12 comments on “Inquisitor 1699 An Alternative Guide to Wonderland by Phi”

1. Hugely enjoyed this one — many thanks to Phi and kenmac. 7D was a stumbling block while — having not registered that a redundant word might have only one letter — the anagram and cross-checks seemed to make the misspelled INTERREGNI the only possible answer. Seeing a symmetrical design begin to emerge was all very exciting, and I liked the extra touch of the carefully placed O and O for Harvey’s eyes. (Inked them in red. Wished I hadn’t.)

   Never saw the film but know it by reputation — there’s an entry in the 1997 Encyclopedia of Fantasy whose website I still look after. “I’ve wrestled with reality for 35 years,” says Elwood, “and I’m happy, doctor: I finally won out over it.”

2. Oooh! I never saw the eyes. Well spotted.

3. I rather enjoyed this, and was also pleased to work out everything in the endgame.

4. Yes, I enjoyed this too. It’s rare I can see the objects depicted in shadings, so this was a fun exception. What else could it be? Although, because I couldn’t get 4D, or the parsing of 15A, my rabbit’s ears are more like flags.

5. Enjoyed here too, but also with surprise at my correct solution as I ended up using symmetry to complete some of the shading. REAM required an inconclusive search through Chambers for a definition that was perhaps a little iffy, but the rest went in with little ado.

6. Thanks for the blog for a tricky puzzle. I think there’s a slip in the parsing for 24d – I had GAPE minus P for the ‘look vacant, powerless’ part – GAZED would need ‘looked’ rather than ‘look’ & GAZED minus the middle gives an extra D & doesn’t account for ‘powerless’.

7. Another great puzzle! The instructions made it look very daunting indeed, my first impressions were the same as kenmac’s: has Phi gone mad? But once I got my head around the uncertainty it didn’t turn out to be as much of a problem as I expected. By the end I was solving as though all clues were like this.

   I am a bit of a film buff but had never seen Harvey so I rented it next day. It was a super film. Thanks to Phi for bringing it to my attention, and to kenmac for the blog.

8. Glad to bring the film to solvers’ attention (he says, having never watched it all the way through himself…)

   There’s a setter’s blog at http://phionline.net.nz/setters-blogs/inquisitor-1699-an-alternative-guide-to-wonderland/

9. Very classy puzzle and blog. Loved it thank you Phi and kenmac. I didn’t spot the eyes, nice touch. I’ve never heard of the film so may look it out.

10. Enjoyed the puzzle, but agree with Jon_S @5 about REAM: for the single clue that ignored the entire wordplay the definition could have been somewhat tighter. Also agree with shikasta @6 about the correct parsing for 24d (T)OGAED.
    Thanks S&B.

11. I think Harvey needed to be a bit taller than his supposed height as Jimmy Stewart was at least 6ft 3.
    I got interregni early on and plodded a bit until I had a few crossers-I first thought MARK TWAIN might fit then maybe MARCH HARE and finally unearthed MARY CHASE so that was my entry point as a very average solver.
    That led to the main theme as she didnt seem to write a lot else of note.
    But my parsing was substandard so was my artwork
    Thanks for blog and DL’s spotting of the Os

12. shikasta @6

    Well spotted … fixed now … thanks

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