Guardian Prize 29757 / Philistine

36 comments on “Guardian Prize 29757 / Philistine”

1. I thought this was just the right level of difficulty for a Prize: needed a couple of sessions, but not frustrating. Nice blog, too.

   I pondered a bit about the LITTLE BLACK NUMBER clue, and I think it is a little presumptuous. Black is indeed how most solvers probably see them, but it is not an intrinsic property of the clue: the 1 and 2 could be rendered in any colour with a suitable browser, or if the reader has synaesthesia (to me they are dark purple and orangey-yellow, respectively). Just noticed, they are red in the blog!

   Tx

2. I bet I wasn’t the only one to try subtracting AS instead of the two As from the anagram fodder for ESTEEM. Sneaky.
   Otherwise, although Philistine is always good fun, this was on his easier side.

3. Thanks duncanshiell. Parsed WEREWOLVES similarly. It brought a chuckle. Liked your explanation of SAKE as an ‘alcoholic drink’ as it’s neither a wine, nor a beer or a spirit, but in a category all of its own, due to the process of fermentation of sugar derived from the rice starch.

   I liked the misdirection in OUTBACK, bringing to mind one of the Presidents Bush.
   As an Aussie, BUSH and OUTBACK are almost interchangeable, although there is a vast area of the continent which is outback with very little bush.

   I took it that Philistine knows the phrase ”Gone BUSH”. , when someone disappears, intentionally, either for adventure, or escaping troubles. They sometimes return of their own accord.

   My favourite was AMNESIAC for the wordplay, with the empty chronicle.

4. WEREWOLVES
   My line of thinking was the same as that of the blogger and paddymelon@3 (seen only during weekends?).
   Modern dogs are said to be descendants of wolves. If ‘they’ WERE WOLVES earlier, they are now dogs, possibly.

   My faves: LITTLE BLACK NUMBER, AMNESIAC and FREELANCE.

   Thanks Philistine and duncan.

5. [KVa @ 4. Nice that you missed me. I see you in lots of places, at all times of day. 🙂
   At this time of year, I’m often in bed asleep before the 15sq blog comes up on weekdays, and by morning it’s all been said. Anyway, got to give UK solvers a share of the first bite of the cherry, as it is a British puzzle, and, for much of the year, the rest of us jump in first.

   I wonder if you can cast any light on Roz’s absence? I haven’t wanted to ask, but I haven’t seen comments and perhaps there’s something I’ve missed. Last I knew she was having trouble with her username. Then I thought maybe she’s on a summer break, or unwell. I’m sad if she’s disappeared for good, whatever the reason. )

6. Only 5 contributors and not much to add!

   I add COMEDIAN, ASPS and OBSERVANCE to the list of favourites. All great surfaces.

   I also want to say I share pm@5’s concern for Roz’s absence.

   Thanks Philistine and duncanshiel

7. LITTLE BLACK NUMBER – it occurred to me that “2 or 4” would have got round the colour problem described by DrW@1, as they are actual little black numbers on a roulette wheel. Just a thought.

   Thanks to Philistine and duncan.

8. Lovely puzzle. Difficult to choose favourites as so many good clues.

   But I did like WEREWOLVES very much.

   Also: EMPOWER, STRAWBERRY, TRIANGLES, ESTEEM

   I have also noted Roz’s absence and hope she’s OK. I do look forward to her comments.

   Thanks Philistine and duncan

9. Thanks Philistine for an excellent crossword (no surprise there) with many favourites including EMPOWER, ASPS, ELLE, PAPERS, KEEPSAKE, COMEDIAN, and ORAL. Some may say this was too easy for a ‘prize’ but that’s not a concern to me – I just like good clues. Thanks duncanshiell for the blog.

10. On the easy side for a Phillistine prize, but no complaints from me on that score. The only note I can see on my paper copy is one about checking that Benedetti was a violinist, but that really had to be the case. I was left wondering about 1 and 2, it never occurring to me that it might be how they were printed. Particularly liked OUTBACK. Otherwise, nothing to add, except thanks to both setter and blogger.

11. I found this one flowed smoothly for me which made for an enjoyable experience of solving. My favourites were the already discussed 5a OUTBACK (thanks for the Aussie input, paddymelon@3) and 14a,19d LITTLE BLACK NUMBER. I needed the blog to understand 1a EMPOWER and 20a ESTEEM fully, so many thanks to duncanshiell for the excellent blog and of course to Philistine for a really good Prize puzzle offering.

12. Thanks for the accessible puzzle, Philistine, and for the blog, Duncan, which is comprehensive, clear and colourful.

    My take on ‘werewolves’ is that Philistine was being a little whimsical about the folkloric characters (lycanthropes) who transform into wolves at the full moon. At other times when they have resumed human form, it could be said they “were wolves”. As I see it, whether or not they are related to dogs doesn’t come into it.

    I enjoyed the clue, but had to look up lycanthrope. Enjoyed the rest of the clues, too.

13. The dog IS just a domesticated wolf (they are both scientifically the species Canis lupus – the dog is the subspecies Canis lupus familiaris). ALL dogs were wolves until very recently in evolutionary terms.

14. I found this pretty straightforward but very enjoyable. Plenty of smiles, with CAPER hidden in a misleading ‘perhaps’ and the playful WEREWOLF, where the pronunciation of the whole word is more like “warewolf” but splitting it gives us the hint of wolves and dogs being related. (or identical, Andy@13 😁).

    I was held up very briefly, like Gladys@2, by trying to take the letters of ‘as’ from the fodder, but I soon remembered that Philistine has done this trick before.

    I enjoyed LITTLE BLACK NUMBER, though I now have to remember to extend sympathy to those like Dr W@1 who don’t see those digits as black. 🙂

    Thanks to setter and blogger as ever.

15. Good fun and finished in one quick session, which is rare for me.

    However it was still a satisfying solve with plenty to entertain and amuse.

    I liked AMNESIAC, OUTBACK and STRAWBERRY.

16. I too had noticed Roz’s absence so I hope all is well.

    I found this one pretty easy (not boasting, just reporting, sometimes I struggle!) I enjoyed it. I was well aware of lycanthropes at which point there was only one answer. I was maybe lucky to see LITTLE BLACK DRESS quickly too, being such a renowned fashionisto 😄

    I vaguely remember self flagellating for my slowness on TRIANGLES – I think I had the wrong figures in mind – but overall, everything went in smoothly. I liked FREELANCE and NOODLES.

    [Today’s puzzle is really good]

    Thanks Philistine and Duncan for a very clear blog.

17. I too greatly enjoyed this and completed apart from EXCESS and ENDEAVOURS, though both were fairly and cleverly clued. The parsing of ESTEEM also eluded me. Thanks to Philistine for all of the pleasure and Duncan for the elucidation

18. I could not parse 10ac.

    Favourites: WEREWOLVES, OUTBACK, ESTEEM (loi).

    Like others above, I hope that all is well with Roz.

19. Thanks duncanshiell. Can someone please explain to me what “this” is doing in 7D?

20. Bristleface@19. It’s a “clue as definition”, so ‘this’ is self-referential, or if you like, a substitute for saying “the answer is…”.

21. In this busy sporting and holiday season, it was nice to have a most entertaining but reasonably straightforward puzzle. There were a couple of easy starters and then a steady drip of PD moments until OUTBACK, our LOI.

    All was explained with favourites STRAWBERRY, LITTTLE BLACK NUMBER, NOODLES, WEREWOLVES, TRIANGLES, EXACT and, I almost forgot, AMNESIA!

    Thanks be to P and d.

22. An excellent puzzle – it flowed well for me too. Getting LITTLE BLACK NUMBER and ON THE FIDDLE quite early on obviously helped with several other clues.

    Thanks to Philistine, whose puzzles I always enjoy, and to duncanshiell for his customary clear and thorough blog.

23. Enjoyed this puzzle a lot. Thanks Philistine. My favourite was also Little Black Number.

    I parsed it as Dress 1 = Dress XS (extra small – from clue to 1D) = Little Black Number. Or 2=smallest black number on a roulette wheel = Little Black Number.

24. Yes, not too tough for a Prize puzzle but very enjoyable. I did like LITTLE BLACK NUMBER – the text is printed with BLACK ink, however you see it. I also liked ENDEAVOURS with its course contents, the broken toilets leading to STILETTO, and the AMNESIAC with his empty chronicle.

    Thanks Philistine and DS.

25. I liked the spitting of “as”; Philistine’s always up to tricks like that.

    I found the WEREWOLVES clue a bit strange, because what was a wolf isn’t necessarily a dog and so the ‘presumably’ didn’t quite work somehow, for me at least. (The idea works better the other way around: what is a dog presumably was a wolf.) But in fact, given what a werewolf actually is, surely ‘Lycanthropes are now humans, presumably’ would have been a more apt surface to my mind – and indeed the fact that it didn’t say that and said dogs instead made the whole thing a bit ponderous, to me!

    Thanks both

26. AP@25. I see what you mean. But have you seen what I said about the pronunciation of WEREWOLVES at #14? In effect, this constitutes the wordplay. If the solver recognises and understands ‘lycanthropes’ it could seem a little ponderous, perhaps. But putting human instead of dog surely destroys any humour there might have been?

    I think the clue would have been improved with “these” instead of “lycanthropes”; maybe the editor thought it was too difficult in the context of an otherwise fairly straightforward puzzle.

27. sheffield hatter@26, I’m not sure I follow. I mean, I get the split of werewolves into “were wolves”, which is the device being exploited. [These “interpret the answer somehow” clues are great fun, and indeed they work best when the split doesn’t match, aurally or syntactically, the normal interpretation of the answer, such as here where the pronunciation helps to disguise the split.] But I’m not sure what humour there is in the original clue; it seems to be the idea that dogs were once wolves, which is fair enough, but it doesn’t exploit the actual werewolf in any way, which a good extended def or &lit clue would.

    My point was that the things that were wolves, in the context of lycanthropy, are presumably now humans – at least until the next shapeshift. So that version gives the clue cohesion, albeit that it would be pretty much impossible to derive the answer without checkers if one doesn’t already know what the word means – but then again I’d personally say the same about the original version anyway (hats off to anyone who worked it out that way!).

    I agree 100% about the “these”; that’s what would turn the clue into a proper cryptic clue IMO (avoids the write-in) – though to make it fair it would probably have to say “these shapeshifters” or something.

28. Robi@24 raises a good point: is the colour of something the colour it is printed in or the colour that’s perceived, the answer to which is a resounding Yes! It’s a little like the whole homophone debate, or, dare I say it, the white/gold or blue/black dress thing of a few years ago. I just checked and found that synaesthetes comprise no more than 4% of the population, so I’ll say here (a little late) it’s perfectly understandable to be ignored. I thought it might have been an interesting point to bring up, though.

29. AP@27. I remember smiling when I got the answer, though perhaps humour was overstating it! We’ve probably discussed this clue for a lot longer than it deserves. I think we can agree that it could have been improved. 😁

30. I parsed it as like 1 = LITTLE 2= BLACK NUMBER (on the roulette wheel)

31. Dr W@28. I’m sorry you felt ignored. I didn’t know that synaesthetes were so numerous. Do numbers always have different colours for you, or is it just when 1 and 2 are presented in sequence? (Hope this doesn’t seem cheeky – I’m genuinely interested.)

32. Sh@31 All letters and digits, and Greek letters too, individual and in combination, regardless of context, although when they are printed in non-black, such as in today’s blog, the printing colour tends to be a bit more prominent. Can’t speak for other synaesthetes (I know a few, and we all have completely different colour associations). The phenomenon tends not to get in the way, and is sometimes quite beneficial, such as when trying to remember a foreign (or even unusual English) word, the colour(s) can sometimes come first, so you play around in your head with the letters that might make that colour.

33. This is the first prize I have finished in one session, and only about an hour at that, so either I’m getting better at cryptics or (more likely) this was on the easy side. I thoroughly enjoyed it whichever is the case. 🙂
    Thanks to Philistine & duncanshiell

34. We are wolves.

35. Pleasant puzzle. The answers flowed more quickly than usual, so I finished early in the week. I didn’t ring any clues with issues, so I mustn’t have had any.

36. Thanks sheffield hatter @20, I think the clue still parses without “this” but maybe I’m being pernickety.

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