Card 1 of 14: How cryptics workSkip to today’s puzzle
How cryptics work
Every cryptic clue is two clues in one.
One half is a plain definition of the answer, and it always sits at the start or the end of the clue. The other half is wordplay: a recipe that builds the same answer out of letters.
Both halves point at the same word, so you can check one against the other. The number in brackets is how many letters it has.
That is the whole idea. Wordplay uses a handful of tricks, and the next cards show you each one with a real clue. About five minutes.