Australian Crosswords

In 2006 I was contacted by a weekly medical publication about doing a medically-themed cryptic. I’ve always had problems setting a price for crosswords of all kinds – it’s not totally about the time taken to set a crossword, it’s more about what the requesting publication is prepared to pay. I think of myself as an artist of sorts, and believe that years of experience should count more than the actual hours taken to set a crossword. The medically-themed cryptic had me at a loss – the task wouldn’t be easy, but the publication itself had a relatively small circulation (compared to state-based papers and magazines), so what should I ask for? In my experience such publications expected to pay a low amount, but I needed to make sure it was worth my time and effort, especially as I was creating an online version as well as part of the deal. Before I could submit my price, though, the medical publication told me the amount they were willing to pay (it happens sometimes) which was above what would have been my asking price. Just as well, since the medically-themed cryptic which I did for a year was the hardest regular cryptic I’ve written. To put it simply, medical terminology is very precise and generally unambiguous, making the definition side of any cryptic clue hard to disguise. Using definitions like “disease” or “complaint” isn’t good enough in a clue that could point to 1000s of answers, both common and obscure. I enjoyed the challenge though and it was amazing how many medical terms were buried in the dictionary and how many common words had medical meanings. The trick with all themed crosswords is to take advantage of all elements involved: answer, surface reading, words/terms in the definition, and words/terms in the wordplay. The simple inclusion of “doctor” = DR somewhere in a clue is enough to add to a theme even though the definition and/or answer may have no medical connection at all. After a year the crossword was axed due to falling income but I learnt a lot through the experience. The publication is still going but with different owners, and times are different now – a lot less printed advertising which ultimately finances the whole enterprise. I now do just one crossword a year for them which effectively summarises a whole year’s worth of articles, featuring the main topics. It’s not cryptic, but large and I have to read 50 or so medical articles and pull out key words in order to assemble enough fodder to generate a decent grid of words. Hard work, but in an environment where there’s not a lot of work available, I’m very grateful for it.

A few weeks ago I saw a themed cryptic (of sorts) that was quite unusual: it had the “theme” (a set of related items) hidden in the solution squares, yet the crossword itself had nothing to do with the theme. That is, the clues and the answers had no relationship with the hidden theme words, in fact, instructions were added to allow solvers to “play the game” with the completed grid. I guess you could claim that the puzzle was flexible in that it could be solved like normal and left, or it could be solved and enjoyed for those interested. In a normal theme puzzle, the theme itself (once discovered) should assist a solver by limiting what certain answers could be. Likewise, if a message or words are hidden in the letters in the grid, a solver may deduce what’s needed and this allows them to preload the grid with letters of answers that are not yet solved. I know some love themed crosswords, but in my experience they can be hit-or-miss as the theme may not be a strong area for a solver, or like me, constant cross-referencing (where used) serves as an intolerable distraction. Theme crosswords can also feel a little forced, as words get used that may not be chosen by a setter under normal circumstances due to the difficulty of clueing them. The result may be some ordinary clues all in the name of adding to the theme.