Comments on: Independent 8184/Quixote

By: Pelham Barton

Pelham Barton — Tue, 08 Jan 2013 14:08:49 +0000

Thanks Quixote for a thoroughly enjoyable puzzle and Pierre for the blog.

13ac: I have kept quiet until now in the hope that someone else would say what I wanted to say but express it better than I can. The issue of false capitalisation relates to the fact that words sometimes have different meanings with or without initial capital letters. I do not see that issue as being at all relevant to this clue, where there is a clever construction in the word play, and I was completely happy with the clue.

By: Sil van den Hoek

Sil van den Hoek — Mon, 07 Jan 2013 21:25:26 +0000

What I like about Quixote is that his crosswords are accessible, for some even easy(ish), while at the same time the clueing (devices, surfaces) is really in a different category compared to eg – and now I have to be careful what I say – what’s happening in the puzzles in my local newspaper.

Thanks, Pierre, for your blog and to Cumbrian ((s)he was first) for explaining 13ac. A very clever idea, but I am not sure whether the (de)capitalisation of c/C is right. Quixote is (generally) a Ximenean, so, well, don’t know. But I liked the clue!

Normally, Quixote doesn’t repeat himself in a crossword, but here we had ‘first sign of’ twice (20ac, 21d). I can’t be bothered too much, but I admit I did think ‘don’t do that again’ .

Good crossword.

By: Bertandjoyce

Bertandjoyce — Mon, 07 Jan 2013 21:13:51 +0000

Meant to say we liked 13ac not 18ac!

By: Dormouse

Dormouse — Mon, 07 Jan 2013 20:39:27 +0000

Re 13ac and the penny dropping only when reading the blog, this is the second time in three days that the blogger has asked for help with a clue that I’d not been able to parse and then suddenly I see it, only to find that several others have already got there.

I failed O-level French in 1968 and have not attempted to learn it since then, but I could remember “lu” was the past participle of “lire”.

By: Bertandjoyce

Bertandjoyce — Mon, 07 Jan 2013 18:38:30 +0000

Bon soir Pierre. We had also decided to adopt the underlining of the definition in the blog so we can also be described as ovine as ‘ewe’!

Back to the puzzle. A few that needed checking but were clear from the wordplay. We thought 18ac was good.

Thanks to the Don for an enjoyable start to the week and Pierre for your blog!

By: allan_c

allan_c — Mon, 07 Jan 2013 16:43:57 +0000

15ac goes back at least to biblical times – see Matthew xvi, 2-3.

By: Pierre

Pierre — Mon, 07 Jan 2013 15:36:02 +0000

Cumbrian at no 3, I know what you mean. Sometimes if I’m stuck I’ll stick what I’ve got into a wordsearch, and the very act of doing that puts the answer straight into my head. Kathryn Friedlander from the University of Buckingham (who’s done a lot of work on the psychology of cryptic solving) was on BBC Radio 4 the other week talking about some of the processes involved – it was interesting, and she talked about which bits of the brain are involved. It was on the ‘listen again’ function, but I think it’s expired now.

By: JohnF

JohnF — Mon, 07 Jan 2013 15:26:24 +0000

15 IS a beauty, and another I know from a different variation–”sailor” rather than “shepherd”. I can vouch for its limited truth and promise as well that sheets are the lines that control sails.

By: Rowland

Rowland — Mon, 07 Jan 2013 13:35:42 +0000

Interesting point, sidey!

Cheers
Rowly.

By: sidey

sidey — Mon, 07 Jan 2013 10:20:09 +0000

13a i.e. capturing carbon would give iCe, I thought setters could capitalise to deceive but not the other way round.