Errata
The following errors were corrected in the second printing:
- In the foreword, it says “As I said from the stage of Carnegie Hall in April 2024…” That date should be June, 2024.
- On page 99 and on page 267, it incorrectly says that A Little Jurassic Treasure Hunt was from 2013. It was actually held in 2011.
- Under Cast of Characters in Chapter 4. Sondheim, Word Puzzle Designer, it reads “Azed: Successor to Apex”. It should read: “Successor to Ximenes.” Noted by Paul Henderson, who rightly added “If anyone is ‘Successor to Apex’, I suppose it’s me.”
- The book currently lists in the ludological timeline the incorrect year for a production of Company. It should read: 2021, December: Last opening night gift of a personalized jigsaw puzzle, for the Broadway revival of Company.
The following errors were corrected in the third printing:
- On page 280, the title for the game “Hostilities” is not properly formatted.
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On page 282 it says: “After each reading, if identifies were revealed…” There are two errors here. The first one is that the word “identifies” should be “identities”. The lower-case “f” can scan like a lower case “t” so it was easy to miss. However, the solution is not to change the word. This line comes from the instructions to the game of Hostilities, whose rules are in BOTH sections of the book. For some reason, the rules are out of sync. On Page 282 it reads, in full: “13. After each reading, if identifies were revealed, players can also choose to play for points, earning one point for correctly guessing either the questioner or the answerer and three points for correctly guessing both. (If a player made someone cry or drop out, perhaps give them an extra five points. It is called Hostilities, after all . . . )”. But on page 29, it correctly reads: “13. After each reading, players can choose to play for points, earning one point for guessing either the questioner or the answerer correctly and three points for guessing both correctly. (If a player made someone cry or drop out, perhaps they receive an extra five points. It is called Hostilities, after all . . .)”. At the same time rule number 14 is also slightly different. The rules on page 29, the first time the rules appear, are the correct ones.
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On page 43 and page 248, George Steel is misspelled as Steele. (The George in the book is NOT the American professional wrestler.) Thanks to Ben Zimmer for the catch.
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P291 – 20ac/25dn – the middle line should refer to “little Garth”, not “Gary” as this is a misprint for “little girth”, defining TUM. (Thank to Keith Williams)
- P291 – clue showing as 0ac/28dn is actually “30ac/28dn” (Thank to Keith Williams)
- The book drew from the 1981 re-print of Sondheim’s essay on cryptics in his print collection from New York magazine to say about cryptics (on page 190) “until recently nonexistent in the United States apart from The Nation, The Atlantic, and Harper’s…” However, that would have been anachronistic to say in 1968. To fix this in Matching Minds, the correct language should be, from the original unedited essay in 1968: “inexplicably nonexistent in the United States apart from The Nation and an occasional Sunday edition of The New York Times…” (Thanks to Ben Zimmer for catching this one).
In the next printing of Matching Minds with Sondheim look forward to seeing corrected (if you find a new one, please let me know):
- On page 33, 3rd line, George Lee “Andrews” is incorrectly written as “Andrew“. (Thanks to Mitchell Karig)
- On page 89, 2nd paragraph, 2nd line – “1954” should be “1944“. (Thanks to Mitchell Karig)