◀  No. 15761 Sep 2002 Clue list No. 1585  ▶

AZED CROSSWORD 1580

MARGENT def. BEETLES

1.  J. P. Guiver: After wasting years divided, Germany tears to pieces old boundary (tears; anag. less y, ears).

2.  J. C. Leyland: The old lip’s quivering in anger – maiden on verge of tears (tears; anag. incl. m + t).

3.  D. P. Shenkin: Old lady first, man afterwards, runs the old rule (runs; r between ma and gent).

VHC

M. Barley: Marks and Agnew endlessly waffling about runs – feature of test commentary (runs; M + r in anag. less w + t; ref. Vic M., Peter A.; see OED for def.).

J. R. Beresford: What Hammers do about man past edge of area (Hammers; ram (rev.) + gent; West Ham FC).

Mrs A. Boyes: Fringe mauls Emin art, chucking half of it out for good (mauls; g for i(t) in anag.; ref. Tracey E.).

N. C. Dexter: As a rule, in motor transport, interior bits of bangers break down (bangers; anag. of (b)anger(s) in MT; see New SOED for abbrev.).

A. J. Dorn: Hem of old garment runs freely (runs; anag.).

L. K. Edkins: Cream gnat, not having wings of Coleoptera, ‘dances’ as a rule (poetically speaking) (Coleoptera; anag. less C, a).

C. R. Gumbrell: Man, going after runs, with early show of vigour striking six – a boundary (runs; (vi)m + r + gent).

R. J. Hooper: Traditional alternative to shopping malls needs to stock the latest skirt (malls; gen in mart; mall = mallet).

D. F. Manley: A modicum of ink rushes tantalizingly out from rare maths genius bamboozled herein? (rushes; anag. less anag. incl. i, & lit.; ref. Fermat’s marginal comment on his ‘last theorem’, see ODQ 5/e).

C. G. Millin: Head of mallets with silver rim (mallets; m + argent).

T. J. Moorey: Married man squeezes inside of cars for old- fashioned bit on the side (cars; (c)ar(s) in m gent).

C. J. Morse: According to makers, edging on front of mallets should be white (mallets; m + argent; maker = poet).

S. Newbery: Typographers avoid this form of tampering without one proof initially (typographers; anag. less I, p; typographer, type of beetle).

F. R. Palmer: Market, having inside information, projects lost profit (projects; gen in mart).

R. Phillips: Old skirt bustles to give rise to garment (bustles; anag.).

T. Smith: Extra allowance for poet given by university scuttles argument (scuttles; anag. less U).

P. L. Stone: Flogging German motors, discounting makes fast profit (motors; anag. less moors).

D. H. Tompsett: Windage forgotten: range shot sails into empty moat (sails; anag. in m(oa)t; windage = margin of error).

J. R. Tozer: No more profit from what tampers with nature – GM not socially acceptable (tampers; anag. less U).

A. J. Wardrop: Inside information in place where cars are traded: perhaps Austin’s borderline (cars; gen in mart; ref. Alfred A., poet).

D. C. Williamson: Rocky range Mount overhangs each side of border (overhangs; anag. in Mt).

HC

F. Anstis, D. Ashcroft, B. Balfour, A. Barker, E. A. Beaulah, Mrs F. A. Blanchard, C. J. Brougham, E. J. Burge, Dr J. Burscough, B. Burton, Mrs M. J. Cansfield, M. Casserley, G. Clyde, R. Cohen, K. W. Crawford, E. Cross, L. J. Davenport, T. J. Donnelly, W. Duffin, C. M. Edmunds, J. & D. Fielding, A. G. Fleming, R. E. Ford, H. Freeman, P. D. Gaffey, R. J. Heald, Mrs B. E. Henderson, T. Jacobs, Mrs D. B. Jenkinson, R. K. Lumsdon, D. W. Mackie, Mrs J. Mackie, W. F. Main, P. W. Marlow, J. McGregor, R. A. Norton, D. Pendrey, D. R. Robinson, H. R. Sanders, Mrs R. Scott, N. G. Shippobotham, J. B. Sweeting, R. C. Teuton, F. Wheen, Mrs B. Widger, W. Woodruff, Dr E. Young.
 

Comments
220 entries, no mistakes in the grid. As always in WN competitions, there were a small number of entries which failed to follow the instructions about the word(s) to be clued and/or made the basic mistake of including a one-word definition of BEETLES which formed no part of the clue to MARGENT. This overlooks the whole point of WN clues, the stiffer challenge of working in the extra definition as an integral part of a clue for a quite different word. This can be very tricky indeed, though I tried to be kind in giving you a pair whose subsidiary member offered a good range of possible definitions. Just be thankful it wasn’t SHEBEENS, which I found a real brute to link to BR.ANSLES! (And yes, my clue to the latter was faulty in implying that ‘les’ is French for ‘they’, a schoolboy howler I perpetrated through sheer carelessness.)
 
I was asked by several competitors how I set about constructing a WN puzzle. I try to include an equal number of words of each word length (i.e. 6 x 6) and to choose, when filling the grid, words which for the most part have a range of different senses. When writing the clues I deal with words in groups according to word length, jotting down a range of one-word definitions for each before proceeding to pair them off one pair at a time, so that my range of options gradually shrinks and the last pair has to go together. Because of the extra challenge WN poses I aim to make clues if anything slightly easier than normal, though some may question whether I succeeded! I gave you the initial letter of MARGENT at the last minute, when I noticed that its first and third letters were unchecked and alternatives (such as TANGENT) just might have been possible. (Someone mentioned the nice coincidence that in the week of the puzzle Oliver Letwin on ‘With Great Pleasure’ (Radio 4) quoted the phrase ‘disporting on thy margent green’ from the third stanza of Gray’s poem Distant Prospect of Eton College.)
 
It was clearly a tough puzzle, as the low entry indicates, but most seem to have relished the battle, and there were some fine clues submitted. One nearly excellent one was ‘Getting married in Gretna, scurries for the border’. Since ‘m’ is the first letter of MARGENT, I don’t see how ‘in’ can be justified, and the comma after ‘Gretna’ makes it difficult to apply ‘scurries’ as an anagram indicator to the words before it. Pity. I also had difficulty deciding how strict to be over the matter of the word’s being archaic except in the language of poetry. What’s more, it seems clear (though Chambers fails to say so) that MARGENT means ‘margin’ in only some of its senses, viz ‘edge, border, brink, side of a page’, not ‘profit’, etc. In the event I did not penalize any who ignored these aspects of the problem, though I applaud those who took the trouble – and no doubt it was troublesome – to address them.
 
My thanks to those who wrote further on castles/rooks in chess. (Why ‘rook’, I wonder, when the piece is so obviously a castle?) Also to those (mainly mathematicians) who disagreed with my views on ‘a’ as the first/middle/last letter of the word ‘a’. With respect, I remain unconvinced by their arguments where crosswords are concerned, so you know where you stand. And finally, Mr Roy Dean has kindly sent me a copy of the revised and enlarged edition of his Mainly in Fun, a delightful miscellany of wit, wisdom and wordplay published by the Book Guild Ltd at £8.95, ISBN 1 85776 668 7, an ideal Christmas present for anyone who enjoys words.
 

 

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