AZED CROSSWORD 1585

SHIATSU

1.  R. J. Whale: Tailor has suit technique of making one fit by hand (anag.).

2.  G. H. Willett: Try exciting intimate sushi bar in time to get exotic massage (anag. less in time).

3.  W. Murphy: Bodyworker’s reconditioning his battered old car with no wings (anag. + (D)atsu(n)).

VHC

D. Anderson: Assorted sushi passed round at local finger buffet? (at in anag.).

M. Barley: Manipulation shown by Iraq’s leader has finally got US mobilizing (anag. incl t).

J. R. Beresford: Massage enthusiast disregarding hospital department to get this? (anag. less ENT, & lit.).

Rev Canon C. M. Broun: Massage treatment exhausts, but not without relaxing one internally (I in anag. less ex).

Dr J. Burscough: Rejecting specialized medicine, enthusiast for this demands massage (anag. less ENT, & lit.).

C. A. Clarke: Massaging nude, therapists pretend this works as an alternative treatment (comp. anag.).

R. Dean: Massage enthusiast abandoning hospital department – for this? (anag. less ENT, & lit.).

V. Dixon: Alternative treatment for enthusiast with ear, nose and throat blocked? (anag. less ENT, & lit.).

C. R. Gumbrell: Get enthusiastic massaging etc in this? (comp. anag. & lit.).

R. J. Hooper: Applying pressure over arms etc, has it to be done with American backing to succeed? (anag. + US (rev.); ref. Iraq).

W. F. Main: This therapy, taking lead from acupuncture, provides treatment for hysteria at a push (comp. anag. incl a, & lit.).

J. R. C. Michie: Massage has its Asian title (anag. + U, & lit.).

T. J. Moorey: Has Matsui shedding a thousand reduced pressure on Japanese corporation (anag. less a M).

C. J. Morse: There’s pressure on key points from Asia – has it turned America back (anag. + US (rev.); ref. Iraq crisis).

R. J. Palmer: It involves kneading tissue with hand no end (anag. less end, & lit.).

J. R. Tozer: Alternative therapy developed by enthusiast abandoning speciality in conventional medicine (anag. less ENT).

M. J. E. Wareham: Japanese digital ingenuity hits USA badly (anag.).

R. Warren: Japanese digital service relays US adult hits (anag. incl a).

P. O. G. White: Stress-relieving ‘finger buffet’ at sushi slap-bang? (anag.; slap-bang, 2 mngs.).

P. B. G. Williams: Suit has gone out of shape; specialised pressing by hand is required (anag.).

D. C. Williamson: Forsaking medical speciality initially, enthusiast might turn to this (anag. less ENT, & lit.).

HC

D. Ashcroft, Mrs M. Bootle, H. J. Bradbury, C. J. Brougham, E. J. Burge, C. J. & M. P. Butler, D. A. Campbell, Mrs M. J. Cansfield, C. W. Clenshaw, D. C. Clenshaw, N. Connaughton, K. W. Crawford, N. C. Dexter, L. K. Edkins, P. D. Gaffey, N. C. Goddard, G. I. L. Grafton, J. F. Grimshaw, J. Hastie, R. Hesketh, M. Hodgkin, A. Hodgson, R. A. Humphries, Mrs S. D. Johnson, J. C. Leyland, D. F. Manley, R. Mann, P. W. Marlow, Rev M. R. Metcalf, C. G. Millin, S. Newbery, F. R. Palmer, J. Pearce, R. Phillips, H. L. Rhodes, D. R. Robinson, A. Roth, M. Sanderson, D. P. Shenkin, P. L. Stone, D. H. Tompsett, A. P. Vincent, Ms S. Wallace, A. J. Wardrop, Dr E. Young, R. Zara.
 

Comments
306 entries, very few mistakes (mostly over CRARE). Some, however, had SHIATZU or expressed uncertainty about which of the two spellings to choose. I did foresee this and so specifically asked for the first spelling given by Chambers. Do read the rules and requests paragraph every time, in case there are additions or alterations to the standard wording. There was no clear favourite clue this month but no fewer than fifteen different ones were mentioned as giving special pleasure, gratifyingly for me. The word I most enjoyed was OCTOPUSH - the sheer battiness of underwater hockey as an idea takes some beating, and might have been dreamt up by Peter Cook. (Apologies to any keen octopushers out there.)
 
As clue words go, SHIATSU offered a fairly limited range of possibilities, almost all involving anagrams. It was clearly tempting to use ‘massage’ as an anagram indicator, often in an’& lit.’ context, and variations on ‘It has us massaged’ were just too numerous to do better than HC. Sushi was also served up quite a lot, but only Mr Willett managed to do something really clever with it. Here are three promising clues which didn’t quite hit the spot, for various reasons: (a) ‘Therapy that suits drunk? Total abstinence not required’ (anag. less TT); but TT stands for teetotal, not teetotalism. (b) ‘Hands-on technique Akira used in Seven Samurai, first reel’ (anag. of first letters; ref Akira Kurosawa); nice idea, but the first two words can’t do double duty both as part of the cryptic reading and as the definition. (c) ‘Manipulation by hand is how sushi is made’ (i.e. sushi = ‘shi’at ‘su’); nothing actually wrong here, just (to my mind) a rather strained use of language, requiring at the very least a question mark at the end to indicate that ‘shi’ at ‘su’ could equally produce ‘sishu’,
 
My thanks to all those (and there were several) who took the trouble to explain the etymology of ‘rook’ in chess to me. It’s given in any decent dictionary, of course, Chambers included, and it’s interesting to note that the roc, the fabulous bird that could carry off an elephant, comes eom the same Persian word, but the connection between an elephant and a sort of crenellated tower is still not wholly clear. Did war elephants go into battle with a sort of tower on their backs? Is that the origin of Elephant and Castle in London, which some say is a corruption of the Infanta of Castile? Or did the Crusaders have something to do with it? No one seems to be sure. Most European languages use a word. meaning ‘tower’ to denote the rook in chess, though curiously the Russians call it ladia, a boat.
 
A final apology to Mr J. C. Leyland for omitting a key phrase from his second prizewinning clue to MARGENT (BEETLES) last month, both in The Observer and in the slip. It should of course have read ‘The old lip’s quivering in anger - maiden on verge of tears.’