Comments on: Guardian 25,710 – Gordius

By: Huw Powell

Huw Powell — Sun, 02 Sep 2012 21:01:39 +0000

Uhudla @ 36, how you post on here and yet not find the cryptics on the papers’ websites? Or did you use the (snail) mail to contribute your post, too?

Which reminds me, apropos of nothing, wouldn’t it be nice if the blogs included a link to the puzzle?

By: Uhudla

Uhudla — Thu, 23 Aug 2012 05:16:35 +0000

Sorry to be so tardy, but for me, cryptics are a once-a-week treat when the Weekly comes in the mail.

I was happy to be able to solve this with brainpower alone — which means it wasn’t very difficult — but I couldn’t parse 18 until I came here. I had thought “one gets lit up” referred to ONE containing RIF reversed, and wondered if RIF was an anglicism for LIT.

By: Rolf

Rolf — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 07:23:06 +0000

All this ranting about accents in respect of 20 down is a load
of 10 across.

Personally I don’t *have* an accent; being originally from Canada
I speak perfect (unaccented) English. But I still saw the answer
to 20 down almost as soon as I’d read the clue.

By: RCWhiting

RCWhiting — Fri, 10 Aug 2012 23:00:53 +0000

…..and obviously a while in the US………

By: Brendan (not that one)

Brendan (not that one) — Fri, 10 Aug 2012 22:49:24 +0000

rho @31

My background is born in Lancashire, working class.

University educated. Lived in Yorkshire 10 years, Stuttgart 10 years, Cumbria 3 years, Lancashire 30 years. Various other counties/countries 1 year each.

I don’t consider “posh” as derogatory at all. Merely a factual statement of someone’s accent or behaviour.

But all this is beside the point. No matter how many syllables you pronounce skewer with it still puzzles me how a solver, who is after all aware that dialects exist, cannot see that “‘s cure” is a potential homophone?

I do apologise to any posters who I have offended with my “posh” slur though I have been labelled as such by many childhood friends in later life and have personally taken no offense! (Quite the contrary as none was intended!)

By: RCWhiting

RCWhiting — Fri, 10 Aug 2012 16:41:16 +0000

rho @31
I agree with 99% of your post. However the comparison is ‘s cure with skewer.
I have already explained my view as a non-posh in @20.

By: rhotician

rhotician — Fri, 10 Aug 2012 10:58:23 +0000

Brendan(not that one): I, like others here, pronounce cure as one syllable and skewer as two. I am not “posh”. I suspect that most of the posters here, including even Thomas99, do not regard themselves as “posh”.

I rarely use the word posh. In my experience it is more often than not used in a derogatory way, especially against people who “talk posh”.

You clearly do not regard yourself as posh. Perhaps you could describe your accent in more detail, by region for example or by class perhaps. I know people who would pronounce both cure and skewer with one syllable, and others who would pronounce both with two.

By: jude

jude — Fri, 10 Aug 2012 08:17:02 +0000

Here in “Cameron County” score, your and cure all rhyme. Makes a nonsense of synthetic phonics.

By: Daniel Miller

Daniel Miller — Fri, 10 Aug 2012 07:54:17 +0000

There was definitely a link or tribute to Jamaica here (Usain Bolt et al) in this one.

Sweet Potato, Green Peppers..
Grease (Greece) Lightning…
(Varnish) – Vanish … (into) Thin Air
Aileron
Beacon (Bacon as pronounced is Jamaica)
B.on-fire
Ensue

etc etc..

By: Brendan (not that one)

Brendan (not that one) — Fri, 10 Aug 2012 07:05:34 +0000

rhotician, please explain what is insulting in “RPers/posh folk”?!!!!

It was a genuine query as I cannot imagine a way of pronouncing “Doctor’s cure” which doesn’t sound like “skewer”