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.

[aldanna]

In agreement with the general drift of the comments, but a bit surprised there is no mention of 7 down. I managed an early finish on Friday apart from the unchecked letter here. The wordplay seems obvious, the other three letters are as expected, but I cannot find any mention of what I feel must be the answer anywhere.

[jim360]

It took a while Aldanna but I did find a wiki entry for the relevant answer. I think it must be a fairly obscure Viennese artist is all.

[Philoctetes]

Good solid puzzle, logical progression, mix of tricky and obvious, new quotation and learn something from the endgame (I don't have that general intelligence). And happily diverted back to St. Custards. What more could one ask?

[aldanna]

Thanks Jim. Your comment inspired Himself to check it out. I could say more about this but would be in danger of saying Too Much

[borealis]

Some clues too easy? But that gives a nice gradation to others, and some misprints, that were much more tricky. Had great fun doing what the removed answer said; didn't seem cheating any more than looking up the brb does. Wonderful extras with the highlighting, and I enjoyed 35a and 38. Thanks, Calmac.

[Scorpius]

Philoctetes asks, "What more could one ask?"
Jim360 has already mentioned the double unches, so I think one thing that one could ask for is a better grid. I always thought double unches were strictly out, except in the case pf perimeter quotations and the like. I've spent hours re-jigging grids to avoid double unches, not dreaming that the editors would accept them. This sets an unhealthy precedent. It's not a question of fairness, since the clues were not hard. It's a question of elegance and reasonably close adherence to Ximenean standards of grid construction that the Listener promotes.

Some will no doubt say that the double unches are forced by the densely packed thematic material (which I've already said in an earlier post is superb) and may think I'm being unduly harsh. But the double unches are not inevitable at all. It's perfectly possible to produce a grid with no double unches that comes close to the Ximenean ideal and incorporates all the same thematic material.

[perseverer]

I don't think anyone objected to the method in the removed answer, only that posting it gave away a major part of the end-game

[olichant]

I enjoyed this (though, like others, was glad I could take a shortcut to the endgame, in my case via google) Thanks, Calmac. I didn't mind a few easy clues - the open lights did speed up big parts of the gridfill.

And a good excuse to read into the various things referred to in the full quotation. Am intrigued by the comments about the icing on the cake - I might not be looking hard enough!

Hope everyone had a good weekend.

[Philoctetes]

May I ask why double-unches are an absolute problem? If the only answer is that they do not conform to Ximenes' rules, then that is akin to the D'Oyly Carte always following the original G&S production business - which leads to atrophy and failure. I would not want a grid filled with them, but, so long as they do not introduce final ambiguity, then rare appearances are, for me, fine. Here, the clues are simple, and the wordplay unambiguous. I, for one, do not have a problem

[easterfool]

No trouble with double unches occasionally. Loved the theme and the clever bit of extra unasked-for thematic material. Thanks Calmac for a good relatively easy puzzle with lovely points where the proverbial dropped. Glad that I didn't need to find all of the quotation. I expect that this is one where I will make a simple copying mistake!

[Cagey]

I really liked this one, and had no issue with the way you had to find the quotation. I thought it played and complemented nicely with the way some of the thematic material was represented in the grid.
Many thanks Calmac

[jim360]

On balance, the final grid highlighting and extra bonus material in the grid more than makes up for the double-unches, but I suppose the problem I have with them is that, from a less experienced setter, one suspects that the same grid might well have been rejected out of hand. Maybe this is unfair. Anyway, it didn't pose a problem in the grid and like others I would say that the endgame is too pretty to care about the grid construction. It's more in the abstract: "I thought double-unches were forbidden?", than meant as criticism of the setter.

[icynorth]

Why is a double unch deemed less desirable than a staccato unch? (if that's the right expression - you know what I mean - the non-contiguous variety)

[Scorpius]

Philoctetes, I take your point and accept that some are not bothered by double unches, particularly if the clueing is fair (as it is here). I also accept double unches should not be an 'absolute problem'. If a good theme and an ambitious implementation of it is impossible without a couple of double unches, then I'd prefer the double-unching rule to be waived than see the puzzle ditched. My point was that in this case the setter could have avoided the double unches. Obviously I cannot go into that without giving away the puzzle's secrets.

On your general question of the dominance of Ximenean rules, they are explicitly listed under the heading 'Requirements' in the Listener Notes for Setters, referring setters to Ximenes' own rules about unchecked letters, where he is explicit that having two consecutive unchecked letters is 'not allowed'. Whether we agree with Ximenes or not is beside the point, since his principles are the ones that the Listener editors have accepted for years, allowing some flexibility in the frequency of unchecked letters in the interests of theme and/or fairness. But I cannot recall the last time two consecutive unches featured in an otherwise normal grid.

[Whenland]

Filled the grid quickly enough but took ages to get the quotation, as we were using the "correct" letters rather than the incorrect ones. Didn't notice the icing on the cake until we checked here. Very clever! Thank you Calmac.

[tramart]

I'm at a loss to understand why anyone would waste time with the boring bit.
Using Openoffice Calc (other spreadsheets are available) it's trivially simple to extract the quotation; less than 5 minutes, a little longer if an OCR is necessary.

[towsertaylor]

I quite enjoyed the 'boring bit' - a nice, slow reveal involving anticipation and expectation with ultimate justification and satisfaction.