Page 9 - Issue 67 Online
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MANEA MATTERS
                                                              MANEA MATTERS
      They were fun to solve as part of
      a crowd and before I knew it, I had
      started writing grids of my own.
      There is a beauty in writing cryptic
      crossword  clues  –  they’re  like
      mathematic equations, except you’re
      using words.
      HAS + LET = HASLET…
      GOA + HEAD = GO AHEAD…

      It is interesting seeing how people
      can break words apart and stitch
      them back together.
      For those less familiar, a cryptic
      crossword clue consists of two parts:   the  clue  must  make  sense  when  read  aloud.
      the definition, which is normally a synonym (a   This can be extremely useful for trying to get
      word  that means  the same  thing) of  the  final   the solver thinking about something completely
      answer, and the wordplay, which explains how   unrelated to the actual solution – so bear that in
      to craft it.                          mind when you are solving!
      For example, ‘Requires constructing in slate’   If you would like to solve some of my grids, they
      tells you that you need to anagram in slate to   can  be  found  at  mpcryptics.blogspot.com.  I
      get a word meaning  Requires, which would be   have also included some example clues on these
      Entails.                              pages. I hope they inspire you to have a go at
           “It is interesting seeing        some cryptic crosswords – I find the Quiptic and
                                            Everyman puzzles in the Guardian (released on
           how people can break             a Monday and Sunday respectively) to be very
           words apart and stitch           approachable for new solvers. They are also
            them back together.”            available online for free!

      There are plenty of types of clue – the fun for me   Christopher Evans
      is deciding how to clue words, especially
      those that have odd spellings or tricky
      synonyms. I will often start by seeing if
      I can break a word into components.                             ANSWERS
      MAMMOTH, for example, can be                                             1. Aspic    2. Turnout    3. Carriages
      written as MAM and MOTH. Then
      I can clue those pieces together to
      get something like “Mother insect
      and beast”.
      I highly value the surface reading
      of a cryptic clue, meaning that



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                         DEADLINE for Issue 68 – Friday 19  February 2021   PAGE  9
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