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62A Bonheur, Sheep in a Landscape
Today’s puzzle suggests a number of illustration possibilities. A nice marsh landscape would fit the title. All too much modern art would fit 37 Across. I’ve settled on the above, which neatly combines 9 Across and 62 Across
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A puzzle of mine will appear next Monday, March 11, in the Wall Street Journal.
George Paul Chalmers, Old Letters
I return to David Christie Murray (see 009). This, his second novel, was a great critical and popular success; its villains are particularly enjoyable.
“It is excellent alike as writing and as invention. The style is one of uncommon vivacity and intelligence. . . . About his work, too, there is a happy and attractive flavour of novelty. His characters and incidents are for the most part new and fresh.” Academy, November 5, 1881
“‘Joseph’s Coat’ is one of the best novels we have met with for a long time. It shows not only a rare power of understanding and drawing character, but the perhaps rarer power of constructing a plot of first-rate interest. . . . The character of young George is . . . a masterly study.” Athenaeum, November 19, 1881
It provides “a psychological inquiry into the nature of the class variously called knaves, scamps, or scoundrels. It is a study in the various shades of roguery. The author . . . evidently enjoys the work of delineation, of tracing ill-doing to its source, and detecting the scamp while he is still in favour with honest but less discerning people.” Saturday Review, June 10, 1882
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v.1 https://archive.org/details/josephscoat01murr/
William Fraser Garden, Back Lane, Holywell
I’m back in action, with back-to-back thrills! I've got your back! It’s payback time! So don’t hold back! Just download the puzzle.
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A puzzle of mine will appear Friday, March 8, in The Los Angeles Times (and The Chicago Tribune, The Houston Chronicle, The San Francisco Chronicle, etc.)
James Jacques Joseph Tissot, Woman in an Interior
Frances Cashel Hoey (née Frances Sarah Johnston) (1830-1908) published some 13 works of fiction between 1868 and 1886 and collaborated with Edmund Yates on several others. She was a Catholic convert, and one of her purposes here is to condemn divorce; several contemporary reviewers agree that this does not impair the novel’s literary quality.
“This novel, remarkable in many ways, is especially so for its skilful delineation of character. All the principal personages and many of the subordinate ones stand out so distinctly before us that we have their images in our minds and are able to picture them to ourselves in the various attitudes they are made to assume, and to understand perfectly the motives which underlie their actions… On the whole we must say of this novel that it is as powerful as it is well written and well imagined. It is original in its tone and its modes of thought, and to all who can enjoy a good study of human nature, and who love to see follies, weaknesses, and sins unflinchingly exposed and as scornfully denounced, must afford a treat but seldom offered to them in these days of weak, washy novelties and meaningless love stories.” Morning Post, April 16, 1874
“So well kept up is the interest from the first page to the last, that her readers forgive her the three volumes...and the story is not at all too long for its requirements. . . . The peculiar charm of the book is its liveliness, the go and movement on every page; yet the workmanship is careful and correct all through, and the characters possess a distinct individuality of their own which is seldom met with now-a-days.” Times, August 21, 1874
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Joseph Farquharson, An Aberdeenshire Farm Under Snow
My choice of painting was inspired by 39 Down. I looked up the term online and found it originally referred not, as I thought, to a raucous but harmless celebration of some sort, but to a noisy, sometime violent mock-parade held to express collective “disapproval of different types of violation of community norms” (Wikipedia). And this reminded me of everything that arouses the misanthropy against which, dear solver, I am perpetually struggling—it reminded me, that is, of mindless tribalism, hideous clamor, deliberate cruelty in the service of some sanctimonious purpose. I found myself longing for silence and emptiness. The inhabitants of these Aberdeenshire farms, however maliciously inclined, have got to remain quietly in their snowbound buildings for the present.
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Archibald J. Stuart Wortley, Lilian Eldée
A well-intentioned middle-aged man, in love with a middle-aged woman, finds himself in a painful moral dilemma.
Here is another excellent novel by the prolific and talented Walford (see Novel 018), with an unconventional heroine and several other complex characters.
“The heroine is a charming creation, and as original as she is charming. . . . The characters are drawn with Mrs. Walford’s well-known skill, and there is many a touch in her delineation of the heroine that could only have been given by an accomplished novelist who has...the sympathetic imagination of a true artist.” Athenaeum, August 23, 1884
“There must be something deficient in the mind of any person who does not find it full of humour and vivacity varied by true pathos, and also by distinct traces of tragic power.” Spectator, August 23, 1884
“This is one of the most fresh and delightful stories recently published in English literature. . . . The book has humor and vivacity, with pathos and enough tragedy to relieve its lighter portions. The narrative is quiet and not very eventful, but it has the charm of flowing logically out of the clash and collision of character.” Eclectic Magazine, October, 1884
“To buoyant spirits and a fresh imagination the author unites a piquancy of style which is fairly irresistible. Her characters are life-like yet unhackneyed, she has an artistic grasp of plot, and excels in her conversations, which are thoroughly natural, spontaneous, and flowing.” Dublin Review, April 1885
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v.1 https://archive.org/details/babysgrandmother01walf
Herbert Draper, The Lament for Icarus
I have crafted this puzzle specifically for those elite solvers who are able to soar above the petty, earthbound considerations of vulgar linguistic usage that limit the intellects of the common herd. If you belong to this group, I congratulate you, and invite you to congratulate yourself. For self-congratulation is a primary—in fact, for many, the only—purpose of cultural experience. Let us wallow in it together.
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A puzzle of mine will appear next Tuesday, February 19, in the New York Times. Meanwhile, on the very same day, another puzzle of mine will appear in the various newspapers that run the Universal Crossword .
Sir William Quiller Orchardson, The Chinese Cabinet
Charlotte Elizabeth Riddell (1832-1906) wrote over fifty works of fiction between 1856 and 1900, often set, like this one, among middle-class denizens of London.
“A well-conceived, well-wrought-out story, which has an air of human truth and reality about it which novels do not often possess.” Athenaeum, March 17, 1860.
“A thoroughly good novel” distinguished by “its downright reality”; practical scientists in charge of factories are brought “living before us, in very flesh and blood, not a blotch or stain overlooked.” Spectator, March 31, 1860
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Henry Holiday, First Meeting of Dante and Beatrice
A crossword puzzle, says Aristotle, or Coleridge, or somebody, should create its own alternative world, one in which, though people may not behave as expected, they nonetheless follow an internal logic of their own. I have tried, in my humble way, to obey these strictures, nowhere more than in this present offering.
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George Frederic Watts, Miss May Prinsep
Anna Harriet Drury (1824-1912) wrote some 16 novels between 1849 and 1891. This one, despite intermittent downpours of religiosity, provides some excellent social comedy.
“It is at once amusing and instructive, genial and healthful. . . . Miss Drury’s style is peculiarly correct and elegant. She writes, indeed, simple, honest, unaffected English, quite refreshing after the artificial semi-barbarous Teutonic gibberish of the day. . . . Miss Drury . . . has a natural dramatic faculty—the power of entering into the feelings of others, and speaking in their persons.” English Review, March 1849
“Her perceptions are lively and keen, and her powers of delineating manners and character might well be compared with those of authors ‘of mark and likelihood.’ Her style is racy, animated, and easy, often pointed and epigrammatic. . . . The story is told in a pleasant and genial spirit; and although pervaded . . . by an earnest religious tone, it is so far from being bilious or melancholic that many a hearty laugh is to be enjoyed at the strokes of humour scattered through its lively pages. If Miss Drury is a serious thinker, . . . she has also a relish for a joke, and a keen perception of the ludicrous.” Morning Chronicle, April 14, 1849
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Atkinson Grimshaw, Tree Shadows on the Park Wall, Roundhay Park, Leeds
Today, in Connecticut, will be held the Westport Library Crossword Tournament— where, frightened of my shadow, I will not appear. But, through the kind offices of “Bob Kerfuffle” (who also thought up its title) the attached puzzle will appear there, in paper form, and I welcome anyone led here by that means. I couldn’t find any paintings of groundhogs, but I’ve posted a nice one of some shadows. Imagine yourself as seeing them from a groundhog’s point of view.
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A puzzle of mine appeared yesterday in The Los Angeles Times (and The Chicago Tribune, The Houston Chronicle, The San Francisco Chronicle, etc.)
A puzzle of mine will appear next Thursday, February 7, in the Wall Street Journal.
Abraham Solomon, First Class, The Meeting
Here is another, shorter novel by Mrs. Alexander (See Novel 001), with an easily guessable but entertaining plot and an interestingly complex heroine.
“In spite of the plot being . . . commonplace, the story runs well in the artistic hands of the author; the characters are definite, the heroine charming, and the result agreeable to the reader.” Athenaeum, April 3, 1875
“The characters . . . are well sketched”; “the story, though slight, is . . . one which from its brightness and play of fancy is sure to please.” Morning Post, June 4, 1875
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v.1 https://archive.org/details/ralphwiltonswei01hectgoog/page/n4
v.2 https://archive.org/details/ralphwiltonswei00hectgoog/page/n4
Atkinson Grimshaw, Park Row, Leeds
I’m afraid the relation of the title to the puzzle is arguably just a little bit strained here, requiring both a parsing and an unlikely abbreviation. Normally I am all too scrupulous in making titles that simply and exactly delineate the nature of the puzzles to which they are attached. I make an exception today in order to give myself an excuse to haul in another painting by the great Atkinson Grimshaw. Maybe somewhere there’s an alternate art world, into which (if we’re good) we will pass when this earthly life is over—a world in which the fame of Grimshaw is choired by angels, and Picasso is unknown.
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James Sant, Lesbia
Anne Elliot (1856-1941) wrote 13 novels, of which this was the first, between 1883 and 1903. Like her protagonist here, she was a doctor’s daughter; the novel’s representation of the plight of a Victorian woman seeking a professional career, though somewhat undermined by its dénouement, is vivid and touching.
“A fresh and clever story. . . . Several of the subordinate characters, though little more than sketches, are vividly drawn, and the whole tone of life in a prosperous, but highly Philistine, provincial town is cleverly caught.” Academy, October 20, 1883
“The writer of this novel is manifestly very much in earnest. There is an unmistakeable reality, a ring of genuine passion, in her complaints of the folly and caprice which deny to her heroine her legitimate career.” Spectator, November 10, 1883
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v.1 https://archive.org/details/dredithromneyan02elligoog/page/n11
v.2 https://archive.org/details/dredithromneyan00elligoog/page/n4
v.3 https://archive.org/details/dredithromneyan01elligoog/page/n8
Charles Robert Leslie, Gulliver Presented to the Queen of Brobdignag
Why say in one word what you can just as well say in two, or three, or four, especially if you can thereby come up with 15-letter grid-spanning phrases?
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A puzzle of mine will appear next Thursday, January 24, in the Wall Street Journal.
William Powell Frith - The Artist’s Model
The great M.E. Braddon (see Novel 004) was among the most often and unjustly maligned of Victorian novelists. Contemporary critics never tired of blaming her for Lady Audley’s Secret (1862), as the worst consequence of an unhealthy vogue for “sensation novels.” And her improbable plots are easy to mock. At the same time, they are consistently engrossing; while her characters are vivid and often surprisingly complex, her settings evocative, and her style subtle, witty, and exact.
“When our fault-finding is done with we thank Miss Braddon for a treat. Her novels are always agreeable reading and have as much genuine merit as would set up a dozen of her rivals. Her descriptions of Voysey Street and other districts are delightful.” Sunday Times, September 27, 1874
“The real secret of her success is that her people are exactly the same kind of commonplace, everyday folk as we are ourselves, and as our friends are.” Observer, September 27, 1874
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v.1 (Tauchnitz ed.) https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_5HAdetMocuQC/page/n5
v.2 (Tauchnitz ed.) https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_lNzrF7wZ5JsC/page/n7
Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Lady Lilith
What Darwinian purpose does hair serve? How are the odds of human survival increased by its plentiful presence on the top of the head? Maybe it provides protection from sun and rain and snow? But if so, why do so many men who are deprived of this protection after their first youth successfully breed other men who will be similarly deprived? And why do they meanwhile retain the facial hair that just gets in their food?
Well—it’s another of life’s unsoluble riddles. Crosswords, by contrast, provide only soluble riddles, so console yourself with this one.
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Myles Birket Foster, The Milk-maid
Anne Beale (1816-1900) wrote some twenty novels between 1844 and 1891. This one, set in her native Wales, has vivid characters and an endearingly contrived plot (though the treacle does run a little thick in the last volume).
A “half-pastoral Welsh story”; the plot “may be said perhaps rather to have been well felt than cunningly devised. It is unquestionably interesting, but a quiet sense of what is good and beautiful in life is the chief grace of the tale.” Examiner, October 27, 1860
“An interesting, natural story, written with evident care and pains.” Athenaeum, November 10, 1860
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v.1 https://archive.org/details/gladysreaperbya03bealgoog
v.2 https://archive.org/details/gladysreaperbya02bealgoog
v.3 https://archive.org/details/gladysreaperbya00bealgoog
Henry Moore, Light Airs at Sunset
Is it permissible to alter a certain letter in a crossword theme phrase, and yet allow that letter to remain unaltered elsewhere in that very phrase? Will it, as I’ve heard more than once, confuse the solver? Maybe so, if the solver is a primitive computer capable of processing only the simplest “if-then” algorithms and immune to humor. I construct my crosswords, however, for genuine, warm-blooded, passionate human beings! I’m not saying that, if you object to what you think is my inconsistency in the matter of theme-answer-letter alteration, you’re not fully human—but it’s a possibility worth considering.
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A puzzle of mine will appear next Wednesday, January 9, in the Wall Street Journal.
George Elgar Hicks, A Gypsy Girl
Justin McCarthy (1830-1912), an important Irish politician as well as a journalist and novelist, published some 25 works of fiction between 1866 and 1901. The contrast here between the attitudes of the husband and wife towards life and each other is particularly well delineated.
“Mr. McCarthy’s language is correct and well chosen: the events of his story bear each its due and proportionate share in working it out; his scene is not over-crowded with characters, and those whom he introduces are reasonable, probable, and consistent with themselves.” Athenaeum, October 10, 1874
“Besides their general truthfulness to nature, there is mostly to be discovered playing round the several characters that lambent flame of humour which is serviceable in lighting up particular traits and idiosyncracies, and setting them clearly in the reader’s eye.” Examiner, October 17, 1874
“A close observer and excellent delineator of character, Mr. McCarthy contrives to combine in his portraits reality and originality, and while he does not disdain to mention trifling incidents and minute but distinctive traits, he never wearies by prolixity.” Morning Post, October 22, 1874
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