Crossword News June 2024

 

Crossword News June 2024

The May Prize Puzzle was Singing by Chalicea. According to Fitzgerald in the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam the poet only needed 'a loaf of bread', 'a flask of wine', 'a book of verse' and 'thou' beside me singing in the wilderness to turn the 'wilderness' to 'paradise enow'.

Here are some of the comments from solvers.

I first heard of Omar Khayyam in a mathematics class, but I knew he also wrote poetry and strongly associate the word in the circled cells with him. I must have seen some version of the thematic poem, but I can't remember if it was the translation appearing in ODQ. I thought it was neat that four of the unclued entries are 12-letter phrases from the translation.  I wondered if it was deliberate that A GLASS OF WINE could also fit at 1d.  A while after submitting my entry I noticed that the grid is a pangram, which I assume is deliberate. It isn't something I would normally look for, but I was checking that I had sent my entry and realised that the grid contained J, Q, X and Z so I thought I should check if any other letter was missing.

Thank you Chalicea. There was plenty at school that was learned because I had to but this (along with "The moving finger writes...") was the first poetry that I learned because I liked it.  My older brother had discovered it before me.  Not long after that I found myself resident in Woodbridge, Suffolk, where (according to the blue plaque) Edward Fitzgerald lived for a while.  So I spotted the theme very quickly and enjoyed it very much.  Thank you.

A gentle solve which led to Omar Khayyam's beautiful verse. It makes me wonder what the equivalent would be for the young lovers of today. Maybe the loaf of bread and flask of wine would be a can of Red Bull and a bag of Doritos? We can be thankful that he wrote it when he did. Many thanks to Chalicea and the Crossword Centre.

Many solvers commented that this was an easy Chalicea puzzle, but there was a record number of wrong entries. There were 66 entries, of which 26 were marked incorrect, mainly for GLASS instead of FLASK OF WINE. The lucky winner, picked from the electronic hat, was Graham O’Neill from Purley, Surrey, who will be receiving a copy of Chambers Crossword Dictionary, which was donated by the publishers.

There is a full solution at https://crosswordcentre.blogspot.com/2024/06/solution-to-singing-by-chalicea.html

There is still time for you to solve the June challenge, Sage Derby by Vagans. https://crosswordcentre.blogspot.com/2024/05/june-2024-prize-puzzle-sage-derby-by.html

The Prize Puzzle for July will be White Label by Henri. Henri is an Englishman living in France who stays connected to his mother tongue through solving and setting cryptic crosswords. One of the top setters on MyCrossword.co.uk with over 75 regular cryptic puzzles, Henri branched out into setting barred thematic puzzles in 2023.

We will also be publishing a summer special in July. Mate in Two by the Badger will be a delight for solvers who like playing chess. This puzzle will not count for annual statistics and I will offer a prize for the winning entry.

The Badger is now retired after a career in the financial services industry and has recently celebrated 50 years since he did (to be more accurate, partly did) his first crossword.  The earliest crosswords were done on rest breaks during cycle rides with his gran in the Yorkshire moors.  Initially these were puzzles from monthly puzzle magazines and plain crosswords from newspapers.  But later, there was an epiphany with the discovery of the cryptic crossword.  Addiction followed.  But it is the transition from standard cryptic puzzles to thematic puzzles which cemented the addiction.  That feeling with each puzzle when the penny drops and suddenly the fog clears.  Or the frustration when the fog remains thick and the puzzle has to be put down for review and a future rethink.  Away from crosswords, the other main hobby of The Badger is travelling (which fits in very well with crosswords since both can be tackled together).  The target is to try and visit all of the Hillman 1000 wonders of the world list (worth a look for those who have not seen it before and enjoy travelling).  Admittedly this is a truly impossible task to complete without both winning the lottery and living to be aged 120.  But like completing a crossword which seems impossible at the outset, it is as much about the journey as the completion.
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I was shocked by the death of Richard Rogan, crossword editor of The Times. His wife posted on Facebook that he had died following a heart attack.

Richard took on the role of editor in 2014. He composed many tough Times cryptics, Quick Cryptics as Felix and puzzles in the Independent as Bannsider. He also had 12 Listener crosswords as Aragon.

Apart from his crossword skills, he will be remembered for his good nature, sense of humour and conviviality. He leaves a wife, Malika, and a son, Liam.

An obituary in The Times https://www.thetimes.com/uk/obituaries/article/richard-rogan-obituary-innovative-crossword-editor-of-the-times-2mh3nh392
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It is with sadness that I also note the recent death of Allan Scott, a long-serving setter of Times Cryptic and Quick Cryptic crosswords. As Ascot he had 24 Listener crosswords published from 1977 to 2006. He will be remembered for donating the two Listener trophies, the Solver Silver Salver and the Ascot Gold Cup.
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The last time we had a chess-themed crossword was in July 2004, A Chessword Puzzle by Radix, the late Roddy Forman. It was a tour de force where Radix invented four new chess pieces, the Amazon combined the powers of Queen & Knight, a Crusader those of King & Knight, an Emperor those of King & Rook, and a Pontiff those of King & Bishop. It certainly was tough. We had only 20 entries and, marked by Roddy, there were few correct solutions. However, one solver had cracked it and it was AJ Moore who received the prize and a cheque for £100, donated by the setter. You can try this puzzle at https://crosswordcentre.blogspot.com/p/our-toughest-crossword.html

When I looked for the solution, it had disappeared from the internet. I asked Larry Baum if he had kept a solution and he hadn’t, but offered to solve it. Larry soon found a way of tackling it. Just then, AJ replied to my email and sent a copy of his solution. Of course, he files all his entries. I shall be replacing the solution shortly.
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The latest Azed Slip is now available on the Crossword Centre with the clues for RATTY.
http://www.crossword.org.uk/Azedslip.html

Dafydd Price Jones won first prize with this.

Thames water vole? One’s seen in River Tees and then Wye!

(a in R tt + y; ref ‘The Wind in the Willows’).
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John Nolan’s The Very Logical Prize Puzzle is now on a new address. Make a note of it.
https://johnnolantheverylogicalprizepuzzle.blogspot.com/
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Tim Moorey had his 500^th and final Mephisto crossword in the Sunday Times. He fitted a farewell message and this great clue.

Wherein one could find orgasms are a plus naughtily? (7, 8)
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The auction of Stephen Sondheim’s collection at Doyle’s of New York made almost £400,00. The framed crossword given to Sondheim on his birthday in 2014 by John Henderson, Enigmatist, sold for over $400.
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Thanks to Barry Joseph for this snippet.

On April 28, 1969, New York magazine printed the results of the competition to mark their one-year anniversary. The challenge: parody any writer or department at the magazine.

A David Axelrod of NYC won a runner-up prize for submitting Do I Hear a Waltz? While not a cryptic crossword puzzle, it’s a note-perfect parody of the sort of rules Sondheim used to introduce each one of his in the previous year.

“Answers contain six Serbo-Croatian words, a Nicaraguan idiom, 11 words made up by the author, four outrageous puns and a far-fetched definition of ‘tinderbox’ Three of the definitions are in Norwegian, and two must be held up to a mirror. One letter in each answer does not fit into the diagram. Then unchecked letters may be arranged to spell “I HATE YOU, STEPHEN SONDHE”
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Best wishes
Derek