Listener No 4365: General Intelligence By Calmac

[AHearer]

What a neat grid construction. I found finding the quotation a bit tedious, but the rest of the puzzle was a total delight, with some cleverly concealed misprints. Many thanks, Calmac.

[Ruthrobin]

I thought the endgame was more satisfactory than filling the grid, and agree that it was a bit of a chore finding the quotation but it was good to have a relatively straightforward crossword with an original and amusing gimmick.

[starwalker]

I thought that Calmac had been extremely generous as I worked my way through this, only to realise that he had found one of (my many) weaknesses. Given a need to find x number of misprints, I can frequently fill a grid and discover only x -3. Now, all sorted, but I do agree about the "tedious" element. Obviously some of the misprints were very cunning. Thanks Calmac.

[AHearer]

You did better than me, starwalker -- I had x-4, but luckily they were enough. My other failing, which is to say one of my many other failings, is to try to make sense of the corrections rather than the misprints or vice versa. I did that here too.

[IainGrace]

Grid filled but only 15 misprints spotted. Aiming to join the Friday club for the first time, following retirement, but not quite there yet. Entertaining puzzle but easy clues are a weakness since one can solve the first dozen or so clues off the bat and hence get the initial run of letters.

[AHearer]

Welcome to the retired community, IainGrace -- bet you're busier than ever!

[tilbee]

I was somewhat held up since I omitted to read the preamble correctly and the correct letters did not reveal much ! However once I overcame this oversight had the first and last words of the message, so quickly guessed what was required. Agreed that the final endgame was very neat, and bypassed much of the "tedious" element by guessing the first few words of the quotation after working out only a limited number of letters of each, and then googling the quotation from these. Final step then to go back and work out the remaining multiple missing misprints which were often well hidden indeed.

[IainGrace]

Thanks, AHearer. Certainly taking a few days to get to the Listener each week.

[jim360]

Some very well-concealed misprints... as I can't find them all, and the handful of letters I do have isn't proving much help.

[Scorpius]

What is to be found in the grid is delightful and very clever. Having found the perpetrators, I left the puzzle and went out for some exercise. It was during that time I thought, "I wonder if..." When I returned to the puzzle and looked more closely at the grid I saw the icing on the cake.

The device used in the last stages of the puzzle is one I detest, it is so mind-numbingly tedious (I'd be happy if it were banned!). However, in this case it was possible to short-circuit most of the tedium using ODQ's keyword index.

It was a pity that there were so many entries with no unchecked letters (20, I think). That, coupled with some very easy clues, made filling the grid abnormally quick. I had the first four rows of the grid filled within three minutes. Admittedly it got a bit harder after that, and there were a lot of clues, so some may be grateful that they weren't hard.

[jim360]

I'm surprised that no-one's yet mentioned the double-unches in 6 and 51 across...

[Contrarian]

It's true that some of the misprints were very hard to spot, but the clues were far too easy to present much of a challenge overall.

I've just finished working through the entire batch of 2009 Listeners, and most of the puzzles then seem to be in a different league (in terms of difficulty, if not quality). Out of that set, there were probably about 10 puzzles that were harder than anything I have seen from this year's setters.

[upsetter]

Good fun at the end, with an elegant bonus, and thankfully no need to find all the extra letters or grind through the whole process of finding the quotation.
Several rather weak clues it must be said.

BTW, maybe it's sour grapes, but didn't think 4362 was very fair.

[icynorth]

I applaud the grid construction, but, not for the first time this year, I've managed to bypass a whole puzzle layer (i.e. the quotation) and completed the puzzle through a simple grid stare.

But I enjoyed what I had, so thanks, Calmac.

[s_pugh]

Although I felt that many of the clues were far too gentle for a Listener, I felt that the overall neatness of the construction more than made up for it. Thanks Calmac.

[Scorpius]

Nobody needs to bother with one of the few aspects of the puzzle that might need bit of care. All they need to do is to come here and see one of the secrets blatantly revealed by someone boasting his technique.

[jim360]

Bit of an irony that his first post was about how good AB was about avoiding spoilers...

[towsertaylor]

Sorry, but I think Telramund has been allowed to give a massive hint as to the solution...glad to say I had solved it before coming on here. Found a number of clues a bit too easy but agree that a very neat solution with, as someone has noted, that extra bit of icing. Thanks Calmac.

[IainGrace]

Finished - albeit not on Friday because of rugby. What is contained within perpetrators is cleverly done.

[Cloverjo]

I didn't notice that, IainGrace. Yes, very nicely done.