Friday 20 July 2012

Solution for 19 July cryptic crossword clue



Young child enthralled by stories?  That’s an understatement (7)
Solution – litotes


First, a big shout out to Angela at Tracing Rainbows who was the first to correctly solve this.


Ok, I am showing off, here.  Being of a certain age I was taught grammar at school and knew that litotes was a technical word for an understatement.  An example might be someone winning a medal saying that they hadn't done too bad.  New Zealanders are very fond of using litotes (although they wouldn't recognise that word) since one of the biggest sins in New Zealand is to be "up yourself" – or a "skite".  So a fail on that front today.


So what has the first part of the clue got to do with the solution? 


Young child = tot


Tot is found "enthralled by" ie in the middle of a word for "stories" ie "lies"


Li + tot + es = litotes


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