![]() ![]() Doctor Watson’s kit – or bits of modern office furniture (12) (Biddlecombe, 2009)Ĭhoices in anagram solving – it’s a personal decisionīut there’s more to the psychology of anagram solving than misdirection, and research suggests a few ways we might get better at setting and solving anagram clues.Tube taken to theatre for three-act play (8) (Aarons, 2015).As for rebus clue types and riddles/puns, this is because the solver has to relax the ingrained rules of reading in order to overcome their automatic understanding of the text, allowing a new interpretation of the problem to unfold. ![]() Because of the level of misdirection in the surface reading, and the heavy disguise of the clue components, we’d expect these better crafted anagrams to trigger the Penny Drop Moment (PDM) much more successfully. Misdirection in anagram cluesĪll the same, many cryptic crossword setters employ great ingenuity in adapting the indicator to fit the context, and this can lead to a much more sophisticated clue. ![]() Find rare new frequencies beyond the visible range (8) (Johnstone, 2001).For this reason, it’s pretty difficult to camouflage the mechanics of the clue, meaning that this clue type often jumps out at an experienced solver. Anagram clues typically contain both the letters to be rearranged, and some type of adjacent indicator signalling that they need to be jumbled to form a new word. Often thought of as an easy way into a crossword, anagram clues are a staple of cryptic crosswords. Maybe you, too, scan the list of clues hoping for an anagram clue or two? In the third part of our ‘explainer’ series, Kathryn Friedlander takes a look at the psychology behind this popular clue form. And as cryptic nuts will tell you: when creativeness and lies are exploited, you spell essential service.It’s a common experience – you have a blank grid in front of you, 1A isn’t helping, and there’s no obvious way to get going. Because crosswords exploit creativeness and lies. Start on the simple stuff (not mine), and get gamer as you go. Life is angsty enough without thumping your brain against a wall. Remember, be kind to yourself along the way. Handy for cryptic tyros when it comes to sniffing out definitions. Subscribe at for a win-win-win deal, helping sellers by securing a copy, as well as snaring a splendid two-speed crossword, where dual clues (quick and cryptic) lead to one set of answers. Thanks to our lockdown lives, with fewer kerbside encounters, vendors are needing our support even more. Short of plugging my latest how-to book, let me urge you to subscribe to The Big Issue. Rather than cheating, that’s self-teaching. Get hooked, and you start to work backwards, using today’s answers to fathom yesterday’s clues. Practise and you improve, like oboe or origami. Thanks to brevity, double-definitions are quicker to spot on the page. Cryptic clues embody misdirection, projecting bogus pictures to lull us into narrative your task is to see beyond the pretence to pinpoint the clue’s own mechanics. So, what word means both muffler and bolt?įorget mechanics, your Subaru Outback. With only two words to ponder, the recipe must be double-def as word-nerds know this style, where each word denotes the answer in a different light. Take this American gem: Muffler bolt (5). Another formula is the double-definition, the canniest way to enter a blank grid. A-la baking, cryptics offer multiple recipes, with anagram the rifest of eight purebred types. Like baking, you must rise to the challenge, develop an appetite for the ritual. Nobody conquers sourdough overnight, and ditto for cryptic solving. That command goes to isolate the definition as protective gear, a piece of apparel lurking in a deviant blend of haunts. See how it works? Try a leaner anagram: Protective gear from criminal haunts (6) Here the anagram prod is criminal, as in devious. Fighting for the answer: Emilia Clarke in you-know-what. ![]()
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