Fun theme idea, to spell out "A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte" using dots, or points, if we want to get even closer to a literal connection to POINTILLISM, the style that GEORGESSEURAT is most remembered for.
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| It's almost mandatory that I include this, isn't it? Also, what's with that monkey? |
It's almost like a stunt puzzle. If the letters in the title were symmetrically placed, that would be a true stunt.. but then, it would probably be a much worse puzzle, too. As it is, we already have kind of a lot of iffy material: EVEL (Daredevil Knievel) (is he still relevant?), NASL (Org. for the New York Cosmos) (North American Soccer League) (is that still relevant?), ANI (What's far from fair?) (Cute, but tortured clue), FOO, LAT, INE, NUI, STE, NOOR, INS, ODS, and CAF, to name but twelve.
On the other hand, I did enjoy the two preposition-ending-with phrases SNORTAT (Dismiss with derision) and PROUDOF (Self-satisfied about), and the clue for PJS (Cover of night?) was excellent. PITH (Essential part) is great. I learned something with BINDI (Dot on a Hindu woman's forehead), and I always enjoy a smattering of foreign language answers - DEJA, NYET, CHERIE, EINE, BRAVO, and FORTE. And did anyone else start typing in "Rastro" for 27D: Elroy's dog on "The Jetsons?" (ASTRO). I actually did that. Heh.
So there was good and bad. As I said at the top, the theme was fun, and it was well done. There were necessary concessions, apparently, and sometimes that's fine, especially when you can find a whole paragraph of good material too.
- Horace
over twice a long as Horace :)
ReplyDeleteBINDA? BINDI? My lack of knowledge led to one error there!
But this was a great theme - I wondered, at first, if the dots would lead to a visual...not really. I loved the final answer - if one hasn't been to the Chicago Art Institute to see the original, it is well worth the trip! That thing is huge - 10' wide and 7' tall. And the pointillism technique shows us so well at that scale! It apparently took a couple of years and 60 studies to get it finished!
Back to the puzzle - I don't mind crosswordese at all. My old friends these nearly 60 years. ETUI - which I now own 2 of those, EWER - I don't have one - and ESNE are all welcome! Easy fill is great, leaves my hard thinking for clues like "Egg shell?". I do agree that NASL is the bunk! ha
And what's with the guy in the sleeveless top??? At least the monkey is on a leash!
~MLou
5:03 (FWOE)
ReplyDeleteI guessed sEND rather than LEND. I only figured it out by using the POINTILLISM trick. I don't think much of ELO being clued with "Chess rating system." How about "Mr. Blue Sky band"? Honestly, this puzzle comes down on the side of not so hot for me. I love the painting (and I love Sondheim's Sunday in the Park with George even more), but the trade off is too much. You didn't even mention ATOB! That's so ad hoc, it's crazy.
10:31
ReplyDeleteI noticed ATOB, Colum, which made me cringe when it was finally completed with crosses. The monkey was probably trendy; maybe people were just starting to travel to exotic locales at that time, like southeast Asia, which is rotten with the creatures, and decided to impress their friends with their new, exotic pet. I had to talk Sue out of bringing one back with us from Bali. NASL isn't too relevant to me, but EVEL always will be, no? A bit more difficult in parts than a normal Tuesday, but I didn't mind this puzzle, overall, too much, though I wouldn't necessarily yell BRAVO.