Enigmatic Variations 1216: Border by Chalicea

Borders are a bit of a hot topic at the moment – with the EU struggling with the refugee crisis, Donald Trump threatening to build a wall to ‘keep the Mexicans out’, and the Canadians thinking about building one to keep all the Americans out if Trump wins… So what type of BORDER does Chalicea have for us this week?

The full preamble states that:

“In each clue, the wordplay leads to the answer and an additional letter not to be entered into the grid; in clue order, these identify an attitude to a BORDER that must be highlighted, along with the speaker’s initials (a total of 28 cells). A number of answers are appropriately positioned in relation to the unclued 17ac. Chambers Dictionary (2014) and the Oxford Dictionary of Quotations are recommended.”

Short and sweet – extra letters providing a quotation with attitude, to be highlighted, and one unclued entry which stretches all the way across the grid. It helps that it is ALL clues that have the extra letter – so no trying to work out which ones do and which ones don’t.

After a fairly fruitful first pass at this puzzle, I had a good few entries, several crossing 17A and pretty much enough to guess at it being HADRIAN’S WALL – so we have a BORDER, although technically speaking I don’t think the wall forms any part of the current border between England and Scotland? (I did walk most of it once, well, more of a glorified pub-crawl, and don’t remember having to bring my passport!)

I also had PICT and CELTS ‘above’ the wall – which kind of tallied with the reference to some answers being ‘appropriately positioned’ in relation to the 17A.

It took a while for the extra letters to start making sense, but as they fell in to place I could see a few pieces like ‘NOBLEST’ and ‘??SPECT FOR’ and ‘NORTH’ and ‘LIGHT’. I initially read this as NOBLEST RESPECT and started searching for quotations with these words in them, but soon enough came across the words of Samuel Johnson:

“The noblest prospect which a Scotchman ever sees, is the high road that leads him to England!”

(In fact Mr Johnson seems to have had quite a few scathing remarks to say about our northern cousins/neighbours.)

So we have a quotation and a speaker, we have a ‘border’ and some appropriately positioned answers…almost there…ah, yes, POMS below the border as well.

It took a while to find the quotation even then – it wasn’t on the main diagonals, or in any obvious block – or around the border… in the end it was to be found in ‘stripes’ across the grid, which is a method I have seen occasionally before:

 

The extra letters finally spelled out: ‘THE NOBLEST PROSPECT FOR ONE NORTH OF UNCLUED LIGHT’ (Johnson’s ‘Scotchman’) and the stripes gave a slightly paraphrased version of the quote: ‘(the) HIGH ROAD THAT LEADS (him) TO ENGLAND’, plus the initials ‘SJ’.

Well, I hope Chalicea doesn’t have any Scottish friends or acquaintances who will be offended by her use of this quote, but it is a nicely constructed puzzle (I have never even created a normal blocked grid, so how you can ‘stripe’ something this long and fit a grid of real words around it is beyond me!), that in the end wasn’t too taxing and gave me a smile once I got there. And in her defence, she did put the ‘EEJITS’ south of the border as well…although SLOTHS and PARIAH were also mostly above…I’ll stop stirring now…

LOI, or rather last one parsed satisfactorily, was REST at 8D, with ROESTI as a variation of ROSTI being new to me, and I took a diversion (the low road instead of the high road?) by first entering SLUSHY rather than SLOSHY at 26D, giving me the wrong additional letter for a while.

 

Across
Clue No	Solution	Additional letter	Clue (definition underlined), additional letter in [] / Logic/Parsing
1	SPEARS	T	Pierces heart of despot and rips (6) / SP (‘heart’ of deSPot) + [T]EARS (rips)
6	SCRAPS	H	Ditches bit of shattered pedal in accident (6) / S (first letter, or bit, of Shattered) + CRA_S[H] (accident) around P (pedal, musical term)
11	RHAPHE	E	Royal engineers hold mound on hard ridge (6) / R_E (Royal Engineers, army), around (holding) H[E]AP (mound) + H (hard)
12	ERSE	N	Sneer about language of 7 (4) / anag (i.e. ‘around’) of S[N]EER
14	ORGY	O	Surprisingly groovy but not very wild gathering (4) / anag (i.e. surprisingly) of GRO[O][V]Y without V (very)
15	ILL-SEEN	B	Badly versed bishop’s office naively at first pursuing draft of law (7, two words) / [B]ILL (draft of law) plus (pursued by) SEE (bishop’s office) + N (Naively, at first)
16	PICT	L	Steele’s painted lady sending back end of worst section of film (4) / T (end of worsT) + C[L]IP (section of film) – all sent back
17	HADRIAN’S WALL		See preamble (12, two words) / Thematic deduction
20	SHIAH	E	Religious Asian girl getting one a husband (5) / SH[E] (girl) + I (one) + A + H (husband)
21	VELIGER	S	Skittish grilse following disembowelled valvate mollusc larva (7) / VE (disembowelled ValvatE) + LIGER (anag, i.e. skittish, of GRIL[S]E
23	ARCTOID	T	Bear-like deranged dictator (7) / anag (i.e. deraged) of DICTA[T]OR
25	E-NOSE	P	Sniffing device to keep with bone and flesh essentially (5) / [P]EN (keep) + OS (bone) + E (essence, or centre, of flEsh)
28	MODERATE GALE	R	Area with this weather forecast might cause alarm to a degree (12, two words) / Cryptic Definition? anag (i.e. might cause) of ALARM TO [A] DEG[R]EE – less A (area)
35	POMS	O	In Perth the English disease’s got into local fix (4) / PO_[O] (‘in the poo’, Australian dialect for an awkward situation, or fix) around MS (Multiple Sclerosis, disease)
36	OMNEITY	S	It’s money that changes the condition of God? (7) / anag (i.e. that changes) of IT[S] MONEY
37	NISI	P	Small measures of drink Islam originally ratified unless certain conditions are met (4) / NI[P]S (small measures of drink) + I (initial, or original, letter of Islam)
38	ESSE	E	Existence within Chinese settlement (4) / hidden word in ‘chinES[E] SEttlement’
39	SEE RED	C	Be irked by countermanded orders (6, two words) / DE[C]REES – orders – reversed, or countermanded
40	REEDEN	T	Grassy network and lair (6) / RE[T]E (network) + DEN (lair)
41	RENEYS	F	Forswears forgotten retrograde desire held by umpires (6) / RE[F]_S (umpires) around (holding) NEY (yen, or desire, retrograde)
Down
Clue No	Solution	Additional letter	Clue (definition underlined), additional letter in []  / Logic/Parsing
1	SLOTHS	O	Individual performances involving principally tree height mammals (6) / S[O]LO_S (individual performances) around 9involving) TH (principal, or first, letters of Tree Height)
2	PARIAH	R	Social outcast bungled harp air (6) / anag (i.e. bungled) of HARP AI[R]
3	ERGODIC	O	Of a statistical probability fine, centrally valid (7) / ER_IC (irish, blood-fine) with GO[O]D (valid) ‘centrally’
4	RADII	N	Feather barbules topped Italian decorations for raised ledge behind altar (5) / [G]RADI[N]I (Italian altar decorations, ‘topped’ by removing first letter)
5	SPICA	E	Bandage human foot up on invalid care allowance (5) / S[E]P (pes, the human foot, up) + ICA (abbrev. Invalid Care Allowance)
7	CELTS	N	Highlanders line in small change (5) / CE[N]_TS (small change) around L (line)
8	REST	O	Leftover potato dish, last bit gone (4) / R[O]EST[I] – potato dish, with last letter gone
9	ARENA	R	Region surrounding Royal Navy sphere of action (5) / ARE_A (region) around (surrounding) [R]N (Royal Navy)
10	SENA	T	Governing body contracted paramilitary political organisation (4) / SENA[T][E] (governing body, contracted)
13	SELLE	H	Outer framework on English seat (old style) (5) / S[H]ELL (outer framework) on E (English)
16	PRATE	O	Talk foolishly and work without initial showing of energy (5) / [O]P[E]RATE (work, without first occurrence of E – energy)
18	NED	F	Fend off teenage hoodlum (3) / anag (i.e. off) of [F]END
19	WINGS	U	Woman unusually suing players (5) / W (woman) + INGS (anag, i.e. unusually, of S[U]ING
21	VIA	N	Way article of food is docked (3) / VIA[N][D] (article of food, last letter docked)
22	GO ASIDE	C	I do a GCSE badly and retire (7, two words) / anag (i.e. badly) of I DO A G[C]SE
24	ROAMS	L	Charitable relief supports run out, moves around aimlessly (5) / RO (run out, cricket) on (supported by) A[L]MS (charitable relief)
26	SLOSHY	U	Abnormally shy soul, informally said to be extremely sentimental (6) / anag (i.e. abnormally) of SHY SO[U]L
27	EEJITS	E	Imbeciles according to Dubliners set up after early English jig stops short (6) / EE (Early English) + JI[G] (stopping short) + T[E]S (set, up)
29	DENSE	D	Nuclear ship engaged in exploit – extremely stupid, it’s said (5) / DE_E[D] (exploit) around (angaging) NS (Nuclear Ship)
30	RAISE	L	Exalt Israel inordinately (5) / anag (i.e. inordinately) of ISRAE[L]
31	TOYER	I	American apron wrapping Ian’s grandchild, one who plays idly (5) / T[I]_ER (US for apron, something that ties) around (wrapping) OY (Scottish for grandchild)
32	EMURE	G	According to the bard, enclose precious stone with out-of-date practice (5) / [G]EM (precious stone) = URE (archaic for usage, practice)
33	BOER	H	Farmer turning up in rehab getting over having dropped alcohol primarily (4) / BOER = RE[H][A]B dropping A (alcohol, primarily) and gaining O (over, cricket) – all turned up
34	SEED	T	Horse offspring (4) / S[T]EED (double defn. STEED = horse, SEED = offspring)