Three from LAT:
Drawings briefly cursed in the New Testament (4)
Animal spirits off noisily to Thames (6)
Russian novelist Nikolai gets nothing for an awful lots (6)
Two from ST:
Therapeutic salts move from Mass to Nova Scotia for electronics (6)
Resigned investigation questions usage in tech start-ups (1,4)
 LAT |  Seattle Times // sNYT |
Here are the solutions to yesterday's clues:
Heartless | videogamer | depicted in | toponym of poem about the Bell of Justice (4)
[eliminate middle letter] [ATaRI] [=] [ATRI]
Videogamer referred to game maker, not player. A toponym is a place-name, to signal that it wasn't the entire name of the poem, Longfellow's The Bell of Atri, that was wanted. The capitalization of Bell and Justice was a red herring.
Frightening situation | of | potter | in song (5)
[HAIRY] [=] [HARRY {potter}] [homophone]
Boom | scatters | coins (5)
[SONIC] = [anagram] [COINS]
Desiring | to escape | DWI? Shin guards | are the answer (7)
[WISHING] = [hidden] [dWI SHIN Guards] [filler]
In some states, Driving While Intoxicated (DWI) refers to alcohol and Driving Under the Influence (DUI) is for drugs; in other states one or the other is used for both.
Bone up | on | retrospective of | 2001 movie about Artificial Intelligence | bit (5)
[TIBIA] [=] [reversed] [A. I.] [BIT]
A.I. as an abbreviation is not, I fear, in common use, but it's been used a couple times as a movie title.
If you are only reading the main entries on this blog, you're only reading part of it! The comments are often more interesting and informative than the main entries, so check them out even if you don't plan to add one yourself! Please post comments, guesses, questions, partial answers, rationales, alternative clues, or anything even marginally related.
LAT1: Drawings briefly cursed in the New Testament (4)
ReplyDeleteNice clue, but pretty obscure and Christianocentric.
My clue: “Dresses smartly, but leaves with minimal clothing (4)”
LAT2: Animal spirits off noisily to Thames (6)
Very clever; no pronunciation issues today. “off” seems to be rather strong filler.
My clue: “Do they have spiritual significance for children with electromagnetic hearts?” (6)
LAT3: Russian novelist Nikolai gets nothing for an awful lots (6)
OK if you know the novelist – plenty of Nikolais out there. Should the clue not have finished “awful lot” ?
My clue: “Search engine said to offer the power of the century (6)”.
ST1: Therapeutic salts move from Mass to Nova Scotia for electronics (6)
I was trying to figure out how this could be “ATOMIC”, but then realized my mistake. Mass should probably have a period.
My Clue: "Is nothing specified when starter elements are returned for printers?" (6)”.
ST2: Resigned investigation questions usage in tech start-ups (1,4)
Nice acrostic. The (1,4) gives the game away rather.
My Clue: “Could a measure of intelligence lead to the end of Arctic residents? Forget it!”
NC
LAT1: I get half your clue, but I'm not sure which half.
ReplyDeleteLAT2: nice.
LAT3: much better than just Russian novelist anyway. Your homophone works fine.
ST1: punctuation in cryptics are meaningless anyway, but a period would have only been a red herring anyway.
Yours is technically okay except for leading to singular instead of plural or possessive. But it is philosophically British.
British differences have been noted before, but there is, I think, also an underlying philosophy difference. British constructors see it as a competition. They are trying to make their clues as difficult as possible. Their perfect puzzle would be one that no one managed to complete, but that everyone agreed was fair once it was explained. American setters see it as a challenge to make it exactly hard enough for most solvers to get, but with enough difficulty to make it enjoyable. A perfect puzzle would be one that 75%-90% could solve, but no more than 25%-10% would complain was too easy. Add to that, I consider my puzzles, and this blog, to be aimed towards the novice at cryptics, and so occasional gimmes like give-away numerations or telegraphed solutions are actually desirable.
ST2: Yours was good. Elves and polar bears were my first thoughts before Inuit, so nice misdirection.