This puzzle is the final one in a series of four Inquisitors compiled by new setters. The puzzle is entitled Operation and is set by Cranberry
The preamble told us that "the tenth letters of 25 clues give (including one initial) the name, location and focus of an operation with serious consequences. Wordplay in the remaining clues omits up to five letters of the solution. In the grid, the cells containing these letters should be shaded to provide an account of the operation. The author of the account should also be highlighted (12 cells). Cross-checking will resolve any uncertainties about which cells are to be shaded"
I had most early success with the clues that were complete as I realised that just about every clue I was solving was using all the letters in the wordplay. That gave me quite a few of the letters forming the 25 letter message. I then had a bit of surge solving some of the clues where the wordplay omitted a number of letters. The crossing letters from the normal clues were helpful and the definitions for the incomplete wordplay clues were fairly friendly.
The first clue to what might be going on was detecting letters in the message that seemed to spelling HEYDRICH. A bit of research uncovered Operation ANTHROPOID, which was undertaken to assassinate Reinhard HEYDRICH in the city of PRAGUE in 1942.. This enabled me to do a bit of reverse engineering of tenth letters to identify the remaining normal clues.
After solving the remaining normal clues, it was fairly clear what the definitions of the remaining treated clues were. This helped identify some of the omitted letters although I wasn’t entirely clear about all the parsing.
The final stage was to read more about Operation ANTHROPOID and discover what reports or books were written about it. It was obvious that the shaded cells of omitted wordplay letters were identifying at least 3 Hs. The final bit of research identified the book HHhH by LAURENT BINET.
Apparently HHhH is a reference to the phrase Himmlers Hirn heißt Heydrich ("Himmler’s brain is called Heydrich")
Putting everything together we have the 25 letter message ANTHROPOID PRAGUE R HEYDRICH, the shading of HHhH across the top half of the grid and the highlighting of LAURENT BINET centrally in rows 9 and 10
The final grid is shown immediately below with the highlighting and the table goes into detail about the letters in the message, the letters omitted from the word play, the entries and the relevant wordplay.
There were some good clues involving what I might term ‘subtractive compound anagrams’ where an anagram of one word is excluded from a phrase that also contains an anagram of the solution. I started off on the wrong foot when I didn’t included IN the full phrase leading to the anagram of UNSUBSTANTIATED at 50 across, so I thought Ii had some omitted letters there.
The last clue I sorted out was the one for COOLBAG where only OLA was included in the wordplay.
The title Operation is fairly self explanatory given the full title of the assassination plan was OPERATION ANTHROPOID.
Thanks to Cranberry for an entertaining debut puzzle.
| No |
Clue Entry Wordplay |
Letters Wordplay |
| Across | ||
| 1 |
MAD comic rated no.1 in poll by bohemian US liberals (15, 2 words) DEMOCRATIC PARTY (The DEMOCRATIC PARTY in the United States has a philosophy of modern liberalism) Anagram of (mad) COMIC RATED + P (initial letter of [no 1] POLL) + ARTY (bohemian) DEMOCRATIC* P ARTY |
A |
| 12 |
Final report primarily blames Trump (4) OBIT (obituary [account of a deceased person; final report) BT (first letters of [primarily] BLAMES and TRUMP) B T |
OI BT |
| 15 |
Without air, it’d be impossible to relax on moon (4) LILO (airbed; without air it would be very uncomfortable to lie on it) IO (moon of Jupiter) IO |
LL IO |
| 16 |
Northerner in Italy (5) INUIT (member of indigenous people of Greenland, the arctic and subarctic regions of Canada, and Northern Alaska; northerner) IN + I (International Vehicle Registration for Italy) IN I |
UT INI |
| 18 |
Catch someone’s eye (3) NET (catch a fish for instance) E (middle letter of [eye] SOMEONE) E |
NT E |
| 19 |
Experiences hallucinogenic drugs (4) SEES (witnesses; experiences) ES (ecstasy tablets; hallucinogenic drugs) ES |
SE ES |
| 21 |
Peeled and chopped up onion pieces covering the kitchen floor, say (5) LINOS (pieces of linoleum; pieces covering the kitchen floor, say) Anagram of (chopped up) ONION excluding the outer letters (peeled) O and N INO* |
LS INO |
| 22 |
In despair, once close to disaster (5) AMORT (archaic [once] word for spiritless or dejected [in despair]) R (final letter of [close to] DISASTER) R |
AMOT R |
| 23 |
More appropriate temperature (5) APTER (more appropriate) T (temperature) T |
APER T |
| 24 |
Absolute stunner (5) TASER (small gunlike device which fires electrified darts or barbs, used to immobilize or stun eg an attacker) A (absolute, when referring to temperature) A |
TSER A |
| 25 |
Exotic pet advisor (6) TIPPER (one who gives tips on how to deal with an issue; an advisor) Anagram of (exotic) PET TPE* |
IPR TPE |
| 26 |
Books about communication (6) NOTICE (form of communication) NT (New testament; books) + C (circa; about) NT C |
OIE NTC |
| 29 |
Back of budget hotel? Jazz might be playing here (4) UTAH (UTAH Jazz are an American professional basketball team based in Salt Lake City, UTAH) T (last letter of [back of] BUDGET) + H (hotel) T H |
UA TH |
| 31 |
Address in Lisbon, a suitable place for drinks (7, 2 words) COOLBAG (a bag for keeping items of food or drink at a cold temperature; suitable place for drinks) OLA (a form of greeting in Portuguese [spoken in Lisbon]) OLA |
COBG OLA |
| 34 |
Unseen barrier to progress in field hospitals (4) HAHA (ditch or vertical drop often containing a fence, eg between a garden and surrounding parkland, forming a barrier without interrupting the view; unseen barrier in field) H (hospital) + H (hospital) to form hospitals H H |
AA HH |
| 35 |
Revolutionary play, partially cut for legal reasons? (6) REDACT (edit to remove or blacken text in a document, usually for legal reasons) RED (communist; revolutionary) + ACT (part of a play) RED ACT |
N |
| 37 |
Organised teachers hurry about without enthusiasm (6) FLATLY (with no vigour; without enthusiasm) FLY (hurry) containing (about) ATL (Association of Teachers and Lecturers; organised teachers) FL (ATL) Y |
T |
| 39 |
Apply oil when nearing the end of an extremely emotional massage – the last drop? (5) ANELE (anoint; apply oil, possibly to someone approaching the end of life) AN + EL (outer letters of [extremely] EMOTIONAL) + E (final letter of [last drop] MASSAGE) AN EL E |
H |
| 42 |
Jolly cheerful refrain from a clarinet, played without faltering – nice! (5) TRA-LA (a phrase used to express joy, pleasure, etc, or when humming a song) Anagram of (played) A CLARINET excluding (without) CINE (the letters forming an anagram [faltering] of NICE) TRA-LA* |
R |
| 43 |
You are reportedly popular on the radio – number one! (5) URINE (NUMBER ONE is a slang or childhood term for URINE) U (sounds like [reportedly] YOU) + R (sounds like [reportedly] ARE) + INE (sounds like [on the radio] IN [popular]) I think the IN homophone is dependent on how each solver pronounces URINE U R INE |
O |
| 44 |
It’s quite spicy, this stripped back Dua Lipa offering (5) PILAU (highly spiced Asian dish of rice with a fowl or other meat, or fish, boiled together or separately) PILAU (letters reversed [back] in DUA LIPA excluding the outer letters D and A [stripped])_ PILAU< |
P |
| 45 |
Slash cost of housing (4) RENT (tear; rip; slash) RENT (payment for accommodation; cost of housing) double definition RENT |
O |
| 46 |
East Kilbride’s own unlimited electricity supply (3) AIN (Scottish [East Kilbride] word for ‘own’) MAINS (electricity supply) excluding the outer letters M and S [unlimited]) AIN |
I |
| 47 |
Signal mild disappointment with vacuous exchange student (5) TUTEE (one being taught; student) TUT (express mild disappointment) + EE (letters remaining in EXCHANGE when the central letters XCHANG are removed [vacuous]) TUT EE |
D |
| 48 |
Start to empathise following removal of radium from brain stem (4) BINE (the flexible stem of a climbing plant; or, more specifically,the stem of the hop) BRAIN excluding (removal of) RA (chemical symbol for Radium) + E (first letter of [start to] EMPATHISE) BIN E |
P |
| 49 |
A youngster’s old injury (4) TEEN (TEENager; youngster) TEEN (archaic [old] word for ‘injury’) double definition TEEN |
R |
| 50 |
Varying in attention span? Dubious, misguided opinion to be disregarded as without foundation (15) UNSUBSTANTIATED (without evidence or proof; without foundation) Anagram of (varying) IN ATTENTION SPAN DUBIOUS excluding (to be disregarded) INNIOPO (letters forming an anagram [misguided] of OPINION) UNSUBSTANTIATED* |
A |
| Down | ||
| 1 |
Doctor and nurse maybe treat potentially deadly matter with this? (10) DENATURANT (a non-radioactive substance added to radioactive material, in order to prevent its being used in an atomic bomb; something used to treat potentially deadly matter) DR (doctor) + ANT (reference a nurse ANT [a species of ANT that is the first known non-human animal to tend the wounds of its fellows) DR ANT |
ENATU DRANT |
| 2 |
Miles to go by car (5) MOTOR (go by car) M (miles) M |
OTOR M |
| 3 |
Cold, like a stone tomb (6) CISTIC (like a tomb consisting of a stone chest covered with stone slabs) C (cold) C |
ISTIC C |
| 4 |
Endless war devastated Middle Eastern city (6) ALEPPO (Syrian city devastated by recent years of war) WAR excluding the outer letters W and R (endless) A |
LEPPO A |
| 5 |
Less well defined at the waist (5) ILLER (more sick; less well) I (central letter of [at the waist] DEFINED) I |
LLER I |
| 6 |
Fibre optic cable leads redirected to India (4) COIR (strong fibre of coconut husk, used in making rope and matting) OC (first letters of [leads to] each of OPTIC and CABLE) swapped round (redirected) to form CO + I (India is the International Radio Communication codeword for India) CO I |
R COI |
| 7 |
Irrational North American horse (5) PINTO (American piebald horse) PI (in mathematics, PI is an irrational number [one that cannot be defined as a simple fraction whose nominator and denominator are both integers]) + N (north) PI N |
TO PIN |
| 8 |
Acting dodgy on a browser in south-east Asia (4) ANOA (the sapiutan, or wild ox of Sulawesi in Indonesia, like a small buffalo. An animal that grazes or browses by feeding on the rough shoots of plants) A (acting) + an anagram of (dodgy) ON + A A NO* A |
G |
| 9 |
State secrets, essentially (6) RUSSIA (a Country or State) R (middle letter of [essentially] SECRETS) R |
USSIA R |
| 10 |
Berners-Lee, pioneer of the Internet Age (4) TIME (period; age) TIM (reference TIM Berners-Lee [born 1955], English computer scientist and pioneer of the internet) TIM |
E TIM |
| 11 |
European seduced by the roar of surf in California, far away (6) REMOTE (far away) E (European) contained in (seduced by) ROTE (American term describing the roar of the surf) R (E) OTE |
M REOTE |
| 13 |
Bishop, on turning up, had got confused, discarding ridiculous dog collar (6) BERTHA (woman’s deep (usually lace) collar worn to cover a low neckline) B (bishop) + RE (with reference to; on) reversed (turning up; down entry) + an anagram of (confused) HAD GOT excluding (discarding) DGO, an anagram of (ridiculous) DOG B ER< THA* |
U |
| 14 |
Return to favourite brewer (6) TEAPOT (a POT in which TEA may be brewed) (TO + PET (favourite) all reversed (returned) (TEP OT)< |
A TEPOT |
| 17 |
Vulnerable spot for news journalist (10) THREATENED (subject to danger; vulnerable) TEN (reference the TEN o’clock news bulletin or ‘News at Ten’; spot for news) + ED (editor; journalist) TEN ED |
THREA TENED |
| 20 |
Right on the heels of McCartney, for example, on the A-list (7) STELLAR (relating to a star performer who may be on the A-list of celebrities) STELLA (reference STELLA McCartney [born 1971], fashion designer) + R (right) STELLA R |
E |
| 26 |
Swimming trunks apparently necessary, initially upsetting a nudist on vacation (6) NATANT (swimming) TAN (first letters of [initially] each of TRUNKS, APPARENTLY and NECESSARY) all reversed (upsetting; down entry) + A + NT (letters remaining in NUDIST when the central letters UDIS are removed [on vacation]) NAT< A NT |
R |
| 27 |
Fancy heather blossoms finally put in the flower arrangement (6) THYRSE (flower arrangement) YRS (last letters of [finally] each of FANCY, HEATHER and BLOSSOMS) contained in (put in) THE TH (YRS) E |
H |
| 28 |
Rather more than a couple of pints for Homer? See he gets warning, perhaps Chief Wiggum’s on his way! (6) CHENIX (in ancient Greece, at the time of Homer, a dry measure equivalent to rather more than a quart) C (see) + HE + NIX (a cry to give warning of the approach of a person in authority, eg a policeman or teacher. Chief Wiggum is a police officer in The Simpsons animated film series where we find a different Homer [Simpson]) C HE NIX |
E |
| 30 |
Needing support of Special Branch experts (6) ADEPTS (experts) DEPT (department; branch) + S (special) – this being a down entry, the letter S is ‘supporting’ the letters forming DEPT DEPT S |
A DEPTS |
| 32 |
Alcoholic drink: short measure, a stiffener (6) BALEEN (whalebone; horny plates growing from the palate of certain whales which are often used as stiffeners) ALE (alcoholic drink) + EN (a printer’s measure equivalent to the width of a letter n; short measure) ALE EN |
B ALEEN |
| 33 |
Potentially futile, lacking strong muscles (6) GLUTEI (muscles) Anagram of (potentially) FUTILE excluding (lacking|) F (forte; strong) LUTEI* |
G LUTEI |
| 36 |
Big name, maybe Le Corbusier, put up houses (5) CELEB (celebrity; big name) CELEB (hidden word [houses] reversed [put up; down entry] in MAYBE LE CORBUSIER) CELEB< |
Y |
| 37 |
Possibly a date for revelries to begin on sun-deprived Scottish islands (5) FRUIT (a DATE is an example of a fruit) FR (first letters of [to begin] each of FOR and REVELRIES) + UIST (reference North and South UIST islands in the Outer Hebrides [Scotland]) excluding (deprived] S (sun) F R UIT |
D |
| 38 |
Big soldiers (5) GIANT (huge; big) GI (American soldier) + ANT (reference a soldier ANT) – giving soldiers GI ANT |
R |
| 40 |
Absence of intergovernmental organisation that could be substantive (4) NOUN (a substantive NOUN is any part of speech, including an adjective or a verb, that serves the function of a NOUN within a given sentence) NO (absence of) + UN (United Nations; intergovernmental organisation) NO UN |
I |
| 41 |
Tell fabricated story to gain university place (4) LIEU (place or stead) LIE (tell fabricated story) + U (university) LIE U |
C |
| 42 |
In the north they might draw on these key points (well, one of them (4) TABS (term for cigarettes in the North of England; in the north they might draw on these) TAB (reference the TAB key on a keyboard) + S (South, one of the four cardinal points) TAB S |
H |
Enjoyed this one a lot. Nothing to add really. All thanks to Cranberry and duncanshiell.
Interestingly, the Wikipedia article on the Operation has a Literature section for books inspired by the event, which even now fails to mention Laurent Binet or HHhH (which both however have their own entries). I wonder whether Cranberry was hoping with fingers crossed that it wouldn’t be updated before this IQ appeared….
Very brave man but revenged fiercely unlike Princip some years earlier who was spared the death sentence
Good history lessons in these puzzles!
I think the book falls into the category of la litterature
I read the book a few years ago: a very French (and very entertaining) combination of personal biography and history. Knowing the book certainly helped the endgame; but it was an eminently fair puzzle and a nice debut. Thanks to Cranberry and duncanshiell.
A lovely puzzle, thanks and welcome to Cranberry!
A good, fun puzzle, though the subject (and subsequent history lesson) made for very grim reading!
A fine debut for Cranberry with this enjoyable and informative puzzle. As a rule I’m not keen on clues that omit more than a couple of letters from the wordplay (the Spice-monster Listener being a good example!) but in this case the Hs helped to fix the position of the unclued letters, which made solving less difficult than it might otherwise have been. I hope we will see more from this setter.
A rather engaging solve and not as difficult as it first appeared. Plus learning something new in completing the highlighting. It’s early in the year, but this puzzle might feature in my submission to the end of year review.
Thanks Cranberry & of course Duncan too.
Yet another debut puzzle. A relatively tough challenge again, but one that was cracked pretty smoothly in the end. All clues parsed acceptably here – I felt that answers losing five letters in the wordplay were a little bit much (several wordplays encoded for only a single letter!) – but to be fair, the setter did very clearly state that cross checking clues would iron out any wrinkles and indeed they did. Once the idea of HHhH was spotted all become totally clear – a very neat finish, nicely done.
Many thanks, as always, to Cranberry (a fine debut), to duncanshiell (for the blog) and to those that have commented (on what seems to have been a well regarded puzzle all round).
Many thanks duncanshiell for the blog, and to all for the encouraging comments – I’m really pleased the puzzle seems to have been well received. I should also thank my initial test-solver, all those over at Big Dave’s site, and of course John Henderson & team for their support.
Because of the ‘letters missing from wordplay’ device, I deliberately used a lot of crossers – only four of the shaded letters were unchecked. This meant a lot of clues, but also that quite a few could be relatively short (I’m a fan of ridiculously long clues, see e.g. CHENIX, so this instilled a bit of discipline!) I hoped this element might present a slightly different challenge. But because of this I also wanted to keep the other clues ‘straight’ (no extra words etc) so there’d be plenty of regular solving too. I settled on the 10th letter device to enable this – somewhat arbitrary, but the number of letters in ANTHROPOID.
I do hope the puzzle itself was fun, but as Jon_S @5 points out, the events were of course very grim indeed – I believe it’s appropriate to use a ‘light’ medium to draw attention to serious events, and hope that some may have been encouraged to find out more about the history, and maybe even take a look at HHhH which I would recommend very highly.
Thanks again! @CranberryFez
thanks DS and C for the blog and educational puzzle! I immediately ran out to buy the book on Amazon and learning quite a lot – both about the domain and about literary constructs. (Wrt the clues, clueing ant as nurse took some research)
Yes very enjoyable, thank you. I got 1.5 Hs quite quickly and it looked like there was space for 4 of them, so I googled that + ‘operation’, which made the rest easy enough.
To Cranberry’s point about clues, indeed “chenix” was my last one as it was particularly obscure…
I’m on the fence about the book though – it sounds interesting but the reviews were a bit mixed and it certainly sounds very French 🙂
Thanks Cranberry. This is my favourite type of puzzle: a demanding challenge with a payoff that leads to me learning something new. Since doing it I have bought and read what is a fascinating, if grim, work.