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Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.
A blog that takes a look at the highlights from the week’s cryptics, and some of the puzzles coming up this weekend.
Clues of the weekend
A happy 90th birthday to a certain creator of children’s characters, as featured in Gaff’s themed puzzle today. Here’s a clue that leads to one of those characters —
Insignificant problem for murder investigation (6)
Leonidas is the setter for the Saturday cryptic puzzle, which contains this simple fare —
Two fishes not doing an awful lot (6)
Sunday brings forth the monthly US puzzle, set by Reorder, and featuring this one —
One of 400,000 held beneath the Bank of England
US puzzles don’t indicate how the solution divides up numerically, suffice to say this clue contains seven letters.
Here’s another Reorder clue, also seven letters —
He or U, but not Me
And from the Polymath, set by Sleuth, do you know this general knowledge clue —
Song by Marshall Hain that reached No 3 in the UK charts in 1978 (7,2,3,4)
In Aldhelm’s hybrid Weekend puzzle, which combines straight clues and cryptic ones, here is what is known in the trade as a container clue, highlighted for ease of understanding —
Dry bit of lobster I left (7)
How to solve
Throw away last of lime pickle (6)
This was the first clue in Peto’s puzzle on Monday.
Throw away gives us SCRAP.
The last letter of lime is e.
So, SCRAP + E = SCRAPE which is another word for pickle.
Fancy a simplish anagram? Gurney on Tuesday came up with —
Change clue ending as favour (10)
Change indicates an anagram.
CLUE ENDING, when jumbled, gives us a word for favour — INDULGENCE.
A simple double definition in Steerpike’s puzzle on Thursday —
Remove tariff (6)
Both words mean EXCISE
Word of the week
PAMPHLET
Neo on Wednesday came up with clue —
Page 50 in the map changed for publication (8)
This becomes pamphlet when you change the letters contained in the map and put them in P for (Page) and L (for 50).
The OED says that the 12th century amatory poem or comedy Pamphilus, seu de Amore, featuring the protagonists Pamphilus and Galatea, was translated into French, and was mentioned as Panflet in the Middle Dutch.
From the FT Style Guide
effectively/in effect
Effectively is very often used incorrectly. Effectively means with effect eg he leads the team effectively. It should not be used in such sentences as: ‘the company is effectively bankrupt’ — here we should use ‘the company is in effect bankrupt’.
To access the FT’s Cryptic, Polymath and FT Weekend crosswords, go to https://www.ft.com/puzzles-games or solve them on the iOS and Android apps.
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