Comments on: Guardian 25,623 – Rufus

By: mikewglospur

mikewglospur — Wed, 02 May 2012 14:54:47 +0000

A bit late, but as I recently commented, I like to stick with a puzzle until I get it done.

Dare I say that I think Chambers is WRONG?
Or will I be struck down for this?

The function of “their” is never as a pronoun.
It is always a (possessive) adjective.
“Theirs” is the pronoun form.
That’s what I taught for many years, too.

But I’m also unhappy about all this “possessive determiner” mumbo-jumbo.
So I agree only partially with Gervase @ 27.

By: Rufus

Rufus — Tue, 01 May 2012 09:08:14 +0000

Thanks for comments.
My submitted clue for EXECUTED was “Done – to death?”.

As mentioned by PeterJohnN at 12, THEIR is in Chambers with the first definition: “pronoun (genitive plural)”.

By: tupu

tupu — Tue, 01 May 2012 07:13:17 +0000

Hesitatingly not convinced by Gervase et al re ‘Their’. In the phrase ‘tupu’s hesitation’, ‘tupu’s’ functions as a genitive form of tupu, and words like his, my, their stand for nouns in such roles. The fact that they can also stand alone as pronouns – ‘it is his, theirs, mine etc’ – does not seem at least superficially to exclude their other pronominal function. The term ‘possessive determiner’ in itself does not remove the value of distinguishing between nominal and pronominal examples of such words.

By: aztobesed

aztobesed — Mon, 30 Apr 2012 23:29:05 +0000

Gervase @27

Yep, someone is still here. Determinatives rather than demonstratives? ‘We’ are after all a stress language. Aren’t they 18thC rules? Belonging to languages which didn’t rely on (vocabulary) stress to impart their meaning? Khufu might have had his problems and needed determinatives to define his daughters but do we? Isn’t that why English is the choice of text lingo? Write as you speak, speak as you write? Personally, I love determinatives – very interesting and often elegant, but they would have made the tube-maps even more confusing.

By: Paul B

Paul B — Mon, 30 Apr 2012 22:51:05 +0000

Correct, Rufus makes an error at 23, but is FLAGSTAFF now a verb?

I am still here, watching Silent Witness, on the i-Player, which babbles on about exorcism. Bloody lapsed left-footed script-writers: can’t we have one about football? Or one with ANY good storyline? Gaah. Doctor Who as well. Ruined.

There are nine full anagrams, no partials, in this puzzle. I would agree that this does seem rather a lot.

By: Gervase

Gervase — Mon, 30 Apr 2012 22:14:44 +0000

If anyone is still there…

Thanks, Andrew.

I felt there were rather more anagrams than usual in this Rufus, which I enjoyed (ambiguity deliberate).

I’m with Stella @11 on THEIR. It is not a pronoun! The corresponding possessive pronoun is ‘theirs’ – which CAN stand for a noun. Neither is it really an adjective. The proper description of the word is a possessive determiner. Determiners are words which define the accompanying noun, viz. the definite article, demonstratives (this, that etc) and possessives. Only one can be used at a time in English. In some other languages, the possessives are much more like true adjectives, e.g. in Italian, where a definite article is required as well: ‘my book’ is ‘il mio libro’ (literally ‘the my book’), so ‘un mio libro – ‘one of my books’ and ‘questo mio libro’ – ‘this book of mine’ are also possible.

By: RCWhiting

RCWhiting — Mon, 30 Apr 2012 20:38:17 +0000

Headmaster
Please let us know when the ‘flashmob’ is to take place, and where.

By: morpheus

morpheus — Mon, 30 Apr 2012 20:29:01 +0000

Anyone else put elevated for 21a? Got us stuck for quite a while.

By: Headteacher

Headteacher — Mon, 30 Apr 2012 18:26:17 +0000

My usual Rufus Mobday comment. Nuff said

By: John E

John E — Mon, 30 Apr 2012 16:45:46 +0000

Ape@20. Thank you for your comment. I think your alternative answer is a rather better clue for the anagram in question, having been slightly puzzled by the Rufus clue because the modern idiomatic sense of ‘go by the board’ seems so much weaker than the original nautical meaning.