AZED CROSSWORD 426

MISL(E)ADING

1.  W. J. M. Scotland: Naughty gals with mini skirts had little not showing clearly! (’d in anag.).

2.  E. A. Beaulah: Promising the unattainable left Midas frenzied because of touch of gold (anag. incl. l + in g).

3.  Mrs M. J. Cansfield: Seducing in a sports car is romance with a capital R (is Ladin in MG; i.e. Romance language).

VHC

T. Anderson: Dim signal might be so construed (anag. & lit.).

D. W. Arthur: Intelligence service gets faulty signal about the start of Doomsday, causing false alert? (MI + D in anag.; ref. Pentagon computer failures).

Mrs K. Bissett: Signal with dim light could be (anag. & lit.; light = frivolous).

E. J. Burge: Taking up the garden path for ‘crazy’ conversion, man digs vestiges of lawn in (anag. incl. l i; ref. crazy paving).

R. S. Caffyn: Azed’s constant aim: bending infinitely agile minds (anag. incl. agil(e)).

R. V. Dearden: Dim signal could be this (anag. & lit.).

J. Dromey: What dim signal could be (anag. & lit.).

Dr I. S. Fletcher: Is pulse rising at the bat in sports car causing distraction? (is dal (rev.) in in MG; bat = speed).

B. Franco: Many such cases are bound to fail almost before a charge is entered (mis(s) lading; ref. A. P. Herbert’s ‘M. Cases’).

F. D. Gardiner: This claim ultimately discredits slimming ad (anag. less m, & lit.).

R. B. Harling: Dim signal could be this (anag. & lit.).

P. F. Henderson: Cryptic? See heartless Azed smiling deviously (anag. incl. A(ze)d).

Mrs S. Hewitt: Is chap at home in sports car not to be trusted? (is lad in in MG).

G. B. Higgins: Getting wires crossed, dials in M.G. read incorrectly (anag.).

J. P. H. Hirst: Seducing in a sports car is one sort of Romance (is Ladin in MG).

Miss H. Kimble: Deceptive knave swearing about missing tart (lad in (pro)mising).

R. E. Kimmons: Glamis uneasy about noise? Apparitions’ statements proved this (din in anag.; ref. Macbeth IV, i, ‘What noise is this?’).

J. R. Kirby: Mixing a gin with mild’s likely to catch you out! (anag.).

A. Lawrie: What dim signal could be (anag. & lit.).

L. May: Married lives drag on, filled with discord, fostering misunderstanding (m is + din in lag).

J. J. Moore: Dreadfully dismal batting; with one scored, gone, making one mistake (anag. + in + g(one); mistake v.i.).

C. J. Morse: What dim signal could be (anag. & lit.).

R. A. Mostyn: Motorway sign vandalized (youth involved), causing errors (M1 + lad in anag.).

W. H. Pegram: Deceptive: dodging M. Ali’s punch? (anag. + ding).

Mrs E. M. Phair: Dim signal could be —— (anag. & lit.).

B. A. Pike: Like Viola, slim in drag, transformed, if casting right (anag. less r; ref. Twelfth Night).

A. D. Scott: Descriptive of slimming ad if madam’s bottom is not seen differently? (anag. less m, & lit.).

Mrs E. J. Shields: Confusing minds with a lig? (anag. & lit.).

P. J. Wagstaffe: Heartless Azed, smiling outrageously about taking one up the garden path (anag. incl. A(ze)d).

Dr R. L. Wynne: Dim signal flickering like Will-o’-the-wisp (anag.).

HC

C. Allen Baker, Mrs A. Baker, R. L. Baker, J. C. Barnes, M. Barnes, G. T. Berryman, P. R. Best, Mrs F. Blanchard, A. G. Bogie, C. Brougham, Rev C. M. Broun, C. J. and M. P. Butler, E. Chalkley, D. P. Chappell, C. A. Clarke, M. Coates, A. G. Corrigan, Dr A. G. C. Cox, A. J. Crow, Dr V. G. I. Deshmukh, Dr R. V. Dugdale, O. H. Frazer, E. H. Freedman, J. Gill, J. J. Goulstone, J. Grainge, M. J. Grocott, R. S. Haddock, B. Hancock, D. V. Harry, V. G. Henderson, I. A. Herbert, J. C. Hobbs, S. Holgate, E. M. Holroyd, J. G. Hull, K. Hunter, S. H. Jarvis, A. H. Jones, M. D. Laws, J. H. C. Leach, P. W. W. Leach, J. P. Lester, D. F. Manley, S. M. Mansell, H. W. Massingham, H. J. McClarron, C. G. Millin, W. L. Miron, Dr R. G. Monk, T. W. Mortimer, F. R. Palmer, S. L. Paton, G. S. Prentice, A. J. Redstone, D. R. Robinson, H. R. Sanders, T. E. Sanders, Mrs B. Simmonds, W. K. M. Slimmings, F. B. Stubbs, Dr G. A. Styles, Dr S. G. Subbuswamy, R. C. Teuton, Miss D. B. Thomas, D. H. Tompsett, I. Torbe, M. A. Vernon, R. Walkden, A. J. Wardrop, Mrs J. Welford, G. H. Willett, M. Woolf.
 

COMMENTS
About 450 entries for a puzzle everyone seems to have enjoyed solving. Almost no mistakes though a number of you noticed the CRABBY/CRAGGY and PIGHT/SIGHT alternatives which were unplanned by me and in any case did not affect completion of the diagram, though they may have delayed discovery of the quotation. I had recourse to the new edition of ODQ only because I couldn’t find a suitable quotation in the old edition. And since many of you asked whether an ‘L.L.’ puzzle takes longer to set than most specials, the answer is ‘Yes, much.’ The quotation or message whose letters are latent must be relevant or appropriate in some way and making it fit can be a problem. Few lines of verse, for example, with or without a word omitted, are exactly 36 letters long (36 being the number of words in an average AZ puzzle). Constructing the diagram is also a lengthy if fascinating exercise in word manipulation, especially if one is keeping, as one must, the number of unches to the normal percentage or even slightly less, and also going for a standard balance of short, medium and long words. The temptation is always, of course, to find words with several of the latent letters in each, but this requires an extra degree of mental agility, visualizing words with more than one ‘hole’. And finally one has constantly to beware of interlocking words in case a latent letter from the word that crosses the one being entered occurs at the crossing point, which it must not do. I would not like to say how many hours I wrestled with this puzzle. In all it can’t have been fewer than fifteen.
 
Clues are less of a problem, and it’s quite agreeable making a change from the standard ‘plain’. I would however make three general points since they all have a bearing on competition entries. (i) By and large ‘L.L.’ clues should be a bit easier than normal ones, since the solver’s task is from the outset a bit more difficult than usual. He has a definition of the answer but no cryptic indication of it in its complete form. (ii) I avoid, and prefer competitors to avoid, ‘join-words’ between the two parts of an ‘L.L.’ clue. While perfectly legitimate and acceptable in ordinary clues where definition and cryptic indication refer to exactly the same thing, such usage strikes me as at least questionable in an ‘L.L.’ clue in that it suggests that the mutilated and unmutilated forms of the word clued are likewise exactly the same thing, which they are not. Thus in ‘Distraught, I’m glad sin is deceptive’ I regard ‘is’ as not merely unnecessary but obtrusively misleading. I hope I make my point. (iii) I see no reason, as some competitors wondered, why an ‘L.L.’ clue should not be an ‘& lit.’ clue also. The whole clue could be read as a definition of the answer, or, at a second reading, as the cryptic indication of the mutilated form of it. See the ‘& lit.’ clues which use the ‘dim signal’ anagram above (much the most popular idea this month by the way). I’m sure Ximenes also had no objection to this device (remember the ‘ “U” ’eel-bar’ for BEAU(C)LER(C)?); where he did not, and I do not, accept the ‘& lit.’ is in Misprint clues, of which more, no doubt, when the next ‘Misprints’ competition occurs.
 
No more for now. I’m on holiday in Cornwall as I write and my wife understandably regards crosswords or anything to do with them as taboo on these occasions. I mustn’t close however without a special word of congratulation to Mrs Joyce Cansfield who won the 1980 National Scrabble Competition (at which I was adjudicating) on the same day that her third-prize-winning clue above was announced.