Listener Crossword 4262 - One Across By Mr Magoo

[starwalker]

Was a bit upset to have to put the latest Magpie (plug, plug) aside, but lo and behold - it's a Magoo ! With just a couple of clues to go, the light has dawned and the penny has hit the ground. Just a little tricky partitioning to go, and then it's back to the Magpie. (plug) Thanks Magoo.

[bobbycollins]

Rudeness such as Alekhines is one of the reasons that I have ceased to comment here.

[s_pugh]

Thanks to Mr Magoo for a fun but fair challenge. I too didn't need to resolve all of the answers but this didn't spoil my enjoyment of a very neatly worked construction. At least it was a little light relief after last week's word search. Now that WAS a yawn!

[Cruncher]

I'm in the grumbly camp. I think it's a clever construction - although I also remember a previous Listener on this theme - but feel a bit frustrated by some of the entries: 13ac for instance is a 9-letter answer with only 3 letters cross-checked and a lot of possible letters to choose from for the missing 6 letters. Seems a bit unfair. Out of personal honour I will winkle out all the answers but it's a rather thankless task

[Mesnilpat]

I'm not in the grumbly camp, I admire the clever construction but did find some of the clues surprisingly easy to solve - still, it has meant lots of time for the garden in the autumn sunshine, lovely!

[Whenland]

We quite liked 13ac - in fact the whole puzzle. We have also been musing about whether the same idea would have worked on an 8 x 9 grid. There is an alternative spelling in the BRB that would have permitted the same title to be for a grid of that size, but the grid actually used has a certain elegance to it. Thank you Mr M.

[perseverer]

Well I would have liked more clues to solve, but I don't think the grid could have been easy to construct. The nature of the puzzle does rather constrain the grid to certain sizes, so I don't think 8 x 9 is feasible.

And to harp back to last week's, if you follow the instructions as given by the preamble, you don't really have a word search as such.

[Alekhine]

bobbycollins,

If my apparent 'rudeness' offends and prevents you from posting, let me fix that a stroke and vow not to appear here again.

Bye!

[sunny-dave]

Gentlemen please - let's not have any "handbags at 30 paces" on The Listener thread - it's just not the done thing ...

[jim360]

There's room for differing opinions about any puzzle. No need to get into a tizzy about it.

[Mesnilpat]

Well said Sunny Dave and jim360.

[Cloverjo]

I find Alekhine's remarks quite amusing sometimes. His disdain for some puzzles fits his rather forbidding-looking avatar.

[Alan7777]

I do hope everyone continues to post their comments and it would be much less interesting if all the comments were anodyne. I don't often post as by the time I've got anything to say it's already been said. But I do enjoy reading the threads.

And the tortoise does sometimes win the prize.

I too have finished this although there are a few clues I haven't yet solved.

[teuchter2]

I've been on holiday, so a bit out of circulation. I did manage last weeks rather belatedly and didn't like the look of 4260. I could have been in the Friday club if I had bothered to do the partitioning before going to bed, but left it for the morning. It was pretty obvious what to do once you got the title clue. Incidentally, I loved the 'chefs' title - very clever.

[aldanna]

Only got round to posting now, despite making the Friday club. I thought the gridfill fell into place surprisingly easily despite the vague preamble, at which point I thought I had finished until Himself pointed out the partitioning. That too was not hard, but I am with Jim on admiration for the planning that ensured there is a unique solution.

[tilbee]

Always grateful to have an easier puzzle at the start of the month when the new Magpie has been published (yet another plug). Although not too challenging you do have to admire the construction. Thanks to Mr Magoo.

[ScillyPeople]

Just want to comment on all this 'join the Friday club' stuff. Here on Isles of Scilly we are pleased to get the Saturday paper delivered by plane by late morning Saturday. If its bad weather (winter coming up) then Saturday goes AWOL and there is no transport here on Sunday. So for us joining the Monday club is a rarity! So not too many hints so we can enjoy our crossword whilst you lot are presumably resting your brains.

[Contrarian]

Alekhine,

I appreciate your rather dry comments too.

And I agree that it is a legitimate criticism that the puzzle could be solved independently of some of the clues (although, isn't that often the case with Listener puzzles that contain relatively few unchecked cells?). The fault is perhaps more significant here because of the relative simplicity of the clues.

[IainGrace]

Some puzzles do indeed have few unchecked letters, but that just allows one sometimes to complete the grid entry without solving the clue. Here, one needn't even know the "real" grid entry, let alone solve the clue, which is inherently unsatisfactory.

[EAChaplin]

That criticism didn't bother me as I took the scenic route, which gave me more pleasure, by doing all the solving first. Thanks Mr Magoo for an enjoyable puzzle. I do have just a tiny niggle. The final appearance of my finely crafted pieces was marred by a couple of pre-existing elements.

[Staurologist]

I don't think that Alekhine's remarks were rude at all, although I did think that he might have gone for the A cup by injecting some humour, or giving himself a look in, at any rate.

There are solvers' puzzles and setters' puzzles. The best are both. For me, this one was firmly in the latter camp. As a setter, I hugely admire the construction, even though the idea has been used before. As a solver I found it rather tedious. Araucaria has said of Mr Magoo that "he seems to lose interest after construction of the grid" (quoted in Jonathan Crowther's "A-Z of Crosswords").

Incidentally, the Oxford Companion to Chess says of the original Alekhine, whose face stares out at us from Alekhine's avatar, that "although few admired his personal character all admired his chess genius" >:) See Ray Keene's chess column in this week's Spectator for an example.