Posted by Colin Blackburn on 4th January 2008
This looked like it was going to be a tough puzzle but the theme dropped out quickly and helped me to fill in most of the answers. Initially I considered that Noel might be some devius trick like “No el” but it turns out it was more straightforwardly Christmassy.
The perimeter, which I got after getting just a couple of letters on the top row, and the internal oblong of 24 letters spelt out,
IN THE BLEAK MIDWINTER
FROSTY WIND MADE MOAN
EARTH STOOD HARD AS IRON
WATER LIKE A STONE
This was written by CHRISTINA ROSSETTI and thus I had the missing letters available to me after having solved only a couple of the thematic clues. I only knew the first line but waking up my partner, she’s quicker than Google, I soon filled in the rest.
Afetr typing up the blog I realised that I’d filled in some answers without solving the clues. I leave the explanations as an exercise to the reader, or me if I have time to check before starting this week’s Listener.
The thematic clues below are listed with their grid entries and extra letters first. This is followed by the clue answer.
| Across |
| 8 |
HYAENA — alternate letters + A |
| 9 |
INCHON — INCH+ON — this one had me for a while as I assumed that Yellow belonged to the word play and so the answer ended in OR. It turns out that Inchon is Korean port on the Yellow Sea. |
| 10 |
DITHER + C – DITCHER — DIT+CHER |
| 11 |
MOLOSSI — MO + (S+S in OIL*) — S is a medieval Roman numeral for 70. MOLOSSI are feet in verses. I assume “black” is being used as an anagram inicator here. |
| 12 |
OTTAR + H – THROAT — THRO + TA< |
| 15 |
EGOS + R – GORSE — S in GORE |
| 16 |
IDOIST — IDIOTS* — Ido is a breakaway from Esperanto. |
| 17 |
TEEN — ? |
| 18 |
HOSENET — (ON THESE)* |
| 19 |
SEROSA — SORE< in SA |
| 21 |
DEWIER + I – WIERDIE — ? |
| 24 |
METHUEN — MET + U in HE + N — Tom = Collins = English publisher threw me initially. |
| 28 |
AS OF — A+S+O+F |
| 29 |
TENSON — TENS+O+N — TENS are honor cards, N=Knight in chess. Finally, a TENSON is a competition between two troubadors. |
| 30 |
TAIT + S – ? |
| 33 |
REALO + T – ? |
| 34 |
AUSTRIC — comp anag. OBSCURATION - BOON |
| 35 |
ALTERS + I – SALTIRE — (A TILER IS - I)* |
| 36 |
SCORNS — S+CORN+S |
| 37 |
REGLET + N – GENTLER — L in G+ENTER |
|
| Down |
| 1 |
TATTLER — ATTLEe in TRue |
| 2 |
ENERGY — GREEN* + Y |
| 3 |
BARDO + A – ABROAD — A+BROAD |
| 4 |
ENOSIS + R – SENIORS — I in SENORS |
| 5 |
KHOR — K+HO+R — |
| 6 |
MOSSIE — O+SS+I.E. after M |
| 7 |
INSIST + O – IONIST — (z)IONIST |
| 11 |
MASORETIC — O in MASTER* +I.C. — |
| 13 |
TWEE + S – SWEET — WE in SET |
| 14 |
IDEE — (IE + DE)* — chIEfs and elDErs |
| 20 |
SHOE — S+HOE — not sure about this one on reflection. |
| 22 |
ISRAELI — R in IS+A+ELI |
| 23 |
EORL + S – LOSER — S in ROLE* |
| 24 |
MEDUSA + E – ? |
| 25 |
ENESCO + T – CENOTES — C.E. + NOTES |
| 26 |
UNKIND — UN+KIND |
| 27 |
BIRLED + T – DRIBLET — DRIBLET |
| 31 |
ALARM + I – LARIAM — I in LARA + M — ref Brian Lara. |
| 32 |
ATOM — ATO+M — but I’m not sure how ATO comes from college - censor? |
Posted in Inquisitor | 1 Comment »
Posted by John on 4th January 2008
The usual pleasant offering from Phi, but one or two I can’t quite understand.
| Across |
| 1 |
J UMP(ire). Expressing in the sense of throwing out. |
| 3 |
DESPOTIC I’m pretty sure. Oppressive = despotic and place = spot. But I can’t see how DEIC comes. Oh yes, de-ice, which I suppose = warm. |
| 10 |
TIGHTROPE WALKER. I think this is because a tightrope walker is an act, it provides tension because it’s so exciting, and it’s upon tension because it’s done on a tense rope. |
| 11 |
L(HAS A)APS O. A dog that appears far more often in crosswords than in real life, I suspect. I’ve never knowingly seen one. |
|
|
| 13 |
Another one that I’ve made a note I don’t understand. Perhaps again by the time I finish this comment I’ll have got it. It seems to be CARAMEL, which is a sweet and contains a ram. But how is cel a piece of animation? No, I haven’t got it. |
| 15 |
TO(U CA)N |
| 17 |
QU A L I A. Not a word I was very familiar with, but the wordplay is easy enough. |
| 19 |
RO(B)OT I C. |
| 21 |
(GOO(d) CAKES)* R |
| 24 |
CLEAR-HEADEDNESS - (needless charade)* |
| 25 |
B(ONE D)UST. I have two doubts about this clue: doesn’t “A in possession of B” put A on the outside, not the inside, of B? And according to Chambers, bone-dust is used in agriculture, which makes the definition a bit of a strain. |
| |
| Down |
| 1 |
JET B(L)ACK |
| 2 |
MAG (U)MA. Uma Thurman is a name I hardly know, but something like it is fairly obvious and it can be confirmed here. |
| 4 |
EVEN [= still] OUT [= undecided, as in "the jury's still out"] |
| 5 |
PLATINUM BLONDE - (pull tanned bimbo - b)*. Good clue. |
| 6 |
TAKE A PART, which is arguably what you do if you play on stage |
| 7 |
COR K |
| 8 |
IT’S A SMALL WORLD, but I can’t see the significance of “office” |
| 14 |
ROUGH-HEWN - “when” rather crude, or rough, becomes “hewn”. I can’t see any link between this one and the one before, so what do the ellipses mean? |
| 16 |
ACTRESSY- (racy sets)* |
| 18 |
ALGIERS - (sea girl)*. I suppose it isn’t the end of the world having two such similar clues next to each other. |
| 19 |
R(ES)IDE |
| 22 |
K NELL. “monarch’s mistress” always seems to point to Nell Gwynn. |
| 23 |
Initial letters |
Posted in Independent | 6 Comments »
Posted by neildubya on 4th January 2008
This was the puzzle that almost never was. Due to be published on the 29th of December, it was nowhere to be found in the newspaper, much to the frustration of a number of eager solvers (not to mention Eimi himself). It eventually appeared on the 1st of January as a “Bank Holiday special” with an apology (a production error was at fault) tucked away elsewhere in the paper. As someone commented: “Cheeky, eh?”.
Anyway, I hope everyone who bought the paper on the 29th eventually got to solve the puzzle as it was very enjoyable. Tricky in places and there were a few things I didn’t understand at the time of solving but I think I’ve got them all now. 8/15 was very much a case of third time lucky.
| Across |
| 1 |
E in CHER’S |
| 4 |
MOUSS[-e],AKA - “also known as” was a big help here as there aren’t many words that end with AKA. |
| 10 |
(AC ARCH MORALISTS)* - A CHRISTMAS CAROL. Very easy once you’ve got 17d. |
| 11 |
PAN,OPTIC - wacky surface reading. |
| 18 |
(CATCHLINE)* - TECHNICAL. |
| 20 |
LOCAL,E - I’ve only just spotted why LOCAL is “number”: LOCAL anaesthetic (which makes you numb). |
| 22 |
PIN T[-able +POTS] - I made a mistake at 8/15 (I had GLITTERS rather than GLISTERS) which meant I spent ages looking for a suitable phrase that fit ?I?T?O?T. I eventually had to concede that there wasn’t one. “Pin table” is another name for “pinball”. |
| 24/12 |
THE CRICKET ON THE HEARTH - I’ve read a fair amount of 17d but none of his short stories and while I’ve heard of 10a (who hasn’t?) and even 13d, this one was new to me. I drew a blank with the wordplay so I took the lazy route and got Googling. The wordplay is in two parts: “what a keen sports fan might have” (THE CRICKET ON), “where the Ashes might be seen” (THE HEARTH). |
| 25 |
SASH CORD - which is something attached to a sash window (”certain lights” I think) in order to balance it any height. |
| 26 |
IDEALS - a bit of indirectness here but the clue makes things as easy as possible. The ninth day of Christmas has “ladies dancing” which we could read as (LADIES)*. |
| |
| Down |
| 1 |
CHAMPAGNE FLUTES - to get this one you need to know that the illustrator for some of 17d’s books was Hablot Browne, who went by the pseudonym “Phiz” (which sounds like “fizz” - champagne) |
| 2 |
E THANO[-u],L - quite an apt surface reading as Ekaterina Thanou was withdrawn from the Greek Olympic team on the eve of the Athens 2004 Games for missing a number of drugs tests (although I think she was later cleared). |
| 3 |
IMPOS[-t] in DEER - anyone get tripped up by “Does”? |
| 6 |
SUCRE - this is definitely worth remembering: SUCRE is the legal capital of Bolivia and is also the currency (another type of capital) of Ecuador. |
| 7 |
AIR,DRIE[-d] - I’m still a bit unsure about “almost completely forgot words”; isn’t this “dried up” rather than just “dried”. Or have I got this completely wrong? |
| 8/15 |
(RIGHT TAGS TO ALL TINSEL SOLD)* - this is what happens when you don’t work out anagrams properly. My first go at this was ALL THAT GLITTERS IS NOT GOLD. 22a showed that that wasn’t right so GLITTERS became GLISTENS. Then, as I was writing up this blog I thought I would double-check and I realised that the anagram fodder had one N and the answer had two and that the fodder had an R and my answer had none. So, GLISTERS it is then. |
| 9 |
I in (STITCHES)* - I liked the surface reading. I’ve read some Aquinas and believe me, there’s not exactly a laugh on every page. |
| 13 |
CHI in THEMES - this was the 17d story I knew of but hadn’t read. CHI (or QI) is a term from Chinese medicine. |
| 17 |
DICK,ENS - I thought this was quite tough, especially ENS (which means an existing or real thing). I guess it all depends on how quickly you get to DICK for detective. |
| 21 |
hidden in “JoeLY RIChardson” |
Posted in Independent | No Comments »