Hello, and happy Jubbly weekend! Thanks to Piccadilly, who has given us a fun reminder of where to go with the EV when done – which certainly beats the Telegraph telling the EV where to go.
The preamble reads:
Solvers must omit one letter, wherever it occurs, from each answer, the omitted letters being placed at the end of the row/column. The omitted letters from the leftmost/uppermost answers are placed in the leftmost/uppermost cell in the row/column. Two cells must contain single-digit numbers. Identification of the GOING POSTAL theme allows ambiguities to be resolved and the central cell to be filled. Numbers in brackets are answer lengths; Chambers Dictionary (2016) is recommended.
I approached this methodically, solving NW, NE, SE, SW. The SE turned out to be a good place to end because that was where the numbers appeared. It was clear enough how to enter ONE-LINER, but the puzzling clash of NECROTIC/CRAZES took a little thought until I saw that, with the right letters dropped, ZERO would resolve things.
Fairly early on I noticed TELEGRAPH MEDIA GROUP emerging in the top and right, but the rest of the perimeter remained opaque. (Not that I try too hard to jump ahead to end games, see blog-wittterings passim.) With everything in place, I followed the message round and it clicked into place. Checking on a certain address (naturally I googled rather than looking right next to the grid!) enabled me to resolve the remaining ambiguities and fill the central cell to reveal:
TELEGRAPH MEDIA GROUP CXI BUCKINGHAM PALACE ROAD LONDON SW1W 0DT
I liked that the hidden message had in fact been in plain sight all along (albeit with a little interpretation of CXI) – right next to the puzzle, telling solvers where to send their POSTAL entries to the competition.
No animated grid today (not after last time!), just a simple before and after. (Well, not before before, because that would be a blank grid, but you know what I mean.)
| Clue No | ANSWER | Clue with definition underlined |
| Explanation, with quoted indicators in italics and ANSWER letters in bold caps | ||
| Across | ||
| 1a | NOBBLES | Arrests baron hidden by peers (7) |
| B (baron) inside (hidden by) NOBLES (peers) | ||
| 6a | REPAND | Cloth that’s corded and slightly wavy (6) |
| REP (cloth that’s corded) + AND | ||
| 11a | LORNE | Learning about new Scottish location (5) |
| LORE (learning) around (about) N (new) | ||
| 12a | COATI | Carnivorous mammal covering island (5) |
| COAT (covering) + I (island) | ||
| 14a | CLOSED | Cathedral precinct deserted, not open to traffic (6) |
| CLOSE (cathedral precinct) + D (deserted) | ||
| 15a | ATTARS | Sailor in Auxiliary Territorial Service provides essential oils (6) |
| TAR (sailor) in ATS (Auxiliary Territorial Service) | ||
| 16a | AULAS | It’s a pity to screen university halls (5) |
| ALAS (it’s a pity) around (to screen) U (university) | ||
| 17a | STUGGIER | Suit Greg altered, being stouter in some areas (8) |
| SUIT GREG anagrammed (altered) | ||
| 18a | LASSO | Give girl old rope (5) |
| Add to (give) LASS (girl) O (old) | ||
| 20a | RAGNARÖK | Crazy arrogant king ignoring tense event in Norse myth (8) |
| An anagram of (crazy) ARROGAN[t] and K (king) without (ignoring) T (tense) | ||
| 21a | CORNER | Something old-fashioned presented to queen results in awkward position (6) |
| CORN (something old-fashioned) + ER (queen) | ||
| 24a | ENDOW | What was enough to hold daughter’s present (5) |
| ENOW (what was enough) containing (to hold) D (daughter) | ||
| 26a | SECTION | Notices unusual division (7) |
| NOTICES anagrammed (unusual) | ||
| 29a | TRUSS | Star guests regularly shown corbel (5) |
| sTaR gUeStS taking alternate letters (regularly shown) | ||
| 31a | CORDIAL | Homer, face informally friendly (7) |
| COR (homer) + DIAL (face informally) | ||
| 33a | PASS | Proceed quietly with donkey (4) |
| P (quietly) with ASS (donkey) | ||
| 35a | RAPID | Sudden swift inroad capturing prince quickly accomplished (5) |
| RAID (sudden swift inroad) containing (capturing) P (prince) | ||
| 36a | NECROTIC | Notice centre of sacrum affected, showing gangrenous symptoms (8) |
| NOTICE and the centre of saCRum anagrammed (affected) | ||
| 37a | STEEL | Metal support in empty shell (5) |
| TEE (support) in ShelL without its inner letters (empty …) | ||
| 38a | TAXER | Extra special one levying charges (5) |
| EXTRA anagrammed (special) | ||
| 39a | ELSANS | The Spanish and French without mobile toilets (6) |
| EL (the Spanish) and SANS (French without) | ||
| 40a | BRISKET | Little Elizabeth embracing danger to get meat (7) |
| BET (little Elizabeth) around (embracing) RISK (danger) | ||
| Down | ||
| 1d | NUT CUTLET | Crazy person on canal allowed vegetarian dish (9, two words) |
| NUT (crazy person) + CUT (canal) + LET (allowed) | ||
| 2d | BEDELL | Roar surrounding educated Oxbridge vice-chancellor’s mace bearer (6) |
| BELL (roar) around (surrounding) ED (educated) | ||
| 3d | LOSENS | Relaxes in Ed’s poetry lesson to unwind (6) |
| LESSON anagrammed (to unwind) | ||
| 4d | EGRESS | White herons lacking time heading to south depart (6) |
| EGRE[t]S (white herons) lacking T (time) + the first letter of (heading to) South | ||
| 5d | SNORT | Contemptible person claims right to inhale cocaine (5) |
| SNOT (contemptible person) goes around (claims) R (right) | ||
| 6d | REMUAGE | Argue with me about turning of wine bottles (7) |
| ARGUE with ME anagrammed (about) | ||
| 7d | PECTIN | In part, respecting what’s used to make jellies set (6) |
| In part, resPECTINg | ||
| 8d | POTHEAD | Poet had confused cannabis user (7) |
| POET HAD anagrammed (confused) | ||
| 9d | NETSUKE | Difficulties our country initially encounters obtaining Japanese ornament (7) |
| NETS (difficulties) + UK (our country) + the first letter of (initially) Encounters | ||
| 10d | FLOSS | Lecturer in trench to clean between teeth (5) |
| L (lecturer) in FOSS (trench) | ||
| 13d | MARROWS | Northern companions mark missiles for archers (7) |
| M (mark) + ARROWS (missiles for archers) | ||
| 19d | ACCOMPT | Old account involved camp cot (7) |
| An anagram of (involved) CAMP COT | ||
| 22d | OTARIES | Seals books with sign (7) |
| OT (books) + ARIES (sign) | ||
| 23d | EGOISTS | Starts to examine grossly obnoxious individuals, self-centred types – suchlike? (7) |
| First letters of (starts to) Examine Grossly Obnoxious Individuals, Self-centred Types – Suchlike | ||
| 25d | BASSIST | Bishop to help musician (7) |
| B (bishop) + ASSIST (to help) | ||
| 26d | SPARSE | Spears thrown, thinly scattered (6) |
| SPEARS anagrammed (thrown) | ||
| 27d | HIDDEN | Kept secret papers by duke in layer (6) |
| ID (papers) and D (duke) in HEN (layer) | ||
| 28d | ONE-LINER | Wisecrack on European passenger ship (8) |
| ON + E (European) + LINER (passenger ship) | ||
| 29d | TWERKS | Thrusts the hips, beginning to train with aircraftsmen (6) |
| The first letter of (beginning to) Train + W (with) + ERKS (aircraftsmen) | ||
| 30d | CRAZES | College demolishes fashions (6) |
| C (college) + RAZES (demolishes) | ||
| 32d | NAWAB | Muslim prince lifting graduate, pale and sickly (5) |
| The reversal of (lifting) BA (graduate) and WAN (pale and sickly) | ||
| 34d | STUDE | Scots stood performing duets (5) |
| An anagram of (performing) DUETS | ||
This was a good implementation of the old ‘letters latent’ idea because we were given both the lengths and the full wordplay of the answers to the clues. The result was a well-pitched puzzle that went smoothly for me until I got to the answers that wouldn’t fit. I got 1-LINER easily enough, without then knowing why it was designed to go in like that, but NECROTIC was not at all obvious. The solution to that problem came when a friend pointed out that both the ZE of CRAZES and the RO of NECROTIC must be used. (My grid was complete and correct, but I had forgotten that I had left 30d unresolved.)
It was an unusual kind of theme, which seemed to be making a point. It took me a few moments to realise that the full address went in, turning a sharp corner at the top left. As Kitty said, there it was in plain sight on the page.
Thanks to Piccadilly for another EV puzzle to the usual high standard and to Kitty for the blog with the clear before and after diagrams.
A neat idea. I spotted Telegraph emerging at the top pretty quickly, and once media became apparent, I spotted the theme relatively early on, which sped up identifying the omitted letters. Thanks to Piccadilly for a pleasant solve and to Kitty for the review.
my first thought when the theme revealed itself was that it was encouraging solvers to write to the telegraph media group to ask them not to axe the EV – but i suppose this puzzle was in the works before they announced their intention.
an enjoyable puzzle with enough approachable clues to get a foothold, i thought!
A very enjoyable puzzle with a lovely PDM. As DIAGR began to take sharpening the NE corner I thought some kind of diagram was going to be needed. With a few further letter additions this had to change. As someone who used to write out the envelop every week that address was burned in my memory so knew what to do. I changed during the pandemic to taking photos of my grids and emailing them in instead. I’ve no idea how the puzzle team decide on how to pull a winner from a mixed bag of digital and print entries, but I’d be Intrigued to find out …
A lovely puzzle and entertaining blog. Thank you both.
Super puzzle, I really enjoyed this. Was distracted for a long time expecting a message asking someone to send them a telegram about a diagram etc
Forgot to say thank you to Kitty and Piccadilly
🙂