Thursday 14 November 2013

5 More Ordinary Words with Obscure Meanings in Cryptic Crosswords

ordinary-word-obscure-meaning In the article 5 Ordinary Words with Obscure Meanings in Cryptic Crosswords, we went through a few everyday words that crossword setters love to use for their less-known meanings. Here is an extension to the set.

1. CORPORATION

'Corporation' means a paunch or potbelly. You'll often find the word on the clue's surface invoking its legal entity sense, leading to a word like TUM in the solution.

Times 25223: Men on short time engaged in work with corporation (6) PORTLY
OR (men) T (short time), in PLY (work); definition: with corporation

2. MAN

"No man is an island", said John Donne - but he had not accounted for cryptic crosswords. 'Man' can well be an island when the word is used as a definition-by-example for Isle Of Man, an island in the Irish Sea.

Times 25282: Man, for example, losing head, with repeated hesitation — bad speaker? (9) SLANDERER
ISLAND (Man, for example) – I + ER ER (repeated hesitation); definition: bad speaker

When using 'man' with reference to the isle, the setter would play a trick as above (i.e. starting the clue with that word) to draw attention away from its capitalized initial.

3. NO

'No' is a variant spelling of 'Noh', a classic theatre in Japan.

FT 13965 (Loroso): Filmmaker's pitch, not for Japanese drama (9) TARANTINO
TAR (pitch) ANTI (not for) NO (Japanese drama); definition: filmmaker

4. PANTS

'Pants' is slang for dreadful/rubbish. And so it can function as anagram indicator.

Guardian 26016 (Arachne): Hot pants, more or less clean (10) THOROUGHLY
(HOT)* ROUGHLY (more or less); definition: clean

5. SAW

'See' can mean something worlds apart from 'look', and its past tense is not far behind. 'Saw', when used as a noun, isn't only a cutting tool. It is also a maxim or proverb.

FT 14189 (Crux): Saw dog get tangled in lead (7) PROVERB
ROVER (dog) in Pb (chemical symbol for lead); definition: saw

Also see: TIME, TO, MARCH.

Solve These

Guardian 26080 (Paul): Saw around soft fold in limb (9) A________
Times 24498: New plaque encapsulating a northern corporation's breakthrough (7,4) __A____ L___
FT 14423 (Bradman): Man maybe at the end of a passage (5) __S__
Guardian 25960 (Paul): Wear thin pants, exposing one's private parts (2,3,3) __ ___ R__ 
Times 25574: Frequently abridged, absorbing drama, worth seeing (2,4) __ __T_

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7 comments

Lakshmi Vaidyanathan said...

Guardian 26080 (Paul): Saw around soft fold in limb (9) A________
APPENDAGE {A(P)(PEN)DAGE}
Guardian 25960 (Paul): Wear thin pants, exposing one's private parts (2,3,3) __ ___ R__
IN TH RAW (WEARTHIN)*

Annapoorani said...

Guardian 26080 (Paul): Saw around soft fold in limb (9) APPENDAGE

A (P PEN) DAGE

ADAGE = saw ; P = soft ; PEN = fold

Annapoorani said...

Guardian 25960 (Paul): Wear thin pants, exposing one's private parts (2,3,3) __ ___ R__

IN THE RAW

(WEAR THIN)*

Defn: exposing one's private parts

Lakshmi Vaidyanathan said...

FT 14423 (Bradman): Man maybe at the end of a passage (5) __S__
AISLE (A ISLE)

Kishore said...

1. A(P)(PEN)DAGE
2. QU(A N)(TUM)LEAP*
3. A ISLE
4. IN THE RAW*
5. OF (NO)TEn

Your ref. to No man is an island reminded me of how Inspector Clouseau pronounces is-land

Sreelakshmi said...

Lovely, straightforward (only because I read your post!) clues, Shuchi! Had a good time working on them:D All these were news to me! I still hadn't come across these, perhaps because I don’t get the opportunity to solve crosswords often.
Hopefully I could go through the aisle of darkness into light by taking a quantum leap and become someone of note! (I am definitely not using the other word!:P)
1.-
2. {QU( A N TUM) LEAP}*
3. (A)(ISLE)
4.(IN THE RAW)*
5.{OF (NO)TEn)

Shuchi said...

@Lakshmi, @Annapoorani: Nicely solved, and welcome to the blog Annapoorani.

@Kishore: A clean sweep! Thanks for making an unexpected Clouseau connection.

@Sreelakshmi: Glad you enjoyed the clues. I guess APPENDAGE too would've been placed in your exclusion list ;)