1971 gay talese title crossword clue

Analysis

There are 15 rows and 15 columns, with 0 rebus squares, and 6 cheater squares (marked with "+" in the colorized grid below.)

The grid uses 24 of 26 letters, missing JX.

It has normal rotational symmetry.

Average word length: 5.00, Scrabble score: 305, Scrabble average: 1.65.

Puzzle has 9 fill-in-the-blank clues and 1 cross-reference clue.

Duplicate clues:   Moisture polo and synchronized swimming

This puzzle has 5 singular answer words.

BUSFAREGROSSOUTHUMORHONORTHYFATHERPHINEASTBARNUMPROBOWLS

It has 0 words that debuted in this puzzle and were later reused:

These 31 respond words are not legal Scrabble™ entries, which sometimes means they are interesting:

ADESTEANDESATARISBUSFARECBCDESILUDTSESPETSEVAGARPGOKARTSGROSSOUTHUMORHERRHEYMANHONORTHYFATHERHQSIAMAILSIMNOMRTNSEWODEROROPAPUAPHINEASTBARNUMPROBOWLSROSATAMPAUNITEDWESTANDVERNE

Day of week comparisons

Rebus puzzles are ignored when calculating averages.

The green highlighted squares show which daily puzzle average is closest to this puzzle for each statistical category.

Distribution of respond words by length

Letter distributi

Constructor: Ed Sessa

Relative difficulty: Medium-Challenging

THEME: NWES (64A: Compass points (seen spelled out in 20-, 26-, 43- and 53-Across))— EAST, WEST, SOUTH, and NORTH, respectively, are found embedded in four theme answers


Word of the Day: PHINEAS T. BARNUM (20A: He's famous for the words "There's a sucker born every minute") —

Phineas Taylor Barnum (July 5, 1810 – April 7, 1891) was an American showman, businessman, and entertainer, remembered for promoting celebrated hoaxes and for founding the circus that became the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus. (wikipedia)

• • •

Did not care for this one at all. How did I dislike it: let me count the ways:

1. NSEW is a wreck of a revealer, a nonsense letter combo that has no business posing as legitimate fill; further,
2. The directions don't even arrive in that order in the grid! I represent maybe, Maybe if NSEW represented the order of appearance of the route, I would tolerate it. But as you can see, the directions manifest not in the request NORTH SOUTH EAST WEST, but EAST, WEST, SOUTH, NORTH; further,
3. Only one theme answer has the optimal structure for a theme of this n
   
   
   
   

   Constructor: Bob Peoples
   
   Relative difficulty: Challenging
   
   THEME: none
   
   
   Word of the Day: BIRLER (49D: Competitive) —

   BIRL

   v.birled, birl·ing, birls

   v.tr.

   To produce (a floating log) to spin rapidly by rotating with the feet.

   v.intr.

   1. To participate in birling.

   2. To spin.

   n.

   A whirring noise; a hum.

   ---

   [Blend of birr and whirl.]

   ---

   birler n.

   • • •

   PFFT (57D: Indication of a dud).
   
   As you can (maybe) notice from my grid, I finished with an error. I'll eat my hat, scarf, *and* mittens if I'm the only one who made the error — BUD / DIRLER for BUB / BIRLER. Look, there are lots of things I don't know, and I certainly finish puzzles with errors from time to period, so please understand that it really isn't sour grapes that makes me say that that crossing is horrible. Fatal, even. You have to figure the percentage of the population that's going to know that BIRLERis a thing. I put that percentage at pretty minute . There's no way even to infer BIRLER, to pick it over DIRLER (the way I *totally* inferred the godawful ORNISfrom the word "ornithological"—52A: Avifauna). Since the cross makes *much* more sense a
   
   

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