Fifteensquared

Never knowingly undersolved.

Archive for December 27th, 2007

Independent 6613 by Tees

Posted by nmsindy on 27th December 2007

nmsindy.

A very difficult puzzle, which I was not able to finish - clues I struggled with listed in full below - any help provided would be much appreciated. The theme is “The Scottish play” (Macbeth by Shakespeare) which also allows a reference to Hampden Park.

* = anagram < = reversed

ACROSS

9 ECLAMPSIA Ma< in (special)* Fitting = having a fit

11/12D THANE OF CAWDOR (Who can do after)* Thematic and it gave me the theme - it’s the Shakespeare play I know best.

12/23D HAMPDEN PARK (Ham pp darken)* Scotland’s equivalent of Wembley.

13 “Character must die” (5) ??U?D The 1st letter of this crosses 1 down at its 6th letter. (With that letter revealed as M, thanks Fletch, this is MOULD, I’d say - Yes, it is)

15 T(H)E SCO TTISH PLAY (this aptly)*

19 “Summon again where king quits, having grasped argument against Spain” (9) With ??C?N?E?E, it has to be RECONVENE - I can see the argument against (CON) and Spain (E), but not the rest of the wordplay. (Understand this now, thanks to Conrad - R E(CON) VEN E, even = quits)

21 CINNA “Sinner”. Killed in a mutiny.

22 MA (CBE) TH Math is an Indy setter.

23 PO (W) E RED Horrible refers to genre of Poe’s writing, I think (horror)

24 “Wanting wee (5)” ??O?T Think it may be SHORT as double definition.    (Yes, it is.)

25 AI R POTATO (taproot)*

DOWN

1 “22A’s line brings tungsten closer, boring through rock” (10). 22A is Macbeth and I have ?E?T???T?R, that R being from the slightly doubtful RECONVENE. Tungsten suggests there may be a W there (its atomic number), but I can get no further.

(Thanks, Fletch, for this PE (N TAME) TER - not sure I understand definition tho’)

4 ASIF As if

6 THE M INCH

7 PE (DD) LE

8 M ANN

14 LETTER HEAD

15 LA(d)Y H AND S ON many = D = 500

17 CONTENTS Excellent double definition

18 LUNARI AN (Urinal)*

22 “Sounder food from a standard pack(4)” M?(maybe an S from SHORT)? Have no idea what this is.

(Thanks, Fletch, it may be MAST hidden, indicated by pack - I completely missed that possibility.) (Yes, it is.)

Posted in Independent | 6 Comments »

Independent on Sunday 932 by Quixote (23/12/2007)

Posted by nmsindy on 27th December 2007

nmsindy.

A special Christmas offering from Quixote, the main theme being the use of a well-known Christmas item in its role as an anagram indicator. Once seen, solving was very fast. Solving time: 14 mins.

Notes on some clues below - happy to explain others if asked.

* = anagram

ACROSS

18 CONCERTI (One critic less i)* A less common plural of concerto than concertos. Excellent surface reading.

23 DI (woman) VANS (vehicles for transporting)

24 ALBERTAN (let a barn)* Prairies in Alberta, Canada

DOWN

1 PAR (R O) T r = runs (cricket) O = round

17 CONTRA ST

22 C HANTS

Posted in Independent | 1 Comment »

Guardian 24269/Araucaria - count me out

Posted by ilancaron on 27th December 2007

ilancaron.

Christmas songs not being a strong suit, I would never have worked out the song so thanks to Shirley for putting me out of my misery. It’s “Green Grow the Rushes, O” - a “well-known” counting song. I managed to cut and slash my way through the wordplay and definitions with guesses and some dictionary lookups and now that I know what the song is, hopefully everything else will fall into place.  Comments below have resolved some of the open questions…

Across

9 AR(THUR[sday])IAN - King Arthur was a royal and I believe an ARIAN was some sort of Christian heretic and I suppose THUR is much of Thursday…
10 YOU,TH [ink] - “I think therefore I am” in the 2nd person would be: “You think therefore you are” thus “proof that you are” is “You think”… now, remove the “ink” and you have…
13 IRIS[h] - she’s a Greek goddess but it looks like “Hibernian” is serving double duty… providing the H to remove from Irish and the definition of Irish.
14 GO,SPELLERS - ref. our song and “Four for the Gospel makers”.
15 ANG[n]ULAR - not a bad clue once you work it out which took me a bit: basically ANNULAR (ring-shaped) and ANGULAR are opposites: so replace N for nitrogen in ANNULAR with G (”first of gases”) to get ANGULAR.
17 DEC,[l]IBEL
19 S(TRA,TEG)IST - indeed insist means in SIST: namely, rev(get, art) in SIST.
22 LA[r]VA
23 LES(OTH=hot*)O - or is it LESO,THO=hot*? “Sign about its first awfully hot country”. It’s LE(S[ign]O,THO=hot* where LEO is our “sign”.
24 LA(R[a]GE)SS
26 T,WEED - not a stuttering clue after all.
27 TASMANIAN - ref. TASMANIAN devil.

Down

1 CAPTAIN, ABSOLUTE - from Sheridan’s “The Rivals” and ref. our song: “Three, three, the rivals” (there are two rivals presumably in the play, our captain being one of them).
2 ST,RIDING - not sure about the edge of the Lake District ref. STRIDING Edge is in fact a ridge in the Lake District.
3 TU=”two”,TU=”two” - it’s a garment and ref. two and ten (10) in our song: 10A is YOUTH and “Two, two, the lily-white boys, Clothed all in green…”
4 FIRED,OO,R[ange]
5 [fr]ENC[ch],AMP - French “some” is EN and “some” is Roman C (though by convention it’s usually many) and AMP for electrical current. OK “some French” is actually ENC.
6 S(YM,BOL)IC - ref. “Five for the symbols at your door” in the song, and the 2nd half of 4D (DOOR) where the wordplay is: rev(lob=chuck, my=setter’s) in SIC for “so”.
7 SUB=rev(bus),TLE=let* - Nice isn’t always in France you know!
8 THERE’S ALWAYS ONE - well, the song in question is a counting song in which each verse ends in ONE… but as for the “awkward” ref? See Shirley’s comment below.
16 LATITUDE - a rather nice double definition (one cryptic) since LATITUDES are indeed geographic parallels.
18 BE A D,EVIL=rev(live) - BEAD is our “round object” and “be” is live.
20 RUSHES - two meanings: together with 21 is our “hint” as to the theme song which, if you know the song already, makes it dead easy to understand the hint.
21 G,ROWTH=throw*
25 ROAD=”rode”=”rowed” - I suppose it is indeed better to ride a horse when travelling by ROAD rather than by boat (is there anything else going on?). Quite a good clue given the double homophone.

Posted in Guardian | 11 Comments »