Preamble: Solvers must scale component letters of some entries to match the illusion. This will require some letters to be entered in such a way that one to a cell is not maintained; word lengths are to apparent grid entries. They must then highlight the more usual view elsewhere in the grid, and the relevant line. Twenty clues contain a misprint in the definition – correct letters spell the nature of the illusion.
As usual, first reading of the preamble doesn’t help much except to make it clear that there are some misprints. On my first quick squiz through the clues, I realised that 3d and 4d were fairly obvious anagrams though the definition wasn’t so obvious in 4d. 6d was also fairly obvious. This gave _ _ _ D A _ R _ in 14a and it was crying out to be NON-DAIRY but I couldn’t make it work. And I had similar experiences with 1d and 16a. Eventually I had most of NW, NE and SW corners done with very little in SE. The corrected misprints by this point looked like they contained EARTH and MOON and I could see MOON in the four squares b3, c3, b4, c4 but still very little happening in SE.
At this stage I thought that 22a was almost certainly a Latin phrase and I guessed (wrongly) that it was thematic. Re-reading the preamble I guessed that some clued words must be too short for their alloted space and this helped though I couldn’t figure out what blank squares to leave. Then it struck me (was I moonstruck??). The phrase jumped out at me and I realized that the component letters to be scaled had to be written in 4 cells each, making a big MOON in the sixteen cell square from h6 to k9. The phrase is LARGER NEAR THE HORIZON. So the MOON in SE looks bigger than NW and the smaller one has to highlighted.
The illusion is that the moon appears larger when it’s nearer the horizon is discussed here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moon_illusion. And we can find HORIZON in squares d12-j12.
I found this quite a tricky puzzle, especially since three of the affected answers (18d, 25a and 32a) also had misprints in their definitions but I got there in the end. Just a couple of queries with the clues, detailed in the appropriate grid below.
Thanks to Phi and I trust most readers will be stepping outside to observe the illusion on April 4th – the date of the next full moon: http://www.timeanddate.com/moon/uk/london?month=4&year=2015 at around ten to eight in the evening. Phi, of course, will have to wait until half past six on the 5th (don’t forget to put your clock back!!)
Finally, just to go off-topic for a minute, there was much discussion, last week, on whether internet search engines should be used to aid in solving: http://www.fifteensquared.net/2015/03/04/inquisitor-1374-engagement-by-schadenfreude/#comments.
My opinion is that there’s absolutely no problem, why should there be? We live in an information age where almost everything you ever wanted to know about life or were afraid to ask is available on-line. OK, I concede that there’s a lot of misinformation but if you choose your sites carefully then you shouldn’t go wrong. For this particular puzzle, I didn’t need to go on-line as I’d heard of and witnessed the illusion but I’ll bet that many solvers either haven’t heard of it or haven’t given it much thought. So what should they do, trot down to their local bookshop and buy a copy of “101 Moon Facts” (or whatever?) And you can bet your bottom dollar that some of our setters do their own research on-line. I imagine that back in the dark ages of the 20th Century, setters used big reference books and pencils and paper to create their puzzles and solvers pretty much did the same. Now they probably use Excel and on-line references and intend to carry on doing the same. And, yes, I imagine that there are exceptions on both sides.
| Across |
|||||
| No. |
Clue |
Misprint |
Letter |
Entry |
Wordplay |
| 1 | Withdrawal of impediment is producing harvests |
RABIS | BAR (impediment; rev: withdrawal of)+IS | ||
| 6 | Fellow’s one embracing independent Trojan princess |
HESIONE | HE‘S (fellow’s)+ONE containing Independent | ||
| 11 | Skunk: low creature, primarily, with stench at rear |
skuNk->skuLk | L |
MOOCH | MOO (low)+Creature (primarily)+stencH (at rear) |
| 12 | Garment striking pain into the soul? |
KHURTA | HURT (striking pain) inside KA (soul) | ||
| 14 | Agree, without much thought, to accommodate number avoiding milk products |
NON-DAIRY | NOD (agree)+Number+AIRY(without much thought) | ||
| 15 | Headland incorporating Welsh herd spots? |
hErd->hArd | A |
RAWS | RAS (headland) containing Welsh |
| 16 | Stags fret out of cover, we hear |
staGs->staRs | R |
GREAT BEAR | Sounds like GRATE (fret)+BARE (out of cover) |
| 17 | Go after Spain’s steel | EPEE | E (Spain)+PEE (go: urinate) | ||
| 19 | Map makers? Map makers engaging with German terrace |
Map->Gap | G |
OMITTERS | OS (Ordnance Survey: map makers) containing MIT (with in German)+TERrace |
| 22 | I made for tee, playing by faith and love |
FIDE ET AMORE | I MADE FOR TEE (anag: playing) | ||
| 25 | Man bargaining seriously almost retaining second groat |
grOat->grEat | E |
FAMOUS | FAUSt (man bargaining seriously; almost) containing MO (a second) |
| 27 | Scot’s away a long time, meeting English |
awAy->awRy | R |
AGEE | AGE (along time)+English |
| 29 | Position no. 5 for fencer? |
SECONDE | Not entirely sure of this one. Maybe my lack of fencing knowledge is to blame. As far as I can see, it comes from fencEr (the SECOND E, which is in position 5. Seconde means to parry so is it refering to the fifth stroke in a sword fight, or something? |
||
| 30 | Saying little to dismiss deception of the people |
LAIC | LAconIC (saying little; minus CON (deception) | ||
| 32 | Historic coifs shown by King and Queen on English note |
coiFs->coiNs | N |
KRONEN | King+R (queen)+ON+English+Note |
| 33 | A new child or birth | bIrth->bErth | E |
ANCHOR | A+New+CHild+OR |
| 34 | Blasts earl, removed from regions by King |
ZONKS | ZONeS (regions) Earl replaced by King | ||
| 35 | Poet’s circumstances including shelter ruined with hail |
rUined->rAined | A |
SLEETED | STED (circumstances) containing LEE (shelter) Not really sure what “poet” has to do with it, STED seems to be obsolete rather than poetic. |
| 36 | What plover does? Hardy heroine absorbs half of it |
pLover->pRover | R |
TESTS | iT (half of) inside TESS ([Thomas] Hardy heroine from Tess of the d’Urbervilles: A Pure Woman Faithfully Presented |
| Down |
|||||
| No. |
Clue |
Misprint | Letter |
Entry |
Wordplay |
| 1 | Stop buzzing – succeed in zapping bee |
RING OFF | bRING OFF minus Bee | ||
| 2 | Offer to secure one French article – it’s now or never at work |
noW->noT | T |
BONE-IDLE | BID containing ONE+LE ([definite] article in French) |
| 3 | Do it at sea with sea salts |
IODATES | DO IT+SEA (anag: at sea) | ||
| 4 | Host and star etc variously sitting all over the place |
Sitting->Hitting | H |
SCATTERSHOT | HOST STAR ETC (anag: variously) |
| 5 | Most of article, the speaker reckons, will identify place in the past |
Past-East | E |
THIBET (alternate spelling of TIBET) |
THe (most of; [definite] article)+I (the speaker) BET (reckons) |
| 6 | I run into that female employer |
HIRER | I+Run inside HER (that female) | ||
| 7 | Historic court revised this – it’s accommodating about emission from cow? |
SHIRE-MOOT | THIS (anag: revised) containing RE (about)+MOO (emission from cow) | ||
| 8 | By rights, that is to involve University Rector |
IURE | IE (that is) containg University Rector | ||
| 9 | Openings for one reading anatomy? |
ORA (&lit.) |
One Reading Anatomy (openings of) | ||
| 10 | Sappiness, perhaps a contributor to ineptitude, as ever |
Sappiness->Happiness | H |
EASE | ineptitudE AS Ever (hidden: contributor to) |
| 13 | Nuzzle, being increasingly sentimental |
nUzzle->nOzzle | O |
TWEER | (double def.) TWEER = more TWEE |
| 18 | Poor quality beds: odd bits of pillow sank badly, with one sliding away |
Beds->Reds | R |
PLONK | PiLlOw (odd letters)+SaNK (minus A (one); anag: badly) |
| 20 | Air with added nitrogen – quite a weight |
TONNE | TONE (air) including Nitrogen | ||
| 21 | Resolution isn’t maintained in malls again |
maLls->maIls | I |
RESENDS | RESolution+ENDS (isn’t maintained) |
| 23 | This could get Ramsay crying anew? Only partly |
INGAN (reference to Gordon Ramsay, I guess) |
cryING ANew (hidden: only partly) | ||
| 24 | Of bad influence that is not attributed to insect |
oF->oZ | Z |
MOZZ | MOZZie (insect) minus IE (that is) |
| 26 | Spur a colt, with journey finishing early |
sPur->sOur | O |
ACRID | A+Colt+RIDe (journey; finishing early) |
| 27 | Unfortunately one’s outed from false identity |
ALAS | ALiAS (minus I (one)) | ||
| 28 | Augment old church in middle of Greece |
ECHE | CHurch inside grEEce (middle of) | ||
| 31 | Do it, and risk losing daughter |
iT->iN | N |
ICE | dICE (risk) minus Daughter |
I really enjoyed this. I wasn’t quite as observant as you Kenmac and didn’t notice MOON in the top left quadrant so was unsure what ‘illusion’ we were menat to find or reveal in the grid.
I did however work out quite early that most of the shorter grid entries were down in the bottom right and that they seemed to carry similar letter combinations: MO and ON, so a quick bit of googling revelaed the MOON ILLUSION- no I hadn’t heard of it.
I struggled with the extra letters for a while as I was sure that 23D involved an extra A derived from changing RAMSAT TO RAASAY in order to get the Scottish onion connection. Got it sorted in the end though.
Thanks kenmac for the blog and Phi for an excellent puzzle.
Great puzzle, great blog – brilliant animation.
As Phi is a trained astronomer, I doubt he needed to Google too much to set this. Thanks to him and kenmac.
Guessed MOON ILLUSION very early – reminded me of arriving at a holiday gite in the Dordogne in the late 80’s where we were welcomed with an alfresco meal of barbecued barracuda under a low full moon.
So not too much difficulty here (& no Googling). I don’t think I dug out the wordplay for 29a SECONDE, so thanks kenmac for that.
Regarding STED in 35a, it’s Spenserian for STEAD, which itself is Spenserian for “circumstances”, so that’s the poet reference.
But I did have a problem with the definition of 15a RAWS – “hard spots” – don’t really get it.
Novel stuff from Phi, and blog from kenmac (tho’ the moon does look a funny colour) – thanks.
Nmsindy, with respect I don’t think any of the setting required great knowledge of astronomy.(Even 16A).
Nmsindy, I hope that my last comment didn’t sound snide – it certainly wasn’t meant that way.
I think there is a big problem with online conversations. One can’t see the “speaker’s” face. So we don’t see the slightly raised eyebrow or the slight smile that would normally moify what we hear. In fact, we can’t “hear”. So no tone of voice – is a person being pompous or pedantic, or just enjoying being involved in a not-too-serious debate?
I had meant to get this up more promptly but didn’t quite get round to it yesterday. But here’s the setter’s blog for Illusion:
http://phionline.net.nz/setters-blogs/illusion/
Enjoyed this immensely. Many thanks to setter and blogger.
Likewise much enjoyed here. I got to “moon illusion” without noticing the little moon, saw where HORIZON might go (useful cue for ZONKS), and then had a vision of all the Os in the obviously affected SE region being somehow merged into one huge moony O. The actual solution took a little longer. Thanks as always to Phi.
All this and posh animation too! I am much impressed.
Great fun. Thanks to Phi and Kenmac.
I agree with HG about ‘RAWS’.
@10 When I came to blog this I forgot that I had justified RAW as meaning HARD and meaning SPOT – hence the question mark.
HTH
Not too much trouble this week, for a change. It was evident that something odd was happening in that SE corner which was where the main focus was, and where the end game was played out. I struggled to parse 29 too so thanks kenmac for a very plausible clear up on that one. Another thumbs up too for the animation, excellent!
Thanks to Phi for yet another winner.
Re #5 and #6, no problem, the comment was essentially intended to be a light-hearted one in view of the references to Google in kenmac’s blog…
@11: RAWS … still don’t get it.
Neither do I.
Phi, thank you for your views – on your own blog – about acceptability of using online reference sources
Phi writes in his blog ‘I find it surprising that there remains a group of people who insist that finding something in a reference book is OK, but finding the same datum online is somehow besmirched. I can’t see where the principle differs’.
The principle differs when the information that the solver has gained from the puzzle wouldn’t be sufficient to research using reference books, but may yield something in Google. I have googled a few words from a quote as I am sure have others, and found it where I would have had no chance of finding it using reference books. I am not taking sides here btw and if I did would probably take the side of googling as a last resort. I say that because I have learned a lot from reading about themes that I wouldn’t have learned had I abandoned the puzzles. But it does differ.
Re #17, I think the difference may be because, in the past especially, not everyone had access to the Internet. So it was right that crossword editors and setters tried to ensure all the info needed to solve a puzzle is available in a reference work. These works have the extra benefit of being generally pretty accurate.
The principle, as Phi says, is no different.
With smartphones taking over the world, the Internet is now the traditional ‘visit to the library’. I guess, in solving puzzles, and trying to get enjoyment from that, which IHMO is the object of the exercise, the solver can decide when exactly to go for help – as the pleasure is, I’d say, to be found in teasing out the clues.
Re18, what I am referring to is the difference between discriminate in indiscriminate searching. The ability to search on a snippet of information is different to having to know what you were looking for before you went to the library. I am not saying that it is a bad thing, probably the opposite, but it is different.
Niall, you say that “…in the past, especially, not everyone had access to the Internet”. This is still very much the case. There are certainly at least two setters I know of who haven’t got web access (or indeed computer access at all), so there must be a larger number of solvers.
Thank you, Chris, at #20 – I was not aware of that TBH. So I’ll continue, in the setting world, as I have up to now, to ensure everything can be found in the standard references.
Chris@20
“There are certainly at least two setters I know of who haven’t got web access (or indeed computer access at all), so there MUST be a larger number of solvers.”
(my emphasis)
With the greatest respect, that doesn’t follow at all.