Digital Commons Network^™

Anglophone Friend Or Foe?, Thomas L. Bernard

Word Ways

I watched a World War II program about how the Germans recruited a group of soldiers who could speak English (or thought that they could) to infiltrate American lines and cause havoc. Even though dressed in U.S. uniforms, they soon ran into difficulties as a result of their English language knowledge and usage; for example, some of them were only familiar with British English. This situation transported me in my mind back to the Revolutionary war. I doubted that there was a great deal of language difference in those days between the speech of the British and the Colonials, but …

Het Eten (The Eating), Hugo Brandt Corstius

Word Ways

The following text, in which the last two letters of each word are repeated in the first two of the next, appeared in De Volkskrant of December 4, 1998.

How Big Is English?, Chris Cole

Word Ways

The English language has a complement of somewhere between two million and three million "short" words ...

Palindromic Decalogues, Bill O'Connor

Word Ways

We all need a light to guide us in these troubled times. To this end i present here not one, but four palindromic decalogues, the first pair for the partisans of the gods, the second for those of the giants. Remembering the travails of Moses, the compiler makes no overt claim that either was written by the Finger of God (Exodus 31:18).

Lets Trade Phantom Monkeys, Hugo Brandt Constius

Word Ways

Two words are dual if for every position where one word has a vowel, the other has a consonant and vice versa. Eckler's near-alternating ten-letter words in the August 2000 WOrd Ways exhibit many examples: themselves-Euroaquilo, literature-anatomical, clubfooted-audiophile, etc.

Bananagrams 13, Edmund Conti

Word Ways

Bananagrams--anagrams to drive you bananas--consist of rhymed couplets, each one containing a pair of anagrams to be solved. One of the rhyming words will always be an anagram, and the couplet itself will offer clues to help solve the anagram. Answers can be found in Answers and Solutions at the end of this issue.

Common Ground, William Webster

Word Ways

Although each of the names anagrams, first and last, doing so will not solve this puzzle. The solution is a pair of six-letter words.

Answers And Solutions

Word Ways

Answers and solutions to the puzzles and games contained in this issue.

Common Place Names, Dan Tilque

Word Ways

Articles about American placenames in Word Ways have generally reflected their great diversity. But what about their commonality? There's lots of duplication among the names of American places. Isn't it time that we had an article appreciating that fact.

A Visit With Dr. Letrix, Michael Keith

Word Ways

When I checked my e-mail that day, one address ([email protected]) caught my eye, though I didn't grasp its significance right away. When I opened it, the message just said "Twelfth Night, Act I, Scene V, Clown's 13th speech, 2nd sentence". I quickly pulled a copy of Shakespeare from the shelf and checked the reference, to find the admonishment.

Fifteen-Letter Transdeletion Pyramids, Darryl Francis

Word Ways

There are two bibles in the world of Scrabble. There's the American bible, the Official Tournament and Club Word List, and there's the British bible. Official Scrabble Words, 4th Edition. Both sources are used widely throughout the world that plays English-language Scrabble. Some countries use one or the other source, and some countries use both sources together. The combination of these two sources is often referred to as "world dictionary".

Back Cover

Word Ways

Instructions to authors wishing to contribute to Word Ways.

Yes & No, Michael Keith

Word Ways

In the following poem, the first and last stanzas use only those letters found next to even digits (2, 4, 6, 8) on the telephone dial, while the middle two stanzas use only odd ones (3, 5, 7, 9). This method of dividing the alphabet puts about twice as many words into the first group (which gets the vowels AIOU) compared to the second (which gets only EY), while Q and Z cannot be used at all.

Front Cover And Publication Information, Volume 34 Issue 1

Word Ways

Front cover and publication information for this issue.

Ten Riddle-Poems, Paul Maxim

Word Ways

The answers to the following ten riddles are not given in Answers and Solutions. Anyone wishing to verify a prospective answer should communicate directly with me (P.O. Box 120, New York NY 10012), enclosing a stamped self-addressed envelope. I request that the prospective answer be accompanied by a signed statement that no answers will be disclosed or published. I offer a cash reward of ten dollars to the first person who mails me the correct answers to any seven of the ten riddles.

Palindromania, Win Emmons

Word Ways

Setup: What Hannibal Lechter said when he had devoured a young girl and had been brought in for questioning.

Answer: MAIDEN LATE-DETAINED 1 AM

The Oz Contradictionary: Part 1

Word Ways

"Anil" is the pen name for Dr. Charles Melton, a retired Ox (Australian) biologist who privately published in 1999 a 98-page booklet, up/dn, a dictionary and contradictory of wordplay including anagrams, palindromes and charades. Word Ways will present excerpts from his book in this issue and future ones.

There, Denis Borris

Word Ways

I can't believe it there isn't there. I'm at the Ottawa Public Library--Rideau Street Branch. Without too much trouble, I just got in the "general"subject" module of the public-use computer, entered TH, hit the return key. Nothing on"there": "therapy" is followed by "thesis".

Eth Rat Coed Face, William Webster

Word Ways

"Lil ware het lickers," Apt dolt Enters, hewn eh acme fro het married.

"Overacts hotting, tub on rani--hared no eth aroid juts won."

"Si het whereat porter kayo?"

"Strut em!" saw Nereis prostie,

"Who arf si het Tar Code Face?"

"Net limes."

Drawn Inward And Other Poems: Part 2, Mike Mcguire

Word Ways

Seasons

Leaves fall.

Approaching winter with regret,

we wonder no less.

Together are beauty and truth,

then truth and beauty

are together less.

No wonder we regret.

With winter approaching,

fall leaves.

One Alphabet Scrabble, Richard Sabey

Word Ways

You're playing solitaire Scrabble, where the bag of tiles has just one of each letter and no blanks. The game is open, i.e. you choose which letters to draw when. After all your plays, deduct the values of the unplayed tiles. How much can you score?

The Origin Of The -Gry Problem, Chris Cole

Word Ways

On page 96 of my book Wordplay (Sterling Publishing Company, 1999) I state that the "-gry" puzzle originated on the Bob Grant talk show on WMCA-AM in New York City and was.

Bananagrams 12, Edmund Conti

Word Ways

Bananagrams--anagrams to drive you bananas--consist of rhymed couplets, each one containing a pair or anagrams to be solved. One of the rhyming words will always be an anagram, and the couplet itself will offer clues to help solve the anagram. Answers can be found in Answers and Solutions at the end of the issue.

Theme And Variations, John E. Connett

Word Ways

John Connett is one of the most prolific composers of short palindromic phrases. These often come in related families, as shown most spectacularly in "Ed's Palindromic Trickery" in the May 2000 Word Ways. Here are a number of further examples.

Answers And Solutions

Word Ways

Answers and solutions to the puzzles and games contained in this issue.

Colloquy

Word Ways

A collection of responses to previously published articles.

A Calculated Display, Susan Thorpe

Word Ways

The numbers which appear on the LCD of a calculator are made of a series of straight-line segments. For the purpose of the current exercise, I ignored (a) the gap junctions between the straight-line segments and (b) the fact that the numbers are displayed at an angle. The game is to turn the ten numbers 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9 on the calculator display into words. To do this, I started with a three-by-five grid of 15 cells, the smallest possible grid for the exercise. When drawn on the grid, each number occupies specific …

Pi Words, Howard Bergerson, Michael Keith

Word Ways

The number pi (= 3.14159265358979323846264338327950288...) is fundamental to the very fabric of the universe, so it's not surprising to encounter it in a number of logological contexts. In this article we explore families of words having a connection with the value of pi. Unless noted, all words are in Webster's Third Unabridged.

Residual Heterograms, Susan Thorpe

Word Ways

A heterogram is a word with no repeated letters. Residual heterograms are made by discarding letter repeats in words and then rearranging the remaining letters to form a word. Words with repeated letters can be divided into.

Compassionate Conservative, Mike Morton

Word Ways

I keep hearing this "compassionate term". Not being quite sure what it means, I figure there's one sure way to find the deeper meaning.