In Douglas Adams’ 1985 novel “So Long and Thanks for All the Fish,” there is a memorable conversation between Fenchurch and Arthur Dent about crossword puzzles. Arthur mentions buying a newspaper to do the crossword and grabbing a cup of coffee at a buffet. Fenchurch asks him which crossword he does, and Arthur says he usually does The Guardian. Fenchurch prefers The Times, thinking The Guardian tries to be too cute. Arthur hasn’t had a chance to look at the crossword yet because he’s still trying to buy coffee.
This anecdote was a personal experience that Douglas Adams liked to share. He even discussed it with David Letterman on his talk show. Adams mentioned this incident in his book “The Salmon of Doubt,” dating it to April 1976. He included it in the book to let others know that the story was his and not to be used by anyone else.
However, it turns out that other people had already been telling variations of this tale since the early 1970s, often involving biscuits and usually with a woman as the unwitting thief. One such version appeared in the Huddersfield and Holmfirth Examiner on January 22, 1972. The story was related by John Bright, and it involved a woman who went into a cafe with a packet of biscuits. As she sat down for coffee, she noticed a hand from behind a newspaper on the opposite side of the table also taking a biscuit. This amused and irritated her as they continued to take turns eating biscuits until they reached the last one. In the end, the biscuits she ate actually belonged to the man with the newspaper, and she found her own packet of biscuits untouched in her bag when she got home.
What interests us is whether Adams, as someone who enjoyed solving crossword puzzles, aligned more with Fenchurch’s preference for The Times or Arthur’s dedication to The Guardian. An old photograph suggests that he leaned towards Arthur’s choice. The photo shows Adams holding page six of The Guardian from Saturday, January 3, 1981. It’s clear that his interest was in Araucaria’s puzzle, featured in the newspaper.
If you want to experience what Adams did, you can try solving the resurrected puzzle. However, for an authentic experience, you might want to have a noisy cast around you, including a paranoid robot. If you’re curious to see a real attempt at solving a vintage Araucaria puzzle by a distinguished British figure, Roddy Howland Jackson’s exploration of philosopher AJ Ayer’s try at prize puzzle 15,276 might interest you. It’s one of Araucaria’s experimental puzzles, based on Scrabble.
You can solve the puzzle first (copy provided), although it won’t work with standard crossword software. Then you can see how Ayer did in his attempt. Additionally, there’s a fascinating article by Howland Jackson that delves into a failed solve by TS Eliot. If this piques your interest, you might also look forward to Howland Jackson’s thesis, “Cryptic Modernism: Reading Puzzlement, c 1866-1966.”
To find more crossword explainers, interviews, and other helpful resources, visit alanconnor.com. You can also order “The Shipping Forecast Puzzle Book” by Alan Connor, which includes a variety of puzzles from cryptic to other types, from the Guardian Bookshop.
Denial of responsibility! Vigour Times is an automatic aggregator of Global media. In each content, the hyperlink to the primary source is specified. All trademarks belong to their rightful owners, and all materials to their authors. For any complaint, please reach us at – [email protected]. We will take necessary action within 24 hours.
