Ian’s Labyrinth (Part 2)

This Post contains SPOILERS of puzzles that appear the book The Maze of Games by Mike Selinker, specifically “All the World’s a Stage” in Chapter 1.

Hey for the second crossword in maze of game for diamonds, is the literature shakespear…

Ian’s text came after about two weeks of silence. I figured he was getting settle into the school year and I planned on working with him on TMoG in person during a trip to Glenwood Springs in mid-September. I was glad that he got back to solving on his own before then.

And how do u get the letters A thru L to only 6 letters

The author is Shakespeare and the letters in the boxes A through L form a clue that produces a six letter answer

Ian’s question about Shakespeare made me wonder what Ian knows about the Bard of Avon. He may have encountered the name in school and maybe in a popular culture reference but I doubt he’s ever read or even knows the basic play of any of the one of the plays. The puzzle’s instructions clearly identifies the themes answers and doesn’t require any advanced Shakespearean knowledge, so Ian may have been asking out of curiosity. The question about the answer letters suggested that Ian was struggling with the puzzle fill, which is understandable given his inexperience with crossword vocabulary. Given that the book doesn’t have an asnwer key I’m happy to give Ian hints.

Is the clue “both meanings” or “bolomeanings”

Neither of those but you’re close do you want to know which letters are correct?

Yes plz

So, yes, Ian had some holes in the fill. After some more letter confirmations Ian had the twelve-letter clue.

Is the 12 letter word a body part or is the answer a body part

The six letter answer

Is the final answer joints? I think it is joints

Hmm, interesting. Ian knows not of meta-crosswords where the idea of “meetings” would suggest to the experienced solver to look at intersections in the grid. He took a more direct interpretation of the clue and came up with a legitimate body-part answer.

Look for places in the grid where the Shakespeare characters “meet”

Is it HEARTS

Where did you get HEARTS

By scrambling the letters I got crossing the Shakespear words. Is it right

That’s right

Yess Thanks

We’re making progress.