Comments on: Guardian Prize No 25268 by Pasquale

By: timon

timon — Tue, 22 Mar 2011 12:29:47 +0000

Thanks to bridgesong for the opportunity to contribute, albeit in a small way, and the gracious mention in the heading. I wonder if others sometimes solve together; I certainly find it adds to the enjoyment especially when the light suddenly dawns about a tough clue, rather in the same way as sharing a joke.
p.s. Carrots@18 isn’t the only one to use it as an excuse to get out of digging the garden/allotment…

By: Barry

Barry — Mon, 21 Mar 2011 17:28:18 +0000

Who else spent time looking up different types of lemur after first getting ‘ringtail’? Surely we’re all of that age to remember Johnny Morris on Animal Magic?

By: Martin H

Martin H — Sun, 20 Mar 2011 23:02:00 +0000

Hi Sil, if you’re still there – I’ve been away all weekend so have just seen your comment. If you look at my reply to anax, it might make my view a bit clearer. The film theme lacked focus, partly because Brummie’s selection seemed pretty random, and there are thousands of possible candidates for inclusion (far more than there are bird names anyway), and also because films, as I said, don’t have names in the same way birds do. ‘Tomtit’ is a bird is a bird, ‘Babe’ is a film, but also a few other things too; the theme is just too flabby. Also Pasquale’s presentation was, in my view, preferable: we are told there are certain clues which share a common definition: the clue’s belonging to the theme is not reflected in the surface – we don’t have that repetitive ’26 down’ every time, which I find annoying, even cacophonous. Even better, I think, is when we are told simply that a certain number of clues have something in common, and it’s up to us to find them. Brendan’s mousetrap theme, of course, was something else entirely.

By: Geoff

Geoff — Sun, 20 Mar 2011 22:41:01 +0000

Thanks to bridgesong and Pasquale.

I got the theme very quickly and found this puzzle uncharacteristically easy for one of the Don’s.

Last in was STARLING – it had to be a bird, and this was the only one I could find that would fit, but it took me a long time to parse it to confirm that this was the correct answer. My conclusion was the same as cjl@8, but I would have preferred ‘having made’ to ‘making’ in the clue.

By: Robi

Robi — Sat, 19 Mar 2011 20:19:17 +0000

Thanks, Pasquale; it’s always nice to get some comment from the setters – you have a fairly awesome task, the difficulty of which is sometimes not fully appreciated. Looks like this one is several weeks late!

By: Pasquale

Pasquale — Sat, 19 Mar 2011 17:56:32 +0000

Thanks for all the feedback. My original idea was this might have been published on the day of the RSPB Birdwatch!

By: bridgesong

bridgesong — Sat, 19 Mar 2011 16:07:42 +0000

Sil @22, you’re quite right, I have now amended the blog, but on reflection it was perhaps too cryptic. I also thought 15ac might involve ‘ell.
Tupu @ 24 speaks for all of us, I’m sure.

By: tupu

tupu — Sat, 19 Mar 2011 15:43:18 +0000

Thanks Tokyo Colin

I, and I am sure others, have been thinking of you.

By: Tokyo Colin

Tokyo Colin — Sat, 19 Mar 2011 14:23:51 +0000

Thanks bridgesong and Pasquale. When I finally found time and peace of mind to attempt a crossword, this was the one and it provided the escape I needed.

It took a little while to cotton on to the theme. I had Ringtail from the first clue but for someone who grew up in country Australia, that’s a possum. After that I found myself regularly postulating a potential word from the wordplay, Googling to see if it matched the definition and getting a hit in every case. Sanderling, Missel Thrush, Redstart, Laverock, Pinner, Lanark and Torbay were just sequences of letters until they appeared in Wikipedia next to a picture of a bird, etc. I suppose it is a tribute to the precision of the cluing that I didn’t have a single miss.
Favourite clue – 5 dn. I am glad I did the online version.

And if anyone is interested, life goes on in Tokyo. The nuclear radiation scare is a media event while the tsunami was a horrific tragedy – nature at its most destructive. We are shellshocked, but safe and sound.

By: Sil van den Hoek

Sil van den Hoek — Sat, 19 Mar 2011 12:55:41 +0000

Because we started with some Down clues, we didn’t get the theme early on.
Should have started with (the easy) 1ac, just like you bridgesong.

At first we didn’t find solving very satisfying – of course due to not finding the theme, but also because we didn’t find the surfaces very inspiring.
In 15ac we initially thought that ‘orrible place must be ‘ell – giving us the obscure Erioll. Could be a name of someone. For some reason we were almost certain that 23ac had to be a name too, and therefore we were afraid to get a theme of cricketers ….

How things changed.
After everything fell in place, we started to enjoy this crossword.
As ever very well clued by Pasquale.
Last one to go in PINNER (6d), as we didn’t know that place in Middlesex – the only word that had to be checked.

Funny enough, we didn’t have any problem with STARLING.
I saw the construction immediately, was even a bit surprised to see this device being used twice in the puzzle.
In 4d (ATTENDEE) Pasquale did the same trick, replacing the L (the Left) in Attlee with END.
[btw, bridgesong, not sure whether your excellent blog clarifies this]

Martin H (@20), a few days ago (Brummie’s puzzle) you wrote: “This was a dud theme: it didn’t lead anywhere (…) there was no connection between the solutions other than that they were simply, as 26d bluntly put it, ‘film’, making an almost endless list of possible candidates”.
I am a bit confused by your view on themes now.
Aren’t these ‘birds’ not simply ‘birds’, with an endless list of candidates, too?
Glad you liked it, though.

Fine crossword, perfect for a Saturday.