Comments on: Financial Times 13,729 by Cincinnus

By: nmsindy

nmsindy — Sun, 10 Jul 2011 13:20:56 +0000

In STAR PUPIL I think both the inclusion of the question mark and looking at “astronomical eyepiece” as a phrase, equivalent (in a playful way) to “star pupil’, make this clue fine, with ‘star’ and ‘astronomical’ not needing to be absolutely exact equivalents.

By: Pete Maclean

Pete Maclean — Thu, 07 Jul 2011 17:59:29 +0000

Ah, thanks Sil, yes I forgot to include the second wordplay for 1A.

By: Sil van den Hoek

Sil van den Hoek — Thu, 07 Jul 2011 13:33:26 +0000

As you said, Pete, Cincinnus on good form here.
And if you (in general, so not just you, Pete ) liked this one, why not try the easier but brilliantly clued Quiptic (by Orlando) at the Guardian website – only till Sunday on display.

I had some trouble in the NE where DACTYL and ALERT were the last two in.
I couldn’t fully see how SPUR (20ac) worked but thanks to your blog I do now – as easy as that.

For me, HOUSEBOUND (21ac) with its magnificent surface is this week’s winner, but I smiled at the silliness of STRIPLING (3d) and NIGHT (22d) too.

One remark about 1ac (SPARSE).
There is something very unusual going on here.
A definition (‘Meagre’) plus two cryptic constructions.
The one you gave plus: SPARE (not used) around S (sulphur).

By: Bryan

Bryan — Thu, 07 Jul 2011 12:11:25 +0000

Many thanks Pete & Cincinnus

This was very enjoyable except that 4a DACTYL was too tough for me.

Or otherwise I would have submitted a Prize entry, assuming that I could have sent it Freepost.