An alphabetical jigsaw for this Bank Holiday weekend puzzle, but this time Azed has not provided word lengths.
It’s a couple of years since Azed last offered us a jigsaw. Unlike some other setters, he doesn’t necessarily use every letter in the alphabet as an initial letter, but the clues are presented in the alphabetical order of their solutions, which does help once you get started. As it happens, clue No 1 (the numbering is irrelevant) was an easy clue for a word beginning with A, with clue No 36 being another easy clue (for a somewhat obscure word) beginning with Y.
The only technique which works is to cold solve as many clues as possible until you can begin to guess at placements in the grid. Fortunately I got one of the 12 letter entries fairly early on and guessed correctly that it was more likely to occupy the right hand column, and that proved to be correct. Some of the four letter words proved trickier to place correctly, but that’s why pencils have rubbers on the end! The omission of word lengths certainly made it harder to get started, but Azed’s clueing is so precise that in most cases the solver is no doubt about the accuracy of the answer. I am grateful to Gaufrid for his assistance in pointing out where I had gone wrong in a couple of cases.
Apologies for the slightly unusual layout: I had difficulty with using PeeDee’s program and resorted to cutting and pasting from Word instead.
| No | Clue | Answer | |
| 1 | You may find a lump liquidized in this vessel | AMPUL | *A LUMP & lit |
| 2 | Brief time in small early section dictionary, pulsating | ATHROB | HR in A TO B (the first volume in a large dictionary) |
| 3 | Arranged to have hearses around for lists | BARRIERS | ARR in BIERS. I think the definition refers to the enclosures used for jousting. |
| 4 | Exorcists snare first sign of satanism | BENETS | BENET (snare) + S(atanism) |
| 5 | Caught angel slipping, admitting offence – purification required | CLEANSING | SIN in *(C ANGEL) |
| 6 | Pie thrown, stool for the penitent soak | CREE | CREE(pie) (a stool of repentance) |
| 7 | Pile of sand required by gardeners | DENE | Hidden in “gardeners”. |
| 8 | Refusal to conform involved me with direst sins | DISSENTERISM | *(ME DIREST SINS) |
| 9 | Sung note one’s hit, that is rolled around | E-LA-MI | LAM (hit) inside IE (rev). I’m not sure what “one’s” is doing, except to improve the surface. |
| 10 | Record Keats unusually receives in poetry | ENTERTAKES | ENTER (record) *KEATS |
| 11 | Former lodging showing class earl occupies for nothing | FERM | FORM (class) with E for O. |
| 12 | Corn cookie, one turning up wrapped in tripe | HOE-CAKE | ACE (one, rev) in HOKE (hokum). Note the use of “up” to indicate a down clue. |
| 13 | With layers applied thickly over, in modern clothes | IMPASTO’D | PAST (over) inside I MOD (in modern). |
| 14 | Listen out for sounds | INLETS | *LISTEN |
| 15 | Hard kiln crumbles – I melt outside | IRONLIKE | *KILN inside I ROE. |
| 16 | Child receiving name Ray family no longer used | KINRED | N RE (ray) inside KID. |
| 17 | It’s clear I had lost paperback | LIMP | LIMP(id) |
| 18 | Sorghum: some that’s processed girl swallowed | MOLASSES | LASS in *SOME |
| 19 | Riparian folk gather as harvest, returning plenty | NILOTS | IN (rev LOTS. I’m not entirely sure how “in” equates to “as harvest” |
| 20 | Grain measure heading for capital fully shifted | OMER | ROME with the first letter moved to the end |
| 21 | Odd name changed includes name shortened whenever required (2 words) | ON DEMAND | N(ame) inside *(ODD NAME) |
| 22 | Flops with MP lacking positive quality | PLUS | PLU(mp)s. This is the second meaning of plump given in Chambers. |
| 23 | Pop, humdinger, about right as accompaniment for Chinese meal (2 words) | PRAWN CRACKER | R in PAWN (pop), CRACKER |
| 24 | Give fresh appraisal of dimwits occupying reservation | REASSESS | ASSES in RES(ervation). |
| 25 | Decline former advice about Church | RECEDE | CE in REDE (old word which can mean advice) |
| 26 | Profligate fellow with nothing – job for the bailiffs? | REPO | REP(robate) + O; it’s short for repossession |
| 27 | A gale like this can scatter spa in terror | RIPSNORTER | Comp.anag: *A RIPSNORTER = SPA IN TERROR |
| 28 | Old angler making list that includes dace (not of highest quality) | RODSTER | D(ace) in ROSTER |
| 29 | Sort of Chinese clothing, outer garment for Malaysian | SABAHAN | ABA (outer garment) in SHAN (Chinese people) |
| 30 | Cuttlefish eggs skink rolled round East Indian city (2 words) | SEA GRAPES | E AGRA in SEPS (rev). |
| 31 | What a glacier may become is worrying when reversed | SERAC | Cares (rev). |
| 32 | Recipe included cuts off prunes (long forgotten) | SHREDS | I think that this is R in SHEDS: but “cuts off” is itself a definition of SHREDS and SHEDS means cast off, not cuts off |
| 33 | Observe uprising regularly alternating with explosive doctrines | TENETS | TNT (explosive) interpolated with the letters of SEE (rev). Note again the use of “uprising” to indicate a down clue. |
| 34 | Pupil poorly educated in a heap | UPPILED | *PUPIL, ED(ucated) |
| 35 | Commands in conflict not specified | WARNS | WAR, N(ot) S(pecified). |
| 36 | Scots over there in Grimsby, Ontario | YONT | Hidden in “Grimsby Ontario”. |
*anagram
Just couldn’t get started on this. I’m not the sort of solver who methodically goes through the clues, I tend to get a clue and see what that opens up for the crossing clues. And I rely on the word lengths. So I’d get the odd answer, but then didn’t know where to go next. So I never got enough answers to even start filling in the grid.
“in vt to gather in harvest” is in Chambers. And even though we must assume that setters are quite right to mislead us, I don’t like the position of that comma.
Thanks for 2 — I had no idea how to figure it out.
And as for LIMP, well: I’m an old bookseller. I’m not sure what’s in the 2014 Chambers but if I describe a paperback as being in “limp” covers I’ll have a lot of unsatisfied customers.
Stefan
Sorry! Apologies to Azed. My 2006 has LIMP as “(of a cloth binding for books) not stiffened by boards”, which is correct. Chambers 2014 does indeed indicate merely “soft cover”, which is wishy-washy at best and could be downright wrong. You won’t find me changing my descriptions.
Stefan
The missing answer lengths made this a lot harder than usual for a jigsaw: it make it trickier to solve individual clues, and also means that even with some answers in the grid the crossing letters don’t give much help, unless they come at the start of words.
After cold-solving more than half the clues I got started on the grid with DISSENTERISM and the two 9-letter answers, which can only fit one way, and proceeded from there, with occasional guessing that I sometimes needed to backtrack on. I suspect that BENETS, INLETS and TENETS were there are a trap for the unwary.
Marmite Smuggler: I don’t see any objection to the comma in 19: it’s telling you to use “gather as harvest, returning”.
Andrew @4: you could add NILOTS to the list of traps!
Your method, using the 9 letter words, was essentially the same as mine.
When I started this I thought that the omission of answer lengths was either an Observer cock-up or, unusually, Azed throwing in an unnecessary level of difficulty just for the hell of it. Like others I soon realised that the key lay in how the 9-letter answers connected with the long answers. From there it wasn’t plain sailing but certainly not as hard as it first appeared.
I had to look up LIMP too and was surprised by its meaning of paperback. I wouldn’t have thought any author would want his/her books to be described as limp, unless perhaps the title was something like “Drugs that enhance performance in the bedroom”.
Thanks to Azed and Bridgesong.
Challenging but satisfying. I thought Azed was kind in giving us two relatively straightforward 12 letter down clues, which started the unlocking, although I held myself up by over confidently putting “on demand” on the top line across.
I think ‘paperback’ for the definition of ‘limp’ is really not right – I mean, paper isn’t exactly cloth like old books were bound in are they?
Re 32, remember the ‘shedding ring’ from OMAHD?
My first three were DISSENTERISM, DENE and CLEANSING. I wasted a lot of time with the first two as 1 across and 1 down and the 9-letter no help. Then I got SEAGRAPES and it started falling into place. I cannot remember whether a Jigsaw without word lengths has happened before but it did make it a lot of fun. I think my last in was ELAMI- it’s usually the short words that take the time.
Many thanks, as always, to Azed and to Bridgesong for the excellent blog- I thought the columned layout was ideal. I do agree that 32 seems unusually doubled in definitions.