Genius No 187 by Vlad

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A tougher than usual Genius for January, employing a device that I don’t recall seeing before.

Five clues contain a cryptically superfluous word.  Wordplay in 14 other clues contains a cryptically superfluous letter.  Unclued entries are five pairs of characters linked cryptically to each other and to one of the five superfluous words.  The superfluous letters in clue order give two further characters and a third word linked in the same way.  Eleven of the characters are (or were) real people; one isn’t.

These instructions seemed rather daunting, especially when I calculated that there were only six normal clues in the whole puzzle.  I made a start in the north western corner, with FLAB and NABOKOV going in easily enough, although I wrongly assumed that “review” in the clue for NABOKOV was a superfluous word, when in fact it was an anagram indicator (relating to the letters of the word “book”).  SHAKER followed, accompanied by the realisation that the wordplay led to “SHAKIER” so ”I” must be one of the superfluous letters.  That assumption did prove to be correct.

My first inkling of the theme occurred when I realised that DRALON in the clue for 1 across must be one of the superfluous words.  It forms several anagrams, one of which is LANDOR, which led me to believe that I might be looking for writers of some kind.  I then worked out that ARDEN in the clue for 17 across could form NADER and that RALPH would fit at 2 down.  Next I realised that ROLAND (another anagram of Dralon) could be linked with the three letter word at 24 R.T to make ROLAND RAT, who must be the one character not to be a real person.

In the end, it was the additional three words that provided enlightenment.  They were (in clue order) BILL SMITH DIODE.  I realised that DIODE was an anagram of both ODDIE and DODIE; so we had Bill Oddie and Dodie Smith.  (Somewhat strangely, there is no need to enter these words when making the online submission).  I now understood the instructions.  The five pairings are as follows:

RALPH NADER/ANDRE AGASSI
AMIR KHAN/HANK MARVIN
MATTHEW ARNOLD/ROLAND RAT
EUGENE O’NEILL/LIONEL SHRIVER
SALLY FIELD/FIDEL CASTRO.

So, just to be clear, the five superfluous words in clue order are Dralon, Arden, Niello, Ankh and Filed.  I don’t think it’s entirely accurate to describe them as superfluous, as although they are not required for either the definition or the wordplay in the clues where they appear, they are necessary for the surface reading, particularly at 28 down.

It took me the best part of two days to complete this puzzle, which makes it one of the toughest Geniuses in my experience, although I don’t always remember to tackle it every month.  As I said above, I don’t recall seeing this particular device before, and the resulting pairings were amusingly bizarre.  I do have a couple of very minor quibbles about aspects of the clues, which I have set out below.

Many thanks to Vlad for the challenge and for the pleasure of the moment when the lightbulb finally came on!

I have highlighted the unclued entries in the grid.

completed grid
Across
1  TRENDIER One hearing Dralon curtains last getting more in (8)
END (last) in TRIER (a judge is one who tries a case).  Dralon is superfluous.
6  CASTRO (See instructions) (6)
9  FLAB Fat fellow at work? Not half (4)
F(ellow) LAB(our)
10  SALLY (See instructions) (5)
11  RAYS In Torbay selling fish (4)
Hidden in “Torbay selling”.  The “b” is superfluous.
12  SHAKER Sect member increasingly unsteady (6)
SHAK(I)ER.  The “i” is superfluous.
13  ACTIVELY Behave with spirit in a positive manner (8)
ACT (L)IVELY.  The “l” is superfluous.
14  ASS Idiot girl (3)
(L)ASS.  The “l” is again superfluous.
15  MARVIN (See instructions) (6)
17  EFFORTS One over from Forest of Arden wasted shots (7)
*(FOREST OF) omitting O.  Arden is superfluous.
19  ARMREST Around room forcibly assert support for chair (7)
RM in *AS(S)ERT.  The “s” is superfluous.
22  AGASSI (See instructions) (6)
24  RAT (See instructions) (3)
25  PARTERRE Some slip close to the flower garden (8)
A charade of PART (some) ERR (slip) (th)E.  Flower looks as though it’s superfluous, but is in fact part of the definition.
27  EUGENE (See instructions) (6)
29  ETCH Get off with female and make an impression – niello! (4)
(F)ETCH.  I’m not entirely happy that fetch = get off.
30  WOTAN God’s female, feminist ultimately claimed (5)
(feminis)T in WO(M)AN.  The “m” is superfluous.
31  AMIR (See instructions) (4)
32  DRAW ON Make use of? In a word, wrong! (4,2)
*((I)N A WORD).  The “i” is superfluous.
33  ENLISTED Was inclined to go after number engaged (8)
(T)EN LISTED.  The “t” is superfluous.
Down
2  RALPH (See instructions) (5)
3  NABOKOV Writer in front upset about book review (7)
*BOOK in VAN (rev).
4  INSURANCE Nun and cashier breaking cover (9)
*(NUN CAS(H)IER).  The “h” is superfluous.
5  RELEASE Left relax with socialist publication (7)
L (eft) in RE(D) (socialist) EASE (relax).  The “d” is superfluous.
6  CRYPT Underground room to call mine (5)
CRY P(I)T.  The “i” is superfluous.
7  SHRIVER (See instructions) (7)
8  ROYALISTS Song taken up in revels disowning the Queen and her supporters (9)
LAY (rev) in ROIST (ER)S.  The problem here is that, according to Chambers, “roist” and “roister” have the same meaning (to revel noisily) so there is no need to disown the Queen, except of  course for the surface reading.
16  ALABASTER Rock plant by lake pulled up (9)
(Lake) BALA (rev), ASTER (plant).
18  FRATERNAL Like some twins for a threesome initially? Run during way over (9)
I’m not sure that this clue is entirely sound.  It seems to be part hidden “for a threesome” (with the “o” being superfluous), followed by R(un) in LANE (way) (rev).
20  MATTHEW (See instructions) (7)
21  TRESTLE Struggled—time for women’s support (7)
WRESTLE(D) with T for the initial W, the “d” being superfluous.
23  AFGHANS Country people safe? Hang about! (7)
*(HANG SAF(E)).  The “e” is redundant.
26  ROWAN Egyptian god carrying round ankh with new tree (5)
O (round) W(with) in RA (Egyptian god), N(ew).  Ankh is superfluous.
28  NOISE Report I filed in issue over drug (5)
I in SON (rev), E (drug).  Filed is superfluous.

*anagram

14 comments on “Genius No 187 by Vlad”

  1. Thanks to Vlad for the puzzle and bridgesong for the blog.

    In 29a, I think ‘get’ = FETCH and ‘off with female’ = remove the F.

    In 18a, I think ‘for a’ = FOR A (with the “o” being superfluous) and ‘threesome initially’ = T.

  3. Thanks, Bridgesong.  We found this hard too, though would have been delighted to finish it in only two days!  18d was first in.

    The lack of normal clues made it hard to get started, and we’d done most of the grid before the penny finally dropped.  We realised fairly early that anagrams were involved (Ankh and Khan, to start with) but it took a long,long time before the double anagram theme revealed itself.  Very cunning indeed!  But satisfying when we finally got there.

    We don’t seem to get the monthly bulletins from the crossword editor any more – do the Grauniad publish numbers of entries for the Genius?  I always found that statistic interesting …

  4. Mr Beaver @3: the editor doesn’t seem to have published a letter since last July, and that one had nothing about the Genius in it. I don’t know why he stopped doing it.

  5. This was hard, and I had to dip into it several times over a couple of weeks before it unraveled. Almost gave up.

    Like you, bridgesong, I thought at first that flower was the superfluous word in 25a. And I also thought Torbay was superfluous in 11a, and that the fish was that old favourite the (sel)LING. That led me up the garden for a long time.

    Thanks Vlad for the puzzle. I like a good workout. And thanks bridgesong for the blog. Must be a bit intimidating to blog a tricky one.

  6. Thanks bridgesong

    Certainly one of the tougher Geniuses. (The hardest since Enigmatist last year?)

    The extra words in the clues are described as “cryptically superfluous”, which probably covers their surface necessity. I had a different quibble with the preamble where it says “Unclued entries are five pairs of characters linked cryptically to each other and to one of the five superfluous words”. This to me indicates a direct link between the unclued names in addition to the link with the superfluous words. I spent some time looking for the cryptic connection between BILL and SMITH when they emerged from the extra letters.

    I parsed 29 and 18 in the same way as Matthew@1.

    Thanks Vlad for a tough but rewarding challenge.

  7. I agree with DuncT.

    It would perhaps have been more accurate, and certainly more helpful, if Vlad had said, “Unclued entries are five pairs of characters linked cryptically to each other BY one of the five superfluous words” As stated, the rubric suggests that there are links between the ten AND [IN ADDITION] between the ten and the five superfluous words. The words “AND TO” meant we wasted a lot of time and energy trying to find direct links between the ten unclued characters – especially since we found one, Agassi and Shriver both being tennis players. This caused us to put CALVIN instead of MARVIthN, since Calvin and Ralph were both names in haute couture. But we had great fun and never object when a Genius defeats us – that’s their mission, to bring us down a peg or two! So thanks Vlad, and thanks Bridgesong for the blog.

  8. This was a strange solving experience.  With one exception (I’d entered QUAK[i]ER at 12a and not thought twice about it until R_L_U forced me to) I had every clued entry solved long before I had the foggiest about the rest.  Only finished yesterday when I decided to come back and have one last good hard look before the deadline.

    I’m grateful to DuncT@6 too for voicing his quibble with the preamble because I too thought the characters would be linked in some way.  Was utterly foxed by BILL / SMITH / DIODE.  Anagrams don’t generally jump out at me, and even with just five letters to play with I was a long way off seeing ODDIE, let alone DODIE.  Feel just a little bit less dim-witted now!

    Even with the gimmick identified, it wasn’t trivial for me to sort out as not many of the names came readily to mind.

    Still, I really enjoyed both halves of the solve, if not so much the wilderness days in between.  Thanks to Vlad and bridgesong.

  9. Well done to everyone who managed to finish this.  I certainly did not.

    After 3-4 hours spent over three days I had precisely three clues done.  I suppose I could have got another dozen or so if I had really tried every day for the month, but I decided that it was futile as I was not enjoying it and I knew I would not finish it.

    It makes me realise yet again that we all like different setters.  I respect the complexity and toughness of  VLAD, but I much prefer the sort of puzzle that SOUP did last month, or TRAMP.

    I’ll now go and hang my head in shame at my failure.

  10. Geoff@7 We had the same interpretation of the preamble, and I too noticed the tennis connection. So in the end I wound up with a bunch of names that seemed plausible to me but did not work as the setter intended, thanks to the ‘AND” instead of ‘BY” as you suggested. I’m usually bad at retaining what the preambles say once I get into a tougher puzzle so I’ve tried to start reading them more than once as I work, but I doubt that would have helped me here. Well, it was a month ago and I didn’t save the grid, but the blog was so well done that I immediately realized I had missed the theme. Thanks to Bridgesong for explanations and to the setter.

  11. Well done, Kitty @8 for your eleventh hour breakthrough. Always worth a last look! I’ve done just the same with apparently insoluble Geniuses before and it’s a great feeling when you crack it. Not this time, sadly.

    Don’t beat yourself up, Gordon @9; I got precisely zilch, nada, zip, niente. Every time I looked at the puzzle, my brain hurt trying to keep in mind the possibilities for each clue. I must say, I was under the impression that the unclued names would be well-known couplings, like Burke & Hare or Morecombe and Wise (for two very different examples), but that hardly mattered to me in the circumstances.

     

  12. Hi Tony @10

    Thanks for your kind words of commiseration.

    Considering that both of us have actually won the Genius prize in recent times, there is a certain irony to our combined failure to get anywhere this month.

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