Financial Times 17,964 by Wanderer

by

Puzzle from the Weekend FT of February 1, 2025

Since this puzzle has been published and blogged before, I am not blogging it again but am just providing this pointer to the original blog by Turbolegs at https://www.fifteensquared.net/2020/12/04/financial-times-16651-by-wanderer

Please post comments here, not on the original.

RIP Paul Facey-Hunter who was known here as Wanderer, in The Guardian as Puck and in the Independent as Hob.  I understand that Paul had been setting for the FT  for over 10 years but we have seen him only thrice in the Weekend spot, and the last time was in 2016.

6 comments on “Financial Times 17,964 by Wanderer”

  1. I don’t think I have seen a Wanderer puzzle before. Found it challenging and there were several I didn’t parse.

    Liked: IGNORES, APPAREL, GRAPH, IMPASSE, TRIDENT

  2. Same as Fiona. I add ANGEL OF LIGHT to the list of favourites.

    Aside from a couple of interesting devices (such as HANDY) there was more than a fair share of partial anagrams and fiddle charades. I see a lot of enthusiast reviews when this was first blogged, but I confess I found it a bit monotonous.

    Thanks Wanderer, Turbolegs and Pete

  3. Thanks Pete for the link to the Turbolegs blog. I had no independent recollection of having solved this crossword in 2020 but the blog was proof that I had done so. I solved it a second time and I enjoyed it just as much. I have missed this setter and will continue to do so.

  5. Thanks, Pete, for the link.

    I wasn’t expecting a whole new blog, of course, but it would perhaps have been good to have a few thoughts on the puzzle from you, four years on – something along the lines of the ‘idothei’ blog
    https://idothei.wordpress.com/2023/05/16/i-cryptic-crossword-3829-by-hob/
    which comments on crosswords in the ‘i’ newspaper (recycled four-year-old crosswords from the Independent, with a link to the original 15² blog).

    Like Tony Santucci and allan_c, I have no clear recollection of having solved this puzzle. 😉

  6. Thanks for the blog, and thanks to the family and the FT for providing this puzzle . I was not doing the FT in 2020 so it was all fresh for me , I only knew the setter as Puck.
    A typically coherent and imaginative puzzle with so much to enjoy .

Comments are closed.