#Crosswords clues archive
Fraser Simpson was the editor and a frequent constructor-along with Patrick Berry, whose name will be familiar to fans of our American-style crossword.įind our entire archive of cryptic crosswords here-and a brand-new puzzle every Sunday.īrowsing through those cryptics twenty years later, we were delighted to find that they remain a smooth, albeit challenging, solve. Its unusual, condensed design-an eight-by-ten rectangular grid with bars in lieu of the typical black “blocks” separating words-was cooked up by the senior editor and staff writer Hendrik Hertzberg, who launched the puzzle. If that kind of thing strikes you as sadistic, be grateful that you’re not tangling with the London Observer’s weekly cryptic, where the celebrated setters (as cryptic constructors are known) have traditionally derived their pseudonyms from various Spanish Grand Inquisitors.įrom 1997 to 1999, The New Yorker ran a cryptic crossword in the back of the magazine.
The magic happens, of course, where the two meet: “DISC,” considered as “IS” inside “DC,” can be clued as “Record is set in Washington”-“record” being another word for “disc,” and the word “is” being literally “set” within Washington (that is, metonymically, D.C.). Basically, a cryptic clue consists of two elements: a definition of the answer (the so-called straight part), and a wordplay element that elliptically suggests the same answer (the cryptic portion). Unlike American-style crosswords, in which clues are usually synonyms or bits of trivia, a cryptic contains clues that are small puzzles in and of themselves.
Like steak-and-kidney pie, the cryptic crossword is hugely popular in Britain and, to put it delicately, an acquired taste for most Americans.
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