This device appears quite frequently in the UK puzzles but I'm seeing more of it in The Hindu of late. There was this one on 20-DEC-08 (was it the first?):
2D: Fur? Um… it belongs to me (6) ER MINE
7D: Command Act 2 needs to be restructured (8) DO MINEER*
The solution of 7D depends on the answer for 2D. The key here is to recognize that the "2" in 7D refers to the 2 Down clue.
There's another one in today's THC 9423:
8A: He distributes parts of a film (6) CASTER
22A: Back at home in 8 for a container (8) CA{NI<-}STER
Once you know that the "8" in 22A means clue 8A, the answer is simple.
So when you see a number in a clue, consider that this could be an inter-grid reference. [Caution: This is a possibility, not a certainty. For a clue like "Queen follows Act 5 here", if you try putting in the solution of clue#5 you'll be on the wrong track - the 5 in this instance simply needs its Roman numeral substitution.]
Related Posts:
- Circular Reference - a slightly more complicated case of inter-grid reference, with cyclic dependency between two clues.
- The Hindu Crossword 9409 (Gridman), which has an instance of inter-grid reference.
- Roman Numbers – when numbers in clues are not clue numbers, but Roman numerals
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As one who has been solving THC from No. 1, I can say the device (which is common in crosswords) has been used many times before.
ReplyDeleteIt should not be overdone, though. One reason why I disliked the Guardian crossword was that it used the cross reference to an irritating degree. Sometimes a whole lot of clues depended upon your cracking a particular clue.
One disgusting feature of a particular THC compiler was putting two parts of a phrase in two places; this is all right in a rare instance but if a puzzle has half a dozen such clues you will get a strain by looking at different slots before putting in the answers. Luckily that compiler is no longer contributing THC.
UK crosswords resort to this but the parts of the answers are in the same row or column divided only by blocks. In THC the slots were in odd places.
One thing that I'm not 100% sure about is when you can fairly reference a clue as a pure number and when you need to qualify it with "across" or "down". If you have both 1 across and 1 down, I assume it's only fair to say which you're referring to - which (without some really clever misdirection) gives away the fact that we're talking about another answer rather than any other use of "1".
ReplyDeleteIn a slightly more complicated case, suppose 1 across is BOB and 14 down is DYLAN, and you still also have a 1 down and 14 down, but these aren't linked.
Further, assume 1 across and 14 down are linked in the clues, e.g.
1/14d Bland boy transformed as singer (3,5)
...
14 See 1 across
If you want to reference this answer elsewhere, say
28 F-finisher of make of instrument controversially played by 1 across 14 down on 25/7/65 (6)
Should you include the across and down here, or would "1 14" be acceptable (given that they're linked) ?
I generally assume you have to specify the across/down unless there's only one clue with that number, but I'd be interested to know if there are any exceptions to that, e.g. the one I've contrived above.
I'm wondering about how you reference a clue, in the sense that English uses "an" for words starting with a vowel (and possibly 'h')
ReplyDeleteFor example, suppose the answer to 15 is "assailant" and I'm writing a clue for "strangler". I want to use 15 as the definition.
So my clue might be
Street where different perspective cracker the Ripper case for a 15
(Because when talking you'd say "a fifteen" - should that construction ever arise!)
Or should the clue say "an 15" because if you substitute the answer, you get "an assailant" ?
I'm in favour of the former, which doesn't give away whether the answer begins with a vowel, but I'm not sure if that's kosher...
If one is referencing another answer and the wordplay requires "a" or "an" should one use the correct article to go before the number of the word?
ReplyDeleteFor example, suppose the answer to 4 is "eponymous" and I'm trying to write a clue for "Beef Stroganoff" - would I be correct to define it as "a 4 type of food" or "an 4 type of food" ? (In other words, "a four" versus "an eponymous").
(PS I may have got this wrong, but shouldn't these be called "Intra"-Grid References?)