One of the clues was “Otto in England, possessing fine vision” “Vision” was the thing we were supposed to get. The answer was “eyesight,” but I didn’t get how the answer was constructed. Peter Biddlecombe offered a helpful comment:

6D: “otto” is Italian for eight – “in England” should arguably be “in English” but that would spoil the surface reading. “yes” and “fine” are both words for “I agree”. possessing is the containment/embedding indicator, and “vision” is the definition.

I was stuck on “fine” being a synonym for “good” on this clue. I was also stuck on “otto” being a name instead of a numeral, so I was trying to translate from German instead of from Italian.

Why should you care what Peter Biddlecombe has to say about a cryptic crossword clue? Because he’s been solving cryptic crosswords in the Times of London for 30 years (with a five-year gap when he was solving puzzles in the Guardian). He was the Times Crossword Championship Winner in 2000 and 2007, and in the final 6 other times in a total of 14 attempts. He is currently editing the UK crossword group blog Times for the Times. I grasp from a quick visit to Times for the Times that it hasn’t changed substantially from when I wrote a profile of Times for the Times in August 2007.

Getting back to the NYT cryptic, another one of the clues was “Feel sorry about alien in group of attendants.” “Group of attendants” was the thing we were supposed to find, and the answer was constructed by putting “et” (for alien), and “in” inside the word “rue,” thus yielding the word “retinue.”

The word “about” in this case means “around.” I’m recalling the Psalm written when then-King David was temporarily fleeing from the rebellion of his son Absalom. David wrote “I will not be afraid of ten thousands of people, that have set themselves against me round about.” (Psalm 3:6, KJV). Peter again writes:

There are some words which you really need to watch out for in cryptic clues, and “about” is one of them. It can indicate embedding, reversal, the letters RE, and like any word often used as an indicator, can be worked into a definition to lead you off the scent.

In between August 2007 and now, I’ve noticed that Times for the Times offers more explanation as to how the answers are constructed. As part of the charter of Crossword Bebop to blog about crossword puzzles throughout the Anglosphere, I plan to visit Times for the Times when I get thrashed by puzzle in the Times.

Technorati: Peter Biddlecombe, Cryptic crossword, Times for the Times