal of most solvers is simply to complete each clue. This doesn’t change my approach, as I aim to entertain 100% of my solvers and make my crosswords accessible to all. This whole event has got me thinking more about the different types of solvers out there, and I’ll aim to profile these types over the coming weeks. Different crossword styles have evolved largely due to variations in solvers’ expectations and skill, not the other way around. A supportable claim? We shall see.

A regular contributor to this blog asked me about 2-down, Dysfunctional topic men dislike ultimately? (9), a type of clue known in the trade as an &lit. This translates to “and literally”, and refers to the duplicity of the clue which represents the definition and wordplay at the same time. &lit clues are strange animals as they fit the standard “two ways to the answer” cryptic clue profile, but don’t actually include anything that tells the solver what’s going on. In American cryptic crosswords, an “!” must be inserted at the end to indicate an &lit clue, but some see this as giving the game away, so it hasn’t been universally adopted. A question mark at least is required IMO to indicate that something different is going on. A poster in a crossword newsgroup once suggested that an &lit could easily go unnoticed as it may appear to be just a so-so cryptic definition. I think this is probably true as cryptic definitions are common in the modern cryptic crossword and a solver may not think to look beyond the definition aspect of a clue. Good, true &lits are relatively rare. They come about usually through the normal process of trying to tie in the definition with the wordplay, which should be a setter’s goal for every clue. It’s common to find something in the wordplay that links with the definition, but much less common to find that the wordplay can be manipulated to form a viable definition that stands up in its own right. A much more likely scenario is the creation of a semi-&lit clue, where the wordplay is added to in order to make a viable definition.

So how did I create 2-down? The same way I create most clues:

1.   Look up every definition I can find for the answer word to arm myself with as much clueing ammo as possible.
2.   Look for “simple” cryptic structures like hiddens, charades and container and its contents.
3.   Use an anagram function to “see” what possibilities are available for full anagrams, partial anagrams, anagram combinations with other devices, and subtractive anagrams.
4.  See if anything pops outs from the steps above, in particular looking for a possible relationship between the definitions found in 1. and words that have materialised through 2-3.
5.   Decide on a definition and device and put them together.

In this case I had chosen (anagram of MEN and TOPIC) + E, and that would work well with just about any definition available, so my next task was to pick an anagram indicator. It was during this process that I realised the potential of the clue and actively set about looking for a suitable indicator and fitting “E” in some way to the end. Note that this type of thing (identifying the possibility of an &lit) happens relatively regularly but making it work isn’t easy and can take a lot of unrewarded time, so rather than ending up with something dodgy, a standard cryptic clue would be the usual result.

At one stage in my setting career I believed it wasn’t possible to intentionally set out to create an &lit and to some extent I think this is still true, however, as you can see from above, opportunities do arise, and perhaps with a great deal of persistence, something resembling an &lit could be created.