Notes for Azed 2,664

There are usually one or two points of interest in an Azed puzzle, and here we pick them out for comment. Please feel free to add your own questions or observations on any aspect of the puzzle (including clues not listed below) either by using the comment form at the bottom of the page or, if would prefer that your question/comment is not publicly visible, by email.

Azed 2,664 ‘Eightsome Reels’

Difficulty rating: (4 / 10)

The Eightsome Reels variation was originally devised by Azed, the first one appearing in November 1972, and this was its twenty-fifth outing. I rather like having normal clues but a different way of entering them in the grid; sometimes with this sort of puzzle the clues are made a little too easy in order to compensate for the extra difficulty of the format, but although there were quite a few straightforward anagrams (plus a ‘hidden’), Azed threw in a few tricky ones to go with them, so there was no sprint to the finishing line as soon as one had got a few interlocking solutions. A novelty here was the groups of unchecked letters in the corners forming words when read anticlockwise; the corner letters are usually confirmed by means of an ‘unch message’ (an anagram of the 12 letters), which is perhaps rather more helpful to the solver.

When solving an Eightsome Reels puzzle, clearly a single answer cannot be entered in the grid unless the solver possesses the relevant paranormal ability*. To get going, one needs first of all to solve the clues to two adjoining squares – let’s assume that they are side by side, and the solutions are MEPHISTO and CURTSIED. The three consecutive shared letters are IST/TSI, so there are only two ways these can be entered:

The fact that the shared letters are reversed in one solution means that the entries will both run clockwise or both anticlockwise (if they were in the same sequence, eg MEPHISTO/BRISTLED, then one will run clockwise and the other anticlockwise). If you can then solve a clue to a ’reel’ above or below either of these two, you can then confidently enter all three solutions into the grid. I got started with 5, 6 and 11, none of which are too difficult – respectively an anagram with two closing letters omitted, an anagram including a two-letter abbreviation, and an anagram followed by two initial letters. 13/19/20/25 also represent a good way in.

*The requirement to have three-letter words running anticlockwise in the corners could in theory allow you to enter a single answer, but I am struggling to think of an eight-letter word that when considered cyclically and in either direction offers exactly one sequence of three letters which constitutes a non-palindromic word. Any suggestions?

Setters’ Corner: The unusual way in which answers are entered in the grid raises a question about indicators that suggest a particular orientation of components, eg ‘back’, ‘held’. The standard approach for setters is to treat each answer as being fully assembled in a horizontal direction and then entered into the grid. Hence Azed uses ‘flanked’ in 6, even though the abbreviation for His Excellency is not  ‘flanked’ by anything to the north, and ‘put in’ in 28 despite the monster being very much on the loose. The form which the answer takes in the grid is thus entirely independent of the clue  – so ‘one from the south’ would not be considered valid for ENO even if the letters appeared in the grid one above the other. 

Notes on individual clues

1 Matched? I did so, admitted sexual attraction
I (from the clue) and a five-letter word meaning ‘matched’ (‘did so’) contain the two-letter word for the sort of sexual attraction oozed by Clara Bow in the film of the same name.

3 Hardy types showing interest in bar?
A four-letter word for ‘interest’ (often preceded in this sense by the words ‘for my’) is contained by a word for ‘bar’ or ‘without’ assimilated into English from the French language.

7 Downplay gambling stake – no longer finger one held
A four-letter word for a gambling stake, more common in the barred puzzle than at the card table, has a three-letter bit of archaic (‘no longer’) slang meaning ‘[to] finger’ or ‘pilfer’ plus the Roman numeral representing one inside (‘held’).

9 Old portraits: place pictures beside former queen, retiring
As discussed in Setters’ Corner above, the three components (3+3+2) indicated in the wordplay need to be placed alongside each other and then reversed in linear fashion. The fact that they subsequently gyrate in the grid is irrelevant to the solving of the clue.

10 Notches miss the mark cutting stuffs
A three-letter word meaning ‘[to] miss the mark’ is contained by (‘cutting’) a word meaning ‘stuffs’ in the sense of ‘feeds gluttonously’.

12 Inflorescence of e.g. hops to plunder in wall crossing
A three-letter word meaning ‘to plunder’ is put inside the sort of wall crossing that one might encounter on a country walk.

14 Shield carriers are protecting fighter, last in former wars
The word ARE (from the clue) contains a three-letter abbreviation for a class of Russian fighter aircraft, the combination being followed by the final letters (‘last’) of FORMER and WARS. The answer relates to a gentleman who attended a knight to bear his shield.

15 Fine silk tears badly clothing nurse
Here we have an anagram (‘badly’) of TEARS containing (‘clothing’) an abbreviation for a nurse qualified to a certain level, the term having succeeded ‘assistant nurse’ but not used in the UK since the 1990s.

16 Wretched quality, without a hint of excellence, in singer
A three-letter musical abbreviation meaning ‘without’ (bearing a striking resemblance to the abbreviation in the previous clue) and the first letter (‘a hint’) of EXCELLENCE are contained by a word for the type of singer exemplified by Barry White, Boris Christoff, or (my personal favourite) Mr. Jetsam.

18 Don’t hurry, I mean to say in store department?
A charade of a six-letter word meaning “don’t hurry” or ‘tarry awhile’ and a familiar abbreviation often indicated by ‘that is’ but here by ‘I mean to say’.

23 Rows of housing, short, unfinished, for accommodating people
A five-letter word meaning ‘short’ is deprived of its last letter (‘unfinished’) and placed around (‘for accommodating’) a term for a people.

24 Set cutting plant in pond freeze again
A three-letter word for ‘set’ in the blancmange sense is contained by a word for water-crowfoot, which could have been indicated by something like ‘concerning, consumed’.

26 About to perish, love hillside, yielding
Containing (‘about’) a three-letter word for ‘to perish’ are the usual single-letter representation of ‘love’ and a word that I didn’t associate with a hillside, rather with any type of wiry grass.

29 A boon for asthmatics, indeed when taken in disturbed rest
A four-letter word meaning ‘indeed’ or ‘yet’ is taken into an anagram (‘disturbed’) of REST.

31 Half of us not drinking in wooden bar, old-fashioned
Half of the word US and a two-letter abbreviation meaning ‘not drinking’ are contained by an old or poetic adjective used to describe something made of a particular wood.

32 Wherein fossils may be found I missed shattered bovine, one back inside
A three-letter word for ‘one’ is reversed (‘back’) inside an anagram (‘shattered’) of BOVINE from which the I has been removed (‘I missed’).

(definitions are underlined)

The unchecked letters in the corners could be defined by: [1] ‘Junk’, [6] ‘One in south-west’, [31] ‘Lay hold of Scots’, and [36] ‘Mimic’.