Guardian Prize Puzzle 26,178 by Imogen

33 comments on “Guardian Prize Puzzle 26,178 by Imogen”

1. Am I really first to comment? Unfortunately now gone to recycling but as far as I remember I solved most of it and enjoyed it.

2. Thanks PeeDee . New setter, difficult puzzle. After getting the first three Austen heroines I did google the other ones. And resorted to TEAS twice. Otherwise it was a good workout with SATELLITE and NECTARINE as the main ahas, each with a groan. A shrug for 2d, last in.

3. Thanks, PeeDee. An enjoyable solve. Apparently, Imogen has been published once before, in 2003, although she doesn’t appear when I try the Guardian’s archive search – I hope she will be allowed rather more frequent outings in future!

   The only clue that seemed a bit below par was that for PRESTON – since the name of the team is PRESTON North End, I spent a moment at the end trying to find a way to make something more of “one short” than the obvious but to no avail.

4. Six heroines. HARD TIMES at 1ac and TWIST at 3dn. A nice touch.

5. Thanks PeeDee. I enjoyed it and not wishing to revive last week’s discussion over whether it is right for these puzzles to be assigned a degree of difficulty, I’ll confine myself to observing it didn’t take too long – once 23 provided with the entrée.

6. I enjoyed the puzzle, and the couple of nods to Dickens. Like PeeDee I didn’t like satellite/alight or nectarine/tureen though. Or dash-wooed. But hey.

7. Many thanks PeeDee

   Not having read any of Jane Austen’s stuff, I had to resort to Google to help out – which it did.

   So, I did manage to finish it but with no sense of achievement.

   I reckon that an Imogen puzzle once every 11 years is about right.

8. Characters from Jane Austen, might as well have been from Bunty, I didn’t read either.

   I did a few, don’t often skip puzzles, but the effort/reward balance didn’t work on this occasion.

   Thanks all.

9. A theme can add to the fun. Or, as here, it can turn a puzzle into a tedious exercise in googling. Like Martin P, I decided not to bother with this one.

10. Where have you been Imogen? My faith is restored.

    I can’t remember doing an Imogen puzzle before but this was a belter.

    Total fun from start to finish with innovative cluing.

    I really enjoyed this and it was certainly worthy as a Prize puzzle.

    First pass yielded almost nothing but I made steady progress thanks to the fair cluing and eventually I was able to drag all those Austen surnames out of the depths.

    Re the usual homophone moans. Firstly I can assure you that NECTARINE and TUREEN are almost perfect homophones for a very large percentage of the UK population. In nearly all crossword homophones the implication is that the clue sounds LIKE or could be heard as! I’ve never seen “is a perfect homophone for” in a clue. It’s a bit of fun but I suppose it gives members of the Pedant’s Society their own form of entertainment 😉

    Thanks to PeeDee and Imogen.

11. NeilW@3 – you need to search the Guardian’s Prize archive, not the Cryptic archive, to find the old Imogen puzzle. I went back and did it before I attempted this one to try and get a feel for her style, but it didn’t really help.

    I found this trickier than plenty of recent Prize puzzles but I stuck at it. I’ve never read the Austen novels but most of the names were vaguely familiar from previous crosswords over the years. The cluing was generally very good and I certainly felt a sense of achievement when I finished it. PRICE was my LOI when I finally remembered that rice is a type of grass.

12. Thanks Imogen and Peedee
    1ac was a write-in, which then gave me MORLAND. As I am familiar with Jane Austen, I then just looked where I could fit the other heroines in. This made the rest of the crossword quite easy, though I was led astray in parsing NECTARINE by thinking that “nectar” was the “drink”.
    Pedant’s note – a metric “ton” should really be spelled “tonne”.

13. Thanks Imogen & PeeDee.

    Yes, I needed some Googling but still enjoyable Prize Puzzle. Unlike PeeDee I didn’t much like the clue for AUSTEN as I don’t see how anyone could arrive at the solution without crossers (although I do admit this is a CROSSword 😉 )

    I can’t see what the fuss is about SATELLITE – sounds exactly right to me (and try the Collins pronunciation.) The NECTARINE homophone was a bit more jokey but was a delightful clue.

14. muffin @12

    Actually I believe what you are suggesting could be described as tautology.

    1 tonne = 1 metric ton

    1 metric tonne = 1 metric metric ton

    “metric ton” is very commonly used to describe a tonne.

15. …….. non-pedant’s comment METRIC TON is in Collins ……

16. Good point, Brendan – it looked odd, though.

17. Oh no! I totally agree with Brendan NTO!

    Re homophones – I don’t know whence you hail, PeeDee, but if you say out loud the full word that makes the answer, not just the part in question, to my ears the sound is virtually identical.

    Let’s have no homophonobia here!

18. Thanks PeeDee and Imogen

    A well-constructed puzzle. 6,25 was quite my favourite clue, but I also ticked 10a and 14d.

19. I’ve nothing against homophones. Unlike anagrams for example, which either work or not, homophones are subjective and sound a better or worse depending on your background. They are not right or wrong, they just work better for some than others, that all.

20. Thanks, PeeDee

    It took me a while to work out the theme, but thereafter it was simply a matter of finding where the rest of the linked surnames went; in my case, as it happens, from memory, but Googling would certainly work: the downside of the ‘closed set’ thematic.

    I enjoyed the puzzle, nevertheless. Some good clueing – though I did wince at NECTARINE (SATELLITE seemed OK to me).

21. realised Bennet for 10a then later the penny dropped for the heroines. Had to google them to check.
    Could not do upper right corner even with dash supernova and Austen. Thought of preston but thought of “press on” so got stuck.

22. Thanks AndyB @11 – I did try both at the time but was told, “Sorry, there aren’t any crosswords that match your search.” The problem is there’s no “either/or” logic to the search so you have to specify month and year as well as setter’s name… finally, I’ve got there by using just the general search function.

    Now for Imogen 2003… looks interesting: “Special instructions: 1 7 14 for 4/23down: but 3/20, 6 and 8/22down do and are clued without definition.” 🙂

23. …and I’ve just realised it’s our good friend Tramp in today’s Independent online so that’s my Saturday evening organised!

24. Thanks to PeeDee and to the self-confessed melon(wo)man. I found this quite difficult, mainly because the only J Austen work I have ever read is Mansfield Park and I do not Google. But the cluing was very fair and I didn’t have any problem with the homophones.

25. I found this quite challenging – didn’t finish it on Saturday but came back to it on the Monday armed with the names of a few more Jane Austen heroines and the rest gave way fairly easily. I was wondering whether a setter with only two appearances so far apart may be another name for somebody more familiar, but if not welcome back Imogen, and please don’t leave another 10 years before the next one.

    Thanks to PeeDee and Imogen

26. Hi beery hiker, I wonder, if it really is a ten year gap, if Imogen is a pseudonym used by an established setter to commemorate somebody or something, possibly a family member? We may see her again on the next 10th anniversary date.

    I’m thinking along the lines of John Halpern and Paul.

27. If so it’s not an exact anniversary – the previous one was no 22965 dated 18 October 2003 but that’s still nearer 10 years than 11.

28. This was a crossword where one had to, in the words of the late great John Lennon, imogen all the people.

    Thanks, Imogen, whoever you are, for an entertaining puzzle and to PeeDee for the blog.

29. Re the last few comments, I did have an inkling that Imogen was a little Arachne’ish when I was doing the crossword.

    However I didn’t mention this in my post as I thought it too whimsical.

30. Last Saturday, I remember me staring at the clues for about fifteen minutes without finding any solutions.
    In a second session, the outcome was the same.
    Quite extraordinary for me, even if I am certainly not the best let alone the fastest solver in the world.
    Just when I was on the point of throwing the puzzle in the bin, I found a couple of words after which the ball started rolling very smoothly.

    Gervase says: ” …. thereafter it was simply a matter of finding where the rest of the linked surnames went; in my case, as it happens, from memory, but Googling would certainly work: the downside of the ‘closed set’ thematic”.
    The latter applied to me (and apparently other solvers) which could have taken away the fun.

    However, I must say that this crossword was splendidly clued.
    Something that stopped the fun from going away.

    I am no homophone expert but ‘Satellite’ was surely OK to me.
    If ‘Nectarine’ is ‘neck tureen’, well, then I’m not sure.
    My take on it was that it was ‘terrine’ here.
    In Holland, people speak of a ‘soep terrine’.
    Moreover, Chambers gives under ‘terrine’ as def.4: ‘a tureen’.

    It is clear that I had to get used to the very clean style of this setter (almost Times-like) but, eventually, I appreciated it very much.
    That said, because of the cluing being so clean I found 1ac rather confusing. It must surely refer to Times crosswords and not to X, in my opinion. In that case, I thought it to be slightly inappropriate while I am also not convinced by the use of “a” at the start.

    Many thanks to Imogen (whoever you are) for one of the harder Saturday crosswords recently.
    And PeeDee for a fine blog.

31. Thanks all
    When a young teenager I was given a copy of Northanger Abbey but like everything at that stage I read it avidly, although I never achieved a second Austen novel.Still through some form of literary osmosis I knew everyone of these names but as usual would not claim that the theme added anything.
    Is Imogen Welsh? My only complaint was the lack of a non-cryptic definition in 2 down.

32. Enjoyed this a lot. 10 year gap seemed crazy but I couldn’t pin it on any regular setter – in cluing style it seemed a little reminiscent of earlier times – or at least original compared with much contemporary stuff – which could of course equally have been a regular doing that intentionally – so still a complete mystery.

    I’m no expert on the theme but obviously we all hear about all this a lot on account of costume drama adaptations. There’s that much of it about Judy Dench & co must be rushed off their feet. The real McCoy’s bad enough – I refuse to get sucked into lookalikes such as D Abbey.

    None of that detracted from the puzzle itself. The various names were guessable/buildable and the theme didn’t dominate too much so no loss of enjoyment or major solving hold-ups – and in general it had the flavour one hopes for in a G Saturday prizer.

    Thanks for the blog PeeDee.

33. Not sure I agree with NeilW at #3 re use of Preston in PRESTO. In all the coverage in recent days since his passing at the age of 91, I don’t think I’ve seen Tom Finney referred to as the “Preston North End plumber”…

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