The Stickler Weekly 61 Solution

Exploitation. The job of a setter is all about exploitation. They exploit everything involved with crosswords, from language quirks, word classes, shapes of letters and things related to the orientation of answers in a grid and grid structure. They even introduce themselves on occasion. All these things incorporate valid devices that must be justifiable and solvable without making too bigger leaps. It’s important to remember that the fundamentals of the English language are always in play and should be relied upon by solvers. For example, solvers would always assume they are dealing with an answer that runs left to right and horizontal as this is the way we read words, write words, solve clues and mentally think of words. The answer may be put into the grid vertically but this doesn’t necessary change how the solver would normally approach solving, unless the setter makes an issue of it. A down answer is one entered vertically, not an answer with any special quality, no matter how the setter helps a solver derive it. The setter’s exploitation of an answer’s orientation in the grid is just another device that doesn’t dictate how we would normally approach solving clues. Thus all clues should be thought of in the horizontal, and only those that the setter chooses (by way of indication) may be considered in the vertical.