Inquisitor 1807: See for Yourself by Nathan Panning

15 comments on “Inquisitor 1807: See for Yourself by Nathan Panning”

1. Ken, I had the same substitutions as yours in the blog (except for “defecate” at 27d spelled correctly!), and agree that some are decidedly iffy. I did not enjoy this one, my least favourite puzzle so far this year.

2. Yes, soup, jam and pickle are all tricky situations, as is Stew.
   ‘I’m not sure it’s something we’d like to see too often’. That’s putting it mildly.

3. At the time I thought this was likely to divide opinion. I was also not a fan initially, but was eventually ground down by the conceit and found myself chuckling at some of the switches (e.g. Ivor the Engine, defecate).

4. This was for me the most entertaining puzzle so far this year, with its theme representing a brand of wacky British humour. I had some difficulties with it, only because the source I found online (a Wikipedia article that supplied the contents of all the shaded entries) did not include some of the pairs used here (as noted already), such as B for lamb (the article had B for mutton, which is the one that I knew).

   I was lucky to get the idea quite quickly from my first two solutions, ALBUM and IDIOM, making RELIEVE a straightforward follow-up.

   To construct a whole puzzle on this theme was an impressive feat, and I enjoyed playing with it and solving it, even if it’s not the sort of thing I would like to have too often.

   Thanks to Nathan Panning and kenmac.

5. Least said soonest mended

6. It was a strange solving experience, like stumbling in the dark. I was diligently making a list of all the coded substitutions, but then ‘cockney alphabet appeared’, and it was a short jump to Wikipedia. But still lots of questions at the end. I liked more than some, as it’s good to get something completely different… thanks to Nathan Panning and kenmac

7. Yes, I thought it looked impossible too. Thought I had ROBE (1st one in), DALI and EERIE but couldn’t work out why or how. ‘E’ is the first letter of EVA/EVITA and also the last of CASTLE but… Then gradually it dawned but took quite a while to realise that some were made up by NP (who had, remember, been ‘inspired’ by Clapham and Dwyer). ‘Oh, for crying put loud’ is, I suggest, more usual than ‘Gee, for…’, but it didn’t fit. Quite nice in the end but I didn’t get the LIMES thing and still can’t find authority for ‘kaffir limes’.

8. Kaffir Limes

9. I hated this originally, but ended up loving it. So thank you!

   Never a big fan of having large unclued areas, because it typically means you spend forever hunting in the dark, and once the penny drops the grid fills itself very quickly (per the recent Harry Potter themed one).

   But in this case, once I finally got the theme (via CLAPHAM and ALPHABET), the fun only started because I then spent a fun hour or so reverse engineering each entry one by one – with only some being referenced in the Wikipedia entry. Many of them made me chuckle, with Wife of Bath, Alfa Romeo, Emphasis and Eggs For Breakfast particular favourites . But then I always have been a fan of nonsensical British humour in the Monty Python mould.

   A couple of minor quibbles. I don’t think “Vive (or Viva) De Gaulle” is really ‘a thing’ as the French celebrate their country (or the revolution) but not so much individuals. So I would have plumped for “La France flies…” instead. And 1D really didn’t need to be quite as complex.

   But overall an A for Effort from me.

10. Put me down as another initially reluctant convert. What seemed like an hour of firm conviction that this was going to be utterly beyond me, then illumination from thinking about my two tentative but seemingly unjustifiable answers ALBUM and DALI in the light of the title. Vague memories of some sort of joke ALPHABET (aha, there was a place for that word), and many a chuckle, groan or snort of outrage at the more far-fetched substitutions.

    So thanks to Nathan Panning for a change of pace, and kenmac for the unravelling.

11. Clearly a “marmite”, this one! I’m with Alan B @4 – I really enjoyed it once the penny had dropped and loved some of NP’s own creations, which, like Arnold @9 made me chuckle. Surprisingly, when I mentioned just the title to my wife, a b&b Northerner, she immediately said, without any prompting, “Cockney Rhyming Slang”.
    21D and 24D illustrated for me the interesting change in the pronunciation of the vowels A and E over the decades. To my ears, the sound of the letter L would lead me to Elpha, not Alpha whereas the current trend seems to be to say “Yas” for “Yes”, “Dath” for “Death”, and so on, and this reflects NP’s use. (Was this Arnold’s point in his closing remark?) The exact converse was true for many of my parent’s generation where our neighbour, Alma was known as Elmer.
    Thanks to NP and Ken.

12. I was merely trying to be mildly humorous by signing off on another ‘nonsense definition’; I’m afraid it wasn’t any cleverer than that.

13. Initially baffled by the parsing answers to any of the clues, I somehow solved both 20A & 22A. 1A, 17D & 20D rapidly followed, and suddenly things made sense. Fun and very different, but sadly I ran out of time and so must record a DNF.

    For 25A I read split as having the meaning wrecked or rent asunder.

14. I googled CLAPHAM and DURER(guesswork) and came up with the goods
    Apparently their act included someone checking into a hotel room and phoning reception saying a ladies nightdress had been left in his room
    “Would you like it removed, sir?”
    “No I’d like it filled”

15. Arnold @12. Yes, I got the joke as well. Modesty accepted but you might as well take the credit for both meanings.

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