A challenge of a puzzle from Curmudgeon, to keep solvers busy for the subsequent week-or-so…
The preamble states that:
“A feature completely absent from the puzzle, we’re told, echoes the state of a character that most of the top row (unclued) evokes. Most of the bottom row (also unclued) represents the shattered result of the broken character’s 25d, and DEATHBLOW. Solvers must shade the name of one author (12 cells) who used the theme.”
Rather a complex preamble, and a lot of aspects, some that your blogger couldn’t cotton on to for some hours! Fortunately, the clues were generally at the gentler end of the EV scale, and he managed to make good progress on the clued parts – the unclued ones and the more complex parts of the preamble could be deferred to later.
Once he had R?V?NG? at the unclued 25D, he wondered whether the theme could be the RAV?NGS of a madman, but the E of ETEN turned the entry to REVENGE…Montezuma’s, perhaps?!
More helpful was that 12-cell author – who was wheedled out reasonably soon – ALDOUS HUXLEY, just offset along the top-left corner to bottom-not-left corner route. However, some e-research was needed to take the next steps, as your blogger was not overly learned on Huxley’s oeuvre.
Huxley wrote EYELESS ‘EN’ GAZA – to use the French vernacular – as per the top row. A character from the book was SAMSON, who was also an ‘eyeless’ character from a fabulous story from bygone ages, where he took REVENGE on some foes by an act of force that made a TEMPLE collapse – unfortunately that was a DEATH BLOW to Samson as well – so along the bottom row, SAMSON and the TEMPLE are collapsed together:
As per the preamble, there’s a feature (the just-before-tenth letter of the alphabet!) that’s absent from the preamble we had to comprehend, the clues we had to solve, and the square of cells we had to populate!
Row three may also be relevant, as the fable tells us that Samson’s tresses were cut – maybe by a A RED-HEAD RAZOR?
One must congratulate and thank Curmudgeon for the challenge put together here, a superb feat!
One trusts that all may be clear above and below.
| Across | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Clue No | Solution | Clue (definition underlined) / Logic/Parsing |
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| 1 | GAZE | Unclued (4) / Thematic deduction |
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| 7 | ESSAYS | Unclued (6) / Thematic deduction |
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| 12 | ROLLOVER | Deferment of payment when posh car encompasses boundless folly (8) / R_OVER (posh? car) around (encompassing) ( |
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| 13 | THUMP | Tense to shoulder clobber (5) / T (tense) + HUMP (shoulder, carry) |
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| 14 | ARED | Felt concern (but not constant) formerly uttered (4) / ( |
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| 15 | HEAD | Endlessly cheat odd top dog (4) / (C |
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| 16 | RAZOR | Roar about round heart of polyzonal stubble remover (5) / RA_OR (roar, about) around Z (central letter, ot heart, of ‘polyZonal’ |
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| 17 | AT A LOSS | Clueless muddled sot, alas (7, three words) / anag, i.e. muddled, of SOT ALAS |
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| 19 | AUNTLY | Full of sympathy, uncle’s mate embraces foremost of losers (6) / AUNT_Y (uncle’s mate!) around (embracing) L (foremost letter of Losers) |
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| 20 | SHUTS | Closes southern temporary structures (5) / S (southern) + HUTS (temporary structures) |
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| 23 | SEA-COB | Gull docked ocean mammal and male swan (6) / SEA( |
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| 24 | STASHES | Second test’s end before whole sequence stops (some have declared) (7) / S (second) + T (end letter of tesT) + ASHES (a whole sequence of Tests, in cricket) |
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| 25 | RAPPROCHEMENT | Patter by expert to powerfully bond about husband for renewal of mutual love (13) / RAP (patter) + PRO (expert) + C_EMENT (powerfully bond) around H (husband) |
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| 27 | ETEN | Aged person of great stature French con almost beheaded (4) / ( |
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| 30 | MURRHA | Maybe agate archway regularly seen after alcohol knocked back (6) / MUR (rum, alcohol, knocked back) + RHA (regular letters from aRcHwAy) |
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| 33 | VASA | Vessels; Sweden’s sunken one (4) / double defn.: VASA are tubes or vessels carrying liquid around the body; and the VASA was a Swedish warship which sank on its maiden voyage, in 1628 |
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| 35 | STEAR | Once control course of flawed rates (5) / anag, i.e. flawed, of RATES |
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| 36 | XMAS | Day to celebrate vote pursued by arts graduates (4) / X (symbol used to indicate a vote) + MAS (MA, Master of Arts, or arts graduate, pluralised) |
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| 40 | MOGUL | Magnate’s obstacle on bumpy slope (5) / double defn.: a MOGUL can be a business tycoon; and a MOGUL can be a bump on a ski slope |
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| 43 | NEWSREADER | Wee errands sorted out for presenter of recent events (10) / anag, i.e. sorted out, of WEE ERRANDS |
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| 44 | YEA | Surely no longer class of students reduced (3) / YEA( |
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| 45 | GREATER | More powerful shredder we’re told (7) / homophone, i.e. we’re told – GREATER (more powerful) can sound like GRATER (shredder) |
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| 46 | BRATTY | Born angry, badly behaved and stroppy (6) / B (born) + RATTY (angry) |
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| 47 | TEMS | Unclued (4) / Thematic deduction |
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| 48 | PAM | Unclued (3) / Thematic deduction |
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| 49 | LEON | Unclued (4) / Thematic deduction |
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| Down | ||||
| Clue No | Solution | Clue (definition underlined) / Logic/Parsing |
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| 1 | GRAALS | Royal Academy embraced by local female partners’ long-gone treasured goals (6) / G_ALS (dialect, i.e. local, for girls, or female partners) around (embracing) RA (Royal Academy) |
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| 2 | AORTAE | Blood transporters to area gone to the dogs (6) / anag, i.e. gone to the dogs, of TO AREA |
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| 3 | ELD | Old age of tea lady now and then (3) / regular letters, i.e. now and then, of tEa LaDy |
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| 4 | YO-HO-HO | Seaman’s chant used to call for a bottle of rum? (6) / CD? Various sea shanties include the lyric ‘…yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum…’ |
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| 5 | EVES | Days before Adam’s lady takes on snake’s opener (4) / EVE (Adam’s lady, biblical) + S (opening letter of Snake) |
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| 6 | LEAST | Lowest degree the French academy way (5) / LE (definite article, the, in French) + A (academy) + ST (street, or way) |
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| 8 | STRUMAE | Leaders of surgery trust able experts to arrest odd tumours (7) / ST_AE (leading letters of ‘Surgery Trust Able Experts’) around (arresting) RUM (odd) |
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| 9 | SHANK | Poor golf stroke succeeded followed by loop (5) / S (succeeded) + HANK (loop) |
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| 10 | YMOLTEN | Met only by arrangement and blended for Ed (7) / anag, i.e. by arrangement, of MET ONLY |
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| 11 | SPRYEST | Most deft agent to trap queen, eastern and southern head of tyrants (7) / SP_Y (agent) around (trapping) R (regina, queen), plus E (eastern) + S (southern) + T (first letter, or head, of Tyrants) |
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| 18 | AGAPES | Adult, open-mouthed stares for feasts to celebrate love (6) / A (adult) + GAPES (open-mouthed stares) |
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| 19 | ASTHMA | Awful advanced maths produces health problem (6) / anag, i.e. awful, of A (advanced) + MATHS |
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| 21 | U-BOAT | Shattered about enemy sub years ago (5) / anag, i.e. shattered, of ABOUT |
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| 22 | THERM | The room that was hot bath (5) / THE + RM (room) |
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| 26 | RESORTS | Newly arranges haunts (7) / double defn. (?allowing for punctuation!): RE-SORTS = newly arranges; RESORTS = haunts |
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| 28 | TAVERT | Mac’s fuddled snort averted partly (6) / hidden word, i.e. partly, in ‘snorT AVERTed’ |
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| 29 | GEMARA | Part of Talmud, valuable nugget on a God from Egypt (6) / GEM (valuable nugget) + A + RA (Egyptian sun god) |
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| 31 | URGES | Advocates; woolly arguers – no answer (6) / anag, i.e. woolly, of ( |
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| 32 | HAVE TO | Must talk nonsense up north mostly, by way of response (6, two words) / HAVE( |
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| 34 | ASSAM | Strong tea of backward old US employer (5) / ASSAM (strong tea) = MASSA (old Southern US term for master, or employer) |
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| 37 | SDAYN | Scorn long ago of dreadful Sundays (US maybe excepted) (5) / anag, i.e. dreadful, of ( |
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| 38 | SWEE | Not fully remove at a stroke Balmoral’s suspended seat (4) / SWEE( |
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| 39 | SEEP | Leak from pressure below spot (4) / SEE (spot) + P (pressure) |
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| 41 | URAL | Mount Narodnaya, for one, naturally reveals Kazakhstan’s flower (4) / double defn.: Mount Narodnaya is one of the URAL mountains; and the river URAL flows through Khazakstan (PLUS, hidden word, i.e. reveals, in ‘natURALly’!?) |
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| 42 | LYTE | Small local sample of unruly teds (4) / hidden word, i.e. sample of, in ‘unruLY TEds’ |
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What I liked most about this puzzle was the imaginative way in which the three thematic items were incorporated: the cryptic representation of Milton’s phrase ‘Eyeless in Gaza’ in the top row, the ‘shattered remains’ of both Samson and the temple (as told in Samson Agonistes as well as the Bible) in the bottom row, and Aldous Huxley (the other author) hiding in a diagonal.
The clear clues enabled me to complete the grid in one session – an enjoyable experience to precede a fine endgame.
The preamble led me to look at the completed grid, in which there are indeed no I’s, but I am amazed now to find that the letter is absent from the clues and preamble as well. What a feat by the setter!
Congratulations to Curmudgeon, and thanks to mc_rapper67 for the blog and for pointing out what I missed.
An impressive construction, being I-less in the clues and preamble as well as the grid: not easy to achieve. Of course, I only spotted that at the end, once I’d found the author, which suggested the title and made everything fall into place (appropriately for the theme). Congratulations to Curmudgeon for a fine puzzle and thanks to mc-rapper for the blog.
Alan, well spotted about the lack of Is in the preamable: that also explain’s the setter’s pseudonym. I’d wondered why this one was credited to Curmugeon rather than Chalicea, but clearly not wondered enough to actually see the relevance.
Thanks, all.
Stylers @3
I can take very little credit. To explain: where the preamble said “a feature completely absent from the puzzle …”, I took that to mean only that the completed grid would be ‘eyeless’ (without I’s) – not the clues, the preamble and the setter’s name as well. As I said above, what a feat!
Very enjoyable – elegant composition!
Many thanks to mc_rapper67. My apologies for giving you more of a struggle than my usual Chalicea ones do (but Curmudgeon did originally appear as a reaction to comments about the ‘ease’ and ‘sweetness’ of Chalicea crosswords). I enjoyed reading your ‘eyeless’ review. We did have a bit of a problem about omitting the recommendation of Chambers Dictionary (with its pair of Is) but Steve, the editor, said he does sometimes omit that when space is limited. Actually, Alan, a lipogram is tremendous fun to compile. Thank you all for the comments.
Thanks for the various comments – seems like all enjoyed this one.
Thanks also to Chalicea/Curmudgeon at #6 for your kind words. (I hadn’t made the link with those two pseudonyms, but I know now!)
You mention in your setter’s blog that removing the ‘i’s was ‘no great challenge‘… I would beg to differ! I started writing the blog in my normal style (which for me usually involves lots of ‘I’s!) and at some point realised it would be more fitting to write it in the same style as the puzzle – but I found it quite hard, and ended up running to my eThesaurus for synonyms all the time… I may not have waxed lyrically enough in the blog about how much I enjoyed solving this one, but you can take that as a given, and I also forgot to mention the lack of symmetry – necessitated by having to fit so much in the top and bottom rows.
Four and a bit years on, I still bore people witless with praise for Chalicea’s Listener 4458 entitled “Difficulty” (July 2017), which used a similar device with another common letter of the alphabet. It was one of the most breathtaking constructions I’d ever seen after many years doing these puzzles, not least because I’d never have believed such a feat possible.
Well, she’s done it again! We have clues which are fair, with fluent surface readings, even without using the -ing forms of verbs as indicators or common link words like “with” and “is”. Goodness knows how long it must have taken to compose this puzzle, and many thanks Curmudgeon for what was clearly a labour of love. Wonderful!
mc_rapper67
Yours truly has only just spotted that the whole of the preface to your blog is eyeless! Well done and congrats! No wonder you wrote ‘your blogger’, ‘he’, etc.
(Me @9)
Clearly your commenter meant to type ‘… was eyeless’ – oops!
Thanks – well spotted Alan B! As I mentioned at #7, I found it quite a struggle, and it led to some fairly stilted verbiage, unlike Curmudgeon’s ‘fair and fluent‘ clues (cf. cruciverbophile at #8)
cruciverbophile at #8 – thanks for the info re. Listener 4458 – I only started doing the Listener regularly a couple of years ago, so I have dug that one out and will have a go at it…(albeit I now have some idea what is coming, as Curmudgeon/Chalicea also referenced it in her setter’s blog…)
I really am honoured by all these complimentary comments but you are prompting me to have a go at the E or A lipogram and those are the real challenge (U would probably be a doddle but not have much point). Of course, someone has written an entire novel with no E but what a feat (and I do wonder why!)
Really enjoyed this brilliant puzzle. I wondered if it was “i” that was the feature, or “i-less”, in which case it was present rather than absent. Thanks for the generous clues, helping me to get the top row very quickly and hence the theme. Thanks Chalcea and mc_raper67.
sorry, mc_rapper67