Tense play taken in by Lincoln - The Man Who Wasn't There? (8)
I believe the answer is:
absentee
'man who wasn't there?' is the definition.
The definition and answer can be both people as well as being singular nouns.
Maybe you can see a link between them that I can't see?
'tense play taken in by lincoln' is the wordplay.
'play' indicates anagramming the letters.
'taken in by' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'lincoln' becomes 'abe' (I've seen this in another clue).
'tense' anagrammed gives 'sente'.
'sente' put inside 'abe' is 'ABSENTEE'.
'the' acts as a link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for absentee that I've seen before include "One away from work, etc" , "He's not here!" , "are you fonder of him?" , "One who should be but isn't present" , "shirker?" .)