Listener No 4366: Ego-Trips By Llig

[Contrarian]

Sorry to be a bit repetitive, but this is just not a stiff enough challenge.

Lots of very easy clues, and no real endgame to speak of.

[UglyUncle]

Certainly not a taxing challenge, but Llig has been a setter for many years and has always provided consistency of entertainment with observance of Ximenean standards. That said, I was disappointed in the clues to 40, 9, 27 and 29: surely alternative treatments or - in the case of the last two - synonyms could have been used?

[contendo]

I agree that many of the clues were just too easy for The Listener. I don't see where the extra letter comes into 33A. The title's neat.

[jim360]

33ac could work without an extra letter, but the wordplay can also give the correct extra letter with "Earth" interpreted as the name of a goddess.

[contendo]

Yes, I see now, Jim. Seems a bit clumsy though.

[jim360]

I can't see I disagree -- in extra-letter gimmicks it seems to me that the wordplay ought to generate an extra letter perforce, rather than have a wordplay that works equally well without.

[Philoctetes]

Surely this simply means the extra letter is well hidden - better than in most of them

[lizse6]

I agree it's at the easier end of the spectrum, but that's quite welcome for me. I've completed the grid but can't quite work out the wordplay in 21a; I assume the unchecked letters are N and T and the extra letter is A but can someone help me see why?

[jim360]

I think it's from "get"=attain.

[tristram37]

I'm tired of all this talk of some puzzles not being a stiff enough challenge. It has always been thus. I can remember a puzzle by Babs where I wrote all the answers in without a dictionary while having a sandwich lunch at work. And that was over 40 years ago. Over the years there have been many of a similar standard of difficulty. These days I find an increasing number which I have to abandon as too difficult for me. Fair enough. My view is that we should thank our lucky stars that the Listener puzzle is still providing weekly entertainment on all levels and not sneer at those that occasionally don't engage all of our little grey cells.

[Ruthrobin]

Yes Tristram 37. I agree totally. We've been solving for only about six years but do them all and have seen and appreciated the full range of difficulty in those six years - just like the EV, IQ, Crossword Magazine and Magpie. (Here's my Magpie plug www.piemag.com) For anyone who is not happy with the occasional easier Listener, let me recommend the Magpie with six crosswords every month ranging from the A (much easier than the Listener) via the C (about Listener average difficulty) to the E (which we can rarely solve) with a numerical every month.

[Whenland]

tristram37 - we agree too.

[towsertaylor]

I don't think anyone is sneering tristram37...it's simply that a Listener completed in but a few hours leaves an awful lot of the day for other less enjoyable tasks.

[IainGrace]

Been away for a week so happy to pick this one up and dispatch it within half an hour while watching the rugby. Now for this week's sterner challenge.