Death Wish by Serpent
The wordplay in 12 clues leads to an extra letter; solvers must use these letters to complete the unclued entries. Each of the remaining clues contains a string of one or more consecutive letters at the beginning of a word that must be removed before solving (leaving one or more letters forming a real word); in clue order, the last letters of these strings spell out part of a quotation (in ODQ). Solvers must follow further instructions in the quotation to complete the puzzle. All entries in the final grid (which contains some empty cells) are real words or common proper noun.
(Surely the last word should be nouns!!)
Slightly confusing preamble but at least we have one this week – see Inquisitor 1690.
I had a bit of trouble getting started. First one solved was 44a and this led me to believe that proper words came out of the clues. This, of course, was wrong and held me up for a while.
As often happens with these things I had the majority of answers and the majority of the grid filled without completely justifying everything but trying to make sense of the unclued entries proved particularly tricky.
Then I saw the two I’s together in 2d, I figured that it was probably a regnal number and almost immediately, HENRY VIII ACT II jumped out at me. A short while later, I realised that MY SOUL was a candidate for 43a. This gave me enough ammunition for an assault on the internet. A search for “HENRY VIII ACT II MY SOUL” led me here: http://www.shakespeare-online.com/quotes/henryviiiquotes.html.
The fifth verse (or is it stanza) shown is:
Go with me, like good angels, to my end;
And, as the long divorce of steel falls on me,
Make of your prayers one sweet sacrifice,
And lift my soul to heaven.
The last line contains MY SOUL and the second line helped to identify the groups of letters to be removed as it looked like they were trying to form AS THE LONG DIVORCE OF STEEL FALLS ON ME. HEAVEN is in the last line of the verse and the top line of the puzzle – 3a.
This left 8d, which I initially filled as COOPERATE AS ONE since I struggled to get 14a. It wasn’t until writing this blog that I finally realised that 8d was also in the above verse as YOUR PRAYERS ONE. This left me feeling a bit flat until I realised that, as per the “instruction” in line 3 of the verse, we had to change (“make”) YOUR PRAYERS ONE to SWEET SACRIFICE. Wow, amazing!
The final clue I justified – after starting this blog – was 1d STATUE. I had convinced myself that the second definition was STATUTE, giving an extra T. Knowing that these letters would match the unchecked letters in thematic answers helped me realise the error of my ways.
In the final line of the verse,we see lift MY SOUL to HEAVEN. This means we have to leave 43a blank and change 3a from HEAVEN to MY SOUL.
I’m no Shakespeare expert but I imagine that the verse concerns someone’s death. Hence the puzzle’s title: DEATH WISH.
As I said earlier, I initially felt that things fell a bit flat but the jiggery-pokery in 8d changed my mind.
Finally, many thanks to Serpent – from your “good angel”, kenmac.
| Across | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Clue | Entry | Exra Prefix | Letter | Letter | Wordplay |
| 1 Empty surgery occupied [ba]by hospital of dubious repute (3) | SHY | BA | A |
S[urger]Y (empty) around Hospital | |
| 3 Unclued (6) | HEAVEN | ||||
| 10 Article in Shelter’s [news]letter provides home for him? (6) | TENANT | NEWS | S |
AN (article) inside TENT (shelter) | |
| 11 Show one’s behind cult follower, but not close (4) | MOON | I |
MOONI[e] (without E, its close) | ||
| 12 What means a great deal for some? (3) | ANY | M |
MANY (a great deal) | ||
| 13 Excellent programming language does not require [text]book (4) | COOL | TEXT | T |
CO[b]OL (programming language) minus Book | |
| 14 Find out about [auth]or’s store of sexual material (5) | SORUS | AUTH | H |
SUS (find out) around OR | |
| 15 [Cine]ma transformed this tramp’s market (4) | TREK | CINE | E |
[ma]RKET (anag: transformed) | |
| 17 [Carl]isle for example welcomes returning soldier (4) | EIGG | CARL | L |
EG (for example) around GI (soldier; rev: returning) | |
| 18 Excited publicity surrounding Animal House (5) | ASTIR | Y |
AIR (publicity) around STY (animal house) | ||
| 20 Scriptwriter covers rent in previous [ho]use (4) | RIPT | HO | O |
scRIPTwriter (hidden: covers) | |
| 21 Call up and [con]fine first female guards (5) | EVOKE | CON | N |
EVE (first female) around OK (fine) | |
| 22 [G]rand invested in company by powerful group of people (6) | COHORT | G | G |
COmpany+HOT (powerful) around Rand | |
| 24 [Dead]beat chap, laid back and lacking in depth, is irrelevant (10) | TANGENTIAL | DEAD | D |
TAN (beat)+GENT (chap)+LAI[d] (minus Depth; rev: back) | |
| 26 Way to remove bits of tinfoil melted round tray (10) | FILTRATION | Y |
TINFOIL (anag: melted) around TRAY | ||
| 30 Broadcast fails to tackle leader of [Republi]cans about tax (6) | FISCAL | REPUBLI | I |
FAILS (anag: broadcast) around C[ans] (leader) | |
| 32 US plant requires flyer to retract [affidav]it (5) | BLUET | AFFIDAV | V |
BLUET[it] (flyer; minus IT) | |
| 34 Something long and thin in Turner [lino]cut (4) | LATH | LINO | O |
LATH[e] (turner; cut) | |
| 35 Stereo [wizar]dry used at regular intervals is worn-out (5) | SEEDY | WIZAR | R |
S[t]E[r]E[o] D[r]Y (at intervals) | |
| 36 Craze that is spread by newspaper (4) | RAGE | I |
RAG (newspaper)+IE (that is) | ||
| 37 Produce statement for the defence? (4) | CASE | U |
CAUSE (produce) | ||
| 38 Work that tests employee’s [condesc]ending attitude when half-cut (5) | ETUDE | CONDESC | C |
[employe]E (ending)+[atti]TUDE (half-cut) | |
| 39 Remove [fore]skin of new assistant (4)
(OUCH!)
|
AIDE | FORE | E |
[m]AIDE[n] (skin removed) | |
| 40 [So]lid musical work written by tenor (3) | TOP | SO | O |
Tenor+OP (musical work) | |
| 41 [Half]cut in police station (4) | NICK | HALF | F |
(double def) | |
| 42 Key leaders of politburo let [assass]in function (6) | SPLINE | ASSASS | S |
SINE (function) around P[olitburo] L[et] (leaders of) | |
| 43 Unclued (6, 2 words) | MY SOUL | ||||
| 44 Sound of a [night]mare reportedly born of woman (3) | NÉE | NIGHT | T |
Sounds like NEIGH (sound of mare) | |
| Down | |||||
| 1 Representation of person standing (6) | STATUE | R |
(double def) STATURE | ||
| 2 Unclued (14, 4 words) | HENRY VIII ACT II | ||||
| 3 [Re]gain unauthorized computer access for journalist (4) | HACK | RE | E |
(double def) | |
| 4 Ignorant criminal making amends (7) | ATONING | R |
IGNORANT (anag: criminal) | ||
| 5 Israel having most suitable protection is worse (5) | VILER | Y |
IL (Israel) inside VERY (most suitable) | ||
| 6 Letter to Ptolemy records [aphe]lion’s variation (7) | EPSILON | APHE | E |
EPS (records)+LION (anag: variation) | |
| 7 Naked [school]girl go-go dancing is an outsider in the traveller community (6) | GORGIO | SCHOOL | L |
[g]IR[l] (naked)+GO–GO anag: dancing | |
| 8 Unclued (14, 3 words) | YOUR PRAYERS ONE | ||||
| 9 Baroque lutes [of]ten make harmony worse (8) | UNSETTLE | OF | F |
LUTES TEN (anag: baroque) | |
| 16 Magistrate [threa]tens to detain old man of great eminence (4) | ETEN | THREA | A |
magistratE TENs (hidden: to detain) | |
| 19 Card game’s spirit [acknowl]edged by quiet (4) | SKAT | ACKNOWL | L |
KA (spirit) inside ST (quit) | |
| 23 Rich [bl]end of bacteria kills source of sewage (8) | AFFLUENT | L |
[e]FFLUENT (sewage) – [bacteri]A (end of) replaces E (source of effluent) | ||
| 25 Democrat many from the South [dis]counted (4) | TOLD | DIS | S |
Democratic+LOT (many) all reversed: from the south | |
| 27 Threadbare cast ready to screen two [pro]grammes (7) | RAGGEDY | PRO | O |
READY around GG (two Grammes) | |
| 28 Investor transformed Italian city (7) | TREVISO | N |
INVESTOR (anag: transformed) | ||
| 29 Heartless brute [aban]dons nine goats (4) | IBEX | ABAN | N |
B[rut]E (heartless) inside IX (9) | |
| 31 Fight started by [im]pious man is cancelled (6) | STRUCK | IM | M |
ST (saint: pious man)+RUCK (fight) | |
| 33 Support what’s used to fence humble abode (6) | TEEPEE | E |
TEE (support)+EPEE (what’s used to fence) | ||
| 35 Brands seen in the bodywork of some vehicles (5) | SEARS | C |
S[om]E (bodywork)+CAR | ||
| 37 Area for storing data purged [se]cure lines (4) | CELL | SE | E |
C[ur]E (purged)+LL (lines) | |
The play is Henry VIII and the speaker is the Duke of Buckingham.
Hi Ken, In your last few paragraphs, surely it is change 3A to MY SOUL, not to heaven?
Nice puzzle, though I wasted a lot of time looking for sweets rising from MY SOUL to HEAVEN, or a sweet to delete to form a ladder before I hit on the simple solution!
I actually used the ODQ to find the quotation, rather than the internet. It’s the first time I’ve done that for a while!!
Thanks to setter and blogger.
Terrier @1 and Hihoba @2.
Good spots! (as Captain Mainwaring) “I wondered how long it would take you to spot those deliberate mistakes!”
Changed now.
Great puzzle, though definitely one I didn’t have the requisite knowledge to solve. Yes, I had to Google the play and act, etc, too. Needless to say, identifying the quote was then a great help in finishing off the grid.
Another great Serpent puzzle with some really excellent clueing and a neat endgame. Followed this week by eXternal. I can only surmise they’ve split due to musical differences.
I agree – top drawer Inquisitor, with a really fun way of generating the extra letters. It’s surely no crime to use a search engine for the quote, from such an obscure source; the wonder is, how Serpent found it in the first place. Thanks to Serpent and knnmac.
How many variations on clue manipulation can there be? The idea of subtracting a string of letters of any length from a word in the clue was new to me, and not knowing which clues were to undergo that manipulation and which were subject to the more familiar single-letter device added to the puzzlement and enjoyment.
The clues were excellent (as Bingy said, and ‘top drawer’ as Neil said) and well pitched to the design. Those I admired the most were TENANT, MOON, RIPT, GORGIO, TOLD, IBEX and TEEPEE.
I also liked very much the way the theme was implemented, the full solution revealing itself not too soon and not all at once. I got far enough into the theme with 2d (HENR?V?I?A?TI?) and some words of the quotation to look in either Act 2 or Act 4 (II or IV) of King Henry VIII, for which I used my ODQ. I already had HEAVEN, and all that remained was to modify the grid following Shakespeare’s (unintended) cryptic clue – all great fun.
I suppose the setter had some luck with the matching letter counts of certain words and phrases, but to spot the possibility of making cryptic sense of the text to execute the changes seen here was particularly impressive.
Thanks to Serpent and kenmac.
I put this to bed after lifting MY SOUL to HEAVEN, completely missing the second instruction from the quote. So it goes down as a DNF, even though I hadn’t realised it. My way in to finding the quote came from the phrase “divorce of steel”, which, when googled, led to a novel by Edmund Crispin, The Long Divorce, from which I then found the original source. My admiration for the setter has greatly increased now that I see the effect of the substitution to 8 down – all real words, of course.
Same here, I lifted MYSOUL to HEAVEN, and thought that was it finished. Was I meant to treat INSTRUCTIONS as more than one, and look for something else?
Great puzzle. Well-judged level of difficulty – not so easy but not worthlessly hard. I got in by Googling “long divorce” + “falls”, and then revealed the various layers one by one. Very satisfying, especially with the replacement by SWEET SACRIFICE.
NNI @9: indeed you were; I read instructions as more than one, otherwise leaving YOUR PRAYERS ONE unchanged would have been nose-wrinkling.
Well, Serpent was very sn(e)aky! We thought we had completed the very enjoyable puzzle but we totally missed changing YOUR PRAYERS ONE to SWEET SACRIFICE. An even more amazing grid construction than we thought.
It was good to have a different method of arriving at the quotation too.
Thanks Serpent for another splendid puzzle. Well done kenmac too, another great blog.
Many thanks to kenmac for the excellent blog, and to everyone who has taken the time to comment.
I got very lucky with the creation of this puzzle. First I stumbled across the quotation in ODQ quite by accident when I was looking for something suitable for another barred puzzle. Then I was delighted to discover that all the relevant lengths matched. The clue gimmick was inspired by the execution method of the Duke of Buckingham (beheading).
Beheading! Now, none of us saw that…
I really enjoyed this, though I didn’t manage to complete the top left and bottom right corners for some reason. Fantastic grid design and some lovely clues.
I loved this puzzle, very enjoyable, though like others I failed to complete the change to “sweet sacrifice” final step. At one point, I Googled “divorce of steel”, thinking “nah, I must have got it wrong, surely” only to come across the quotation and feel immense joy (I don’t get out much!) at finding the scene from the play, with its beautiful wording – I might even read the play sometime. Thanks to Serpent for a tour de force puzzle, with, I thought, fair and reasonably challenging clues – not too simplistic but not a heavy slog either, and to Kenmac for the blog.