Author: | Ryan McCarty |
Editor: | Will Shortz |
I'm very humbled and excited to be debuting in the New York Times, especially on my favorite crossword day of the week - Saturday! I'm a relatively recent graduate of Princeton University where I studied Music and Computer Science, and I currently work as a technology consultant onsite at the SEC in DC. I'm also an avid singer (baritone), composer (mostly choral music), and music snob (currently a lot of Roomful of Teeth and future bass.)
I began doing New York Time crosswords at breakfasts in college with some friends and quickly got addicted. Soon after I began trying to construct some of my own puzzles – I found the process had a lot of similarities to what I was studying at school with music composition and coding (I'll let y'all imagine why.)
My fiancé and I had been singing along with "The Schuyler Sisters" from the Hamilton soundtrack multiple times in a row one night when I thought it'd be a fun idea to use Angelica, Eliza, (and Peggy) in a new puzzle. I crossed SCHUYLER SISTERS with ELLIE KEMPER, a fellow Princetonian, and set off from there. I'm happy that I was able to reference several strong women and people of color, including Ta-Nehisi Coates, whose "Between the World and Me" I coincidentally started reading last week.
I'm proud to say that I made this puzzle completely by hand, which was a fun exercise. It took a long time to construct, but definitely made the whole experience much more palpable.
Lastly, I want to give a special shout out to Ariana & Drew whose wedding I'll be celebrating today! This puzzle is dedicated to them!
It used to be that most every themeless puzzle was a standard "four sets of stacks, one in each corner." I like the recent push toward big, open middles. Something cool about that swath of white space smack dab in the center. DEERSTALKER was my favorite long entry through there, as I'm a huge Holmes fan. I couldn't remember SILVER ARROW off the top, but what a neat brand name.
And what a way to debut! Making these types of wide-open middles is hard enough with some computer assistance here and there — to do it by hand is daunting.
I've seen all of "The Office" and two seasons of "The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt," but I couldn't remember ELLIE KEMPER's name. Rats! I wonder if it would be different if the latter show had been on a major network instead of Netflix-only.
Two years ago at the ACPT, people started talking (gushing, actually) about "Hamilton." This dummy had no idea what they were talking about, but I sure do now. Even the SCHUYLER SISTERS rings a bell now (although I still don't know exactly who they are). Amazing how "Hamilton" has exploded. I often don't care for proper names that you either know or you don't, but if they're huge enough in pop culture, they're fair game.
Sara TEASDALE was tough for me to piece together — thank goodness I'm a huge "Music Man" fan (LIDA ROSE is a classic for me). But I wonder if that crossing might trip up a good chunk of solvers. I could see the case for calling that an unfair crossing.
I'm also a huge fan of Norse mythology, so RAGNAROK was a gimme for me. Thank goodness it didn't cross EDERLE though — the exact spelling (for both of them!) is tough to remember.
Along with OTARU and ANTOINE, that is a ton of tough proper names. I don't mind when a puzzle has a lot of proper names. It's when many of them could be called esoteric that it starts to feel like too much.
And QUINTE, SEMIBREVE … that makes for a lot of learning and education in one puzzle.
Thank goodness that this puzzle ran on a Saturday, the toughest day of the week. A lot of stuff I didn't know, a lot of learning I did along the way, a good educational experience. And a huge relief to have solved it correctly. I didn't have high confidence that Mr. Happy Pencil would appear.
Impressive to debut this way — wide-open middles are so tough to construct. I'm looking forward to seeing what Ryan can do with the assistance of some modern tools.
1 P | 2 E | 3 S | 4 T | 5 L | 6 E | 7 B | 8 E | 9 A | 10 T | 11 I | 12 T |
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13 A | N | T | O | I | N | 14 E | 15 A | V | E | E | N | O |
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16 S | T | R | U | D | E | L | 17 S | 18 B | E | R | A | T | E |
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19 T | I | E | R | S | 20 L | I | 21 D | A | R | O | S | E | ||
22 I | R | A | N | 23 T | I | L | E | R | S | 24 D | R | 25 S |
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26 S | E | M | I | 27 B | R | E | V | E | 28 O | 29 T | A | R | U |
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30 Q | U | A | K | E | R | 31 S | 32 E | L | O | N |
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33 S | 34 C | 35 H | U | Y | L | E | R | S | I | 36 S | T | E | R | S |
37 I | L | I | E | 38 A | M | A | T | E | U | R | ||||
39 T | E | S | T | 40 S | 41 P | R | A | G | M | A | 42 T | 43 I | 44 C |
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45 Z | A | P | 46 E | 47 D | E | R | L | E | 48 H | O | M | O |
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49 R | A | 50 G | N | A | R | O | K | 51 B | E | R | R | A |
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52 I | O | N | I | A | N | 53 W | E | 54 M | A | D | E | I | T |
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55 Q | U | I | N | T | E | 56 R | A | T | R | A | C | E |
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57 S | T | A | S | E | S | 58 D | E | A | T | H | S |
Across | Down | |
1. Meal maker? : PESTLE 7. "Vamoose!" : BEATIT 13. Fats Domino's real first name : ANTOINE 15. Skin-care brand : AVEENO 16. Austrian treats : STRUDELS 18. Put down hard : BERATE 19. Rows : TIERS 20. Barbershop staple from "The Music Man" : LIDAROSE 22. Shiraz setting : IRAN 23. Ones putting down quadrels : TILERS 24. Practice composition?: Abbr. : DRS 26. Whole note, to a Brit : SEMIBREVE 28. Port on Ishikari Bay : OTARU 30. Friends : QUAKERS 32. SpaceX head Musk : ELON 33. Sibling trio in "Hamilton" : SCHUYLERSISTERS 37. "Would ___?" : ILIE 38. One might be a "n00b" : AMATEUR 39. Dry runs, e.g. : TESTS 41. Commonsensical : PRAGMATIC 45. Cartoon word often seen with a lightning bolt : ZAP 46. Channel swimmer Gertrude : EDERLE 48. ___ floresiensis (extinct "hobbit") : HOMO 49. Day of doom, in Scandinavian mythology : RAGNAROK 51. "It's déjà vu all over again" speaker : BERRA 52. Sea seen from Ithaca : IONIAN 53. Destination proclamation : WEMADEIT 55. Fifth of eight parrying positions in fencing : QUINTE 56. Wearying work schedule : RATRACE 57. Equilibria : STASES 58. Call of Duty tally : DEATHS |
1. French anise-flavored liqueur : PASTIS 2. Uncut : ENTIRE 3. Flow : STREAM 4. Flow stopper, of a sort : TOURNIQUET 5. Preserves covers? : LIDS 6. Memphis-to-Nashville dir. : ENE 7. Big character in children's literature : BABAR 8. Very much : EVERSO 9. Lead-in to méxico : AERO 10. Poet Sara who wrote "I Shall Not Care" : TEASDALE 11. Shaking like a leaf, maybe : INTERROR 12. Runner's ___ (marathoner's woe) : TOE 14. Title actress on Netflix's "Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt" : ELLIEKEMPER 17. Early Mercedes-Benz racing car : SILVERARROW 21. Part of Sherlock Holmes's attire : DEERSTALKER 23. Part of a merry refrain : TRALA 25. Goes for the bronze? : SUNS 27. Believe : BUY 29. Some pyramids, though not the ones at Giza : TETRAHEDRA 31. Drawn-out campaign : SIEGE 33. ___ bath : SITZ 34. Leave en masse : CLEAROUT 35. Historical name of the Iberian Peninsula : HISPANIA 36. Kakuro calculation : SUM 40. Group of 100 people : SENATE 42. Bothered terribly : TOREAT 43. "Jackpot!" : IMRICH 44. Ta-Nehisi who wrote the best seller "Between the World and Me" : COATES 47. Builders of the original Legoland : DANES 50. Generates, with "up" : GINS 51. Reduce in force or intensity : BATE 52. They're high at M.I.T. and Stanford : IQS 54. About to explode : MAD |
Answer summary: 5 unique to this puzzle, 5 unique to Shortz Era but used previously.
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