Henri has set a number of puzzles for S&B events. He also set Inquisitor 1901 which was quite a challenge but very satisfying at the end when the theme revealed itself. Once again, Henri has given up his time in setting a puzzle for us for which he will receive no fee! Many thanks.
Preamble
Welcome to York! Eight Down answers of a kind must be modified before entry. An Across answer, similar but different to the eight, describes the state of the modified entries. Ten further clues contain an extra word; eight of these indicate a thematic word and the other two are useful for solving. The unclued entry is a ninth example of the theme. One grid entry that is outwardly ambiguous can be resolved by deduction. In the completed grid highlight an appropriate set of four contiguous cells.
If you were not able to attend the S&B at York but would like to solve his barred puzzle, click HERE.
The preamble gave us lots to think about for a start. As always, with puzzles like this, we picked up a pencil – not a pen – and got stuck in!
Well…… the top half went in quicker than the bottom. We needed a fair amount of checking on-line.
The extra words in the clues are path, circuit, channel, passage, obstacle, way, scandal, and opening – in [green square brackets] in the parsings below. These are all synonyms for GATE which we were asked to shade in. The other extra words are LOCAL and KNOWLEDGE.
Unfortunately we had very little of these last two words to fully grasp what the puzzle was about. Thankfully, we had enough of the last word to complete the puzzle apart from the bottom row.
We knew SHAMBLES and solved the clue fairly early on, so guessed that we may be looking at anagrams. However, we did not know all of the GATES or thoroughfares in York that were used for the anagrams so failed to spot the link.
STONE, DEAN, CASTLE, NESS, FISHER, CLAY, SWINE and MOOR.
We searched online using a number of tools but couldn’t find anything to fit in the bottom row. If only we had sorted out the relevance of the anagrams and the various ‘gates or thoroughfares’ in York we may have come across the amazing one featured at the bottom.
WHIP-MA-WHOP-MA
Quite an amazing feat to include all the thematic items in a barred grid. However, it did mean that there were quite a number of rather obscure (to us!) words which needed quite a bit of checking.
The title refers to the fact that the number of attendees at an event is called a GATE.
| ACROSS | |||
| No. | Entry | Anagram | |
| 1 | BE SO GOOD AS TO |
Kindly old sea dog with boots off (12,5 words)
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| An anagram (‘off’) of O (old) SEA DOG and BOOTS | |||
| 11 | RWANDA |
South African settler taking wife by a country [path] (6)
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| RAND (you ‘settle’ your bills in South Africa with rand) around or ‘taking’ W (wife) + A | |||
| 12 | SEED |
Top player finishes off tennis [circuit] life despite demand (4)
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| Last letters or ‘finishes’ of tenniS lifE despitE demanD | |||
| 13 | CRIER |
Announcer relatively brittle, not without issue (5)
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| CRI |
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| 14 | ONETWO |
Part of HBO network, [channel] producing hits (6)
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| Hidden (‘part of’) in hbO NETWOrk | |||
| 15 | LAUNDER |
Clean beer, and German replacing gallons (7)
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| LA |
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| 16 | WIN |
Dated Penny when on vacation around Italy (3)
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| W |
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| 17 | AGEIST |
Not all language is totally discriminatory (6)
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| Hidden (‘not all’) in languAGE IS Totally | |||
| 18 | ANSATE |
[Passage] handled at the outset and now mostly satisfied (6)
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| First letters or ‘at the outset’ of And Now + SATE |
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| 20 | RETICLES |
Tiercels flying to make sets of reference lines (8)
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| An anagram (‘flying’) of TIERCELS | |||
| 24 | SHAMBLES |
Slaughterhouse‘s Sabbath meat briefly consecrated (8)
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| S (Sabbath) HAM (meat) BLES |
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| 26 | TAILYE |
Limit of Scot’s inheritance – the old dog comes first (6)
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| YE (old version of the) with TAIL (dog) coming first | |||
| 29 | SENATE |
Politicians ready in Japan at end of [opening] debate (6)
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| SEN (Japanese currency or ‘ready’) AT and E (last letter or ‘end’ of debate) | |||
| 30 | ERK |
Endless benefits for RAF employee (3)
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| 32 | CIRCLER |
About the French Revolution, primarily it goes round (7)
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| CIRC (about) LE (French for the) R (first or ‘primary’ letter of Revolution). We puzzled over this as we only knew ‘c’ and ‘ca’ as abbreviations for circa – ‘about’ | |||
| 33 | TRICOT |
Wrong about Curie returning material (6)
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| TORT (wrong) about a reversal (‘returning’) of CI (curie) | |||
| 34 | HENRI |
I have never disembowelled myself (5)
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| H |
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| 36 | TAKY |
Tasteless, heartless – attractive once (4)
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| TA |
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| 37 | OREIDE |
Men at Muslim festival, one working away making alloy (6)
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| OR (other ranks – ‘men’) EID (Muslim festival) |
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| DOWN | |||
| No. | Entry | Anagram | |
| 2 | ENRAGE |
Incense smoke can clear [obstacle] via wafting here, ultimately (6)
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| Last or ‘ultimate’ letters of smokE caN cleaR viA waftinG herE | |||
| 3 | SRI |
South Indonesia honorific (3)
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| S (South) RI (Republic of Indonesia) | |||
| 4 | OWENISM |
Eccentric, winsome social philosophy (7)
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| An anagram (‘eccentric’) of WINSOME | |||
| 5 | ONSET | STONE |
Maybe Jasper Carrott finally getting into second joke (5)
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| T (last or ‘final’ letter of Carrott) in S (second) ONE (joke) | |||
| 6 | ODORATE |
Oddly good-natured chucking dung [way] out, it’s smelly (7)
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| An anagram (‘oddly’) of |
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| 7 | DANE | DEAN |
Judo master welcomes English clergyman (4)
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| DAN (Judo master) around or ‘welcoming’ E (English) | |||
| 8 | SETWALL |
Get money for protecting Glaswegian couple’s plant (7)
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| SELL (get money for) around or ‘protecting’ TWA (Scots form of two – ‘couple’) | |||
| 9 | TEWIT |
Winger favourite with crowds (5)
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| Hidden (‘crowded by’) in favouriTE WITh | |||
| 10 | ECLATS | CASTLE |
Rook, one having disease covering sides of tail (6)
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| CASE (‘one having disease’) around or ‘covering’ T |
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| 12 | SENS | NESS |
Head is old-fashioned, not outwardly spontaneous (4)
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| NE (obsolete or ‘old fashioned’ word for ‘not’) S |
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| 19 | WAIKIKI |
Beach with cabin seen regularly on Dee (7)
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| W (with) |
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| 21 | ELECTRA |
Complex woman chosen over god (7)
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| ELECT (chosen) on top of or ‘over’ RA (god) | |||
| 22 | CONCEDO |
I admit cocaine [scandal] after party (7)
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| C (cocaine) ONCE (after) DO (party) | |||
| 23 | SHERIF | FISHER |
Mostly enthusiasm surrounding novel Carrie, perhaps (6)
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| FIR |
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| 25 | ITERUM |
Article about [local] sport again (6)
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| ITEM (article) round RU (sport) | |||
| 27 | ARRAH |
Emotion expressed when a career finally leads to Royal Albert Hall (5)
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| A R (last of ‘final’ letter of career) and RAH (first letters or ‘leads’ to Royal Albert Hall | |||
| 28 | LACY | CLAY |
Could originally beat down fighter before he was ‘the greatest’ (4)
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| C (first or ‘original’ letter of could) LAY (beat down) | |||
| 29 | SINEW | SWINE |
Women gatecrashing function in Essex? (5)
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| W (women) in (‘gatecrashing’) SINE (function) An Essex is a breed of pig. | |||
| 31 | ROOM | MOOR |
Second rule about love fell (4)
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| MO (second) R (rule) around O (love) | |||
| 35 | NEP |
Author’s [knowledge] about regional catmint (3)
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| A reversal (‘about’) of PEN (author) |
Great puzzle as ever from Henri.
Passed the time very well on the York -> London train this morning – though I’d have taken a lot longer if Angel hadn’t been there to co-solve with me!
Thankfully we’d taken a wander round the town on Sunday and stopped at WHIP-MA-WHOP-MA for a bit, and Angel’s a York graduate so had the 25d 35d required for some of the gates.
A harder Henri than some I’ve done before, but as always a fair and approachable puzzle with some great wordplay.
Nice to see a couple of his other pseudonyms in there too.
Thanks a million to Henri for the puzzle, and to Bertandjoyce for the blog.
Top stuff, thanks Henri and Bertandjoyce. Solved whilst at York with the setter sat just across the table … I think he was reasonably happy to see steady progress made, though my lack of ‘local knowledge’ prevented a finish until I could finally get a wi-fi signal for some e-help … I did know SHAMBLES and a couple of the “gates” with the others sounding plausible, but that final implausible(?) step was a nho! Great fun and very nicely put together, with enjoyable clues throughout (I especially liked the “Kindly old sea dog…” – once I’d figured out how the definition worked – and the “South African settler…” so a great start and quality didn’t let up) Also a bit of cheeky self-reference in HENRI & only just spotted the top-right corner too! Thanks again & also thanks to JH & all at S’n’B for a great weekend 🙂
Huge thanks to Bertandjoyce (who I had the pleasure of meeting in York, although they didn’t give away much about what they thought of the puzzle 😆) for a very comprehensive blog. I knew it was going be a little tricky in the endgame without a bit of ‘local knowledge’ but I just couldn’t resist the lure of WHIP-MA-WHOP-MA-gate. It was somewhat surreal to watch people solving the puzzle in the room, in real time – lots of fun though.
Thanks also to Matt and cranberryfez for their kind words – funny that they both spotted my other pseudonym ODO in the grid, which was quite unintentional, as I set this puzzle before I even decided that I was going be ‘Odo’… so just a nice coincidence!
Thanks again to everyone that tackled the puzzle and especially to Bertandjoyce of course.