Comments on: Inquisitor 1245: Barred by Nutmeg

By: Neil Hunter

Neil Hunter — Sat, 15 Sep 2012 15:18:40 +0000

Bertandjoyce: lunchtime? I consecrate five lunchtimes to the Inquisitor – and even then don’t always finish it. Though in retrospect I’m not sure why I decided to disregard Google’s suggestion of Cage when I enquired about John Milton’s centenary. Nice puzzle; nice blog.

By: Bertandjoyce

Bertandjoyce — Fri, 14 Sep 2012 15:27:10 +0000

Thanks Duncan – we had enjoyable lunchtime and cup of tea solving this one. We needed your blog to see the letters hidden when you removed the 4m and 33s!

It took us rather longer than that to solve it!

Thanks Nutmeg and Duncan.

By: HolyGhost

HolyGhost — Wed, 12 Sep 2012 20:53:51 +0000

Only one word for this puzzle – marvellous (literally). The misdirection of John Milton (I didn’t get “centenary” till v.late, and started looking for PARADISE which had to be LOST), the interpretation of 4’33″, finding exactly 4 M’s & 33 S’s, then seeing that they traced out CAGE … and finally scrabbling in my desk drawer for a golden highlighting pen.

Nutmeg – you’re a star. Brilliant!

Hi(hoba): if you join the centres of contiguous highlighted cells, the surname appears quite clearly – even the A (and E).

Swando: if it’s any consolation, I too had HOLS for ages, which is why I was held up solving 7d and finding “centenary”. (I had made a mental note that Holst was known more as composer than conductor.) It was only when I was ‘joining the dots’ that I tumbled to the misplaced S and rectified my mistake.

I could go on and discuss the title BARRED and some fine clueing, but I think I’ll just leave it there.

By: Swando

Swando — Wed, 12 Sep 2012 18:31:37 +0000

Doh! I was convinced the answer to 19a was “hols” – time off famous conductor (?) Holst!

By: Thomas99

Thomas99 — Wed, 12 Sep 2012 08:23:52 +0000

Only my third Inquisitor and another corker! I found the various hints towards the theme worked very well in concert. I’m not sure what pushed me in the right direction first – I think it might have been the “S”s – I saw they seemed to make a shape and tried joining them up, imagining that they might link with John Milton and perhaps the serpent’s hissing in Paradis Lost… That showed me what looked like it might be CAGE, which combined with “Barred” and “silence” to suggest another possibility. I still spent a while wondering if the Ms and Ss just indicated the absent “manuscript” for the famous piece until realisation finally dawned later in the day (I was on the tube, I think). So many thanks to Nutmeg for a satisfying challenge and to Duncan for the admirably full blog.

By: Hi of hihoba

Hi of hihoba — Wed, 12 Sep 2012 07:56:19 +0000

I got as far as completing the grid and identifying the extra words, identifying John Cage (didn’t know about Milton or Junior!) and the work, then ground to a halt. I was looking for the words “Four minutes thirty-three seconds” + “Cage”, but no luck!

I am impressed by your finding the Ms and Ss, less so by the “oblique” name – It almost reaches the level of the illegible Pi symbol when no-one managed to solve the Weekend Crossword (as it was then). Even with your solution, Duncan, I could barely discern the letters when the grid was turned sideways. The A is particularly bad.

Clever stuff from Nutmeg, but one misdirection too much for me.