Northern Lights by Phi
Orthernay Ightslay ybay Iphay
The unclued entries (none of which is a word) can be converted to a list of names with something in common by the application of the process identified in the missing components of two answers where the wordplay indicates what is entered in the grid and the definition is to the full word.
Classic Phi and classic Inquisitor – what a joy.
I found NW corner the hardest to complete/justify and, curiously, I didn’t justify 12a ETHIC until writing this blog. 2d wanted to be OSWALDT for a long time as it seemed, to me, to be a perfectly acceptable German surname. Of course, I’d never heard of OSWALDT but then I’d never hear of OSTWALD, either!
7a and 11a (the two answers referenced in the preamble) were, understandably, more difficult to solve as 7a revealed PIG and 11a revealed LATIN. Now, I’d vaguely heard of PIG LATIN but my memory isn’t good enough to remember how it actually works. A quick trip to Wikipedia revealed all: Pig Latin. To summarise, you move the first consonant (or consonant sound) to the end of the word and add AY or if the word starts with a vowel, you add WAY or YAY or AY to the end – I’m not sure if they’re interchangeable.
OK, so we have to Pig-Latinise the unclued answers but what do we actually have to do? After a bit of head scratching and looking repeatedly at the title, I took a punt at RW_ST missing an “E” and becoming WESTRAY as per the Pig Latin rules. Wikipedia then revealed that Westray is one of The Orkney Islands. I vaguely knew that and then, of course, with the proper treatment, the other unclued became as shown in the table below:
| Ematicsthay | ||
| Idgray acementplay |
entryway |
islandyay |
| h1-h4 | SROU | ROUSAY |
| a2-f2 | SSTRON | STRONSAY |
| a4-e4 | RWEST | WESTRAY |
| h9-l9 | SEGIL | EGILSAY |
| a11-f11 | SGRAEM | GRAEMSAY |
| a12-d12 | SDAM | DAMSAY |
| f12-l12 | SSHAPIN | SHAPINSAY |
Finally, sorting out the title, it seems that The Orkney Islands group is one of the best places to see The Northern Lights (Aurora Borealis) in The United Kingdom. Though I imagine that The Southern Lights (Aurora Australis) would be more up Phi’s street these days.
THANKS PHI.
| Across |
||
| Clue |
Entry |
Wordplay |
| 1 Bird needing almost full return of warm weather (7) |
TOTANUS | TOTA[l] (full; almost)+SUN (warm weather; rev: return of) |
| 7 Creeping disease apparent between a pair of roses? (4) |
SERPIGO | [ro]SE RO[se] (a pair of roses; hidden: apparent between) |
| 11 Moving to another place, belabours Government involving Republican (6) |
TRANSLATING | TANS (belabours) containing Republican+Government |
| 12 Call to court rejected as limitation on husband’s moral code (5) |
ETHIC | CITE (call to court; rev: rejected) containing Husband |
| 13 Remote computer peripheral failing one run (5) |
OUTER | [r]OUTER (computer peripheral) minus Run |
| 14 Art forgery, bartering first of Klimts away (7) |
TRUCAGE | TRUC[k]AGE (bartering) minus Klimts (first of) |
| 17 French city outskirts, perhaps, visited by ambassador (6) |
RHEIMS | RIMS (outskirts) containing HE (His Excellency: ambassador) |
| 18 Source of dye is a reptile without tail, I note (8) |
ALIZARIN | A LIZAR[d] (reptile; without tail)+I+Note |
| 22 Source of dye is unknown – a note subsequently having ‘Spain’ attached (8) |
XANTHENE | X (unknown)+A+Note+THEN (subsequently)+E (Spain) |
| 24 One avoids uncovered swindle in Welsh town (6) |
BRECON | B[a]RE (uncovered; minus A (one))+CON (swindle) |
| 27 Australian plants one Australian placed beside pools (7) |
BANKSIA | BANKS (pools)+I+Australian |
| 30 English articles conveniently provided by the poet (5) |
EATHE | English+A (article)+THE (article) |
| 31 Roman vehicles capable of going both ways, ready to disembark millions (5) |
BIGAE | BI[sexual] (capable of going both ways)+GA[m]E (ready; minus Millions) |
| 32 Broadcast excellent sequence of operas (6) |
AIRING | AI (A1: excellent)+RING (sequence of operas by Richard Wagner) |
| Down |
||
| 2 German chemist revised laws to diffusion, primarily (7) |
OSTWALD | LAWS TO D[iffusion] (primarily) anag: revised |
| 3 Area around Wexford, maybe excluding one field after harvesting (5) |
ARISH | Area+[i]RISH (around Wexford, maybe; minus I) I have no confidence in this one – I feel that I’ve, maybe, missed something |
| 4 Moth study turned up marsupial without tail (6) |
NOCTUA | CON (study; rev: turned up)+TUA[n] (marsupial; without tail) |
| 5 Fellow abandoning substandard Sydney apartment (4) |
UNIT | UN[f]IT (sun=bstandard; minus Fellow) |
| 6 Prison cartel on the move (8) | STIRRING | STIR (prison)+RING (cartel) |
| 7 Increasingly brazen, dropping one dish (6) |
SAUCER | SAUC[i]ER (increasingly brazen; minus I: one) |
| 8 Carved historic date with line, possibly (8) |
ENTAILED | DATE+LINE (anag: possibly) |
| 9 Monstrous figure, gross, covered in rings with a touch of silver (6) |
OGRESS | GRoss inside OES (rings)+S[ilver] (a touch of) |
| 10 Ecological communities succeeded in this place, but not at first (4) |
SERE | Succeeded+[h]ERE (in this place; minus first letter) |
| 15 Bleeding heart to risk rant being set off (8) |
DICENTRA | DICE (to risk)+RANT (anag: being set off) |
| 16 Brainboxes? University on the spot raised blocking studies (8) |
CRANIUMS | University+IN (on the spot) rev: raised all inside CRAMS (studies) |
| 19 Answer Independent article I produced about Kiwi politicians in Europe (7) |
ANZIANI | Answer+NZ (Kiwi)+Independent+AN (article)+I (a trademark Phi, NZ reference!) |
| 20 Holy woman and Bishop to take place between a pair of saints (6) |
ABBESS | Bishop+BE (to take place) inside A+SS (pair of saints) |
| 21 Company picked up last of rank meat in schoolman’s residence (6) |
OCKHAM | COmpany (rev: picked up)+[ran]K (last of)+HAM (meat) |
| 23 Set of prayer beads has bit broken (6) |
TASBIH | HAS BIT (anag: broken) |
| 25 City in Mozambique that is included in Arab book after reflection (5) |
BEIRA | ARab+IE (that is)+Book (rev: after reflection) containing |
| 26 Annoying insect set to have head of cattle upset (4) |
CLEG | LEG+Cattle (head of) anag: upset |
| 28 Appear to occupy those embassies (4) |
SEEM | thoSE EMbassies (hidden: to occupy) |
| 29 Sadly it’s a terminal (not terminus) (4) |
ALAS | A+LAS[t] (terminal; minus last letter: terminus) |
With regard to the puzzle’s title, don’t those islands all have lighthouses too ?
I’m assuming that the title is also a punning reference to the usage of light to mean the answer to a crossword clue – which is rather ironic for me, as I suspect my first, confidently entered unclued answer was RAMSAY (or rather SRAM), my misspelled of Ramsey, which is very much not in the North. I was feeling rather pleased with myself until I noticed that.
As kenmac says, a great example of the ingenuity and variety in the IQs. I found the lack of mutually checking answers made it hard to do more than pencil in several of the more obscure answers, but easily enough resolved by reference to the dictionary. I enjoyed the PDM and subsequent trawl through obscure Scottish islands, though I hadn’t actually realised they were all in the Orkenys (unsurprisingly I suppose, as I thought one of them was in Wales!) I wasn’t sure that the final answers fit fully with the rules of pig-latin though – aren’t you supposed to take the full set of initial consonants to the end of the word? Is sstr one consonant sound, or would you pronounce the first S then the STR separately? OK, now I accept this is being overly pedantic.
I really enjoyed this clever, well-crafted puzzle. I’m not sure of the example given in the blog – in Westray, the W isn’t moved to the end of the word ‘as per the Pig Latin rules’ and the same is true of the other unclued entries. This doesn’t bother me unduly, as Chambers says Pig Latin ‘usually involves…’ – ‘the ‘usually’ indicates to me that there’s not a rigid formula. All the thematic entries are consistent, so it worked well for me.
Very neat and much enjoyed. Thanks to Kenmac and Phi, and congratulations to Phi on finding the perfect set of names that are end products of pig-Latinish transformations.
7a and 11a were indeed tough, with several possible options to fill out the second. It took me a fair old while to think of LATIN, but PIG then quickly followed.
I think Caran @3 is looking at it the wrong way around: Westray would become ESTRAYWAY, but the grid’s non-word RWEST plausibly becomes WESTRAY.
Lots of fun to be found here. Getting 11ac right took an unnecessarily long time as I thought of several incorrect alternatives first, none of which were likely to lead to the theme. Working out what to the with the Pig Latin transformations also took a while, as the rules I found online seemed to imply we should be moving more than the first consonant. I’m no expert though, and Wikipedia and Google seemed to say different things, the latter being closer to Phi’s interpretation. And I got there in the end, which is what counts of course.
A most enjoyable puzzle! Totally mystifying until 7A and 11A were solved. I had not heard of Pig Latin but Chambers put me right, giving the definition that Phi used as the usual interpretation. I had, however, encountered it in my distant youth as A-slang.
At first, I just tried transposing the first letter of what I had of the shaded lights, as I could not see how putting AY at the end of them all could work. Then WESTRAY suddenly jumped out at me and I recalled the Orkneys page of my OS atlas and was home and dry.
I agree with OPatrick @2 regarding the interpretation of the title.
THanks to Phi for one of the best and to Kenmac for a succinct blog.
I liked this. I didn’t get the more obscure islands and never completely figured out how Pig Latin works but that wasn’t a problem, it was still enjoyable nonetheless. Thank you kenmac and phi.
I may be a lone dissenter here, it seems. I grappled forlornly with this until finally admitting defeat yesterday morning. A small cluster of clues in the NE corner entirely eluded me, including of course the two crucial entries, and I remained baffled as to what was going on. Thanks for the full explanation here and at least I have learned what Pig Latin is.
I enjoyed all of this except the theme, which I couldn’t get and know nothing about. From TRANSG I came up with TRANSPORTING and TRANSFERRING (as they both fit the definition perfectly) but not TRANSLATING (which of course is also a good fit). I didn’t get SERPIGO from SERO as I haven’t come across that word before, and I wasn’t even certain that this was the other incomplete word.
I solved all the clues except ARISH, which, with just the first letter to help me, was unsolvable. I now know that ‘around Wexford, maybe’ is a fair definition (or indication) of ‘Irish’. (I must remember that for my own amateur efforts at cryptic crosswords.)
This was another anticlimax. I have actually heard of Pig Latin and once saw an example of its use, but I would never have thought of it even if I had somehow thought of LATIN in preference to PORTIN or FERRIN in that troublesome clue at 11a.
I’m gradually getting used to the Inquisitor, but after doing swimmingly well with four of them on the trot I have been thwarted (and disappointed) by the theme in three on the trot. This kind of crossword that I have willingly taken on is clearly a step up from daily cryptics that I also still do on most weekdays, but an appreciation of the excellent clues that I consistently find here may wear a bit thin if the theme is continually out of reach!
Thanks to Phi for a clever puzzle and to kenmac for a clear blog.
Alan B @9.
Don’t despair. I first encountered The Inquisitor (Weekend Crossword as it was then) about 17 years ago and I’ve seen the style change over that period. The major trend, these days, seems to be for clues generating extra letters. Phi’s device here was reminiscent of the kind of device we used to see all those years ago. Admittedly, 7a and 11a were rather difficult but once you managed to separate wordplay and definition, they weren’t that bad.
The best advice I ever received for these crosswords was BUY A CHAMBERS dictionary – it really is invaluable. These days I use Chambers app on my iPhone/iPad.
My own advice, when stuck, is twofold:
1. Read, read and re-read the preamble – and remember to read what’s there and not what you “know” is there.
2. Talk to someone else about it. Whether it’s wife, friend, son, daughter, grandfather, etc. or even your dog, cat, parrot or goldfish. Because just saying it out loud sometimes sparks a series of synapses and, often, the solution appears.
kenmac @10
Thank you for your kind and encouraging comment. There are a couple of things I would like to say in reply.
I always have the Chambers dictionary by my side when I am busy trying to solve the clues of an Inquisitor puzzle. I currently have the 11th edition. So that advice, gratefully received, was not needed!
I would actually love to solve a crossword like this in collaboration with any friend or goldfish within earshot. But I don’t have one! I do also enjoy solving on my own, though – otherwise I would not bother.
I am selective about which Inquisitor puzzles I try. If the preamble is unclear or too convoluted, or there is something that strikes me as too artificial about it, I won’t pick up the puzzle. That simple rule still leaves a good two-thirds of them worth having a go at, and sometimes I regretfully leave them only because I don’t have time. I don’t feel I have to try every puzzle, and I don’t keep stats (but in these early days I do still remember every experience).
7a and 11a were not actually difficult clues. What was difficult with 7a was not being sure whether it was one of the two clues that had a longer answer, and not being able to visualise a longer word with an extra bit (or extra bits) added. 11a was one of the easiest clues, and in coming up with two possible longer words I was well aware there might be others – I just happened to be blind on the day to the one that mattered! (This was possibly an unintended weakness in the clue.)
When I saw the solution I could see why it wasn’t possible for me to guess the theme from the incomplete information I had. It would have meant nothing to me. The weak clue at 3d (ARISH, about which I admit to lapsing into a bit of sarcasm in my earlier comment) was unfortunate, crossing two grey cells and crossing also the only clue I solved but could not parse fully (12a ETHIC).
Thank you again for your comment. I am not yet discouraged and will hope for better luck next time. I actually did very well on this crossword.
A very ingenious puzzle. I didn’t have much trouble filling the initial grid, but I did have some trouble arriving at the right longer word for 11a. As it was essential to the theme I think it’s a pity it was defined in the way it was, given the number of words beginning TRANS- that fit the definition. I also wish I had checked Chambers first for the thematic phrase as I spent some time pondering how the entries converted to the islands according to the rules I found on the internet. I see that the two clues I never managed to parse have been mentioned here, those to ETHIC and ARISH. I agree with Alan B @11 that it’s a weak clue, though the only one in a pretty solid set.
Alan B @8. I am curious to learn more about your reasons for not starting some of the puzzles. I came to the inquisitor because I got fed up with being able to solve the daily puzzles every time*. Being frequently unable to finish IQs restored some of the the spark that had gone out of the crossword solving experience over the years. Not knowing in advance if I will be able to finish the puzzles makes the experience more pleasurable.
Is it the idea that you might not finish that dissuades you from starting the puzzles? Please be assured that I don’t in any way intend to criticise your approach or suggest it is is wrong. I am just curious as to how other solvers think about solving puzzles.
* PS – I am no crossword-solving genius, I have just been working at it for a very very long time!
PeeDee @13
I’ve been out and have only just seen your post. I’m very happy to expand a bit on that part of my earlier comment that prompted your enquiry.
I don’t actually get time to do all the crosswords I would like to do. The Guardian is my daily choice, but I don’t buy the Saturday paper (I buy the ‘i’, as you may have guessed!). I usually start (and solve) 4 or 5 Guardian cryptics a week. Because the Inquisitor has a longer life (so to speak) I pick it up when I have time and not necessarily on the day it comes out.
The Inquisitor is not an addiction yet! Two factors come into play for me to make a start on it: (1) I have the time and (2) I am not put off by the preamble. I happen to be in the strange position today (or more likely tomorrow) of choosing whether to start the Ifor or the Chalicea! I’ve read both preambles, and that’s as far as I’ve got. I don’t have time for both. The preamble to the Chalicea reads more clearly and has a theme that is likely to appeal to me more. That is how I am making my choice this time.
I am not dissuaded by the prospect of not finishing, and I normally don’t mind not finishing. Having already had some good experiences here I tried the recent Schadenfreude puzzle and almost, but not quite, got the breakthrough I needed. I enjoyed what I did and wasn’t frustrated or disappointed. (I was actually relieved later, for the devious reason that I know and like nothing about horse-racing!)
I came to a stop on this one very near the end, and there were things (that I have reported) about the crossword (11a, 3d and one bit of the preamble) that led me to describe my solving experience, finally, as an anticlimax.
Thank you for your enquiry.
Thanks Alan – I get it now. Just a case of if you don’t have time to attempt them all then only start the ones you think you might finish. That makes sense.
Some belated comments for Alan B @9, 11 & 14:
1. A very useful book to have at hand is Bradford’s Crossword Solver’s Dictionary. In particular, it has copious list. I too was stuck on 7A but was able to find SERPIGO under Diseases – I think I had come across it before but my memory is not up to much these days, which is why I find Bradford so useful.
2. Regarding your comments about themes and preambles, the general rules seems to be that there aren’t any, except for sound cluing. It is quite normal to read the preamble, shrug in incomprehension, get down to solving a few clues and filling part of the grid and then having another read, possibly many, before dawn arrives. On the last day before the Independent went on line, John Henderson, our revered editor, wrote the following gem to justify IQ’s transfer to the “i”, where it would remain in printed form:
“ Saved!
So, John, why don’t you think IQ would work on an app? Well, let’s see. Counting back from IQ1425, solvers had to: write multiple letters in some cells; alter contents of some cells, highlighting others; highlight cells; remove multiple letters and draw straight lines through vacant cells; remove letters to create some blank cells, overlay others and highlight; remove almost all of the letters and and send in only half the grid; cut out and build a letter cube.
Fantastic news: the Inquisitor will now have a new slot in the I newspaper every Saturday. See you, I hope, on the other side.
JOHN HENDERSON (NIMROD) @ENIGMATISTELGAR”