Posted by rightback on 29th September 2007
Solving time: 15:23
Not for the first time, a puzzle based on the works of Lewis Carroll, specifically Through the Looking-Glass (TTLG) and its chess ‘match’ between the White and Red pieces. About average difficulty overall, provided you knew a little about the book.
* = anagram, “X” = sounds like ‘X’.
| Across |
| 1 |
FIGHTER (= FREIGHT*) + COMMAND - strictly something like ‘once’ is needed here. |
| 8 |
E VITA - which very plausibly means ‘is life’ in Italian.
|
| 9 |
NO SLOUCH; OSLO in [N for S]UCH - a hard answer phrase. Luckily short capitals are few and far between; Lima springs to mind, but not many others. |
| 11 |
CELESTE (double definition) - refers to the Mary Celeste. |
| 12 |
ERNES + TO - a very innocent looking ‘to’ in the clue proves crucial. Clever, but less so coming from Araucaria as his clues contain so many superfluous words. |
| 13 |
W(HIT)E - the first of many references to TTLG in this puzzle, though I don’t fully understand the definition (”…came from much reflection”). |
| 15 |
LASER DISK; (AS RED SILK)* |
| 17 |
NOVE[mber] + LETTE[r] |
| 20 |
DO YEN |
| 25 |
MITI (”MITTY”) + GATE |
| 27 |
IN(DI)STINCT + NESS |
| Down |
| 1 |
FRENCH WIN (= ‘Victoire’) + DOW - the best I can offer for the last bit of the wordplay is that ‘door opens’ might indicate DO[or]. |
| 3 |
T (= ‘model’) + EAR’S + HE’LL - a shell that dispenses tear gas. I hate ‘model’ for T (as in the Ford Model T). |
| 4 |
RENDELL - refers to Ruth Rendell. The ellispes in this and the previous clue are crucial; take TEAR SHELL, remove SH (’abandon silence’) and change ‘tear’ to ‘rend’. |
| 5 |
OYSTERS - cryptic definition, referring to the scene with the Walrus and the Carpenter in TTLG. |
| 6 |
MY OWN INVENTION - again the ellipses matter, and again a Carrollian reference; this clue refers to the phrase ‘Necessity is the mother of invention’ and to the White Knight in TTLG who claimed that his upside-down box was his “own invention… so that the rain can’t get in”. |
| 7 |
NE(CESS[p]IT)Y |
| 10 |
LOO + KIN + GG + LASS |
| 16 |
RED KNIGHT; (KEND)* in RIGHT - another reference to TTLG. |
| 18 |
T(EST)ACT - I should really be wise to things like ‘intact’ in the Guardian by now, but this took me a couple of looks. |
| 19 |
E(ASTER)N - refers to the Great Eastern, built by Brunel. |
| 22 |
[go]BLIN + I - I didn’t understand this while solving. |
| 24 |
BRUCE[llosis] - my last entry, by a good couple of minutes. I was initially sure that the answer was B[atman] + (word for cattle) = (word for disease), but when I finally looked for something else I remembered that Batman’s alter ego was Bruce Wayne, and the cattle disease ‘brucellosis’ which I think I made a hash of in a Times Jumbo recently. Perhaps not the fairest wordplay. |
Posted in Guardian | 4 Comments »
Posted by Colin Blackburn on 29th September 2007
The theme required solutions to be adapted before entry but said nothing of the clues. Noticing that the answer lengths were one or two less than the grid lengths this suggested some addition to each answer as it was entered into the grid. Treating the clues as normal I solved a few intersecting clues cold. After three of four from the top corner it stood out that each answer so far contained a double-you and that the only way to get the words to fit the grid was to do something with these double-yous. Unfortunately 1a and 1d both went in, and remained real words, if the W became a QU. This didn’t work for the next couple of answers!
I then thought about the title, EMPLOY. Then it dawned, EMPLOY = use = yous; so, turn a double-you into two yous. Then the answers fitted perfectly and a few modified letters even checked against single occurrences of you in crossing words. Once I had this it became straightforward to solve. The only complication was whether to interpret a you in the grid as a you or part of a double-you.
The cluing was generally sound with some good surface reading. There is one answer that I have tentatively put in which follows from the word play, vaguely, but doesn’t seem to be a word. I may be wrong!
| Across |
| 1 |
WAYSIDE — (DAISY)* in WE — straightforward clue with a good surface to start the puzzle |
| 5 |
WOOED — OO in WED(nesday) — (a pair of) spectacles is what a batsman gets when he gets two ducks in the two innings of a match, ie two zeroes. |
| 9 |
IPSWICH — (tr)IPS + WI + CH — some to mean three letters might be frowned upon but as trips appears in the clue it isn’t so heinous. |
| 10 |
RENEW — seRENE Weather |
| 11 |
WIN HANDS DOWN — W + IN + HANDS DOWN — 19 = endows. |
| 14 |
WRAP — “rap” — the completion of filming is a wrap. Great use of the film title for the homophone part of the clue. |
| 15 |
DHOW — D + HOW — how is a Scottish hollow. Oddly it’s also a word meaning a small hill! |
| 16 |
WAVE — cryptic def. |
| 17 |
TWEE — TWEED - D |
| 20 |
WEAL — E in LAW< |
| 22 |
WILD CREATURES — (WALTER CRUISED)* — a French definition here referring to the art movement known as Fauvism. |
| 24 |
SNOWY — double def. — Tin-Tin’s dog was called Snowy. Strange surface though. |
| 25 |
CUTE BOW — (CUBE TWO)* — I can’t find CUTE BOW in a dictionary but it fits the grid. I may be misinterpreting the word play. |
| 26 |
SWASH — double def. |
| 27 |
BYE-LAWS — BY + (WALES)* |
|
| Down |
| 1 |
WIT — (TIW)< — ref is to the Norse god Tiw. |
| 2 |
ANSWER — americANS WE Rejected |
| 3 |
SEWN UP — double def. |
| 4 |
DECLARE WAR — cryptic def. |
| 6 |
WEEDED — “we did” — Hmmm. |
| 7 |
ONE-TWO — double def. — one possible score for an away win in football. |
| 8 |
DOWN QUILT — D + OWN + (L in QUIT) |
| 12 |
DRIVES AWAY — DR + I’VE + SAW + AY |
| 13 |
WET NURSES — (WESTERN US)* |
| 18 |
WIDOW — WINDOW - N — a widow is a short line appearing on the next page separated from the rest of its paragraph; or is that an orphan? |
| 19 |
ENDOWS — END + WO< + S(tatue) |
| 20 |
UNWELL — jUNe + WELL — sounds like Doc’s writing about this year! |
| 21 |
ERENOW — hoW ONE REckoned< |
| 23 |
WAS — W + A + S |
Posted in Guardian | 3 Comments »