Inquisitor 1315: Affliction by ‘Eck

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Preamble:  A number of clues are afflicted and solvers are advised to follow an expert’s remedy. Having initially found the expert and the affliction, solvers must highlight the remedy in the grid (38 cells).

By ‘Eck? By ‘eck, what’s going on ‘ere? The first thing I noticed was that there were a lot of long words in various clues but how did that indicate an affliction and how were we meant to find the expert (and the affliction) for that matter?

Ah well, when flummoxed by the preamble, dive into the clues. As the grid began to fill from right to left, I began to identify some definite superfluous words and some possibilities but I was still none the wiser. With the grid mostly done, I took the, by now, mandatory break to allow my subconscious to mull it over. When I came back and re-read the preamble, I realised the double meaning of “initially”, aha, taking the initial letters of extra words, I quickly found MARK TWAIN in the across clues so I set about looking for the affliction in the down clues. Some of my extra words were a bit hazy (read wrong!) but I could see that it started LOG and ended EA. A quick trip to my interactive Chambers dictionary and I discovered LOGORRHOEA. Thus we had MARK TWAIN LOGORRHEA. Logorrhea is defined as: excessive flow of words, uncontrollable garrulity, so we’re looking for a remedy for “verbal diarrhoea”.

Guessing that there must be a Mark Twain quote referring to the affliction I then turned to the internet and found “As to the adjective: when in doubt, strike it out” from Pudd’nHead Wilson. All of the extra words I found were unnecessarily long and, indeed, unnecessary adjectives.IQ1315

And there we have our quote running anticlockwise from b2 through b12 through k12 through k2 through c2.

Thanks ‘Eck for a wonderful, marvellous, magnificent, outstanding, excellent, superb, admirable, delightful, phenomenal, sensational, stupendous, tremendous puzzle.

I, personally, thought it was: super, terrific, brilliant, great, fabulous, fantastic, smashing, ace, top-notch, smashing, stunning, neat, brill, boffo, out of this world, second to none, divine, heavenly, sensational, not half bad, boss, bully, classic, crack, dilly, famous, jammy, knockout; trimmer; hunky, jim-dandy.

As to the adjectives, in the tables below, I’ve followed MT’s advice and struck them out.

Across
No. Clue Entry
 Initial letter
 Wordplay
1 Hollows are found in manniferous trifles PLAYAS M
 Are inside PLAYS (trifles)
6 Conch-blower’s magnetism seen in market place TRITON
IT (magnetism; sex appeal) inside TRON (market place)
10 Chief is god on Tuesday RATU
RA (god)+TUesday
11 Fanny Adams is ignored by ascetics getting drinks KIRS
faKIRS (ascetics) minus FA (fanny adams)
13 US theatre unfortunately missing a front of house runs without her USHERETTE
US ThEaTrE (anag: unfortunately) minus A H(ouse)+R(uns) (front of) containing HER
I’m not too sure of the definition, is it an &lit, which I’ve never really understood?
15 Norm besmirched avaricious ‘Miss Religion’ PARSISM A
 PAR (norm)+MISS (anag: besmirched)
17 Reckling rascal’s time wearing dress TOERAG R
 ERA (time) “wearing” TOG (dress)
18 In Stratford, collar rower about concealing racket RABATO
OAR (rower; rev: about) containing BAT (racket)
20 Scripture to primarily sanction oils OTTOS
OT (scripture; Old Testament)+TO+Sanction (primarily)
21 Pirate splitting rodents to get bacterium, say? MICROBE
ROB (pirate) inside MICE
23 Chess clubs having Kafkaesque trouble CHEAT K
 Clubs+HEAT (trouble)
25 They may stop one mishandling a bust TABUS
A BUST (anag: mishandling)
26 Sort termagant Sue out for a period OESTRUS T
 SORT SUE (anag: out)
27 Being dragged from 27dn, tragically lacking energy ON-TOW
ONe-TWO (27d) minus Energy (anag: tragically)
29 Remains waspish-headed after lecturer uses tickler LASHES W
 Lecturer+ASHES (remains)
31 Dump nude, improperly embracing indeed! UNLADE
NUDE (anag: improperly) containing LA (indeed)
32 Estate holder in Paris, to go after getting overdrawn ODALLER
OD (overdrawn)+ALLER (to go; French)
36 Plant shown by action replay, 50% edited CLAYTONIA
ACTION+repLAY (50%) (anag: edited)
38 Six-footer’s lost in group of anthropophagous followers SECT A
 inSECT (six footer) minus IN
39 Homeowners regularly removed imparipinnate weeds HENS I
 HomEowNerS (regularly)
I think the definition is HEN=WEED=ineffectual person.
40 Niminy-piminy commodes, say, containing port ODESSA N
 commODES SAy (hidden: containing)
41 Despot flogged a nationalist SOLDAN
SOLD (flogged)+A+Nationalist

d

Down
No.
 Clue
 Entry
 Initial letter
 Wordplay
2 Smoke marijuana without bishop finally LAST
bLAST (smoke marijuana) minus Bishop
3 In front of square at hospital, allow lackadaisical drug runners ATHLETES L
 AT+Hospital+LET+E (drug)+Square
4 As seen from bra or opprobrious tassels, there’s more than one way to a man’s heart AORTAS O
 brA OR TASsels (hidden: as seen from)
5 Sweden’s telephone exchange Petra’s initially rung STEP
S(weden)+T(elephone)+E(xchange)+P(etra) (initially)
6 Gumple-foisted bird bonking’s no amateur! TIT G
 aT IT (bonking) minus Amateur
7 Withdraw from Spain after king’s disquisition RETRACT
R (king)+E (Spain)+TRACT (disquisition)
8 Sloth rested up lime tree TILIA
AI (sloth)+LIT (settled) (rev: up)
9 Leftovers rot horribly at edge of scullery ORTS
ROT (anag: horribly)+S(cullery) (edge of)
10 Suffice for pygmy’s zip RUNTO
RUNT (pygmy)+O (0; nothing; zip)
12 Seven homes renovated for buffoons SHMOES
Seven+HOMES (anag: renovated)
14 Shakespeare’s outrageous fortune? The opposite – it’s fury about nothing WROATH O
 WRATH (fury) containing O (0; nothing)
16 Liars developed rhinal outgrowths ARILS R
 LIARS (anag: developed)
19 Liberal’s with earl after crashing barn dance BRANLE
BARN (anag: crashing)+Liberal+Earl
21 Mark ramshackle (from fighting?) to ruminate about Ohio MOUSE R
 MUSE (ruminate) containing Ohio
22 Got one’s hands on one keelie after vandalising boat OBTAINED
BOAT (anag: vandalising)+I (1; one)+NED (keelie)
23 Guts somewhat shown by hail-fellow-well-met recidivists taking over league COLONS H
 CONS (recidivists) containing Over League
24 Tiler’s worried about luminance for latticework TRELLIS
TILER (anag: worried) containing Luminance
27 Punch! Then another! Obtain walkover after exclamation ONE-TWO
O (exclamation)+NET (obtain)+WO (walkover)
28 Overschutcht rails awkwardly askew WEKAS O
 ASKEW (anag: awkwardly)
30 Spouse initially has associate assassinate groom SAICE
S(pouse; initially)+Associate+ICE (assassinate)
33 Editor after tux made broadcast on radio, perhaps DJED
DJ (tux)+EDitor
34 Empyreal spirits, right? Right! RYES E
 Right+YES (right)
35 Apophthegmatical girl seen in actors’ houses NINA A
 seeN IN Actor (hidden: houses)
37 Pascal’s counsel having one drink AVA
AVocat (counsel; French advocate)+A (one)

 

19 comments on “Inquisitor 1315: Affliction by ‘Eck”

  1. For a short while I thought “by ‘eck” was part of the title of the puzzle.
    But I liked this new arrival and look forward to more of the same.

    Thank you Kenmac for a very witty preamble of your own, and a beautifully limpid blog of the solution.

    In the course of tracking down the quotation I really enjoyed a lot of MT’s remarks about writing and grammar – all of which I would endorse.

    Once upon a time, at school, we were encouraged to use adjectives to add colour to our “compositions”.

    Mind you, these were the same teachers who decreed it a cardinal sin to begin a sentence with And or But.
    An edict which seems to persist.

    But which has no grammatical rule to support it. And, well I could go on . . .

  2. Yes, an excellent offering from ‘Eck, and a nice blog from you kenmac. 38 gif’s in the animation! I found the quotation first, looked up its author, and only later twigged the meaning of “initially”.

    Like you I was baffled by the definition in USHERETTE. If it is supposed to be &lit the word “without” seems to nullify it!

  3. I had the same English teachers as jonsurdy. There is what I call “school English” and it is not quite the same as what you read in books and newspapers. They also used to urge capital letters a lot, such as “I’m going to my School and I will do the Crossword there in Biology”, on the grounds it was a particular school, a particular crossword and a particular subject.

  4. I didn’t manage to the find the quote on the internet (despite having finished the crossword, and worked out the theme letters/words), but I eventually found it in the grid, and I did find lots of other Mark Twain quotes which were very amusing and informative. Not too tricky, but good fun. I managed to finish the Listener (my first ever attempt) as well…I was under the impression that this was much harder than the Inquisitor, but evidently that isn’t the case. All in all, I felt pretty smug!

    Thanks to Kenmac for a logorrhoeaneous(?) blog, and to the superbly named ‘Eck.

    I’m currently battling with Lato, but I think I’ve reached the end-game…I can feel the PDM approaching…

  5. And so here’s to an excellent start to the 2014 programme; with Schadenfreude’s brilliant starter, then this nice offering from ‘Eck and with Lato also up there in spades what could be better. I short circuited a bit on Logorrhoea but with Mark Twain identified not too difficult to find the appropriate quote in the ODQ. Picking up on Dan’s comment about the Listener; is it so that the difference in standards isn’t too daunting? Or is it that The Listener occasionally has an easier puzzle to encourage newcomers. I’ve never had a serious go at it so would welcome some advice.

  7. Amother enjoyable Inquisitor and another flashing grid in the blog, what more can you ask for!

    We also wondered about USHERETTE. We needed a search once we’d spotted ADJECTIVE to connect the quote with Mark Twain.

    Thanks to setter and blogger!

  8. Thanks for the blog, Kenmac. I missed the initial letters completely – having filled the grid I found the quote fairly quickly & googled to identify Mark Twain – I should know better than that by now!, but it just makes what I already thought was an excellent puzzle even better.

    Dan @4 I’ve been doing the Listener when I can scrounge it for 8 or 9 mths, maybe 15-20 puzzles in all – I was pretty smug at finishing the first four I tried in much the same time as an IQ, but then came my comeuppance. IMO there’s a significant overlap between the easy-to-middling Listeners & the middling-to-difficult IQs but the harder Listeners are a step up &, for me, finished only with liberal use of Chambers word wizard &/or online help.

  9. Rather heavily flagged, I thought, with all that logorrhoea, and the “initially” in the preamble. So, not too tough, which was a surprise because I now can’t see which of the last 5 puzzles was rated 1-* and which 3-* on Nimrod’s scale. (The final three in his review of last year were all 2-*).

    I thought that kenmac‘s encomiastic lists might indicate a message, initially – but I fear a trick was missed there. But thanks for the blog, and the puzzle by ‘Eck. (Now pretty much the only thing worth buying the w/e paper for.)

    USHERETTE clue: not great, but OK.
    I broadly agree with shikasta @8 regarding the Listener: that has a higher mean, but also a larger variance – some of the end-games can be very tough indeed.
    And Dan @4 & MANG @5: please refrain from mentioning live puzzles – even comments such as ‘difficult’ or ‘good’ could affect those that haven’t tackled/finished a puzzle yet.

  11. Nothing so clever, H___G____. The lists were merely lifted from the thesaurus section of my Chambers CD-Rom version.

    Note to self: must try harder 😉

  12. Enjoyable puzzle and I liked how the quote was presented in the grid. Personally though I would have preferred to have had to work harder to find Mark Twain, but I am being pernickety and perhaps I am somewhat masochistic. Thanks ‘Eck and look forward to your next one.

    Hi@2 Re USHERETTE. The clue needs ‘without’ to work as &lit doesn’t it? The definition is that the theatre is missing the front of house (serving staff.) but carries on without the answer (one of the serving staff).

  14. Some words lend themselves to &lit treatment like CAPTURE as someone who won the CCCWC a couple of years ago showed us with ‘Put suspect in custody’. I have never been a fan though of the more contrived ones which stretch the bounds of what might be considered a definition. I have to accept that I am in the minority though as they frequently win competitions. This particular clue I thought much better than many.

  15. Re Listener/Inqy

    I’ve done/attempted both for some considerable time. As a general rule, the former is definitely tougher than the latter. True, there are Listener puzzles that fall within the ‘doable’ bracket for me, which I would equate with the medium-to-hard Inqys, but there are often Listeners that for me at least are utterly impenetrable even at the outset, and few if any Inqys are so.

    I should also say that the Inqys tend to be a bit less po-faced

  16. Interesting comments on the Listener vs Inquisitor topic. I think I must’ve got lucky on my first attempt (in terms of it not being too tough). I think I’ll stick to the Inquisitor, as I usually only have time for one.

    I must say (without wishing to ‘big up’ the opposition) that the one I did (about Hitchcock films) was brilliantly constructed, and had the same kind of fiendish end-game that I would expect in a good Inquisitor. It certainly wouldn’t have been out of place in the Indy.

    I am curiously fascinated (probably the same kind of fascination that makes one unable to look away from a scary film) by bingybong@15’s comment about some Listeners being ‘utterly impenetrable’. Presumably somebody manages to complete these…

  17. To expand a bit on my earlier comments, the Listener, I guess, has the reputation of being the most difficult puzzle. For that reason, for a long time, I thought I’d never be able to tackle it and kept away from it. Decided then to try one during a holiday period when I had extra time and, to my amazement, was able to solve it and found it a most enjoyable puzzle. The series aims, I guess, to be challenging and to take the solver a long period (of enjoyment, hopefully) to solve. I never got near solving all in a year as the “all-corrects” do but found I could solve maybe 3/4 of them. They are all solvable tho (they have to be) with the harder ones having under 300 correct entries as revealed in the annual stats (shown on the Listener website). As someone remarked, the Listener is maybe a little harder than IQ on average but there is significant overlap. I’d also like to mention the Enigmatic Variations series in the Sunday Telegraph – this, I’d say, again overlaps with the other two series but on average would be somewhat easier than IQ. Several setters – including this writer – have set for all three series so there would be something in common between them, I’d say, for that reason too.

  18. Thanks to ‘Eck for the enjoyable puzzle. I ‘smelt a rat’ when I read down the clues and saw the impenetrable adjectives guessed that logorrhoea migjht be the ‘affliction’. I’m also a big fan of MT so got the quote quickly. Not many times do I stumble on the theme and supporting detail so quickly.

    Re the Listener/IQ debate, I guess if you have time to do both, then fine, enjoy, but I think I would be probably get into bother, by ‘eck, if I spend all weekend on puzzles, much as I would love to.

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