Stephen Fry has let me know that presbyterians is an anagram of Britney Spears.
DA, if you can hear me, please use that in one of your crosswords.
Stephen Fry has let me know that presbyterians is an anagram of Britney Spears.
DA, if you can hear me, please use that in one of your crosswords.
It wouldn’t surprise me if Mr Fry were a cryptic fan.
I seem to remember DA writing about this particularly magnificent anagram in an article he wrote about cryptics that was published in The Age a few years ago.
I have no evidence that Stephen Fry is a cryptic solver, but it’s perfectly possible. This anagram was mentioned in a recent BBC programme about cryptics, though that appeared after the book – which is well worth a look by the way.
What was the book?
I’d say a few of us here would be interested in it.
Also, how do DA cryptics compare to others around the world? (For those of you who don’t know about Peter, check out his website: http://www.biddlecombe.demon.co.uk/puzzles.html )
Do they have an international reputation at all?
The book I was referring to was Fry’s “The Ode less travelled”, which attempts to et you writing poetry, but also teaches you a lot about poetry.
DA puzzles don’t get much publicity in the UK – I know of them from one or two Aussie solvers. I haven’t tried enough of them to make definite judgements, but he seems to have the same kind of reputation as setters like Araucaria or Paul here (he quite often quotes Paul clues on his blog) – doesn’t always follow the rules, but gets away with it at least some of the time.
It’s good to hear Fry’s book is a good one; I had purchased it the day I read the article I linked to.
I might have a look at Araucaria and Paul crosswords. Generally speaking, though, I’ve had trouble working out the Times crossword, which is reprinted in an Australian newspaper (called The Australian in fact) and seems to follow other rules.
Shame on the NY Times journalist for not liking V for Vendetta.
V for Vendetta was ridiculously entertaining. I especially enjoyed watching people whose politics I don’t appreciate be killed by an avenging, alliterating, Shakespeare-quoting masked madman.