Never a cross word – 33

Tags

anagrams, crossword puzzles, cryptic clues, English for speakers of other languages, learning methodologies, words within words

Last week I left you this clue to solve:

He wrote of crimes involving horrendous carnality (3,6,5,5)

The answer, an anagram of ‘horrendous carnality’, is:

SIR ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE

I suggested last week that this was quite an apt anagram, but I am now having second thoughts (meaning I am not so sure).  Conan Doyle, the author of stories about the famous detective Sherlock Holmes, wrote about horrendous (horrible, terrifying) crimes – but I am not confident that the crimes could be said to involve horrendous ‘carnality’.  Carnality, defined here, is generally associated with a sexual element, which Conan Doyle’s stories did not really include.

You can read more about Sir Arthur Conan Doyle here.

Now try these, both from the Times crossword puzzle No. 26,103 dated 20th May 2015.  They bring out some interesting points of English – which, I should explain to newcomers, is what this series is all about; see here.

The first clue reads:

Company designs toilets to limit gallons (5)

The answer (meaning company designs) is:

LOGOS

Why?  Because in English it is becoming increasingly popular in polite society to refer to a toilet or lavatory as a loo.  This is an example of what is known as a euphemism, which means avoiding using a direct word for something slightly awkward or embarrassing.  Other examples of modern euphemisms include ‘pass away’ meaning ‘die’ (‘he passed away last week’); or ‘let go’ meaning ‘to fire (or ‘sack’) someone’ (‘we had to let him go’).

So if you are in the UK (particularly I suspect in the South of England, where people are less direct) and you want to find a lavatory you could say to someone ‘please could you tell me where the loo is?’  In the USA, however, you would use another euphemism:  ‘where is the bathroom?’ or – in a public place – ‘where is the rest room?’

So, armed with that knowledge, ‘toilets’ in the clue translates into LOOS.  And since G is an abbreviation for ‘gallons’ you can see where the answer comes from (the LOOS ‘limits’ the G in gallons by keeping it inside the word).

A logo is defined (here) as a symbol used by a company to promote its products or services.  Some well-known examples may be seen here.

And if you are unfamiliar with the word gallon, it is a unit of volume, defined here.  In the UK a gallon is equivalent to 4.55 litres.  A US gallon is slightly smaller.  If you fill up a car at a petrol station (in the US a gas station) you will typically put about 10 gallons or more in the tank.  Note that a ten gallon hat is a large hat, though not literally 10 gallons in volume!

The second clue is:

The blues period of American history (10)

Solving this clue relies on an elementary knowledge of American history.  The solution (meaning both ‘the blues’ and ‘period of American history’) is:

DEPRESSION

The reason that is the correct answer is that if you are mildly depressed (feeling sad) you are said to have the blues.  According to this source the expression comes from blue devils, imaginary creatures or spirits thought many years ago to affect one’s mood.  The distinctive style of sad or soulful singing known as ‘the blues’ was – and still is – an important musical genre (type of music), coming originally from the Southern part of the USA and probably dating back to the 1890s, see here.  I should add, with reference to the discussion of the previous clue, that suffering from the blues can be used as a euphemism for more serious forms of mental illness and having the baby blues is a euphemism for post-natal depression.

So the ‘blues’ in the clue means ‘depression’ and ‘The Depression’ (or the ‘Great Depression’) was also a well-known economic crisis in America which began in August 1929.  For more information please see Wikipedia here.

So there we have it: three short cryptic crossword clues have acted as a catalyst for us to cover subjects ranging from Sherlock Holmes to the Great Depression – with time on the way to check out some company logos, put a gallon in the tank, sing the blues and even pay a visit to the loo.  Such is the unpredictable, but I hope valuable and interesting, way of looking at authentic English using this methodology.  Let’s see where we wind up next time.

Finally, from the same crossword, try this:

Show how in reorganisation a list of people is required (4,3)

You should know by now what a word like ‘reorganisation’ hints at.  The answer will appear next week.

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Never a cross word – 32

Tags

anagrams, crossword puzzles, cryptic clues, English for speakers of other languages, learning methodologies, words within words

Last week I left you this clue to solve:

Arrived ahead of artist, producer of pictures (6)

And I gave you a strong hint that ‘artist’ was likely to be represented by the letters RA.  Did you get the answer?  It is formed by putting a word for arrived (CAME) ahead of RA to give:

CAMERA

which is of course a ‘producer of pictures’.  I told you the answer was a word you would be familiar with!  Note the pronunciation, which you can hear here.  There is a hard k sound at the start of the word, the stress is on the first syllable, and the middle e is only lightly sounded.

Composing clues which seem to make sense when you read them is part of the art of the crossword compiler and the clue we have just looked at is a good example: an artist is indeed a producer of pictures. There is a word in English – apt – which describes a clue of this type.  Apt is defined as appropriate or suitable in the circumstances (although there are other meanings).  The fact that the solution has nothing directly to do with artists is cleverly intended to come as something of a surprise.

Now let’s look at another couple of apt clues, both from Daily Telegraph Puzzle No. 27,801 dated 14th May 2015.  The first reads:

He fiddles with cold radiator (7)

A radiator is something you have in your house or flat to provide heating when it is cold. And if a radiator is cold when it should be hot it is highly likely that you will fiddle with it.  The verb to fiddle in this context means to keep making adjustments in the hope you will solve the problem.  Trapped air might be preventing hot water to circulate, for example – something that can be fixed in less than a minute if you know what to do.

Having read all that, it might come as a shock to learn that the answer to the clue is:

CHEATER

As we have seen in a previous post, cold can be abbreviated to C.  And a radiator is a heater.  Put C in front of HEATER and you have the answer.

The reason CHEATER is correct is that there is an informal meaning of the verb to fiddle – which is to falsify records in order to gain money.  If you hear of people fiddling their expenses they are cheating their employer by making claims for money they did not spend (for example on imaginary taxi fares).  A cheater, defined here, is someone who behaves dishonestly.  A cheater can be a man or a woman, and in the case of a man the remaining words in the clue – ‘he fiddles’ – provide the perfect description!

Now let’s look at this one:

Deposit posted containing bit of money (8)

This, again, is apt because ‘deposit’ (whether as a noun or a verb) is frequently linked with money.  You can deposit cash in your bank, for example.  You may have savings in a deposit account.  Or you may put down a deposit on a house to reserve it (a large sum of money which is deducted from the total cost provided the transaction is completed).

So, with money in mind, it may surprise you that the answer is:

SEDIMENT

This is derived from the clue as follows.  If you have ‘posted’ something, for example a letter or a parcel, you have sent it.  And a ‘bit of money’ could be a dime – the name given to 10 cents in the USA.  If ‘posted’ (SENT) contains ‘bit of money’ (DIME) you put the second word inside the first to give the answer:

SE DIME NT

The word sediment, defined here, is a different kind of deposit altogether – a layer of solid particles that can collect the bottom of a liquid.  You may need to decant wine carefully to leave at the bottom of the bottle any sediment which, over time, has been deposited.  And, on a grander scale, a sediment can be created from soil or other matter forming a deposit on the bottom of a river or lake.  For the different meanings of deposit please see here.

Finally, perhaps the most satisfying clue of all is the apt anagram.  In this case, rather than disguising the answer, the words which form the anagram are particularly relevant to the solution.  Whoever realised that THE MORSE CODE is an anagram of HERE COME DOTS … must have been delighted!

Here is an apt anagram from Daily Telegraph Puzzle No. 27,797 dated 9th May 2015:

He wrote of crimes involving horrendous carnality (3,6,5,5)

See if you can work this out.  You are looking for someone who ‘wrote of crimes’.

The solution will appear next week.

Never a cross word – 31

Tags

crossword puzzles, cryptic clues, learning methodologies, words within words

Last week I left you with this clue:

One whose pupils are encouraged to make notes (5,7)

The answer is:

MUSIC TEACHER

This is a joke, admittedly not of the laugh out loud type (abbreviated in text messages these days to LOL), which plays on the double meaning of ‘notes’.  In this case the notes are of the musical, rather than the written, variety!

Now here is a clue which provides a number of different talking points.  It is from Daily Telegraph Puzzle No. 27,794 dated 6th May 2015, and reads:

Look at dance after a bit of needle (7)

The first thing to comment on is the word ‘needle’ which is normally (and is in this clue) a sharp instrument, invented thousands of years ago, used in sewing. But seeing the word prompts me to mention that there is an informal meaning of needle in English which, as a verb, means to annoy someone.  You could say, for example: ‘his constant rudeness really needled me’.

The definition of needle may be seen here – reading which reminds me to tell you the phrase: it is like looking for a needle in a haystack, meaning that something is practically impossible to find.

Anyway, back to the clue and what we are looking for here is ‘a bit of needle’, the answer to which is ‘eye’.  The ‘eye’ of a needle is the opening through which sewing thread is inserted.

We now need a synonym for ‘dance’. The clue could refer to the name of a formal dance such as the waltz or tango, or – at the other end of the spectrum – a more modern dance such as the twist or jive.  However, the answer is in fact ‘ball’.  A ball, can be not only a round object, but also a grand dance.  In the UK it will not be long before the season of university summer balls gets under way.

If you now put ‘dance’ (BALL) after ‘a bit of needle’ (EYE) as the clue dictates, you get the solution:

EYEBALL

meaning the remaining words in the clue, ‘look at’.

But, I hear you say, eyeball is a noun meaning the round part of the eye – and you would be correct.  But the English language is constantly changing and in informal modern speech, particularly business jargon, eyeball has additionally become a verb, meaning to look at.  A business executive, for example, might say: ‘let me eyeball last month’s sales results’.

Let’s now turn to another example of how the English language has developed, this time by creation of an entirely new word.  It is needed to solve the following clue, from Daily Telegraph Puzzle No. 27,973 dated 5th May 2015:

Best English, low in calories (5)

The answer to this (meaning ‘best’) is:

ELITE

This is derived from E (short for English) and LITE meaning low in calories.

Lite is not of course the correct spelling of the word ‘light’ but in this context it has the same meaning. One sees it on products from butter to beer to indicate that they are low fat or low in sugar and accordingly less fattening than their regular equivalents. It appears that the word was introduced in the 1980s, initially in the USA. For a discussion please see here.

The solution, elite, as you probably know, means a select group of people, whether in terms of ability or power and influence.  The definition is given here.

Finally, from the same puzzle, let me leave you with this clue to solve:

Arrived ahead of artist, producer of pictures (6)

When you see ‘artist’ mentioned in a cryptic crossword puzzle, nine times out of ten it will signify the letters RA. Why?  Because RA stands for Royal Academician, one of the elite in the world of British artists and architects.  You can read more about RAs here.

So, given that hint, you now need to think of a word for ‘arrived’, which after being placed ahead of ‘artist’ gives you a producer of pictures.  It is certainly a word you will be familiar with.

Over to you!

Never a cross word – 30

Tags

anagrams, crossword puzzles, cryptic clues, learning methodologies, words within words

Last week I left you with this clue to tackle:

Leader suffering ordeal – it must consume one (9)

This was really difficult, but I chose it because it reveals a surprising meaning of the word ‘leader’.

The answer is:

EDITORIAL

The word is derived from an anagram of ‘ordeal – it’ (if those letters are ‘suffering’ they should be taken apart and rearranged) with an additional I (one) inside (the other 8 letters ‘consume’ the I).  But why does editorial mean leader?  Please read on.

An editorial is a piece of writing, commonly appearing in a newspaper or magazine, which expresses an opinion on some issue, usually in line with that publication’s political views.  As you can imagine, the newspapers (the press) have been full of opinionated editorials leading up to the General Election in the UK which took place yesterday.  Such editorials are also known as ‘leading articles’ or ‘leaders’.  You might say: ‘Have you read the leader in the Times this morning?’  The many meanings of the word leader may be found here.

Now let’s turn to a couple of clues which illustrate other words which can have surprising – and, frankly, illogical meanings.

The first is a down clue from Daily Telegraph Puzzle No. 27,769 dated 7th April 2015.  It reads:

Property not supposed to be put on top of car (4,6)

The solution (meaning ‘property’) is:

REAL ESTATE

The way that is obtained is to find a word for ‘not supposed’ and put it ‘on top of’ (remember this is a down, not an across, clue) another word for ‘car’.

If you ‘suppose’ something you imagine or deduce it to be correct – you are not sure it is really true.  So, conversely, something ‘not supposed’ could be ‘real’  One popular type of car is called an ‘estate car’.  An estate car, often simply called an estate, has a large area at the back for carrying luggage etc which can be accessed via a lift-up back door.  In contrast, a saloon car, or saloon, has a boot (in the USA this is called a trunk) which usually carries rather less.  Note that the words estate, saloon, boot and trunk all have other meanings which are nothing to do with cars!

Now why does real estate mean property?  There are various theories about this but it seems likely that ‘real’ refers to a physical thing, so real estate is actual physical property such as a house, or land.  In the UK you normally approach an estate agent to help you buy or sell a piece of property, but the term ‘real estate’ itself is not often used in the UK except by lawyers.  It is a very much more common expression in the USA.

As an aside, it is worth adding that a contrast can be drawn between tangible property (literally something you can touch) and intellectual property or IP (such as an idea) which is intangible.  However, as any IP lawyer reading this will know, IP rights can still be traded (sold or licensed); and enforced, or indeed challenged, in court.

Now for the second clue.  This is from the Daily Telegraph Puzzle No. 27,774 and reads:

Trial with underground lab equipment (4,4)

This time the answer means the last two words in the clue: lab (short for laboratory) equipment.

A ‘trial’ (not a legal trial in court) can be a test.  If you take a car you are thinking of buying out for a drive first it is called a test drive; the outcome of a medical investigation or analysis is called a test result – and if you want to go into the movies you will first have to have a screen test.  As for ‘underground’, anyone who has visited London will know that everyone calls the underground railway (subway) the Tube (see here for some fascinating facts!).  Put ‘trial’ (TEST) together with ‘underground’ (TUBE) and you get the solution:

TEST TUBE

a simple piece of equipment one finds in a chemical laboratory (a picture of one can be seen here).

I will leave you with this clue from the same crossword:

One whose pupils are encouraged to make notes (5,7)

For a change this is not an anagram, but an example of another double meaning which provides a little joke or pun.

After 30 blog posts I hope you are finding this way of exploring the English language different and helpful.  Please let me know.

Never a cross word – 29

Tags

anagrams, crossword puzzles, cryptic clues, learning methodologies, words within words

Last week I left you with this clue:

Sometimes won hand with ten, after twisting (3,3,4)

The hint that an anagram is involved is the wording ‘after twisting’.  The answer is derived by taking 10 letters from the clue and twisting them to make 3 new words.  But before one can solve that puzzle it is necessary to decide what the answer means:  you can’t start rearranging letters until you know what you are aiming for.  In this case, it would be impossible for the word ‘sometimes’ to be part of the anagram since it is already 9 letters. Logic therefore dictates that the answer itself is a phrase meaning ‘sometimes’.

But which 10 letters are mixed up – or twisted? The only real possibility is to take the letters of ‘won hand’ and ‘ten’.  This is an example of an anagram where not all the letters are consecutive – but that is fair, since the word ‘with’ implies that the letters of ‘ten’ have to be included with the first 7 letters.  The answer is:

NOW AND THEN

The expression ‘now and then’ is frequently used in spoken English to mean sometimes or occasionally.  You might say: ‘I meet my sister now and then’; or: ‘now and then I go to the cinema’.  The word ‘every’ is often added to give the phrase ‘every now and then’.  Another variation is ‘every now and again’. See the entries in the online Idioms dictionary here and here.

Now let’s turn to another couple of clues that lead to a discussion of strange English idioms.  Both are from Daily Telegraph Crossword Puzzle No. 27,770 dated 8th April 2015.

The first is:

Annoyed Britain had turned? (7,3)

The answer means ‘annoyed’ and to get to it one needs to add together a word (or abbreviation) for ‘Britain’, ‘had’ and ‘turned’.

We have seen before that an abbreviation for Britain can be BR, so that is fairly straightforward, but the other elements call for a very good knowledge of the English language – one of the reasons that looking at English through the medium of cryptic crossword clues is so valuable.

If you ‘had’ something it is possible that you could have ‘owned’ it, as for example in the sentence ‘I once had a house in Scotland.’  And if milk has gone bad it is said to have ‘turned’, or ‘gone off’ or simply to be ‘off’.

Put all that together and one gets BR + OWNED + OFF. So the solution is:

BROWNED OFF

The slang term browned off (as in, for example: ‘I am really browned off: I have been waiting over an hour for you’) means annoyed – the remaining word in the clue!  A slightly milder variation is brassed off.  These days a more popular idiom with the same meaning is cheesed off and a vulgar expression which you may hear is pissed off.  How rich the English language is!

The second clue reads:

Sort of grease left in English dish unfinished? (5)

Despite the short length of the answer, this is again a complex clue which involves 3 elements.

The solution, which may surprise you, is:

ELBOW

In this case English is abbreviated to E, and a dish unfinished could be ‘bowl’ missing the last letter, or BOW. If an abbreviation for left (L) is placed inside E + BOW you arrive at the answer.

You will be familiar with the word elbow meaning a part of the arm.  But the reason elbow is correct is that, idiomatically, it is also a sort of grease!  If you use elbow grease to clean something you rub it vigorously.  More generally the term means energetic labour, as discussed here, implying that some things can only be achieved by hard work (using your own arms and elbows), not by taking an easy short cut or applying some special product.  According to Wikipedia, sending someone off to find some non-existent elbow grease has been used as a practical joke (a way of playing a trick on someone).

I will leave you with this clue (from the same crossword) to try.  It is difficult but introduces an interesting word from the world of newspapers:

Leader suffering ordeal – it must consume one (9)

The answer will appear next week.