Wiglaf provides the Saturday challenge this week….
….and quite a challenge it was!
As we have come to expect from Wiglaf, there is some ingenious clueing, some neat surfaces and quite a few rather obscure (to us!) definitions and synonyms.
We felt that there had to be a theme because of the number of proper nouns in the grid, but we couldn’t figure it out until we had filled the grid and used some electronic assistance – even now, we’re not totally convinced that we have tumbled to it.
Initially HERBERT WELLS leapt out at us – Herbert George (HG) Wells – and we wondered about a connection to Louis PASTEUR, with his research into bacteria – which cause the downfall of the aliens in ‘War of the Worlds’. However, we couldn’t find any other connections to Pasteur, except a rather loose one to Mary SHELLEY, author of ‘Frankenstein’, about ‘scientifically’ creating a new life form. This vague connection made us wonder whether Science Fiction might be the key, so with more online checking, we found that there are at least six Science Fiction writers in the grid: William GIBSON, Iain BANKS, Mary SHELLEY, Frank HERBERT, HG WELLS and Philip DICK. Are there any others?
Bert was quite a fan of Science Fiction in his youth, but had never come across Gibson (contemporary author of ‘cyberpunk’ novels), Herbert (‘Dune’) or Dick (‘Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?’). Once again we learn something new from a crosswords! Many thanks Wiglaf.
ROUE (‘Don Juan’) in PIT (hell) + T E R (first letters or ‘starts’ to torment each Russian)
A reversal (‘goes west’) of MEL (Mel Gibson – 1 down) – ‘Lunar Excursion Module’
PAST (former) EUR (European)
PUFFIN (‘flier’) G (good)
An anagram (‘could spark’) of A N (new) ROMANCE
BANS (outlaws) round or ‘stealing’ K (£1000)
SHY (reluctant) round, not ‘appearing in’ (‘on the contrary’) ELLE (woman’s magazine’)
HER (woman’s) BET (laid) round (‘without’) R (resistance) – strange definition!
SWELL (dandy) with the first letter (‘beginning’) moving to the ‘far right’
STERn (back) missing the last letter (‘briefly’) round (‘cuddling’) RETCH (cat) – we had to check the definition
RAN (managed) round (‘keeping’) CO (company) in CO (business)
DELAwaRE (US state) round (‘drinking’) C (clubs), missing ‘WA’ (Washington – US state)
HUIt (French for ‘eight’ – ‘crew’) missing the last letter or ‘snubbed’ – a new word for us
An anagram (‘in medley’) of SERENADED round C (contralto)
GI (‘Joe’ – American serviceman) S (last or ‘final’ letter of starts) ON (playing) round (‘grabbing’) B (bass)
B (bishop) ONE (‘cardinal’ number) MEAL (spread)
BE (live) A R (river)
STEP (rung) HER (the girl) round FAT (‘money’ – a new slang word for us)
REF (referee – ‘official’) in (‘punches’) a reversal (‘up’) of BAP (Baptist)
dALLIANCE (casual affair) missing (‘abandoning’) ‘d’ (daughter)
I (one) M (million) AGES (times) – rather long definition?
A reversal (‘over’) of SHE (that woman) round or ‘staying’ COP (‘busy’ – slang term for a detective)
An anagram (’employed’) of BY S (south) ASIAN round (‘nursing’) IN (home)
ELECTrIC (‘charged’) round (‘possessing’) C (cocaine) and missing (‘away’) ‘r’ (run)
RECENT (‘novel’) round a reversal (‘rampant’) of IT (sex)
A reversal (‘picked up’) of RAT (traitor) + GET (land)
An anagram (‘away’) of WHY ROT
Hidden (‘suppressing’) in thiS COURSe – we had to check the definition
HEAThER (erica) missing the second ‘h’ (husband)
Spotted DICK is something one might have at lunch
You can add (Stanislaw) LEM to your list.
Found this very difficult and needed to check a few words. Failed to get HERBERT & TARGET although I wondered about the latter and failed to see it. Put an unparsed DICTATE in 26, so a few head slaps are in order. Pleased to get the rest though.
Nice puzzle. Certainly tricky in places but I was only beaten by PIROUETTER right at the end, failing to think of the def – or the Don Juan synonym – and unable to get hell = DIS out of my mind. Like our bloggers, I had to check a few unknown definitions – SCOURS, HUI, LEM, STRETCHER and FAT. Lots to like.
I wonder if there might be an alternative parse for IMAGES – though it’s not my favourite. It would end up with a shorter def, though, and do away with the tautologous element of pictures needing to be seen. Def: pictures. One = I, needs to see (juxtaposition) one million = M times = AGES = I M AGES. The second ‘one’ is just about defensible – there is just the one M – but it’s slightly awkward.
Oh, and Gregory BEAR was another SF author.
Thanks both
PS. From Google: Chi HUI (born 1984) is a prominent Chinese science fiction author and former editor of Science Fiction World,