AZED CROSSWORD 2530

STUDENTY

1.  Dr I. S. Fletcher: This life requires working yet it’s led with fun (comp. anag. & lit.).

2.  R. J. Palmer: —— brood could be tutored by dons (comp. anag. & lit.).

3.  R. C. Teuton: As one in form stallion runs away from the field (stud + ent(r)y).

VHC

D. & N. Aspland: Dust’s settling and effort’s beginning with undergraduate’s second and penultimate year – it’s typical for those in uni (anag. + e, n, t, y).

J. A. Butler: Favoured by those seeking tuition, we see smartest undergrad earn trophy after vacation (first & last letters).

R. J. Heald: University degree course half missed amid scene of debauchery – typical of undergrads! (U d ent(rée) in sty).

D. F. Manley: Sun admittedly struggling to fend off alternative D. Mail – like rags? (anag. less anag.).

P. W. Marlow: Sun with a version of nude totty lacking ordinary respect ultimately – typical of a rag? (S + anag. less o, t).

L. Marzillier (USA): Dust with difficulty being short of something like a rag (anag. + ent(it)y).

P. McKenna: Chap who’s always up for it at St Andrews being attentive, spending time like a scholar (stud² + (t)enty).

C. G. Millin: Like undergraduate life – assessment leading to a year university degree’s secured (u d in stent y).

T. J. Moorey: As a youngster staying in digs, one’s heart is in Egypt probing dusty ground (n in ET in anag.).

J. Pearce: What describes primarily young scholars drinking themselves under table every night? Foolish! (anag. of first letters, & lit.).

C. Short: Epithet nailing those youngsters tackling university degrees – some taking firsts, somehow (anag. of first letters, & lit.).

J. R. Tozer: Probably academic what ‘securely attaches’ entry if it’s not right (stud + ent(r)y; ref. AZ comp. rules and requests).

J. Vincent & Ms R. Porter: Typical of undergrads? One can characterize such, most improperly, as ‘stoned’ and ‘smutty’ (comp. anag.).

Mrs A. M. Walden: Like many current undergraduates, beginning to undergo depression in squalid accommodation (u dent in sty).

Ms S. Wallace: Tiny university bedsit not initially inspiring but it might be described thus (anag. incl. u, less i, b, i).

L. Ward (USA): If not seeing page right, it’s wise to probe optical disorder involving pupils ((p, r)udent in sty).

A. J. Whittaker: Tendency to lose book in dusty, untidy surroundings – just like an undergrad! ((b)ent in anag.).

G. H. Willett: It’s like Zuleika’s world, perhaps, when God’s gift heads the field right away (stud + ent(r)y; ref. Z. Dobson).

J. R. Young: The way they are, some talented undergraduates don’t even need three years to get firsts (first letters).

HC

Ms K. Bolton, T. C. Borland, Dr J. Burscough, C. A. Clarke, S. L. Claughton, P. Coles, Ms S. Curran (France), W. Drever, C. M. Edmunds, J. Fairclough, H. Freeman, A. Gerrard, J. Grimes, J. R. Howlett, L. M. Inman, J. C. Leyland, M. Lloyd-Jones, I. Mackintosh, T. D. Nicholl, M. Ollerenshaw, S. J. O’Boyle, A. Plumb, W. Ransome, P. L. Stone, A. J. Varney, A. J. Wardrop, R. Zara.
 

Comments
138 entries, no mistakes. Favourite clue, of 16 receiving one vote or more, was ‘Who often joined Daisy having tea? Come off it!’ for GERTCHA. I’m not sure I ever heard Gert and Daisy live on the wireless (as I’m sure they would have called it) but they were very popular in their day (1930s to 1950s). They were played by the sisters Elsie and Doris Waters, whose brother was Jack Warner, best remembered as Dixon of Dock Green and composer of the programme’s catchy theme tune. The other clue that required some specialized knowledge was ‘Sneery, I maligned those labelled “kindly”’ for ERINYES, also referred to by the Greeks euphemistically as the Eumenides. Chambers translates this as ‘the gracious ones’ but I’ve always thought of them as ‘the kindly ones’, the title Anthony Powell gave to one of the volumes in his wonderful A Dance to the Music of Time series.
 
I got the impression that STUDENTY (an unattractive derivative) proved trickier to clue satisfactorily than expected. Those who chose STY as part of their cryptic element almost inevitably ended up portraying students as an unattractive lot. I had no objection to this; what I was less keen on was using ‘study’ (verb or noun) as part of the cryptic element, it being just too close in derivation to the literal definition of the target word.
 
A gentle word of warning: do please check your clue carefully before sending it off. I feel bound to disqualify any submissions that contain misspellings, regardless of how good they are in other respects, even if I suspect that the error is entirely inadvertent. I dislike doing this but feel that I really have no choice. (An example from this month was ‘accomodation’ (sic).)
 
On a happier note, my wife joins me in expressing our sincere thanks for the many cards and kind seasonal greetings we have received from Azed solvers. As the year ends we send you all our warmest good wishes, in the fervent hope that 2021 will prove altogether less stressful for us all.