Comments on: Guardian 24,343 (Sat 22 Mar)/Araucaria - Lies, Damned Lies and Counterchecks Quarrelsome

By: rightback

rightback — Mon, 31 Mar 2008 07:09:07 +0000

I believe you’re right - I don’t think I read this clue properly. 33ac also corrected - thanks to Beermagnet, and for highlighting the absence of “14 21″ from the preamble which I forgot to mention.

I think Araucaria has derived ‘detailed’ = CIRCUMSTANTIAL from ‘details’ = ‘circumstances’; Chambers does give ‘relating to details’ under ‘circumstantial’.

By: muck

muck — Sun, 30 Mar 2008 18:25:08 +0000

25ac POLYCHROME: I believe this should be pol(-l)y+c(+h)rome.

(Crome was an English Romantic painter, sounds like chrome)

By: Paul Pridmore

Paul Pridmore — Sun, 30 Mar 2008 13:18:53 +0000

A well-worn, tedious quotation. Of course we all remember its use in Listener 890 “Touchstone” by Afrit, 17/04/1947. I wonder how often it has been used since, and what its appeal is?

By: beermagnet

beermagnet — Sun, 30 Mar 2008 11:35:30 +0000

I thought this was all wonderful , but it was a bit annoying the the preamble missed out 14/21 as one of the 7 removes of lie (both in the paper and online) - I see that these are asterisked as thematic in the online annotated solution.

33A Just to be picky - to get from TUITIONS to ITUTIONS it’s the first “I” that moves to the front. I think the Rev’s “slightly twisted” covers it well.

38A I still don’t understand how the partial clue “Detailed (14)” leads to CIRCUMSTANTIAL. I see the annotated solution says [as with 'evidence'] but surely “detailed evidence” is not the same as “circumstantial evidence”.

By: rightback

rightback — Sun, 30 Mar 2008 10:57:29 +0000

I’ll buy all those, including MODE + ST = ‘ways’ (which works) and CHURLISH = CHUR(C => LIS)H = ‘about leaving flower in church’ (which doesn’t, really) - all the other thematic clues had complete wordplay and possible missing definitions, so this all makes far more sense now. “Shavings” I should have seen, but the quotations were both new to me. Many thanks to both commenters.

By: Andrew

Andrew — Sun, 30 Mar 2008 10:48:25 +0000

I had the same problems as you with some of these. The online solution says:

20A: SHAVINGS - savings pronounced when intoxicated
45A: CHUR(c)H
(so maybe that’s one bit of “partial” clueing?)
42D: PLAY “The play’s the thing”, Hamlet, II, 2 + what umpire says to start the bowling”

44D: LIES “One thing is certain and the rest is Lies”, Omar Khayyam
(OK was translated by Fitzgerald)

All pretty obscure and/or Auraucarian!

By: Eileen

Eileen — Sun, 30 Mar 2008 10:48:09 +0000

20A SHAVINGS=’savings’ for the intoxicated!
37D MODE+ST for two kinds of way?
42D I could only think of ‘The play’s the thing’ [Hamlet]