Always a pleasure to see eXternal – this is his third of the year.
Preamble: Answers to 20 clues are too short for their slots and must be entered with gaps, revealing three thematic figures. The 24 remaining clues each contain an extra word; those from across clues can be paired with those from downs to make 12 thematic words or phrases. With these 12 in alphabetical order, first letters from the 24 clues containing these extra words spell out how to fill the gaps (not all in conventional directions). All final entries are real words.
The puzzle number brings to mind Orwell’s novel of course, but the title of the puzzle is “Horrors” and it is Hallowe’en, so who knows …
The long answer at 1d, ESCAPE CLAUSE, came straight away but its companion at 9d, GRANNY ANNEXE, took me till relatively near the end – it was a complete revelation to find that “to granny” someone is a Scots term meaning to whitewash them in a contest.
At first I thought that the empty cells would be unchecked but a little later I realised I was wrong – about half of them were. The left side was coming along well, the right side was a little raggedy, probably owing to my different fortune with the two long answers. The blank cells were assembling themselves into recognisable shapes, one on the left, one on the right, and three in the middle; and with just three or four of the short answers to go it was apparent that the three thematic figures were 1 0 1, the number of the torture room in Orwell’s novel.
Now to pair up the 24 extra words: from across clues memory mini double thought big plus inner new belly floating airstrip joy, and from the downs party one speak brother fortress camp crime good think true feel hole. I managed four combinations from memory but needed recourse to online resources for the rest; altogether we have
AIRSTRIP ONE
BELLYFEEL
BIG BROTHER
DOUBLETHINK
FLOATING FORTRESS
INNER PARTY
JOYCAMP
MEMORY HOLE
MINITRUE
NEWSPEAK
PLUSGOOD
THOUGHTCRIME.
Finally, how to fill in the gaps. The instruction from the first letters of the relevant clues is WITH WINSTON’S GREATEST FEAR, which, as many of us know, is RATS. So, in each set of 3 or 4 gaps we enter RAT or RATS, in half the cases in reverse order and indeed pleasingly symmetrical.
A lovely puzzle and a marvellous grid: six entries containing RAT or RATS (one way or another) that are real words with or without them, not to mention the intersecting entries that exhibit the same feature. What a fine piece of work. Bravo eXternal, thanks.
| No. | Clue | X | Answer | Wordplay |
| Across | ||||
| 1 | Earl at times jogging [memory] for judge (8) | memory | ESTIMATE | E(arl) [AT TIMES]* |
| 7 | Type of [mini] barley greatly discussed (4) | mini | BIGG | BIG (greatly), homophone |
| 10 | Native receives [double] energy when mature (6) | double | SEASON | SON (native) around E(nergy) AS (when) |
| 11 | Aunt’s [thought] husband Arthur vacuous and dim (7) | thought | UNCLEAR | UNCLE (aunt’s husband) A(rthu)R |
| 12 | Wicked product maker designed cedar case for [big] lantern (7) | big | CANDLER | [CEDAR L(anter)N]* |
| 13 | Flurry catching duck, athletic Madagascan [plus] catlike beast (6) | plus | FOUSSA | FUSS (flurry) around O (duck) A(thletic) |
| 15 | Not certain to lose against malaria (5) | A∙GUE | VAGUE (not certain) ¬ V (versus, against) | |
| 16 | Obtain knowledge torturing guards (6) | ∙∙∙GET | (knowled)GE T(orturing) | |
| 17 | Diplomacy to exert influence on Troy (5) | T∙ACT | ACT (exert influence) after T(roy) | |
| 21 | Dusky horse performed in auditorium (4) | DU∙N | DONE (performed), homophone | |
| 22 | Observers in Glasgow watched declining society (4) | E∙EN | SEEN (watched) ¬ S(ociety) | |
| 23 | Exposed fool engaged in plot voiced displeasure (6) | BOO∙ED | (f)OO(l) in BED (plot) | |
| 25 | American’s to remove shell from drain outside hotel (6) | SH∙UCK | SUCK (drain) around H(otel) | |
| 27 | Naan man cut regularly in equal quantities (4) | AN∙A | (n)A(a)N (m)A(n) | |
| 30 | Top soldiers died (4) | L∙ID | LI (Light Infantry, soldiers) D(ied) | |
| 31 | Second person in church runs away from odd cardinal (5) | THE∙E | THREE (odd cardinal) ¬ R(uns) | |
| 32 | Motor muffler removed from casing (6) | CAR∙∙∙ | (s)CAR(f) (muffler) | |
| 35 | Shooter dispatched moving closer forward (5) | STE∙N | SENT (dispatched) with last letter moved earlier | |
| 36 | Newly seal last two characters in [inner] sanctum, Muslim theologians (6) | inner | ULEMAS | [SEAL (sanct)UM]* |
| 37 | Sudden inclination leads to investigating [new] menu’s dal (7) | new | IMPULSE | I(nvestigating) M(enu’s) PULSE (dal) |
| 38 | Turning large, [belly] is one uncritically admired element (7) | belly | SILICON | L(arge) IS both rev., ICON (one uncritically admired) |
| 39 | Twin originally undecided in election with [floating] vote (6) | floating | POLLUX | U(ndecided) in POLL (election) X (vote) |
| 40 | Winds obliterating Britain, [airstrip] closes (4) | airstrip | ENDS | BENDS (winds) ¬ B(ritain) |
| 41 | Girlfriend [Joy] once entering department store abroad for sugar (8) | joy | DEXTROSE | EX (girlfriend once) in D(epartment) [STORE]* |
| Down | ||||
| 1 | See [party] accuse pal breaking contractual provision (12, 2 words) | party | ESCAPE CLAUSE | [SEE ACCUSE PAL]* |
| 2 | Great wave witness reported (6) | SEA∙∙∙ | SEE (witness), homophone | |
| 3 | Initially [one] told point of view in argument (6) | one | TANGLE | T(old) ANGLE (point of view) |
| 4 | Spy harbour protected by massive breakwater (8) | MOLE∙∙∙∙ | double definition | |
| 5 | Court condemned African soldier serving France (6) | TUR∙CO | [COURT]* | |
| 6 | Truckers finally [speak] about travel to north Scotland’s shelter (4) | speak | SCOG | (trucker)S C (circa, about) GO< (travel) |
| 7 | Indecent [brother] boasted aloud (4) | brother | BLUE | BLEW (boasted), homophone |
| 8 | Something impressive to give up (6) | GAS∙∙∙ | SAG< (give) | |
| 9 | Ogilvy’s to whitewash [fortress] before queen turning up outside extension to residence (12, 2 words) | fortress | GRANNY ANNEXE | GRANNY (whitewash, Scot) EX (before) in ANNE (queen) |
| 14 | Reverie cut short for sexually potent [camp] man (4) | camp | STUD | STUD(y) (reverie) |
| 18 | Roughly disregarding [crime] over border (4) | crime | ABUT | ABOUT (roughly) ¬ O(ver) |
| 19 | Extraterrestrial reflected taking in fine puff of [good] cigarette (4) | good | TOKE | ET< (extraterrestrial) around OK (fine) |
| 20 | Cycling trophies tarnish (8) | SPOT∙∙∙∙ | POTS (trophies) with letters cycled | |
| 24 | Deep ravine duck climbs (6) | ∙∙∙LIN | NIL< (zero, duck) | |
| 25 | Sons [think] I exhausted capable chauffeur (4) | think | SICE | S(ons) I C(apabl)E |
| 26 | Jutting feature above eastern ravine (6) | CH∙INE | CHIN (jutting feature) E(astern) | |
| 28 | Engraving [true] lines within entire pot at regular points (6) | true | NIELLO | LL (lines) in (e)N(t)I(r)E (p)O(t) |
| 29 | Investigate South American (6) | ∙∙∙SUS | S(outh) US (American) | |
| 33 | Henri’s friends [feel] wrongly snubbed (4) | feel | AMIS | AMIS(s) (wrongly) |
| 34 | At last, cover [hole] on one running track, perhaps (4) | hole | RACE | (cove)R ACE (one) |
I made quite a good start on this and soon realised that more than one blank was needed for the short clues. When I saw 101 appearing (our house number as it happens) I immediately thought of the Orwell masterpiece and not until then did I spot the puzzle number (doh!). I read this long before that date but could still remember enough to proceed without reference. From the two lists I found 5 of the thematics – BIG BROTHER of course plus the 3 other most famous ones and AIRSTRIP ONE. The endgame was a bit fiddly, needing a separate piece of paper. Eventually, I had an almost complete 24 letter message with 7 more letters to slot in. This I was able to do quickly and some “rev eng” then gave me the remaining thematics without resorting to the internet. I did not remember them but I certainly remembered Winston’s horror in Room 101 was able to complete the grid – very neat.
An excellent puzzle, challenging enough but solvable. I have had a few DNFs recently so this was very welcome. Both the grid and clue designs were amazing and must have been a challenge for the setter.
Many thanks to eXternal and to HG for the blog (I am comforted that he also had trouble with the thematic pairs!)
A very nice one: my suspicions were first roused by Newspeak possibilities in the extra words but embarrassingly I didn’t notice the IQ number until long after finishing. Also I managed to misremember CRIMETHOUGHT rather than THOUGHTCRIME, giving a small but quickly corrected glitch in the message.
Many thanks to eXternal and HG.
I never noticed the puzzle number, thereby confirming my sense that I almost always miss a layer of cleverness in a puzzle even when I solve it (as I did). Interesting the way that some of the Orwellian phrases have passed seamlessly into the language (doublethink, memory hole, thought crime) and other potentially equally useful ones (belly feel, joy camp) haven’t. I admired the symmetry of the rats, and altogether found it very satisfying; thanks as ever to eXternal and HolyGhost.