Comments on: Guardian 24184/ Rufus Gentle start to the week.

By: Rufus

Rufus — Wed, 19 Sep 2007 17:51:58 +0000

Thanks for all the comments – many things to think about! Regarding starting with easy puzzles on Mondays, this is my brief for the Guardian; it was also the brief for The Times in the 10 years I set for the paper, through several editors from John Grant in 1995, and nearly always on Mondays until Mike Laws took over. I assume my alternate Mondays in the FT is for the same reason, and after appearing on most days of the week for the Telegraph I have ended up on Mondays there. There must be a reason!

By: Testy

Testy — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 16:45:52 +0000

Would that be GRASS?

By: petebiddlecombe

petebiddlecombe — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 16:23:03 +0000

Testy: You’re bang on about ‘Game show’. In a similar vein, try an old favourite of mine from Azed: Tea shop (5)

Grading systems work if people know about them. In the US, the NY Times has a progression from easy Monday to very tough Saturday and this is well known. But here, apart from ‘easy Monday’ and ‘quite possibly difficult Saturday’ in several papers, gradings are not attempted and it’s probably not worth it – we’ve heard here that not everyone finds Rufus easy. To Muck, I’d say ‘persevere – you will learn to solve the harder puzzles eventually, and will appreciate them’.

Times easy on a Monday? The official line from Richard Browne, Times xwd editor, is that there is no deliberate attempt to make Monday easier. On an empirical basis, I think Mondays are a bit easier on average but not as consistently as say 10 years ago. There’s some evidence from a batch of puzzles about 18 months ago at: http://petebiddlecombe.livejournal.com/32569.html , and the unofficial contests at http://community.livejournal.com/times_xwd_times/tag/cryptic+rtc are gradually accumulating evidence that I may use for similar anorak analysis one day.

By: Testy

Testy — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 12:44:33 +0000

I think that “Game show” is a good clue and has a suitably misleading surface as a common phrase. As opposed something like “Musical felines” where the surface, whilst it does make sense, does not mislead at all.

Regarding easy Mondays, I don’t do Sudokus (spits over shoulder) myself but I understand that in some publications they often tend to start easy and end the week a bit harder. It’s clearly necessary to have different levels of difficulty to suit different levels of punters. Codifying this according to the days of the week allows people to find their level and know which days are likely to suit them. If they get progressively harder through the week it also helps to tempt them on to the next level.

If it were completely random then someone who is tempted to try an easy one for the first time one week could have the wind taken out of their sails the next week.

BTW I’ve never heard of Lafayette but quite like the idea of using it in the future!

By: struggler

struggler — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 00:28:58 +0000

AlanR — I certainly find Rufus’s harder than do those solvers who post on here and always feel obliged to tell the likes of you and me how thick we are for having to think about them for a bit longer.

Ilancaron — thank you for the answer to 4D, which was the only one that I hadn’t solved.

Rufus — Re. 24A, I have never heard of the musical, so your inclusion of ‘show’ in the clue wasn’t so much misleading as incomprehensible, given that the name of the game was the obvious solution for the grid.

By: ilancaron

ilancaron — Mon, 17 Sep 2007 22:59:40 +0000

I tend to a Rufus fan since I find his clues have satisfyingly meaningful surfaces (unlike someone else who sets for the Guardian whose name begins with A).

I liked 4D: WAKE — economical double meaning with the division between the “to” and “a”.

By: AlanR

AlanR — Mon, 17 Sep 2007 22:16:37 +0000

Am I the only one who finds Rufus’s puzzles harder than most of the other setters’? I didn’t get chess or parole, and still don’t know 4 down: ‘come to a party’.

By: muck

muck — Mon, 17 Sep 2007 21:26:01 +0000

Thanks to Rufus for another enjoyable Monday puzzle – I checked in the paper which I bought later and it did have your name on it! I’m getting fed up with some of the really difficult setters later in the week.

By: Stan

Stan — Mon, 17 Sep 2007 21:20:17 +0000

I wasn’t being rude to the setter – I know they are asked to be merciful on Mondays. The whole Monday thing just doesn’t make sense to me. And for the record, there were some very satisfying clues today.

By: muck

muck — Mon, 17 Sep 2007 21:12:36 +0000

The on-line puzzle Print version was billed as Quantum, but it seemed pretty much Rufus to me!