Cryptic Crosswords

Bob Gregory's Home Page.

Cullen is the nom de plume under which Bob Gregory sets cryptic (British style) crosswords for a broad spread of magazines and periodicals.

I specialise in setting cryptic clues compiled to reflect the underlying interest theme of the publication which carries the puzzle.

This site carries a new crossword each month which will alternate between standard 15 x 15, 27 x 27 jumbo and various sizes of barred grids. Solutions will be available with each puzzle.

I work and have worked for many clients, amongst them The Open University "Sesame", The British Library, Saga Magazine, RAF News, The Career Teacher, The Estate Agent, Profile, Verbatim, The Bookdealer, NASUWT, Antiquarian Book Monthly, The Kennel Gazette, Locomotive Journal, British Orthopaedic News, Scottish & Newcastle, Farming Weekly, Cape News and many others syndicated in newspapers.

I welcome enquiries from editors who are considering running crossword puzzles in their own publications. Please e-mail me at e-mail bobg@cullen.demon.co.uk

The following article reproduced courtesy of the BBC Website 16.1.2005

Why cryptic crosswords are civilisation

By Hugh Schofield Paris

The British are not the only people to have crosswords but nowhere else in the world has the cryptic version - containing anagrams, double-meanings and other forms of elaborate word-play - reached such complexity. For Hugh Schofield these crosswords have become a symbol of British civilisation.

It sometimes happens that I am travelling on a train out to the French provinces.

I settle in my seat in a non-smoking compartment, then draw from my jacket pocket a copy of the now-tabloid Times.

On the inside back page is the crossword. I arrange the fold and, with gnarled biro in mouth, set about deciphering the conundrums of Fleet Street's most fiendish.

At this point a person - it may be old, young, male, female, posh or poor but a French person - occupies the seat next to mine.

He or she extracts from their bag a magazine. It is called Mots Croises or perhaps Mots Fleches or Mots Meles.

The person knits his or her brow and then with a nod and a rustle fills in a couple of blanks.

A start made, they raise their head and glance at their neighbour and at his task.

Unspoken bond

A conspiratorial smile forms slowly across their lips. Our eyes meet.

Where to begin explaining the sheer fiendishness of the British cryptic crossword?

"Aha, Monsieur" - the unspoken message beams between us - "I see we have, how do you say, the same hobby. The love of the language is a marvellous thing, no?"

I am polite and well-brought up so I smile a little conspiratorial smile back, as if to say: "Absoluement, Francois."

But inside I'm thinking: "If only you had any idea."

Where to begin explaining to a French person the complexity, the ironic multi-layered brilliance, the sheer fiendishness of the British cryptic crossword?

It is a slightly unfair question, of course, because it is not just the French who do not understand. If you don't get it, you don't get it and that applies to most English speakers too.

Word games

I pick on the French because I live here and also because they do so love their "mots croises".

Everybody does them - even quite sophisticated people - but let us be brutally honest: what are French crosswords?

Every morning tens of thousands of people strain their grey matter in the same completely useless exercise They're not even word games.

They are just a series of clues along the lines of "type of tree" or "another word for big". And that is it!

So, when they look across at me doing The Times or The Spectator and think there is some kind of equivalence - well, you can see why I bridle slightly.

They are like penny-whistlers - turning out their simple tunes, blissfully unaware of the existence of Bach or Mozart.

Civilisation

For me and - judging by the number of people from outside Britain who win the weekly competitions - for many expatriates, they are a link with civilisation.

I would go further: cryptic crosswords ARE civilisation.

Think about it.

Every morning tens of thousands of people, all in their separate homes around the world and totally unknown to each other, strain their grey matter in the same completely useless exercise: a cerebral labour which requires three things - knowledge of an unwritten, evolving and highly recondite book of rules, a grounding in the classics of English literature and an abiding love of the language.

Eccentricity

No-one teaches you how to do crosswords.

It is passed on - often within families - from generation to generation. I learned from my mother.

At their best they exemplify the three British Es: elegance, erudition and eccentricity.

Constitution for EU amended (five letters) Clue in the Spectator crossword

And, though I dread the appearance one day of a ghastly headline "Crosswords dumbed down - not enough solvers", I have to say there is no sign of that yet.

They continue to exemplify - as they always have done - the pursuit of intellectual pleasure via a shared set of rules, and that is surely as good a definition of civilisation as you will get.

I have a fantasy that one day I will turn to my French travelling companion and offer an exchange.

"I'll tell you what," I will say, "I'll do a couple of yours and you do a couple of mine."

Anagram

And then I'll translate for him, perhaps this gem from the latest Spectator: "Constitution for EU amended (five letters)".

"This is something to do with our Monsieur Giscard?" he will ask.

"Not at all", I'll explain.

"Quite simple really. It's an anagram - signalled by the word 'amended' - of the two words that precede it: 'for EU'.

"Answer: 'fuero' - the constitution offered to the Basques in the old Spanish monarchy."

He will look at me with amazement and I'll say: "Well, you should see some of the hard clues. The answer to 10 across is 'leiotrichous' meaning 'having straight hair'!"

Swallowing hard my friend apologises, grabs his bag and hurries to the next compartment.

Pathetic, I know, but one can dream.

I have recently retired from flying, having been a pilot for over 30 years. I started off with a basic private pilot's licence to which I added a multi-engine rating, then an Instrument Rating and finally the Airline Transport Pilot's Licence. I have flown all over Europe, made several tips from USA to Cardiff in small twins and in 1974 established a speed record in its class for the route London to Hong Kong. I have owned a number of aircraft over thirty years, the last one being a lovely Cessna 340A which was based at Cardiff Airport. Here's a photograph taken at San Sebastian in Spain showing Marian and a friend of ours -

My wife Marian was not an enthusiastic flyer but usually joined me in the air, particularly when a pleasant destination like Spain or some continental capital for a long weekend beckoned. Apart from the flying days, now sadly over, we do mostly everything together and she is frequently a good source of inspiration for a crafty cryptic clue when we're working on another crossword.

I enjoy languages with forays into linguistics and philology, with a good command of German, French and Spanish and with a working knowledge of Russian and Cantonese (both now a bit rusty). I read Greek and Hebrew and I even taught myself the Cherokee alphabet coded by the great chieftain, Sequioa - albeit that this has never proved to be of the slightest use!

I enjoy playing Bridge but would dearly like to be better at it than I am ! On the other hand, I used to play a lot of Chess, for which I earned a "Half-Blue" whilst a student at Cambridge in the '50s. I rarely play nowadays, finding the time more enjoyably spent involved with crossword puzzle setting and reading.

My other great passion is fishing, both sea and fresh-water. I have fished all over Europe and the Mediterranean and have had two trips to British Columbia and Alaska fishing for trout and salmon. A memorable catch on the Kenai River of Alaska in 1997 was a King Salmon at 47 pounds and 5 ozs. This is a photograph of it stuffed and mounted on my office wall.

A couple of years ago I fulfilled a long held ambition to have a go at fishing for Blue Marlin by making a trip to St Thomas in the US Virgin Islands. I dreamt of catching something like the fish that was penned by Hemingway in his "Old Man and the Sea" but in the event I was luckier than many and hooked and successfully brought alongside a wonderful Blue Marlin estimated by the charter vessel at over 12 feet and around 510 pounds. Happily, US game laws dictate a policy of "catch and release" so after fighting this noble beast for over half an hour, it was unhooked with minimal if any, damage, shook its head and swam away. Below is a photograph of an exact replica made to order by Grey's of Florida.

Marian and I are both fanatical Irish Wolfhound lovers. These wonderful huge dogs are known in the "dog-world" as "The Gentle Giants" on account of their remarkable temperament which quite belies their size and great strength. The breed, which was known in Ancient Rome, almost became extinct at the end of the 19th century but was narrowly saved for posterity by the actions of a British Army officer, Captain Graham, who mated two of the last remaining animals. Sadly, on account of their great size, they do not live to an advanced age and, having seen our first two hounds die at respectively 6 and 9-1/2, we recently lost "Rafferty", the largest of the three who weighed in at an awesome 205 pounds and stood just under 40 inches at the shoulder. Here's a photograph of Rafferty when he was at age just coming up to 2 years. We grieve for his loss.

About six years ago, Marian and I built a small pond and started with a couple of Koi carp, the so-called "Living Jewels". As time has passed, we have rehashed our pond a number of times and now have a considerable number of beautiful Koi over many varieties. The more one gets involved in this absorbing hobby, the more fascinating it becomes. Our curent pond(s) are under an open roof and are two rectangular ponds connected by a swim-way, under glass, which the fish love as it enables them to enjoy wandering from one pond to the other and, in the process, get plenty of exercise which Koi need to maintain health and vitality. Click on the links below to see the current ponds and some of the Koi

Travel is always interesting and in 2001 Marian and I fulfilled a long-held hope to drive the wonderful Karakoram Highway from Kashgar in China to Islamabad in Pakistan. In case anyone is interested in the story of this fascinating trip, the URL follows (warning - if you don't have a high speed Internet access, the photographic content can take a long time to load !!).