Preamble: Unnumbered, unclued down entries have something in common with the individual given by the three unclued across answers in order, thanks to 6 down (also unclued). The link is given by the word formed from surplus wordplay given in fifteen clues.
Not wishing to upset any newcomers to The Inquisitor, I found this to be on the gentler side. The only thing I found a little strange was the phrase, “… the word formed from surplus wordplay …” rather than the more usual “single extra letters generated by wordplay.”
The North-East corner was first to yield and I pretty soon saw what looked like EMPEROR (g1-g7) and KING (j1-j4) forming, which immediately made me think of penguins. South-East was next and I found GENTOO (h8-h13) and KORORA (l8-l13) – which I’d never heard of. 6down, BATMAN, soon became apparent and then I referred to Wikipedia to find out that The Penguin‘s “real” name is OSWALD (a3-f3) CHESTERFIELD (a7-l7) COBBLEPOT (a13-i13). I used to be a real Batman fan in the 60’s but I never got into the movie series and I’m surprised that I never knew The Penguin’s real name as it’s the sort of trivia I would normally have remembered.
The next thing to sort out was the extra letters. Here, I failed to read the preamble closely and I was convinced I was looking for a phrase rather than a single word, this threw me off for a while but, in the end, I realised that the word was SPHENISCIFORMES, the word describing the penguin order of birds.
Lastly, the title WAITERS presumably refers to the fact that penguins look a bit like waiters in their black-and-white “attire.”
Thanks Phi for a nice gentle puzzle.
| Across | |||||
| No. | Clue | Entry | Derivation of Extra Letter |
Extra Letter | Wordplay |
| 1 | Market’s collapsed, with number withdrawing | SUK | SUnK (collapsed; minus Number) | ||
| 3 | Make bed up after initially heaping offerings from one’s own kitchen | HOME-BAKED | Heaping Offerings (initially)+MAKE BED (anag: up) | ||
| 8 | Fabricated entire compound | TRIENE | ENTIRE (anag: fabricated) | ||
| 9 | Mother getting cut in spite | MALICE | cut=SLICE | S | MA (mother)+SLICE |
| 11 | Backing group accepting joke songs | TUNES | joke=PUN | P | PUN inside SET (rev: backing) |
| 13 | English with problematic situation after Government’s brought in foreign settler | ÉMIGRÉ | English+MIRE (problematic situation) containing Government | ||
| 14 | Gatherer of sap? One leaving job’s no good | RESINER | RESIgNER (one leaving job; minus Good) | ||
| 15 | Plaster front removed from church vestibule | ARTEX | church vestibule=NARTHEX | H | nARTHEX (front letter removed) |
| 17 | Dispute when about to hear cut-down fugal passage | STRETTO | SET-TO (dispute) containing TRy (to hear; cut down) | ||
| 23 | Mystic article – eccentric character’s all right with that | ANGEKOK | eccentric character=GEEK | E | AN (article)+GEEK+OK (all right) |
| 24 | Carbon extracted from coal dust, I note, and tree extract | ULMIN | cULM (coal dust; minus Carbon)+I+Note | ||
| 25 | Opening set into the ring in addition | THERETO | opening=RENT | N | RENT inside THE+O (ring) |
| 27 | Almost finishing early, penning a lot of nonsense for SF award | NEBULA (never heard of it :-() | NEAr (almost; finishing early) containing BULl (nonsense; a lot of) | ||
| 30 | Foolish escapade terminates thus | INANE | escapadE finishes IN AN “E“ | ||
| 31 | Article received by a Post Office in time | A TEMPO | article=ITEM | I | ITEM inside A PO (post office) |
| 32 | What will receive a number of programmes? | AERIAL | number of programmes=SERIAL | S | A SERIAL |
| 33 | Crook appearing more hopeful | ROSIER | crook=CROSIER | C | (double def) |
| 34 | Classes forgetting information in time | ERA | genERA minus GEN (information) | ||
| Down | |||||
| No. | Clue | Entry | Derivation of Extra Letter |
Extra Letter | Wordplay |
| 1 | Place for this side’s battles | STOURS | place=SIT | I | SIT+OURS (this side) |
| 2 | Country’s people of yore certainly supporting king | KIWIS | King+IWIS (Certainly; archaic: of yore) | ||
| 3 | Reviewed the ideas? Most exciting | HEADIEST | THE IDEAS (anag: reviewed) | ||
| 4 | Extended funding, working fast | ON-LENT | ON (working)+LENT (fast) | ||
| 5 | Ancient person in Middle East? Excellent | MEDE | excellent=DEF | F | ME (middle east)+DEF |
| 6 | See preamble | BATMAN | |||
| 7 | Various deeds involving former lover leave you unmanned, as it were | DESEXED | DEEDS (anag: various) containing EX (former lover) | ||
| 10 | Civil Engineer’s chortle misguided – this is grave stuff | CERECLOTH | CE (civil engineer)+CHORTLE (anag: misguided) | ||
| 12 | Encountered matter round nut – unreal compound | METHYLENE | MET (encountered)+HYLE (matter) containing EN (nut) | ||
| 16 | King going on hurried long journey | TREK | hurried=TORE | O | TORE+King |
| 18 | Provide more weaponry for paper | REAM | provide more weaponry=REARM | R | (double def) |
| 19 | Secret, if disseminated, causing most violence | FIERCEST | SECRET IF (anag: disseminated) | ||
| 20 | Old religious association mostly elevated Biblical villain | CLUNIAC | CLUb (associaton; mostly)+CAIN (rev: Biblical villain) | ||
| 21 | Baron tucking into flesh and drink – that’s this? | EATABLE | flesh=MEAT | M | MEAT+ALE (drink) containing Baron [association seems to be doing double duty] |
| 22 | Treacherous old line in French article attracting pair leading Alliance | UNLEAL | Line inside UNE (French article)+ALliance (leading pair) | ||
| 26 | This writer goes up and down about one girl | EMMIE | ME (this writer)+ME (rev: going up and down) containing I (one) | ||
| 28 | Sharp comment to support book | BARB | support=BEAR | E | BEAR+Book |
| 29 | Misinterpret broker’s final appearance in exchange | WARP | exchange=SWAP | S | brokeR (final letter) inside SWAP |
Indeed, I quite surprised myself by completing this, the first Inquisitor I’d finished in ages. I seemed to have approached this in the other direction. I worked out quite quickly that CHESTERFIELD was the central part of the name, but didn’t know enough about the Earls of Chesterfield for that to be any use. But I guessed COBBLEPOT from the crossing letters and googled the name on the off chance. That opened up the puzzle for me.
NEBULA was the first one in for me. As a long time SF fan, I knew all about it. It’s the SF equivalent of the Oscars, I suppose, in that you have to be a member of the SF Writers of America organisation to vote, the same as you have to be a member the Academy to vote for the Oscars. The other major SF award is the Hugo, which is voted for by fans (including me) and I’ll be going to the Hugo award ceremony this Sunday (and I administered the award in 2005).
Just to note that I’ve put up a short setter’s blog on my website – click through my name above.
Thanks Phi & Kenmac for the blog. That’s consecutive IQs I’ve cracked now – unprecedented! (though needed some parental assistance to complete it). I was help up for a while by entering DOW at 1a.
I almost completed this but several surplus letters eluded me-one or two answers escaped me also i.e. angekok and cluniac -also the korora penguin didn’t exist in my reference books-however it was pleasant to have an Inquisitor with which I wasn’t left with a naked grid-so long live the gentler versions -please let those who want the more difficult Inquisitors have a separate puzzle-thank you Phi whoever you are
Thanks to Phi & Kenmac. I agree this was relatively straightforward but certainly not without its challenges – particularly in sorting out the spare letters & getting sphenisciformes – which I thought was a lovely touch. & I also had to look up The Penguin’s real name. An enjoyable and polished puzzle, I thought.
@4 Gordon Fisher – I suspect your last comment refers to some of my comments last week – I did find IQ1294 too easy for IQ, & I do enjoy the more difficult ones, but rest assured, I’m not trying to make a case for IQ to be generally more difficult – I’m perfectly happy with IQ’s normal range & I think this puzzle sits comfortably within it.
Reminds me of Simon and Garfunkle (Kodachrome).. everything looks better in black and white. A LOVELY puzzle from Phi (where would my Fridays be?) Like Kenmac, King and Gentoo led gently into the theme and I managed to complete the puzzle without deducing SPHENISCIFORMES,but looking at it now am full of admiratiion.
Dormouse@1… Nebula came easily to me being a (kind of) SF fan. Am impressed by your Hugo credentials. Also you will know that the Intervention happened six million years ago this September.
Thanks Kenmac, and all bloggers on this series and Phi for the puzzle.
Finding EMPEROR, KING & BATMAN in the NE quadrant very early on gave me the Penguin theme before I’d got far into this.
As with kenmac, I noted the strange phrasing in the preamble (about the wordplay).
And sympathy for Tom Willis @3: I too toyed with DOW for 1a.
Finally, I never thought that having ANGEKOK in my vocabulary would be of any use – well, there you go.
PS I thought that the title WAITER referred to BATMAN (=an officer’s personal attendant); Chambers gives WAITER as “an attending servant (obs)”. Perhaps Phi will enlighten us, if he drops in again.
We were another one (or two in this case) who had DOW for 1ac! This also held us up for a while despite having deduced the theme. We did have to search electronically at the end to check Penguin’s name as well as the order of birds!
Yes, it was gentler but also enjoyable.
Thanks kenmac for the blog – we failed totally to look back at the title and think you are right about your interpretation.
Thanks Phi!
In solving 20d I encountered / invented a palindrome which I believe to be original, along the lines of “Madam, I’m Adam”, which goes, “Cain am I: maniac”. Enjoy, and remember, you read it here first.