Symbols and Markup Conventions

Purpose

This article explains the symbols and markup conventions used in this blog in explaining the parsing of clues.

• Symbols Used in The Review of the Saturday Cox and Rathvon Puzzles
• Structure of the Reviews of the Weekday Daily Telegraph Puzzles
• Markup Conventions

Symbols Used in The Review of the Saturday Cox and Rathvon Puzzles

For the Saturday Cox and Rathvon puzzles, a detailed parsing is provided. This is not done in the case of the weekday Daily Telegraph puzzles as they have already been reviewed on Big Dave's Crossword Blog and I am merely providing additional information to supplement what is available there.

Legend: The following symbols are used in reviews of the Saturday puzzles: "*" anagram "~" sounds like "<" indicates that the preceding letters are reversed "( )" encloses contained letters "_" replaces letters that have been deleted "†" indicates that the word is present in the clue

Go to top

Structure of the Reviews of the Weekday Daily Telegraph Puzzles

The review of a clue takes the following general structure:

First comes a statement of the clue with markup inserted to illustrate the parsing of the clue. The markup is described later in this article.

#a/d   Clue containing parsing markup (num)

where:

• # is the clue number
• a/d is the directional indicator (a = across; d = down)
• num is the clue numeration; i.e., the number of letters in the word(s) in the solution

Next comes:

Explanations pertaining to the wordplay (or first definition in a double definition).

This is separated from subsequent elements (if present) by a horizontal separator.

---

Next comes:

Explanations pertaining to the definition and solution (or second definition in a double definition).

The review of the clue may conclude with one or more explanatory boxes

Explanatory Box

An explanatory box provides additional information about the clue. In most cases this information will not necessarily help in solving the clue but provides information about the clue. In the case of the weekday syndicated Daily Telegraph puzzles, such information is often intended to help the North American solver appreciate how the clue may be perceived by a British solver. These boxes may also provide information on people, places, films, television program, works of art and literature, etc. mentioned in the clue. Although the titles of these boxes will usually be drawn from a standard list, I do occasionally throw in an ad hoc title specifically suggested by the subject at hand. The standard titles include: Scratching the Surface - an explanation of the surface reading of the clue Delving Deeper - in-depth information pertaining to a subject mentioned in an explanation The Story Behind the Picture - for weekday puzzles, information about an illustration found on Big Dave's Crossword Blog What did he/she/they say? - for weekday puzzles, an explanation of a remark made in a review or comment on Big Dave's Crossword Blog What are they talking about? - for weekday puzzles, an explanation of a discussion on Big Dave's Crossword Blog One box that may provide information that could prove helpful in solving the clue is the following: Here and There - for weekday puzzles, discusses words whose British meaning differs from their North American meaning

Go to top

Markup Conventions

These markup conventions apply equally to reviews of the weekday Daily Telegraph puzzles as well as to those of the Saturday Cox and Rathvon puzzles.

Note that there are many types of cryptic crossword clue and it is not my intention to exhaustively go through each and every one of them here. I will only deal with clue types to the extent necessary to explain the markup conventions used on the blog. Furthermore, be aware that, in the world of cryptic crosswords, there seems to be an exception to every rule.

With one exception that I can think of, cryptic crossword clues provide two routes to the solution. These are commonly referred to as the definition and wordplay. While these terms serve well for most clues, there are some cases where the more formal terms of primary indication and subsidiary indication may be more appropriate.

Most cryptic crossword clues consist of a definition (primary indication) and wordplay (subsidiary indication). The definition may be:

• a "precise definition": a definition that is either taken directly from a dictionary or at least phrased in a non-misleading fashion similar to one that would be found in a dictionary
• a "cryptic definition": a definition misleadingly phrased so as to misdirect the solver either with respect to the meaning of the definition as a whole or to an incorrect sense of a word used in the definition (for example, defining topiary as "clip art")
• a "whimsical definition": a definition "invented" by the setter often by extrapolating a non-existent meaning for a word from a similar word (for example, defining a bird as a "winger" [something possessing wings] or a river as a ''flower" [something that flows] or to extrapolate that, since disembowel means 'to remove the innards of ', that discontent must mean 'to remove the contents of')
• a "definition by example": the presence of one of these is often flagged with a question mark (for example, defining atoll as "coral?" where an atoll is but one form that coral may take).

The only type of clue that I can think of where there are not two ways of finding the solution are those in which the entire clue is a cryptic definition.

I identify precise definitions by marking them with a solid underline while cryptic definitions are identified by a dotted underline.

In clues in which both definition and wordplay are present, the two parts of the clue combine to provide an overall meaningful statement (the surface reading) which usually bears no relationship to the underlying cryptic reading of the clue. In some cases, an extra word or phrase will be inserted into the clue to create a meaningful link between the definition and wordplay. I define clues which contain such a link word or link phrase as having an explicit link and clues which contain no link word or link phrase as having an implicit link.

I mark the existence of an explicit link by enclosing the link word or link phrase between forward slashes (/link/) and mark the existence of an implicit link with double forward slashes (//) positioned between the definition and wordplay.

Examples

A few examples may help to illustrate these points more clearly.

The first example is a clue used by Jay in DT 28573:

4d	Fellow left work // a failure (4)

Here the definition is "a failure" which is marked with a solid underline to show that it is a precise definition. The wordplay parses as F (fellow; abbrev.) + L (left; abbrev.) + OP (work; abbrev. used in music) which gives us the solution F|L|OP. The double forward slashes (//) between the definition and wordplay indicate the existence of an "implicit link" between the two parts of the clue (that is, no extra words are inserted into the clue to form the link).

The second example is a clue used by Giovanni in DT 28575:

29a	Female going to match // travels with mother in advance (10)

Here the definition "female going to match" is cryptic (the setter is attempting to misdirect our thoughts to a sports event rather than a marriage ceremony) and thus is marked with a a dotted underline. The wordplay is {RIDES (travels) + (with) MA (mother)} contained in (in) BID (advance) giving us the solution B(RIDES|MA)ID. As in the first example, the double forward slashes indicate the presence of an implicit link. The third example is a clue used by Rufus is DT 28583:

18d	Knight caught by misplaced big blow /is/ staggering (8)

Here the definition is "staggering" which is marked with a solid underline to show that it is a precise definition. The wordplay parses as N ([chess symbol for] knight) contained in (caught by) an anagram (misplaced) of BIG BLOW producing the solution WOBBLI(N)G. Finally, forward slashes mark the link word (/is/). I also use distinctive underlining to mark &lit.^[7] and semi-&lit. clues. Note that the reviewers on Big Dave's Crossword Blog generally prefer to refer to these clue types by the less pretentious names of all-in-one or semi-all-in-one clues respectively.

In an &lit. clue^[7] (or all-in-one clue) the entire clue not only provides the definition (when read one way), but under a different interpretation also serves as the wordplay.

I mark such clues with a double underline.

In a semi-&lit. clue (or semi-all-in-one clue), either:

• the entire clue acts as the definition while a portion of the clue provides the wordplay; or
• the entire clue acts as the wordplay while a portion of the clue provides the definition.

In such clues, I mark the portion (if any) of the clue that is exclusively definition with a solid underline., the portion (if any) of the clue that is exclusively wordplay with a dashed underline, and the portion of the clue that is both definition and wordplay with a double underline..

One final clue type is what I characterize as a cryptic definition comprised of a precise definition combined with cryptic elaboration. For example, in DT 28560 (setter unknown) the following clue appears:

26d	Heroic exploit, whichever way you look at it (4)

Here, the entire clue is a cryptic definition while a portion of the clue is also a precise definition.

Given the numeration, the precise definition ("heroic exploit") could give rise to at least two solutions, DEED or FEAT. However, the 'cryptic elaboration' ("whichever way you look at it") indicates that the solution is a palindrome thereby immediately eliminating one of these choices.

Note that the part of the clue that I have called 'cryptic elaboration' does not provide a second independent route to the solution (as would the wordplay in most other types of clue). Rather it merely provides a piece of additional information (elaboration) related to the 'precise definition'.

In such clues, I mark the portion of the clue that is both precise definition and cryptic definition with a double underline. and the portion that is exclusively cryptic definition with a dotted underline.

These markup conventions have evolved over time as I discover through experience what works and what doesn't work. Therefore the markup used in past puzzles may vary somewhat from that used currently -- and the possibility always exists that further changes may occur in the future.

Go to top