21 comments on “Inquisitor 1531: Don’t Get Me Wrong by Opsimath”

1. Some slightly uneven cluing I thought, but overall an enjoyable solve. I was cross with myself for resorting to Google for the source of the quote – I’d even considered both OSCAN and TILDE as potentially misprinted elements, but I think I was somehow working on the assumption that the name would be contiguous.

   I realise now, looking at your blog, that there were a couple of clues I hadn’t parsed, notably NOB at 49D. For 30D I also went for ITS, as in ‘of it’, from [b]its. 31D I had as CO + BALT, i.e. someone from the Baltic (sea = deep blue).

2. I concur with OPatrick’s parsing of 30 & 31 down. This was my quickest ever Inquisitor solve! I ripped through the clues and found “survive everything” by writing down all the peripheral unchanged letters. A quick google for the quotation and a grid search for the author and it was done. I agree with Kenmac that producing the blog would take longer than finishing the puzzle.

3. Thanks kenmac

   I had the same parsing as OPatrick for 30dn but I think 31dn is that the abbreviation (‘in brief’) for commanding officer is CO which is the chemical symbol for (‘represents’) COBALT.

4. An enjoyable, pretty straightforward puzzle. The grid fill was nice and easy, I got myself into a pickle with the quotation, because I was unsure what was meant by “barred off cells”, but finally came to my senses…

5. Very enjoyable with a final stage in the right proportion to the overall solving time. I thought I knew all of Oscar Wilde’s famous quotations so was pleasantly surprised to learn a new one.

   I too went down the ALICE route, and for a while thought that the “well-being” in the preamble referred to her falling down the well at the start of Alice in Wonderland and thus being a well-being.

   I agree with Gaufrid’s parsing of 31 down. I never did manage to understand 30 down but OPatrick’s interpretation has got to be right.

6. Enjoyable but I thought the clues were a bit too easy for an IQ.  Most of the solutions were a write-in on first pass through through the clues.  I think the longest part of this puzzle was trying to figure out what was meant by “barred off cells”.  Once the penny had dropped and I had administered myself a hearty smack to the forehead I guessed the quotation and Google lead me to its author Oscar Wilde.

   Thank you kenmac and Opsimath

7. As others have said – an enjoyable solve. The clues were somewhat easier than of late but hopefully will have encouraged some new solvers to our favourite crossword!

   We agree with the parsing of 30d stated by OPatrick and also with Gaufrid’s parsing of 31d.

   Unfortunately we had to google the quotation to locate the author.

   Thanks to kenmac and Opsimath.

8. Enjoyed — thanks all round — but I too had to Google for the perimeter after seeing “everything but a”, which miraculously brought up the required (and unfamiliar, though like cruciverbophile I thought I knew my Wilde) quotation. Should have tried harder.

   I had a nasty shock when I first saw the highlighted LUTANICS in the 19d explanation above (“blimey! was that the answer?!”), but happily it’s just a typo.

9. Gaufrid, it hadn’t occurred to me that Co was also the symbol for Cobalt. I posit that both parsings are involved though, that it is a multilayered clue with two readings (otherwise is there a need for the ‘deep’, if not implying a sea?). Nice.

10. Gaufrid @3 – D’oh! So obvious. Now corrected.

    David @8 – oops! – corrected now.

11. Agree with all above.

    Kenmac, We saw Hurley played, or at least, practised, most weekends when we lived by Parliament Hill Fields in NW London in the mid ’60s. I think there was a large Irish contingent in Camden Town at the time.  Sometimes quite dangerous for parents with small kids, as we were, walking in that beautiful part of “The Heath”.

    On an entirely irrelevant tack, I had a hip and socket resurfaced with COBALT in 2006. A couple of months ago I had a check-up letter from BMI Healthcare, whose surgeon did the operation, asking if I had been suffering any pain. Up till then none at all, but as soon as I had read the letter, it did start hurting and is now quite a bother. Coincidence, or is there some brain pathway that has been opened up ?  Any medics out there ?

12. Murray – get them to send you a letter asking if it is now feeling better again.

13. Is Opsimath a first-time setter? I don’t recall seeing the name before.

    As others have noted, some very gentle clues in here but nothing wrong with that. I also wrote down the letters that had to remain the same and calculated from the replacements that the phrase had to include the top, bottom plus one side (as opposed to both sides plus top/bottom). After seeing SURVIVE EVERYTHING I was then held up by locating a similar, but different Oscar Wilde quote: “One can survive everything, nowadays, except death”. This then held me up for a while as I couldn’t see how the rest of the quote – or a slight variant of it – could be fitted into the grid. Thanks to Terrier for alerting me to the fact that there was another quote that contained “survive everything” and resolving my frustration.

    Thanks to Opsimath for the puzzle.

14. HURLEY    Chambers gives it as (one version of) the name of the game but, I’ve never heard it called anything except hurling.    The “stick” used was known as the hurley though in more recent times is sometimes called a hurl.

    It’s played mainly in those parts of the country where the wood was suitable to make the hurleys and Donegal is, I think, about as far from those areas (mainly Munster and Leinster) as you can get.       It’s got a little better known in England as Sky Sports now shows it, and some tourists have come from there to have a look at it live.

15. Yes – very rapid grid fill, and not overlong to figure out the quotation & correct OSCAN TILDE.

    OPatrick @9 (& earlier): Chambers refers to Cobalt as “of this deep-blue colour” so we don’t need “deep” to be a reference to sea or anything else. I think it’s just a simple clue, like many of the others.

    Kippax @13: Yes, it’s first time out (here) for Opsimath – you can check who’s set which puzzle by clicking ‘Inquisitor index’ in the left menu bar on this site, which has links to a table of setters/puzzles, and to tables of puzzles for each calendar year.

    Thanks to all.

16. HG, yes, I’d just thought to check in Chambers myself and seen the ‘of this deep-blue colour’ part. A bit disappointed. But I still think the clue sort of works on both levels, even if it wasn’t intentional!

17. kenmac: 46d “ELLA  (Henderson)  Never heard of her!” Me neither … not a good clue!

18. I have always been disadvantaged by my relative ignorance of pop groups of the ’70s and ’80s which figure so prominently in ultracryptics and quizzes like University Challenge and Only Connect.   I am now highly amused that the time-frame is shifting so that even our pop-savvy stalwarts on this forum are baffled by a new name, Ella Henderson, that means nothing to them.     FITZGERALD would have done it for them, and even me !      Tempora (at least, the Review Section,) mutantur, as Auctor would observe.

19. Good point Murray (@18): I’d consider myself to be relatively pop-savvy (and probably towards the younger end of the IQ solver spectrum at 37) but Ella Henderson was entirely new to me. Fitzgerald was the first alternative that came to mind for me too.

20. Agree it was as easy an IQ as I can remember. I also started by spotting the potential for EVERYTHING and then guessed sensible letters to work my way back round to the start of the quote. A little too straightforward for my tastes all in all. I also very much enjoyed the rugby victory ha!

    Thanks

21. My ignorance of pop music will rival that of most IQ solvers but I have much sympathy for a setter who wants to reference current pop musicians.  A major driver of of pop music is that it is happens now.  Bands, genres and artists come and go, but what is being played being now is what really matters.

    Claiming to be pop-savvy but not knowing current musicians is like claiming to be up on current affairs but only those more than 10 years old.

    So, even though it may mean that I won’t be able to solve some of the clues unaided please continue.

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