Guardian Cryptic 26731 by Imogen

by

The puzzle may be found at http://www.theguardian.com/crosswords/cryptic/26731.

I spent quite a time staring at a grid with only a couple of scattered entries, until I decided that 10A had to be ORLEY; that led quickly to the key 2D/1D ANIMAL FARM and things started to look up, Even so, it was hard going; of the six thematic novels, only Animal Farm and possibly Cold Comfort Farm strike me as well-known. Some of the non-thematic clues seemed to me a little knotty, and Imogen indulges in a few libertarian riffs. Still, I got there in the end, which is the main thing. Thanks, Imogen, for the workout.

Across
9 ANNUITANT
Angers night worker, giving precedence to a new pensioner, perhaps (9)

A charade of ‘a’ plus N (‘new’) plus NUIT (French for ‘night’, as spoken in the city of ‘Angers’, for example) plus ANT (‘worker’).
10 ORLEY
Literary 1 (European) seen in French airport (5)

An envelope (‘seen in’) of E (‘European’) in ORLY (‘French airport’, serving Paris); Orley Farm (‘1’ down) is a book by Anthony Trollope.
11 MIMED
Signalled road leads to the sea (5)

A charade of MI (M 1, ‘road’) plus MED (Mediterranean ‘Sea’).
12 BLIND DATE
Hopelessly in debt, lad’s not prepared meeting (5,4)

An anagram (‘hopelessly’) of ‘in debt lad’.
13 SOLVENT
Note opening to be out of debt (7)

A charade of SOL (‘note’ of the sol-fa, also rendered SO) plus VENT (‘opening’).
14 STORIES
6 here, but only one in the shops (7)

An envelope (‘in’) of I (‘only one’) in STORES (‘the shops’). The definition ‘6 here’ refers not to 6D COLD (with the initial S in place, my first guess was SIBERIA), but the six novels referenced, in full  or in part. in the puzzle (2D/1D, 10A, 4D/18A, 24D/27D,  25D/20A and 6D/22A).
17 ALGER
Hiss as last two abandon country (5)

A subtraction: ALGER[ia] (‘country’) minus its end letters (‘last two abandon’). In 5D, a first name is used to indicate a surname; here it is the other way round.
19  
See 4
20  
See 25
21 PERIWIG
2 keeps back part of circuit, as judge would assume (7)

An envelope (‘keeps) of ERIW, a reversal (‘back’) of WIRE (‘part of circuit’) in PIG (‘2’D ANIMAL). The definition has ‘assume’ in the sense of wear.
22  
See 6
24 WELL-MEANT
Law let men off, showing goodwill (4-5)

An anagram (‘off’) of ‘law let men’.
26 LEITH
Don’t stop horse going round 1 port (5)

An envelope (‘going round’) of I (‘1’ – here not indicating 1D FARM) in LET (‘don’t stop’) plus H (‘horse’).
28 LENTO
Fast, or half slow (5)

A charade pf LENT (‘fast’) plus O (‘Or half’).
29 OVERSPILL
Emptying of rookery proves extraordinarily unfortunate (9)

A charade of OVERSP, an anagram (‘rookery’?; Chambers lists one meaning as a disturbance) of ‘proves’ plus ILL (‘extremely unfortunate’).
Down
1  
See 2
2, 1 ANIMAL FARM
 Blair’s fabulous place in the country? (6,4)

Cryptic definition; Eric Arthur Blair wrote Animal Farm under the pseudonym George Orwell.
3 MIDDLEBROW
Lib Dem row breaks out over duke — not taxing very much (10)

An anagram (‘breaks out’) of ‘Lib Dem row’ plus D (‘duke’).
4, 19 across RABBIT RUN
 Book 2 series (6,3)

A charade of RABBIT (‘2’D ANIMAL) plus RUN (‘series’). Rabbit, Run is a novel by John Updike.
5 ATKINSON
Rowan Williams finally working to support one likely to hang from tree, executed (8)

A charade of [c]ATKIN (‘one likely to hang from tree’) minus its first letter (‘executed’) plus S (‘WilliamS finally’) plus ON (‘working’), for another Rowan – but not, of course, the only one.
6, 22 across COLD COMFORT
Poor relief with 1 book (4,7)

A charade of COLD (‘poor’) plus COMFORT (‘relief’) – or perhaps better taking the two parts together as a phrase. Cold Comfort Farm is a  novel by Stella Gibbons.
7 CLEARING
Getting permission for bank job (8)

Double definition (clearing cheques).
8 HYPE
Puff, taking extremely heavy exercise (4)

A charade of HY (‘extremely HeavY‘) plus PE (‘exercise’). Very neat.
13 SWAMP
Paddled over soft morass (5)

A charade of SWAM (‘paddled’) plus P (‘soft’).
15 OPTIMALISE
Make the best of one African country in tight spot over energy (10)

An envelope (‘in’) of I (‘one’) plus MALI (‘African country’) in OPTS, an anagram (‘tight’) of ‘spot’ plus E (energy’).
16 SPRAT
Fish larvae\ around river, mackerel bait? (5)

An envelope (‘around’) of R (‘river’) in SPAT (‘fish larvae’ – shellfish, actually; it seems to be both singular and plural). The definition refers to the saw “use a sprat to catch a mackerel”.
18 GARBLING
Dress, underclothes half missing? That’s making nonsense (8)

A charade of GARB (‘dress’) plus LING[erie] (‘underclothes’) minus its latter half (‘half missing’).
19 RAGNAROK
Make fun of sacred text over “the end of the world” (8)

A charade of RAG (‘make fun of’) plus NAROK, a reversal (‘over’) of KORAN (‘sacred text’).
22 CUTTER
Ship‘s maximum speed, say (6)

A charade of C (‘speed, say’ of light) plus UTTER (‘maximum’). The order of the particles is hardly made clear. (‘maximum speed’ of light, in Relativity) plus UTTER (‘say’). Thanks Andrew.
23 OSIRIS
Old Master is depicting god (6)

A charade of O (‘old’) plus SIR (‘master’) plus ‘is’.
24, 27 WOLF HALL
 Book 2 dining room (4,4)

A charade of WOLF (‘2’D, ANIMAL) plus HALL (‘dining room’?). Wolf Hall is a novel by Hilary Mantel.
25, 20 MOON TIGER
Low note with 2 book (4,5)

A charade of MOO (‘low’) plus N (‘note’) plus TIGER (‘2’D ANIMAL). Moon Tiger is a novel by Penelope Lively.
27  
See 24
completed grid

79 comments on “Guardian Cryptic 26731 by Imogen”

  1. OVERSPILL: I think it’s “proves extraordinarily” + “unfortunate” and the definition is “emptying of rookery” (rookery in the Victorian meaning of ‘slum’ and overspill in the sense of the population that was moved out to various new towns)

  3. ALGER was new to me and I loved 9a. Still can’t make sense of 14a, but throughly enjoyable. Thank you Imogen and PeterO

  5. Quite a challenge for a Tuesday morning; I think it might have been better as a Prize puzzle. 17ac was my last one in – got the answer without knowing why, had to consult google.

    Thank you, Imogen & Peter O. Your explanations were much appreciated too, Gladys & Andrew.

  6. Andrew is correct. Great puzzle. I’ve read the orwell and the Mantel but may have to add the Trollope to my list

  7. Andrew’s right re 22d – nothing wrong with the clue, though the clever “maximum speed” took me some time. One of the best in a tricky bunch. I enjoyed the challenge, in spite of lacking quite a bit of the GK.

  8. Thanks Imogen (I think) and PeterO

    I found this the least enjoyable for ages – far too much “guess and check”, with Google much employed too. My entry was exactly the same as yours, PeterO, but I had to Google “Orley” to find the reference to the obscure book and get “farm”. All in all, far too many obscurities. (For example, I’m old to enough to have heard of Alger Hiss, but I bet many solvers aren’t, leaving them with little chance of solving this one.)

    I suppose I can admire the cleverness of some of the clues – ATKINSON and ANNUITANT for example.

    I checked Chambers for “optimalise”. It’s there, but surely everyone would say “optimise”?

  11. 24a, I am sure, but rather 28a to solve and not perhaps the best way to 15d one’s time. The 26a said the better, perhaps.

  12. Thanks for a great blog, PeterO.

    I have to disagree with muffin and pex. The puzzle did look a bit daunting at first, with all the cross-references, but, after getting a way in with ORLEY, although it’s the only book I wasn’t familiar with, it all began to unravel very satisfyingly. Penelope Lively is one of my favourite authors. Hilary Mantel has appeared in several puzzles and caused some head-scratching here but I do hope the Man Booker Prize-winning WOLF HALL is now better known, after the recent TV series.

    Favourite clues: 9ac and 5dn.

    [I had to smile at 15dn, after yesterday. 😉 – but I didn’t recognise the word: it’s not in Collins – and Chambers struggles to distinguish it from the more usual ‘optimise’.]

    Many thanks to Imogen for a most enjoyable workout.

  13. Well done, PeterO – a great blog of a very tricky puzzle. Definitely not one for a Tuesday! I wonder if you should underline “Poor relief” rather than “book” as the definition of COLD COMFORT – the parsing then makes it “add FARM to this to make a book title”?

  14. I found this rather amateurish, and hard for hard’s sake. It’s odd for Imogen who normally does nice clues, but I will be wary next time due to this outing.

    11a rather odd wording; 12a wording of definition; 14a whole thing I hated; 17a dbe; 21 definition is wrong; 28a did not like ‘or half’, and half (along with other devices here) is used mor than once anyway; 3d def again really odd, trying too hard to be ‘cryptic’; 5d dbe and ‘executed’ is pushing it too far; 6, 22 another humdrum execution of the theme; 16d the obscure SPAT.

    The rookery thing too is very obscure, all in all hard for hard’s sake and not the best clueing.

  15. This was one of the best puzzles I’ve seen for a while, full of wit and ingenuity. I found it fairly easy (ANIMAL FARM was first in), and only one of the books (ORLEY Farm) was unfamiliar – in fact I have read most of the others. CUTTER took longest to parse – very clever, and I agree with Andrew @2 on the parsing of that. Last in was PERIWIG after MIDDLEBROW

    Thanks to Imogen and PeterO

  16. This was helped by the not-too-difficult MIMED being fishing, and hence ANIMAL FARM following quickly. But fiction is not a strong point, and there was much struggle to come – though I don’t agree with our blogger that only two titles were well-known, given that WOLF HALL has been both on TV and in the theatre and, if you know one thing about John Updike, it’s that he wrote books with ‘rabbit’ in the title.

    I enjoyed the inventive clueing immensely, BLIND DATE a favourite. But OVERSPILL was an act of faith, and I had to get Mrs Trailman to check STORIES as I hadn’t counted up to 6.

  18. Ha! Amateurish? Oh my goodness.

    HH, were you aware that Imogen was the editor of the Times crossword for several years? As ever, you are perfectly entitled to your opinion as to whether you like certain clues or not, but saying things like that is just preposterous.

    22d is a fabulous clue – the shining star in a very, very good puzzle. Thanks very much to setter and blogger.

  19. Great puzzle.Everything parses perfectly and a great linked theme.Great surfaces and quite educational if you havent heard of 17(I hadnt),I love Trollope but I hadnt heard of 10- again wordplay immaculate.I must read it. (Ive read the Blair and the Mantell)
    Also love 22d. Great stuff from Imogen.

  20. I really enjoyed this – thank you Imogen and PeterO.
    My LOI was 4d, 19ac – entered in some disbelief because I’m rereading Rabbit, Run right now for book group … not enjoying it much this time around though.

  21. Thanks Imogen & PeterO.

    Some nice cluing but too much GK needed, I thought. As JuneG @5 says, it might have been better as a Prize Puzzle. ALGER HISS was known but long forgotten.

    As for OPTIMALISE… Nobody, I think, would ever use that these days (it’s not in the ODE.) I guess it was just a necessary filler. I doubt many would know RAGNAROK but it was well clued.

    I did like CUTTER.

  22. My take on obscurity and the amount of general knowledge reequired:

    Cold Comfort Farm is very well known, if not as widely read as it used to be. Moon Tiger won the Booker Prize, and as Eileen rightly said she is well worth reading, and Updike’s Rabbit series often crops up in best novel lists, though the one I read many years ago (Rabbit Redux) seemed overrated to me. So for me, only Orley Farm was at all obscure, and that one was clued so obviously there can be no valid complaints. Alger Hiss may have passed people by, but is one of those names you remember, and I think I came across him as a central character in some TV series in the late 80s/early 90s, though I have not tracked that down yet.

    I do agree that rookery as anagrind was obscure – in fact I only realised I hadn’t parsed it when I read the comments here.

  23. Thanks Imogen and PeterO.

    This was hard going for me after the past few days. I had to google the Hiss connection with ALGER.
    I parsed CUTTER as Andrew @2 did and I prefer Gladys’s @1 parsing of OVERSPILL.

    Shouldn’t the definition of SPRAT, 16d, be ‘mackerel bait’?

  24. If Cold Comfort Farm is obscure, it shouldn’t be! A wonderful comedy of literary pastiche. In other news, I couldn’t parse CUTTER, but like it now I see it. And despite guessing ALGER, failed to remember him. It seemed oddly obscure when there are other perfectly satisfactory words that would fit the crossers. An enjoyable work out, though, with some really lovely misdirections.

  25. DP @24
    I agree about “Cold Comfort Farm”. Stella Gibbons (the author) considerately marked the outstanding passages with one, two or three stars to save reviewers time in finding the “best literary bits”.

    One of the funniest books in English. I expect that even people who haven’t read it will be familiar with “something nasty in the woodshed”.

  26. This is a fantastic puzzle. I’m ashamed to say I’m not very well read – although I am a news/politics/economics junkie – but I was able to solve (with a bit of guesswork) all the thematic material.
    @hedgehoggy – I am embarrassed for you

  27. Just a parting shot- didnt see “rookery” as an anagrind device- that was covered by “extraordinarily”-shurely. But a great misdirect to get you thinking that R(ooker)Y may be part of the wordplay.

  28. Hi Mitz

    No, I didn’t. But it is a real shock! I’m sure many of the devices here would not pass muster in the world’s Number One crossword puzzle.

    HH

  29. This is a tough puzzle (perhaps too tough for a Tuesday when some people expect to still be easing into the crossword week) but I enjoyed it a lot.

    I couldn’t fully understand the definition part of OVERSPILL, but I think Gladys @1 has parsed it correctly. I couldn’t parse the wordplay for CUTTER at all, but I am sure Andrew @2 is right, and now I think it is a brilliant clue. ANNUITANT and ORLEY FARM were new to me.

    Although I do remember ALGER Hiss (mainly through his case’s role in launching Richard Nixon’s career), I doubt that many younger solvers will have heard of him. I don’t think the books (other than perhaps ORLEY FARM) were particularly obscure, though. Two are Booker Prize winners, and one of those is a recent BBC serialisation. ANIMAL FARM and COLD COMFORT FARM were 46 and 88 on the BBC’s 2003 survey of the UK’s best-loved novels, The Big Read. RABBIT, RUN is also often included in “best novel” lists. If they are too obscure for Guardian crosswords, I’m not sure what could be safely included.

    Thanks to Imogen and PeterO.

  30. Andrew @2

    Yes indeed; I was tying myself in a knot there!

    Gladys @1

    You are very probably right, but it still seems to me that describing the emptying of a slum as overspill is somewhat misplaced – it may have been overspill that filled the slum in the first place.

    Cookie @23

    I have corrected the definition in 16D from ‘fish larvae’ to ‘mackerel bait’ – as I implied in my explanation. I generally solve the puzzles on my iPad, and do most of the formatting of the blog there, but add the underlining later on another machine; in this case I picked the wrong ‘un.

  31. jenny @29 – yes, I missed Gladys’s comment on rookery, but that does make a lot more sense – it doesn’t make it any less obscure though. Also agree with DP and muffin that Cold Comfort Farm is very funny and well worthy reading.

  33. Wow – this was very hard work but I enjoyed the workout. I can understand that some thought it too tricky. The parsing of CUTTER escaped me and I had to scratch my head about most of the book titles, but I prefer the more challenging puzzles. Favourites were MIDDLEBROW, ATKINSON and OVERSPILL. Many thanks to Imogen and PeterO.

  34. Thanks to PeterO and others for explaining the parsing of 22D.

    PeterO – I think there is a typo in your list of the 6 stories. I would suggest that 10A (with 1D), i.e. ORLEY FARM is what you mean rather than 11A MIMED.

    I agree with Gladys @1 on 29A. “Extraordinarily” must be the anagrind.

    Quite a difficult crossword for those who don’t read a lot of novels, but all guessable from the wordplay.

    I really liked 5D – great fun.

  36. Thanks to Imogen and PeterO. ALGER Hiss was first in (for me an iconic figure from the US McCarthy era) but other items were either new (ANNUITANT) or hard to parse. I.e., I got STORIES but was misled by the 6; missed the “[c]atkin” for ATKINSON; did not know the SPRAT-mackerel connection; and needed help with CUTTER. A difficult solve but well worth the effort.

  38. PeterO @39
    The New Towns and overspill estates built in Britain in the mid-to-late 20th century were intended mainly to rehouse people from overcrowded and deprived areas of the big cities. At the time, those new areas were certainly not seen as slums. In some other countries, the shanty towns which grew on the edge of cites to house the overspill population with not even the most basic facilities would certainly count as slums, but this puzzle is on a British newspaper.

  40. In the old days, when I first infested this site, I would have complained long and hard about this being too hard for mere mortals and should be kept for Prize crosswords, and that experts shouldn’t be selfish and expect this type of puzzle in a daily. That was mainly because I would have struggled to finish even half of this. Nowadays I managed to finish, but it was seriously hard work over a much longer time than normal. So the motivation has changed, but on behalf of all our lurkers who will have suffered with this one, I’d still say it was too hard for a daily.

    Moral for the lurkers, if a dummy like me can get better so can you, so stick with it.

    Anyone know anything about the history/etymology of OPTIMALISE? It looks to be such an ugly word when compared to OPTIMISE. I’ve tried my usual on-line sources and most have never heard of it or give it the briefest of mentions, such as “alternative to optimise” which doesn’t tell us much.

  41. I wasn’t put off by OPTIMALISE (although it has a vaguely American feel): I’d suggest that optimise is the stranger word: from norm: normal: normalise: you wouldn’t normise. You wouldn’t optimumise either. I’ll shut up now before Eileen turns up and tells me that it’s a Latin thing… 😉

  42. Derek L @ 40: “Seriously hard work” – my sentiments exactly. I think it makes a big difference if one has plenty of time to do the puzzle (which I do nowadays). There’s more satisfaction in completing a hard puzzle.

  43. Derek Lazenby @40

    I endorse your advice “stick with it”. It is a mantra that I have needed in blogging the new Everyman.
    In writing the blog, I did not chase down 15D OPTIMALISE, as it did not look odd to me. Doing so now, I find that the only form in the OED (the obvious choice for word history) is optimize (shades of the discussion over yesterday’s Rufus!) – no entry for optimise, yet alone optimalize or optimalise (the supplement does give optimalization). Of all these, the spell checker here only likes optimize. Chambers gives both optimize/optimise and optimalize/optimalise as separate entries, apparently with different shades of meaning.

  44. Ta for the feedback.

    If it helps at all, optimise (or -ize) has been an essential word in computer programming for at least 50 years. It was especially essential in the old days when memory sizes were tiny and execution speeds were painfully slow. In an arena where the usage was common, I can’t recall ever hearing optimalise so it was a new word today!

  45. OPTIMALISE (or -IZE even?) isn’t in Collins, where OPTIMAL is listed as ‘another word for optimum (sense 2)’, which would seem to be a less-than-optimal inclusion for the likes of Imogen. However, I see that three of the intersecting letters belong to theme-words, and some licence is certainly to be afforded.

    An E-E (extremely enjoyable) work-out, and a nice literary challenge for a Tuesday.

  46. I found this quite difficult and it did take quite a time but I enjoyed it a lot. I can’t say that I found any of the books obscure. ORLEY was easily gettable from the clue- a French airport in a crossword?- and it’s Trollope-and it was dramatized on Radio 4 quite recently!
    A nice workout.
    Thanks Imogen.

  47. This was way too hard for me, although I recognise that others are more than up for the challenge, so I’m not griping.

    That said, one aside: I’m fast approaching 50, and Alger Hiss (I now know) was convicted 18 years before I was born. That is terribly obscure for the vast majority of the population.

  48. Thanks all
    Imogen usually beats me; this time only leith was a failure. I knew all the books except Orley Farm. Last in was ragnarok.
    A good workout.

  49. I did not like 5d. “Executed” seems far too vague an instruction to take the first letter off a word, if we hadn’t seen it the other week. There are several alternative methods of execution, but presumably there is no-one called Rowan Catlethalkinson, so it couldn’t have been lethal injection. Nor putting before a firing squad, as there is almost certainly no Rowan Catkinfiringsquadson. Or is beheading the standard method of executing catkins? One of those post hoc clues that is crossword Marmite. Or Mr Bean.

  50. I finished this appalling mess.

    I can’t agree that it would have better suited the Saturday slot as it would still have been a mess.

    Badly in need of an editor’s intervention. IMHO of course.

    It was only difficult because it was clued so loosely. (Oh and the references to Alger Hiss (WHO?) and Penelope Lively were a little obscure).

    Not much fun to be had in this puzzle.

    Thanks to PeterO and Imogen!

  51. Thanks Imogen and PeterO

    Van Winkle @ 49: Executed is an instructionto apply to the components of the solution, not to include in it. Means of execution include shooting by firing squad, lethal injection, hanging, burning at the stake, and beheading [I’m sure there are more]. Of these options I think only one could be applied to a word in a crossword context, so I think the clue stands firm. Your view may differ, of course.

  52. Not sure about the definition for 12A – surely blind dates are previously arranged – “prepared”? Blind dates aren’t unarranged – they’re just with someone unknown.

  53. Simon S @51 – my contribution was an apparently defective attempt to show that there were other possible constructions – injecting “lethal” into a word or putting a word in front of “firing squad” in a charade. “Burnt at the stake” could be an instruction to make an anagram of “at the stake”. And it doesn’t make any sense doing it to a catkin. Grumble.

  54. Fairly new as I am to these puzzles, I found it hard but not unreasonably so. If a clue takes me to the answer without my having foreknowledge of the subject, then I don’t feel I have grounds for complaint. That was the case today. I’m also enjoy coming away from a crossword with some new knowledge, or have a forgotten nugget restored to mind.

    Thanks Imogen and PeterO.

  55. Bramspal @ 54: That’s a refreshing attitude. I have a funny feeling that the longer people do cryptic puzzles, the more they tend to be analytical about the way clues are put together, and the more they complain! But not everyone, of course.

  56. Um. I’ve been doing Guardian crosswords for years, and whilst some of the clues were very good (5d), I still haven’t got the hang of Imogen. I’ll get there but my heart sinks… 🙁

  57. I’m complaining. What? 22d. C = maximum speed of light in Relativity?
    Eh? Who the hell knows that?
    Too depressing….
    Going to bed very huffy

  61. The term “rookery” is not that obscure, it was often applied to an overcrowded tenement, especially in Scotland. A large number of tenements in Glasgow and Edinburgh were demolished because of overcrowding and slum conditions in the 1906s and 1970s – not that long ago.

  62. That should read “1960s and 1970s”. The old buildings that survived are now sought after because of their large rooms, high ceilings and ornamental details.

  63. Superb! – just right after all yesterday’s ‘easies’ and a perfect diversion pendant ces fois inquiétantes.

    Mitz@18 – interesting to learn of an earlier Imogen career – I’m not at all surprised!

    Thanks to Imogen and PeterO

  65. Hilton @57 – who the hell knows C is the speed of light ?
    Surely, anyone who has been to school in the last 50 years has heard of E = MC2 ? [help – how do you get it to show 2 as superscript??]

    Now Alger Hiss was obscure, but I’m not complaining – I found this a challenge rather than a grind!

  66. Mr Beaver @65
    “[help – how do you get it to show 2 as superscript??]”

    On a standard keyboard, Alt+253 on the numeric keypad (with Num Lock on) will give you ².

    There is a way to do the same thing on a laptop that doesn’t have a numeric keypad but I’ve forgotten it. 🙁

  67. … and anyone who remembers Landscape, the early 80s one hit wonder: “You better watch out you better beware / Albert said that E equals M C squared / Einstein A Go Go”

  68. To be fair Hilton @57 wasn’t questioning that people couldn’t be expected to know that C = speed of light but that “maximum speed” was to be taken as “speed of light”.

  69. VW @68 – fair point but it is pretty common knowledge for those who follow popular science and science fiction.

  70. beery hiker @69

    … but possibly nit among theoretical physicists, just to confuse matters. There is speculation that there could exist tachyons, travelling faster than c. Although it is a tenet of Relativity that nothing can move faster than light, the theory does not fall apart completely if that is relaxed, provided that the tachyons never slow down to speed c.

  71. @69
    Absolutely. It’s one of the most famous facts in science. It’s as if someone complained about having to know Hamlet was Danish or something. I think Araucaria’s rule comes in – if you don’t know it, you certainly should!

  72. @70
    Yes, that was in the news recently – but it’s still the maximum speed for all the things in our universe, if not for all the particles that constitute them… Perhaps “a” maximum speed rather than “the” maximum speed then.

  73. PeterO @ 70

    I though the Theory of Relativity states that nothing can travel *at* the speed of light, which would allow the existence of tachyons. I read it years ago, so may have misremembered.

  74. Simon S @73

    Believe it or not, light travel at the speed of light. Certainly nothing with a non-zero rest mass can be accelerated that fast, because E and the m in E=mc² would then be infinite; the prohibition of anything travelling faster is a separate assumption.

  76. beery hiker @64 – interesting, and thanks. Was that consensus a certitude, I wonder? The timing would seem a convincer.

  77. Thanks Imogen and PeterO

    This was tough which stretched the solve over a couple of days … a lot of fun though !!! Only knew of three of the books – 2,1 – 6,22 & 4,19 – and have read none of them (missed 2,1 as a part of study, got 1984 instead!). ANIMAL FARM, ORLEY FARM and then STORIES reasonably early on alerted me to the theme. They look an interesting set of books – and this may inspire the reading of at least the two Booker prize ones.

    Finished down in the bottom half, with OVERSPILL (which I hadn’t seen in the slum / rookery clearing sense), CUTTER (the only one that I couldn’t parse – and wish I had after seeing how clever it was) and ALGER (whom was previously unknown and only resulted from a hopeful Google search of the two words of his name).

    There was a lot of electronic help required throughout and much to learn, but because of the clear clueing, found that that it was a very enjoyable solve. A weekend slot would not have put me so far behind again through the week.

  78. Thanks PeterO and Imogen.

    A tough workout needing the whole of my train journey plus the final walk home to get the last few.

    I did need to look up ORLEY Farm and Hiss ALGER but they were fairly clued so no quibbles there.

    SPAT as (shell)fish larvae was a new definition for me so that was another check in my on-line dictionary.

    I’m not quite sure about SWAM = PADDLED in 13dn but there were no reasonable alternatives.

    Equally, I don’t get ‘rookery’ as an anagram indicator in 29ac.

    ANIMAL FARM was one of my first in – I seem to remember that it was similarly clued in the FT recently.

    No stand out clues – just (mostly) tough but solid.

  79. I switched daily papers from Times to Grauniad last year. (Can’t put up with right-wing tosh any more.) But this Imogen crossword is the last straw and I’m going back to buying the Times for its properly compiled crosswords. This one – like so many Guardian ones – is a mess; badly worded clues, wrong defs (a blind date is not ‘not prepared’), silly words (optimalize is barely recorded in dictionaries as an existing form), obscure GK answers (Hiss), awful defs like 14ac, and so on. I agree with commentators who concluded that Imogen is straining to be cryptic and the strain makes the puzzles gauche and unrewarding. Give me a decent Times crossword any day — shame about the journalistic twaddle that it comes packaged with!

Comments are closed.