“Clues are listed in conventional order. All bars touching the perimeter (SCRATCHING THE SURFACE, say) are provided. Locations of further bars, displaying 180° symmetry, are to be deduced (but need not be entered). Ten clues contain single extra words. For each of these, one or two letters (not aways consecutive), as indicated by the extra word, must be removed from the defined answer before jumbling the remainder to make the thematic grid entry. All other clues lead to the answer plus one extra letter. In order, these spell out the theme. Enumerations refer to unmodified answers.”
The theme was the Mohs scale of mineral hardness. The ten thematic entries were the ten reference minerals.
I enjoyed ‘anagrams’ being used as an anagram indicator.
As is often the case with comparable puzzles, a slow start was followed by accelerating progress. Although entering the bars was optional, I did so, as I found it helpful.
“Forced back…” was a nightmare to parse, but I got there eventually.
Thank you to Cranberry for an enjoyable mental workout.
| Notation | |
|---|---|
| Definition | word |
| Indicator | [word] |
| Anagram | WORD* |
| Reversal | <WORD |
| Extra word/letter(s) to be removed | American [A] |
| Extra letter | BAR |
| Across | ||
|---|---|---|
| Leaves FORE (warning) [about] < {UT (Latin American [A] as) AIL (trouble)} [returned] (9) | FOLIATURE/FLUORITE | |
| R | Dull D |
DRAB |
| E | BUDGE (Move), [occasionally] |
BUDGIE |
| F | Priest’s daughter [drunk] – FINE* [to attend] CE (church)? (5) | NIECE |
| E | Crosses E |
DSOS |
| R | [Naked] |
FRICADEL |
| With head [covered by] CAPE (cloak), < TATI (French college [C] director) [retired] (8) | CAPITATE/APATITE | |
| E | East Londoner’s sack IE (that is) [caked in] MUD (4) | MUID |
| N | Rough CRAN (measure of herrings caught) [by] SS (ship) (5) | CRASS |
| C | [Waving] TORCH* from side to side (4) | THRO |
| E | TIE (Obligation) TO Communist leader (4) | TITO |
| Ill-natured sort from Georgia [GE]: CUR (scoundrel), [not first to] |
CURMUDGEON/CORUNDUM | |
| M | Functions Impaired Creating Mild Sickness [primarily] [after] QUART (two pints) (8) | QUARTICS |
| I | Tailor, say, earning little – once DOING [U (uniform) for O (nothing)] (4) | DUNG |
| N | Key LINES* [possibly] (4) | ISLE |
| E | S (Sulphur) [finally] thoughT tO bE causinG deadlY smoke in Pennsylvania (5) | STOGY |
| R | [Preliminary couple of] SC |
ASCI |
| New [N] song [on the radio] “CAN TICKLE” (may amuse) (8) | CANTICLE/CALCITE | |
| A | [Badly written] TREATISES* least likely to go forward (8) | RESTIEST |
| L | [Starters in] Posh Hotel, Lovage Or Samphire soups (4) | PHOS |
| ZAP (Shoot) TEC (detective) [following] O (ordinary) person from Mexico City [EC] (7) | ZAPOTEC/TOPAZ | |
| S | Green man IN GENUS (belonging to group) (6) | INGENU |
| F | FZ ((s)forzando = forced (music)) [back to] |
ZEAL |
| O | They develop E (base) [with] DOCTORS (medics) [outside] U (university) (8) | EDUCTORS |
| Down | ||
| R | Take A BR (bridge) [over] DUCT (channel) (6) | ABDUCT |
| M | Fungus [diminished] FU |
FUSARIUM |
| O | OP (Out of print) A (article) [includes] [curious] OLD* treatment for Parkinson’s (5) | L-DOPA |
| H | Poetic smear [encapsulating essence of] |
OINT |
| S | One might send you off couRSE Forgetting [bags] (3) | REF |
| H | Part of blast furnace [unstable IF ignored – playing] {WITH |
TWIER |
| A | Makes obscure {CLUES AND [originally] OVERUSES}* [anagrams] (8) | ENCLOUDS |
| Second-rate [B] spy caught forced to be slave (8) | BONDMAID/DIAMOND | |
| R | Visibly embarrassed about meeting doctor (3) | RED |
| D | Old woman placing daughter in madhouse (6) | BELDAM |
| Teacher rearranged the Mississippi [MS] classroom (12) | SCHOOLMASTER/ORTHOCLASE | |
| N | < RUN (Trip) [over] DU (Dutch) language (4) | URDU |
| E | Ridicule SATIE (French composer) [with] |
SATIRIZE |
| S | [When blazing] {SUN GOES D |
DUNGEONS |
| Striking effect of < [boosting] [elements from] viTAL energy [E] CElls (5) | ECLAT/TALC | |
| S | Like M25 SORB (service) A (area), [welcoming] IT [with onset of] L |
ORBITAL |
| Maybe four Anglo-Saxon [OE] jacks “CAT OARS” (whip rowers), [we hear] (8) | QUATORZE/QUARTZ | |
| [Drained] S |
SPHYGMUS/GYPSUM | |
| S | [Beginnings of] Storm Causing Ship’s END (stern) to pitch in sea (5) | SCEND |
| C | Second OC (officer in charge), [with THE R (right) support] (5) | OTHER |
| A | [Haphazardly] ENACT* change in US (4) | CENT |
| L | SP (Special) AL (aluminium) bath (3) | SPA |
| E | < CITE (Summon) [up] thoughtless response (3) | TIC |
| A | F | L | U | O | R | I | T | E | D | R | A | B |
| B | U | D | G | I | E | O | W | N | I | E | C | E |
| D | S | O | S | N | F | R | I | C | A | D | E | L |
| U | A | P | A | T | I | T | E | L | M | U | I | D |
| C | R | A | S | S | T | H | R | O | O | R | D | A |
| T | I | T | O | A | C | O | R | U | N | D | U | M |
| Q | U | A | R | T | I | C | S | D | D | U | N | G |
| U | M | L | B | I | S | L | E | S | T | O | G | Y |
| A | S | C | I | R | C | A | L | C | I | T | E | P |
| R | E | S | T | I | E | S | T | E | P | H | O | S |
| T | O | P | A | Z | N | E | I | N | G | E | N | U |
| Z | E | A | L | E | D | U | C | T | O | R | S | M |
I thought this was fun, cottoned onto the theme relatively quickly, which made for a fun couple of hours trying to find all 10 and fit them in. Plus, a genuinely useful theme which I’m surely will come in handy one day in another setting.
I also couldn’t parse ZEAL and still can’t understand how to get there from the explanation above (sorry to be a little thick).
Arnold @1, FZ is an abbreviation for sforzando, a musical term which means “forced, with sudden emphasis”. I assume you’re OK with the EAL part. That one had me confused as well until I looked it up in Chambers.
I haven’t done any Enigmatic Variations in the past as I believe they are behind a paywall on the Telegraph Site. Please correct me if I’m wrong as I really enjoyed this one. It reminded me of The Crossword Centre’s monthly crossword which I’ve started recently and the Listener Crossword which I used to do (in The Listener magazine) when I lived in the UK many years ago.
I happened to come across a downloadable image of this a week ago (I can’t remember where) in my search for things to fill the gap in the silly season. I really enjoyed this challenge but had to come here for the loose ends like RESTIEST and ZEAL, so thanks for the blog Mister Sting.
Hi both!
Arnold – thanks for your comment. As you know, you weren’t alone in finding ZEAL tricky to parse. I’ve added slightly more detail in the explanation.
Tim C – the EVs only appear in the physical paper. For some idiotic reason, they have stopped publishing the pdf on the puzzles site. I haven’t yet cancelled my subscription, because I plan to download all of the past ones, but I certainly will be cancelling it.
Thank you both, and Mister Sting for the blog – finally makes sense now!
I normally only do Inquisitors (which are basically the same) as I can’t quite get myself to pay for the Telegraph, and one of them a week is enough time spent/wasted anyway. I wonder how many people do do EVs, as I think there are normally fewer comments than for the Inquisitor (although that number is also small compared to say FT crosswords.)
However, as iindeed it is silly season I snuck a photo of one in my local coop (please don’t tell anyone) and thoroughly enjoyed it.
A suggestion for those who want a copy of the EV puzzle. Download the app PressReader to your smart thingy and using your UK library card details as a login gives free access to many publications – one of which is the ST and EV therein. You will have to take a screen shot of the crossword – then print. A couple of points – there is a copyright so I would suggest not sharing it publically and the registration lasts for 30 days – once over you can re-submit your library card details for another 30 days. I have been doing this these past few months so hopefully this may be helpful. I use this method sometimes with the Observer to get an AZED whch is sometimes late in being published to the Guardian site.
Another benefit of the library card is full access to the complete OED – happy days.
Many thanks for the blog Mister Sting. Sorry about “forced” – I hadn’t picked that one as *especially” difficult (in relation to a few others, anyway, though of course acknowledge it was a tough solve overall!) so it’s interesting to find out how solvers got on. Thanks also for all the comments. For anyone interested there’s a setter’s blog over at Big Dave’s: https://bigdave44.com/2022/12/29/ev-1570-setters-blog/
Many thanks also to all commenters – all constructive feedback always welcome!
@CranberryFez