Sunday, January 13, 2012
ACROSTIC, Puzzle by Emily Cox and Henry Rathvon
Edited by Will Shortz
This Sunday’s acrostic draws a quotation from The Music of Chance by Paul Auster.
This insightful novel is a taut study of the self-contradictory mind living by chance while thinking it can get away with anything. Jim Nashe is a frivolous Boston fireman who needs music as a life crutch. His wife abandons him just before his father dies, leaving him money that he squanders aimlessly while driving around America. Near desperation, he meets a bitter young itinerant gambler, Jack ("Jackpot") Pozzi, who lures him into a losing poker game with two shady recluses, Flower and Stone, on their Pennsylvania estate. Nashe and Pozzi must retire their debt by building a stone wall on the premises: what this Herculean labor does to them is the novel's leitmotif. An interesting story, but some may object that the journalistic prose merely tells the story instead of showing it. ~ Kenneth Mintz, formerly with Bayonne P.L., N.J.
The quotation: EACH NUMBER HAS A PERSONALITY … TWELVE IS UPRIGHT … WHEREAS THIRTEEN IS A LONER, A SHADY CHARACTER … ELEVEN IS TOUGH, AN OUTDOORSMAN … TEN IS RATHER SIMPLEMINDED, A BLAND FIGURE WHO … DOES WHAT HES TOLD … NINE IS DEEP AND MYSTICAL
The author’s name and the title of the work: PAUL AUSTER, THE MUSIC OF CHANCE
The defined words:
A. Men associated with missions, PADRES
B. “What an ARTIST dies in me!” (Nero’s last words)
C. Relax after a hard day’s work, UNWIND
D. Home to Texas A&M’s Dustdevils, LAREDO
E. Earthworm or leach, e.g., ANNELID
F. 1789 discovery by Martin Heinrich Klaproth, URANIUM
G. Hangdog, SHEEPISH
H. Screwball comedy with Astaire and Rogers (2 wds.), TOP HAT
I. View from the Hell Gate Bridge (2 wds.), EAST RIVER
J. It doesn’t go against the grain, RIPSAW
K. Giant goes of 2012, TIGERS
L. Loft where fodder is stored, HAYMOW
M. With more than a little learning, ERUDITE
N. Fillers of some books, MATCHES
O. Hard to handle, as a piano on a stairway, UNWIELDY
P. Taken from a hard case, SHELLED
Q. Concentrated to an extreme degree, INTENSE
R. Miffed, ticked off, CHEESED
S. With no attempt at secrecy, OVERTLY
T. Six-foot lengths, FATHOMS
U. Designer of a stained-glass window in the U.N. building, CHAGALL
V. Hang out, rub elbows, schmooze, HOBNOB
W. People of very little brainpower, AIRHEADS
X. Geometric shape of a Bahai temple, NONAGON
Y. Discipline, humble, CHASTEN
The quotation: EACH NUMBER HAS A PERSONALITY … TWELVE IS UPRIGHT … WHEREAS THIRTEEN IS A LONER, A SHADY CHARACTER … ELEVEN IS TOUGH, AN OUTDOORSMAN … TEN IS RATHER SIMPLEMINDED, A BLAND FIGURE WHO … DOES WHAT HES TOLD … NINE IS DEEP AND MYSTICAL
The author’s name and the title of the work: PAUL AUSTER, THE MUSIC OF CHANCE
The defined words:
A. Men associated with missions, PADRES
B. “What an ARTIST dies in me!” (Nero’s last words)
C. Relax after a hard day’s work, UNWIND
D. Home to Texas A&M’s Dustdevils, LAREDO
E. Earthworm or leach, e.g., ANNELID
F. 1789 discovery by Martin Heinrich Klaproth, URANIUM
G. Hangdog, SHEEPISH
H. Screwball comedy with Astaire and Rogers (2 wds.), TOP HAT
I. View from the Hell Gate Bridge (2 wds.), EAST RIVER
J. It doesn’t go against the grain, RIPSAW
K. Giant goes of 2012, TIGERS
L. Loft where fodder is stored, HAYMOW
M. With more than a little learning, ERUDITE
N. Fillers of some books, MATCHES
O. Hard to handle, as a piano on a stairway, UNWIELDY
P. Taken from a hard case, SHELLED
Q. Concentrated to an extreme degree, INTENSE
R. Miffed, ticked off, CHEESED
S. With no attempt at secrecy, OVERTLY
T. Six-foot lengths, FATHOMS
U. Designer of a stained-glass window in the U.N. building, CHAGALL
V. Hang out, rub elbows, schmooze, HOBNOB
W. People of very little brainpower, AIRHEADS
X. Geometric shape of a Bahai temple, NONAGON
Y. Discipline, humble, CHASTEN
Z. Umm al-Quwain, for one, EMIRATE
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From the paragraph of the quotation: I've dealt with numbers all my life, of course, and after a while you begin to feel that each number has a personality of its own. A twelve is very different from a thirteen, for example. Twelve is upright, conscientious, intelligent, whereas thirteen is a loner, a shady character who won't think twice about breaking the law to get what he wants. Eleven is tough, an outdoorsman who likes tramping through woods and scaling mountains; ten is rather simpleminded, a bland figure who always does what he's told; nine is deep and mystical, a Buddha of contemplation.... ~ Paul Auster, The Music of Chance
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Puzzle available on the internet at
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