AZED CROSSWORD 1559

THEOLOGASTER

1.  Mrs J. Mackie: One appearing in God slot, there lacking depth and confused? (a in anag. less d, & lit.).

2.  R. J. Whale: Dodgy RE? He’s got a lot (anag. & lit.).

3.  E. J. Burge: Togs with tear and hole, badly worn. Inferior material for the cloth? (anag.).

VHC

M. Barley: You’ll find my version of OT lore full of empty words (the (qv) + gas in anag., & lit.).

M. Bath: Without a bit of prompting Telegraph’s too complicated for dull schoolman (anag. less p; ref. crossword).

C. Boyd: RE? He’s got a lot, sketchily (anag. & lit.).

N. Connaughton: Lacking depth, he’s alert to God in a misguided way (anag. less d, & lit.).

D. J. Dare-Plumpton: E.g. that Rev. O. Slope, awful English Pastor, very uncommitted (anag. less E, P, v, & lit.; ref. Trollope character, Obadiah S.).

A. J. Dorn: He’s got real struggle with OT, perhaps (anag. & lit.).

Dr I. S. Fletcher: Logos he’d treat badly lacking depth? (anag. less d, & lit.).

H. Freeman: To those lager louts a ‘DD Light’ might be the answer (anag. & lit.; ref. Double Diamond ale; lout vi).

G. I. L. Grafton: Lo! He treats God ill, lacking depth (anag. less d, & lit.).

C. R. Gumbrell: Broadcast rated ‘God slot’ showing no signs of depth when he’s involved? (he in anag. less d, d, & lit.).

M. T. Hart: Alert to God, he’s surprisingly lacking depth (anag. less d, & lit.).

V. G. Henderson: One who’ll vulgarize Logos with theatre? (anag. & lit.).

M. Jones: One involved in interpretation of God’s lot there’s no depth in (anag. less d, & lit.).

J. C. Leyland: Word’s second go here? Last time being ‘non-plain’, one’s indifferent on resurrection (anag. incl. o, t; ref. earlier appearance of t. in AZ ‘Misprints’ comp.).

D. F. Manley: This man may be met with hoot, great Anselm being cracked up? (comp. anag. & lit.).

P. W. Marlow: Slope, perhaps, and hotel a good resort developed no end for winter (anag. incl g, less r; ref. Obadiah S.).

T. J. Moorey: An apology for a minister is altogether so difficult (anag.).

D. O’Connor: Superficial divine misconstrued R. Otto as Hegel (anag.; ref. Rudolf O., Protestant theologian).

F. R. Palmer: It could be he’s got a minimum of learning re OT (anag. incl. I, & lit.).

V. Seth: He’d treat Logos without discipline, without depth (anag. less d, & lit.).

T. Smith: To Thora’s glee, bust is a lightweight DD (anag.).

D. H. Tompsett: Healer got sot stinko: his cure may be ineffectual (anag.; cure = care of souls).

HC

D. Ashcroft, R. L. Baker, E. A. Beaulah, J. R. Beresford, S. Best, J. G. Booth, Mrs A. Boyes, H. J. Bradbury, C. J. Brougham, Dr J. Burscough, B. Burton, W. R. Chalmers, A. G. Chamberlain, C. A. Clarke, C. W. Clenshaw, D. C. Clenshaw, R. Cohen, B. Cooper, R. M. S. Cork, A. Cox, E. Cross, G. Cuthbert, L. J. Davenport, R. Dean, R. V. Dearden, N. C. Dexter, Mrs P. Diamond, V. Dixon, C. M. Edmunds, R. Fishleigh, A. G. Fleming, Mrs C. George, Mrs E. Greenaway, R. B. Harling, R. Hesketh, W. Jackson, R. K. Lumsdon, W. F. Main, C. G. Millin, C. J. Morse, T. D. Nicholl, G. Oxley, R. J. Palmer, J. Pearce, R. Phillips, T. Powell, D. Price Jones, D. R. Robinson, M. Sanderson, Ms J. Smith, J. B. Sweeting, A. Tee, K. Thomas, Dr I. Torbe, J. R. Tozer, A. P. Vincent, A. J. Wardrop, A. West, Dr M. C. Whelan, MS B. J. Widger, Dr E. Young.
 

Comments
241 entries, almost no mistakes (two or three failing to spot MAELID). The clues you enjoyed most this month were probably those for SCRAT and VITULINE (the latter ‘very Azedian’, someone wrote, though I’m unsure what he meant), with a number of others, including ARTFUL, getting a mention. Several of you clearly had difficulty with the 4-letter words, especially BRIE (‘Crusty end of a meal cut short?’), and reading it again I admit that the definition part is rather loosely phrased. The cryptic part simply indicates a curtailment of ‘brief, and will pass muster, I think. It was probably the fact that that ‘cut short’ is such a common collocation that threw some of you.
 
As several of you remembered, I’d given you THEOLOGASTER before (in No. 844 on 3 July 1988), but then it was a ‘Misprints’ clue that was required. I thought it would be interesting to see whether, as I believed, producing a straight clue to the same word would yield a different set of approaches - and it is such a delicious word. On the whole it did, though I don’t think I’ll do it again (deliberately, anyway!). Only one competitor owned up to being ‘influenced’ by an idea from the earlier slip. Ideas this time were many and varied. Mrs Mackie wasn’t the only one to exploit ‘God slot’ but she certainly did it much better than the others, in a display of finely crafted wording. Many used the ‘altogether so’ anagram, but of those only Mr Moorey made the lists, on the strength of his nicely veiled definition. Obadiah Slope of Barchester farm, turned up less than I might have expected, but then, to be strictly accurate, he wasn’t perhaps so much shallow as hypocritical. One of my reference books nicely sums him up as ‘ugly, sweaty and physically awkward’, a man of the cloth who ‘nevertheless impresses many women by his flattery and religious fervour’. For the record, the earlier THEOLOGASTER competition was won by Mr Sweeting with ‘No Toper he, so large tot is out’ (Toper/Soper).
 
In last month’s slip I wrote that Alfred Hitchcock’s film Rope was based on the Leopold/Loeb case. Mrs Jenkinson gently corrects me, pointing out that Rope (1948) was adapted from the play of the same name by Patrick Hamilton, and suggests that the Leopold/Loeb film was Compulsion (1959). The latter is strangely not listed in my edition of Halliwell’s The Filmgoer’s Companion, though I’ve no reason to suppose DBJ is wrong and I apologize for my mistake. Can anyone fmd incontrovertible evidence? I dare say a web search would yield the answer but I haven’t the energy!
 
I was sad to hear of the recent untimely death of Michael (M. C. C.) Rich, a crossword setter (as Ploutos) and occasional Azed competitor who also published his own monthly magazine of ultra-difficult puzzles and, with John Grimshaw, ran regular crossword weekends for enthusiasts. As a schoolboy he studied classics under Derrick Macnutt at Christ’s Hospital School in Horsham. He will be much missed by his many friends and admirers, and I offer sincere condolences to his family.