Today’s blog explains a puzzle by Encota, who is a setter who has appeared in the Inquisitor five times previously, dating back to September 2017. All the puzzles have had completely different themes, so it will be interesting to see what we have this week.
The preamble was quite long and told us that some answers are too short for their allotted spaces and must
be entered with an extra space somewhere along their length; another is completely the wrong length. Thematic numbers are included in some clues (some of which have been jumbled); jumbled additions must be
removed before solving. First letters of these jumbles provide one of the unclued answers. First and last characters of the remaining ten thematic clues show how to create the entry for (a) the above and (b) the other unclued entry. Apart from spaces, real words or names are used throughout.
I didn’t understand the preamble fully, so I just barreled into the clues, hoping I would understand the preamble a bit later.
A couple of jumbles fell quite quickly – SEEDED ONE OF MINE at 2 across, and LEFT YOU FOR SHRINK at 4 down. These jumbles resolved to ‘If I needed someone‘ and ‘Think for yourself‘, which are both songs written by George Harrison of the Beatles. At this early stage, I didn’t deduce any link other than the Beatles.
As the solve went on, I began to notice additional Beatles references in the clues with mentions of Harrison, McCartney and Ringo. I also saw Norwegian Wood, which I knew was a Beatles song, but still didn’t make the final important connection.
It was fairly obvious where the blanks had to go in the 8 down entries that were too short for the cells available. The crossing letters determined where the spaces had to be. The first grid below shows the positions of the empty cells.
It wasn’t until two more jumbles fell – OH OUR GUY MIGHT LOOK IN at 20 across, and UNRULY ROOF FIRE at 31 across. With these resolving to two more Beatles songs, ‘I’m looking through you‘ and ‘Run for your life‘, I resorted to googling and found that all the songs (numbers) that I had identified were tracks on the Beatles RUBBER SOUL album. Further study of the clues, trying to match tracks from RUBBER SOUL, showed that all fourteen tracks were present in the clues, four as the jumbles, and ten in plain sight, as set out in the table below.
| Side / Track | Track Title | Present in Clue |
| Side 1 Track 1 | Drive my car | 32 across |
| 2 | Norwegian Wood | 18 across |
| 3 | You won’t see me | 9 down |
| 4 | Nowhere man | 34 across |
| 5 | Think for yourself | 4 down – jumble |
| 6 | The word | 24 across |
| 7 | Michelle | 27 down |
| Side 2 Track 8 | What goes on | 3 down |
| 9 | Girl | 7 down |
| 10 | I’m looking through you | 20 across – jumble |
| 11 | In my life | 30 down |
| 12 | Wait | 33 across |
| 13 | If I needed someone | 2 across – jumble |
| 14 | Run for your life | 31 across – jumble |
The first letter of each of the jumbles were:
| Jumble | First letter |
| seeded one of mine | S |
| oh our guy might look in | O |
| unruly roof fire | U |
| left you for shrink | L |
This spells out SOUL which fits neatly with the theme.
By this point, I had realised that the word ‘number’ in the preamble referred to songs rather than anything numeric. Initially, I thought that NUMBER might be the entry at the unclued 1 across., but realised later that it clearly wasn’t.
Before moving on to the final parts of the endgame, the grid looked like this:
The next step was to examine the ten clues that contained unjumbled track names. These were:
| No | Clue | First character | Last character |
| 18a | Tiny bit of intro to Norwegian wood replayed fake mandolin every 1 in 3 | T | 3 |
| 24a | Remarkably the word eased perhaps such soggy feet and 26 | R | 6 |
| 32a | Even safer when I drive my car with this appropriate song, or vice versa | E | A |
| 33a | A wait of 24 hours to catch the train in Illinois | A | S |
| 34a | This settling nowhere man gets public transport quietly | T | Y |
| 3d | A stick bass over first half of what goes on | A | N |
| 7d | Sky-based girl’s fortunate to give Kelvin the heave-ho | S | O |
| 9d | OK, you won’t see me in poor Spain | O | N |
| 27d | Natural retribution from strong drink served up that’s entertaining Michelle initially | N | Y |
| 30d | Ending early are two central characters in my life, swapping untruths with him | E | M |
The remaining parts of the preamble now made sense once I read the first and last letters as two distinct messages rather than trying to read the first and last letters of 18a followed by the first and last letters of 24a etc.
From the last letters we have 36, A SYNONYM. The entry at 36 across is ERASER. RUBBER is a SYNONYM of ERASER and fits neatly into the unclued 1 across.
There was a mention in the preamble that one of the answers is completely the wrong length. SOUL is obviously completely the wrong length for 21 across, but a bit of research into how the answers with spaces could be lengthened into other real words that would fill the empty spaces, revealed that the middle row could be entered as
SSSOOOUUULL
This made good sense as we would be expanding the word SOUL in an elastic or RUBBER fashion, maintaining a link to the theme. Expanding SOUL like this seems to embody the message TREAT AS ONE, but I am not entirely convinced. I may be missing something here.
The new words were
11 down BACKWORDS to BACKSWORDS
2 down UVULA to UVULAS
16 down POTHOLES to POSTHOLES
22 down OBITS to OOBITS
6 down MASER to MASERU
8 down GRUNTED to GRUNTLED
23 down PLATE to L-PLATE
10 down SHEARINGS to SHEARLINGS
The final grid looked like this:
The clues were good examples of most Inquisitor puzzles, but there is one I can’t parse properly. That is the clue at 19 down for JOHN. I’m sure someone will tell me that I have missed something obvious.
I’m not entirely sure why the puzzle is entitled Made In Britain, but I discovered that the RUBBER SOUL track listing used in the puzzle was only released in Britain and possibly Europe. Four tracks were replaced by other numbers in the version released in the United States.
| No | Detail | Letters |
| Across | ||
| 1 | Unclued (6)
|
|
| 6 |
Either Ron or Eth seeded one of mine: I turned around Australian acacia (5) Either Ron or Eth turned around Australian acacia (5) MULGA (any of several acacias, typically found in arid regions of Australia) GLUM (reference Ron and Eth GLUM, characters in the radio series ‘Take It From Here’, broadcast on the BBC Light Programme from 1948 – 1960) reversed (turned around) + A (Australian) – I think Australian is definitely part of the wordplay as I can’t find ‘a’ as an abbreviation for ‘around’. Australian could also be part of the definition. MULG< A |
|
| 12 | Each year, American plutonium is concealed in Indonesian province (5)
PAPUA (name of a province in Indonesia) (A [American] + PU [chemical symbol for plutonium]) contained in (concealed in) PA (per annum; each year) P (A PU) A |
|
| 13 | Eats around Harrison’s top town in Scotland (5)
BURGH (Scottish spelling of ‘borough’ [town], as in Jedburgh, where I am writing this blog) GRUB (food; eats) reversed (around) + H (first letter of [top] Harrison) BURG< H |
|
| 14 | We introduce author unusually sensitive to English norms (6)
AUSTEN (reference Jane AUSTEN [1775 – 1817], English author whose novels focused on the English landed gentry; author sensitive to English norms) AUSTEN (initial letters [we introduce] each of Author, Unusually, Sensitive, To, English and Norms) A U S T E N |
|
| 15 | Guaranteed rescue after getting into difficulties (6)
SECURE (certain; guaranteed) Anagram of (getting into difficulties) RESCUE SECURE* |
|
| 17 | Long deny playing samples back (4)
PYNE (alternative spelling of PINE [long]) PYNE (reversed [back] hidden word in [samples] dENY Playing) PYNE< |
|
| 18 | Tiny bit of intro to Norwegian wood replayed fake mandolin every 1 in 3 (4)
KAON (one of several types of subatomic particle of smaller mass than a proton; tiny bit) There are two wordplays for this entry (N [first letter of {introduction to}] Norwegian + OAK [type of wood]) all reversed (replayed) and KAON (every third letter [1 in 3] of faKe mAndOliN (KAO N)< and K A O N |
T 3 |
| 20 |
Oh our guy might look in sketching male drummer’s behind (7) Sketching male drummer’s behind (7) DRAFTER (one [possibly male] sketching ;drawing]; sketching male) DR (drummer) + AFTER (behind) DR AFTER |
|
| 21 | Unclued (12)
|
|
| 24 | Remarkably the word eased perhaps such soggy feet and 26 (7)
WETSHOD (having wet shoes or feet) THE WORD EASED is an anagram of (remarkably) WETSHOD (the entry here) and DEARE (the entry at 26 down) WETSHOD |
R 6 |
| 27 | It’s worn by half of like PSNI but only outside (4)
KEPI (flat-topped French military cap with a straight peak; it’s worn [on the head]) KE (two of the four letters [half] of liKE) + PI (outer letters of [outside] PsnI) KE PI |
|
| 28 | Letter from Senegal bearing word of welcome (4)
SHIN (twenty-first letter of the Hebrew alphabet) SN (international Vehicle Registration for Senegal) containing (bearing) HI (word of welcome) S (HI) N |
|
| 31 |
Figures unruly roof fire twice briefly after gazelle returns (6) Figures twice briefly after gazelle returns (6) RHOMBI (two or more equilateral parallelograms [figures]) MOHR (a West African gazelle) reversed (returns) + BI- (a prefix [something brief] indicating two, twice or double) RHOM< BI |
|
| 32 | Even safer when I drive my car with this appropriate song, or vice versa (6)
AIRBAG (an item that makes driving even safer in the case of an accident) AIR (song) + BAG (steal; appropriate) which is the opposite positioning of ‘appropriate song’ in the clue (vice-versa) AIR BAG |
E A |
| 33 | A wait of 24 hours to catch the train in Illinois (5)
DELAY (a wait) DAY (period of 24 hours) containing (to catch) EL (American [Illinois] term for an elevated railroad [somewhere you could catch the train]) – another clue where at least one word is doing duty. In this case, catch D (EL) AY |
A S |
| 34 | This settling nowhere man gets public transport quietly (5)
TRAMP (vagrant, someone, usually a man, who has nowhere to settle) TRAM (form of public transport) + P (piano; quietly) TRAM P |
T Y |
| 35 | Founding brother in rock band as above (5)
REMUS (REMUS is the twin brother of ROMULUS. Together they founded the city of Rome) R.E.M (name of an American rock band founded in 1980) + US (Latin for Ut Supra [as above]) REM US |
|
| 36 | Creator of space opera series in part (6)
ERASER (an eraser rubs things out and creates space) ERASER (hidden word in [part] opERA SERies) ERASER |
|
| Down | ||
| 2 | Suspended body part could be found pickled in Tuvalu, after time (6)
UVULA (the fleshy conical body suspended from the palate over the back part of the tongue; suspended body part) Anagram of (pickled) the letters of tUVALU following the T (time) UVULA* Entered as ‘UVULA space’ |
|
| 3 | A stick bass over first half of what goes on (5)
BATON (staff or stick) B (bass) + AT (letters remaining in whAT after the first half WH is excluded [goes]) + ON B AT ON – as this is a down entry, the letter B is positioned over ATON |
A N |
| 4 |
Sabre’s cousin and some lifepeers left you for shrink (4) Sabre’s cousin and some lifepeers (4) ÉPÉE (the three weapons used in fencing are sabre, ÉPÉE and foil – on the internet, I have found a few references to the informal use of the term ‘cousins’ to describe the weapons) EPEE (hidden word in [some] lifE PEErs) EPEE |
|
| 5 | Follow a course – Spenser perhaps – by letter (5)
RUNED (written in or inscribed by ancient letters) RUN (follow a course) + ED (One ED well known to crossword solvers is EDmund Spenser [circa 1552 – 1599], author of The Faerie Queene) RUN ED |
|
| 6 | Amplifier McCartney’s first used as overtures to Eleanor Rigby (6)
MASER (a device used to amplify long-range radar and radio astronomy signals (very small when not amplified) while generating little unwanted noise within itself; amplifier) M (initial letter of [first] McCartney] + AS + ER (initial letters of [overtures to] each of Eleanor and Rigby) – I think ‘used’ is just telling us that M is used in the word play M AS ER Enter as ‘MASER space’ |
|
| 7 | Sky-based girl’s fortunate to give Kelvin the heave-ho (4)
LUCY (reference the Beatles song, ‘LUCY In The Sky With Diamonds’; sky-based girl) LUCkY (fortunate) excluding (giving … the heave-ho) K (kelvin [unit of thermo-dynamic temperature]) LUCY |
S O |
| 8 | Made noise like Piggies, or little one eating fish locally? Quite the reverse! (8)
GRUNTED (made a noise like little piggies) GED (Scottish or Northern English dialect [locally] for the pike or luce; fish locally) containing (eating) RUNT (smallest pig of the litter; little one) – this construction is the opposite of that described in the clue [quite the reverse] G (RUNT) ED Entered as ‘GRUNT space ED‘ |
|
| 9 | OK, you won’t see me in poor Spain (5)
AGREE (OK) meAGRE (poor) excluding (you won’t see) + E (International Vehicle Registration for Spain) AGRE E |
O N |
| 10 | Ringo’s endlessly entertained by alter ego Billy’s haircuts? (10)
SHEARING (cutting the hair of goats (billy goats) – Angola goats can be sheared) I’m not sure of the wordplay here. I can see RING as a representation of RINGo endlessly (excluding the final letter O), but I don’t see where ‘alter ego’ comes into play. SHEARING – entered as ‘SHEAR space ING‘ |
|
| 11 | Footballer texts withdrawn promises (10)
BACKWORDS (withdrawn promises) BACK (position of a footballer) + WORDS (tests) BACKWORDS – entered as ‘BACK space WORDS‘ |
|
| 16 | Post Office PIN in danger on the street (8)
POTHOLE (hole worn in a road surface; danger on the street) PO (Post Office) + THOLE (a pin in the side of a boat to keep the oar in place) PO T HOLE Entered as ‘PO space THOLE‘ |
|
| 17 | Catch Dua Lipa broadcasting without aid, composed (4)
PAUL (PAUL McCartney of the Beatles composed songs) Anagram of (broadcasting) dUa LiPA excluding (without) AID PAUL* |
|
| 19 | WC Fields, away from restraint, enters tiddly after start of juggling (4)
JOHN (slang term for a toilet [water closet {WC}]) J (first letter of [start of] Juggling) + (H [fields away from restraint{?}] contained in [enters] ON [on the way to being drunk; tiddly]) – you can tell that I don’t understand the wordplay here J O (H) N |
|
| 22 | Passing Notes impacted Operating System limits (6)
OBITS (obituaries; notes on the passing [death] of someone; passing notes) OS (operating System) containing (limits) BIT cut or penetrated; impacted) O (BIT) S Entered as ‘space OBITS‘ |
|
| 23 | 17’s opening most recent cover (6)
PLATE (a cover) P (first letter of either PYNE (17 across] and PAUL (17 down]. Technically, I think I should just refer to 17 down ,as this is a down clue) + LATE (most recent) P LATE Entered as ‘space LATE‘ |
|
| 25 | Amorously cheekier twice removing top in Sandown location (5)
ESHER (town next to Sandown racecourse) frESHER (cheekier) excluding the first letter F and then excluding the subsequent first letter R [twice removing top] ESHER |
|
| 26 | 19’s grievous gamble taking drug (5)
DEARE (JOHN [19 down] Milton [1608 – 1674], English poet’s word for ‘grievous’) DARE (ganble) containing (taking) E (ecstasy tablet; drug) D (E) ARE |
|
| 27 | Natural retribution from strong drink served up that’s entertaining Michelle initially (5)
KARMA (the concept of such transcendental retribution; the theory of inevitable consequence generally; natural retribution) ARAK (alternative spelling of ARRACK [strong alcoholic drink made in Asian countries from toddy, or the fermented juice of the coco and other palms]) reversed (served up; down entry) containing (that’s entertaining) M (first letter of [initially] Michelle) KAR (M) A< |
N Y |
| 29 | Independent Morocco’s male leader (4)
IMAM (the officer who leads the devotions in a mosque; leader) I (independent) + MA (International Vehicle Registration for Morocco) + M (male) I MA M |
|
| 30 | Ending early are two central characters in my life, swapping untruths with him (4)
LIAR (someone [him] who voices untruths; untruths with him) ARe excluding the final letter E (ending early) + LI (the two central characters in ‘my LIfe’) – the two two-letter components are then swapped round (swapping) to for LI AR LI AR |
E M |
“TREAT AS ONE” maybe intended to be read as “treat as 1” i.e. “treat as rubber”? thanks for the writeup!
I think treat as one means treat as rubber. So stretch the S, O, U and L to fill three cells?
Took a while, but (nearly) got there in the end, only failing to work out that treating soul as rubber would give you a 12-letter word. So 9/10 this week. Enjoyed finding the tune titles and working out the jumbles. There’s got to be scope for a fiendish Revolver-themed IQ out there, but I’ll leave that to a more ingenious mind than mine. Thanks to Encota for stretching my brain and reminding me of some great songs, and to Duncan for the intrepid exposition (sorry, I couldn’t parse 19 DN either).
I also went for the ‘stretched SOUL’ on the same basis as Bees@1, but wasn’t convinced either. First of all “TREAT AS ONE” comes before “36a SYNONYM” (so nothing there to be inspired by yet) and then for consistency it should be “TREAT AS 1a” (which I know would be a letter short, so perhaps 1ac).
I was also perplexed by the “entry that is completely the wrong length” and hadn’t considered that it could be 21a given that wasn’t really an entry but more a deduction from the extra / first letters. But I’m sure you’re right as there doesn’t seem to be another candidate.
Could 19d be fields = LEAS away from restraint = LEASH? I couldn’t figure that one out either.
That aside, a really tough but very enjoyable challenge with a lot of different layers. Must listen to the album now!
Thank you to setter and blogger.
No glory for me, alas. I solved all the actual clues and could see the Beatles looming in several places, but don’t know my way around their discography well enough to recognize or guess more than a very few “numbers” (even unjumbled), and had never heard of the album title. Will go and stand in the dunce’s corner now.
Arnold @4 — I’m entirely convinced by that explanation of 19D! Thanks. Likewise to Encota
and duncanshiell.
6A: I thought either Ron or Eth could be described as A GLUM — they’re both Glums after all — and so too Australian as part of the definition.
David @5 surely without the help of the Internet no-one would be able to complete this (and indeed most) Inquisitors?
Well I certainly wouldn’t be.
Did anyone mention that the LP was released in UK on 03-Dec-65?
I had LEAS away from LEASH, just as Arnold @4 says.
And also 36a, SYNONYM rather than 36, A SYNONYM.
(Plus the same misgivings over TREAT AS ONE or TREAT AS 1.)
Lastly, I entered the middle row as {-S-}{-O-}{-U-}{-L-}, stretching each letter across 3 cells rather than triplicating – after all, that’s a real word (as the preamble says) whereas SSSOOOUUULLL isn’t.
Rather hard puzzle, but thanks Encota, and also Duncan.
Long time lurker, first time commenting. My mum and I both do the IQ every week and have done for probably 3 years or so now.
A complete failure for me, this one. The preamble was unhelpfully vague in multiple ways, which started me off on the wrong foot. I did solve a number of clues but couldn’t make any headway with the ‘numbers’.
What really didn’t help is that we both then headed off in completely the wrong direction! I commented that ‘number’ might mean anaesthetic, and when Mum was the first to find a jumble (unruly roof fire), she thus came up with ‘fluorine’ (and also ‘four’) from the letters, plus a spare r and y that confused us (unsurprisingly!). We identified some more possible jumbles but couldn’t get any further – until I (erroneously it turns out) thought that ‘what goes’ in 3d was a jumble and turned it into TWO, GAS, HE (Helium being a gas and number 2 in the periodic table). Well and truly on the wrong track now, the jumbles thus stubbornly refused to make sense. Getting ever more frustrated by that, the vagueness of the preamble and the puzzle as a whole, I eventually abandoned it. Mum did manage to fill the grid at least though!
Unsurprisingly, I cannot offer any further elucidation for 19d! Its counterpart, Paul at 17d, confused me also – the wordplay clearly gave PAUL, but the type of catch (which I assumed to be the definition) is spelt PAWL, and I couldn’t find PAUL as an alternative spelling anywhere. Mum got 2a from the crossing letters, but we couldn’t make head nor tail of the parsing – never come across Ron and Eth GLUM before so we had no chance! (I actually thought ‘Either Ron or Eth’ was the jumbled part, it looked so odd).
Although I’m quite familiar with The Beatles, I was unaware of the Rubber Soul album and unfamiliar with all of its songs (except for Norwegian Wood, which I did notice but thought nothing of), so would never have found the remaining titles or been able to sort the endgame. Looking at it now, that along with Paul McCartney and Eleanor Rigby in successive clues do stand out, but blind alleys and frustration prevented any connection from coming to light at the time!
Nevertheless, thanks to Duncan for explaining everything and putting us out of our misery, and to Encota for the puzzle.
Another small point: the preamble says “another [answer] is completely the wrong length”. In my book, SOUL is an entry but not an answer.
‘Treat as one’ has to be up there with one the most ambiguous endgame instructions ever in an Inqy, and it’s up against some stiff competition. It may be that it’s asking you to treat as ‘rubber’ but that’s inconsistent with use of numerals for the second part of the message.
19d is LEAS(H) for the H. Not going to be a contender for wordplay of the year any time soon.
As you can probably tell, I wasn’t a fan of this puzzle at all (and yes I did complete it). I’ve no doubt it was a labour of love for the setter but the jumbled song titles really add nothing to the solve once you’ve got Google involved (which you have to if you don’t know the titles by heart). One for the fans.
PS – I was also thrown by the ‘too short’ for the space allowed entry. The preamble was unhelpful and I never imagined it would be soul for the same reasons Arnold has so eloquently put already
@yogdaws – if you haven’t already, I urge you to invest in the online Chambers dictionary, which does have PAUL as an alternative for PAWL and is generally the go-to dictionary here and for the Listener (though with occasional exceptions)
I also found ‘remaining ten thematic clues’ ambiguous, but then, I failed the four jumbles and only spotted six of the songs. A research-light week. Thanks to Encota and Duncan for a tricky week.
Welcome to @yogdaws; it was fun to read about your blind alleys; we’ve all been there. I kept wondering when George and Ringo were going to show up in the grid.
@Bingy: my Chambers needs replacing. Is online Chambers superior to the paper version (apart from being lighter)? I’ve never used it.
Neil @12 the main benefit of the Chambers App is that you can search for incomplete words (eg BAC_W_R_S) or anagrams (eg KRWSCAABD).
You may call that cheating and I would not normally use it for standard cryptics, but I couldn’t finish Inquisitors without that help. As it is I probably spend 5-10 hours each weekend so I don’t feel too bad about it!
@ Neil Hunter
Sorry I meant the Chambers app, which automatically updates. In my view it is a godsend for barred puzzles – as arnold points out, it has a search facility which is extremely useful. It’s years since I’ve used the paper version so I can’t properly compare but as I say it is updated regularly and I don’t recall there being any occasions when an entry has not been in there (unless specifically stated by the preamble)
Thanks to Encota for the enjoyable puzzle, and Duncan for his solution. I had to ‘bounce’ around wiki quite a bit for this one: the track listings for the Rubber Soul album, and a few of the word definitions (Deare? Pyne???).
NB – 10D. ‘Billy Shears’ was the alter-ego that Paul McCartney gave to Ringo for the Sgt Pepper album (ref. Wiki). Hope that helps wit the parsing of that clue.
Like others, I had no idea how to parse 19D, but ‘John’ seemed apposite, so in it went,
My ‘Soul’ was stretched S—O–U—L; it seems the slightly ambiguous preamble gave rise to a variety of solutions.
All-in-all, a lot of fun, not least as it led me to re-listen to one of my favourite Beatles albums.
Rich @15 yes good point! I think 10d is ING (= Ringo endlessly) inside (entertained by) SHEARS (=alter ego Billy), with the definition being only “haircuts”. NB in the explanatory table (but not the grid) the final S is missing.
Grateful to those who have elucidated JOHN and SHEARINGS, and it sounds as if PAUL, rather like KAON, has a double definition along with its wordplay. The ingenious addition of Piggies and Eleanor Rigby in the clues distracted me into thinking about far too wide a range of Beatles songs, as well as messing up my list of first and last letter clues; some of the Rubber Soul song titles are scarcely catchy and concealed themselves very readily. On Made in Britain, Duncan and Holy Ghost have both indicated some relevant facts about unique tracks and the release date; I think the Rubber Soul title was also meant to signal that the Beatles were consciously taking Soul music, as an American genre, and stretching it into something different and distinctively British (or even Liverpudlian). Thanks to Encota for an enjoyable puzzle and to Duncan for a very thorough blog.