Derrick Somerset Macnutt (1902–1971) was a British
crossword
A crossword is a word puzzle that usually takes the form of a square or a rectangular grid of white- and black-shaded squares. The goal is to fill the white squares with letters, forming words or phrases, by solving clues which lead to the answ ...
compiler who provided crosswords for ''
The Observer
''The Observer'' is a British newspaper published on Sundays. It is a sister paper to ''The Guardian'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', whose parent company Guardian Media Group Limited acquired it in 1993. First published in 1791, it is the w ...
'' newspaper under the pseudonym Ximenes. His main oeuvre was blocked-grid and "specialty" puzzles. Even though he only provided conventional blocked puzzles once a week for the ''Observer'' Everyman series for about two years his strong views on clueing, expressed in his 1966 book, have been a source of debate in the cryptic crossword world ever since.
Career
Macnutt was born at
Eastbourne
Eastbourne () is a town and seaside resort in East Sussex, on the south coast of England, east of Brighton and south of London. Eastbourne is immediately east of Beachy Head, the highest chalk sea cliff in Great Britain and part of the la ...
in Sussex and was educated at
Marlborough College
Marlborough College is a Public school (United Kingdom), public school (English Independent school (United Kingdom), independent boarding school) for pupils aged 13 to 18 in Marlborough, Wiltshire, England. Founded in 1843 for the sons of Church ...
before achieving a
Double First
The British undergraduate degree classification system is a grading structure for undergraduate degrees or bachelor's degrees and integrated master's degrees in the United Kingdom. The system has been applied (sometimes with significant variati ...
in classics at
Jesus College, Cambridge
Jesus College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. The college's full name is The College of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Saint John the Evangelist and the glorious Virgin Saint Radegund, near Cambridge. Its common name comes fr ...
. Between 1928 and 1963 he held the position of Head of Classics at
Christ's Hospital
Christ's Hospital is a public school (English independent boarding school for pupils aged 11–18) with a royal charter located to the south of Horsham in West Sussex. The school was founded in 1552 and received its first royal charter in 1553 ...
near
Horsham
Horsham is a market town on the upper reaches of the River Arun on the fringe of the Weald in West Sussex, England. The town is south south-west of London, north-west of Brighton and north-east of the county town of Chichester. Nearby to ...
,
West Sussex
West Sussex is a county in South East England on the English Channel coast. The ceremonial county comprises the shire districts of Adur, Arun, Chichester, Horsham, and Mid Sussex, and the boroughs of Crawley and Worthing. Covering an ar ...
, as well as being a housemaster. The historian
Norman Longmate
Norman Longmate (15 December 1925 – 4 June 2016) was an English author and social and military historian.
He was educated at Christ's Hospital and Worcester College, Oxford, where he read Modern History. Author of 31 books, and of various r ...
wrote that he was the "
James Boyer
The Reverend James Boyer (1736–1814) was the tyrannical headmaster of Christ's Hospital from the years 1778 to 1799.
Reputation
These years at the end of the 18th century were when three of the school's most famous students attended: Leigh Hun ...
of his day, a notable teacher of the classics, respected, even liked, by his older pupils, dreaded by the younger boys, a bully and a brute". At the school he was widely known for the pleasure he obtained from caning the boys in his charge.
In 1939 he took over the position of crossword compiler for ''The Observer'' on the death of
Edward Powys Mathers
Edward Powys Mathers (28 August 1892 – 3 February 1939) was an English translator and poet, and also a pioneer of compiling advanced cryptic crosswords. Powys Mathers was born in Forest Hill, London, the son of Edward Peter Mathers, newsp ...
, who had written under the name of "Torquemada". Macnutt selected the name Ximenes after
Francisco Jiménez de Cisneros
Francisco Jiménez de Cisneros, OFM (1436 – 8 November 1517), spelled Ximenes in his own lifetime, and commonly referred to today as simply Cisneros, was a Spanish cardinal, religious figure, and statesman. Starting from humble beginnings ...
, one of
Torquemada's successors as
Grand Inquisitor
Grand Inquisitor ( la, Inquisitor Generalis, literally ''Inquisitor General'' or ''General Inquisitor'') was the lead official of the Inquisition. The title usually refers to the chief inquisitor of the Spanish Inquisition, even after the reunif ...
of the
Spanish Inquisition
The Tribunal of the Holy Office of the Inquisition ( es, Tribunal del Santo Oficio de la Inquisición), commonly known as the Spanish Inquisition ( es, Inquisición española), was established in 1478 by the Catholic Monarchs, King Ferdinand ...
. He pronounced 'Ximenes' in an Anglicised fashion, .
His crossword style was initially in imitation of Torquemada, but was soon influenced by the inventive puzzles of
Alistair Ferguson Ritchie
Alistair Ferguson Ritchie (1890–1954) was a crossword compiler, under the pseudonym Afrit. The son of a post office clerk, he was born in 1890 and brought up in King’s Lynn. He was head boy at King Edward VII Grammar School there and graduated ...
who wrote as Afrit in ''
The Listener''.
Macnutt died in 1971, and puzzle 1200, his final crossword to be published, appeared in 1972. He was succeeded by
Jonathan Crowther
Jonathan Crowther is a British crossword compiler who has for over 50 years composed the Azed cryptic crossword in ''The Observer'' Sunday newspaper. He was voted "best British crossword setter" in a poll of crossword setters conducted by '' ...
, who writes under the name
Azed
Azed is a crossword which appears every Sunday in ''The Observer'' newspaper. Since it first appeared in March 1972, every puzzle has been composed by Jonathan Crowther who also judges the monthly clue-writing competition.Jonathan Crowther (200 ...
.
From 1943, he was also a contributor to ''The Listener'', writing crosswords under the pseudonym Tesremos – his middle name spelled backwards.
Influence
As Ximenes, Macnutt's puzzles gained an enthusiastic following. His many fans organised dinners on the occasion of his puzzles number 100, 250, 500, 750 and 1000, with the 1968 dinner hosting nearly 400 solvers. His followers, known as Ximeneans, often sported a specially designed black tie covered in small white crosses.
Well-known Ximeneans include
Stephen Sondheim
Stephen Joshua Sondheim (; March 22, 1930November 26, 2021) was an American composer and lyricist. One of the most important figures in twentieth-century musical theater, Sondheim is credited for having "reinvented the American musical" with sho ...
,
P. G. Wodehouse
Sir Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, ( ; 15 October 188114 February 1975) was an English author and one of the most widely read humorists of the 20th century. His creations include the feather-brained Bertie Wooster and his sagacious valet, Jeeve ...
, and
Leonard Bernstein
Leonard Bernstein ( ; August 25, 1918 – October 14, 1990) was an American conductor, composer, pianist, music educator, author, and humanitarian. Considered to be one of the most important conductors of his time, he was the first America ...
.
Colin Dexter
Norman Colin Dexter (29 September 1930 – 21 March 2017) was an English crime writer known for his ''Inspector Morse'' series of novels, which were written between 1975 and 1999 and adapted as an ITV television series, ''Inspector Morse'', fro ...
, author of the ''
Inspector Morse
Detective Chief Inspector Endeavour Morse, GM, is the eponymous fictional character in the series of detective novels by British author Colin Dexter. On television, he appears in the 33-episode drama series ''Inspector Morse'' (1987–2000), ...
'' books, named his most famous characters after two prize-winning Ximeneans, Sir
Jeremy Morse
Sir Christopher Jeremy Morse KCMG (10 December 1928 – 4 February 2016) was an English banker, cruciverbalist and chess composer who was Chancellor of the University of Bristol from 1989 to 2003, and was chairman of Lloyds Bank.
Early life ...
and Mrs D. W. Lewis, and he named Morse's old Inspector Macnutt. In
Rex Stout
Rex Todhunter Stout (; December 1, 1886 – October 27, 1975) was an American writer noted for his detective fiction. His best-known characters are the detective Nero Wolfe and his assistant Archie Goodwin, who were featured in 33 novels and ...
's ''Might as Well Be Dead'' (1956), detective
Nero Wolfe
Nero Wolfe is a brilliant, obese and eccentric fictional armchair detective created in 1934 by American mystery writer Rex Stout. Wolfe was born in Montenegro and keeps his past murky. He lives in a luxurious brownstone on West 35th Street in Ne ...
is said to be working on a puzzle by Ximenes.
In his 1966 book, ''Ximenes on the Art of the Crossword'' (reissued 2001), he laid down rules that he claimed should be present in all good crosswords. These are now known as the "Ximenean principles". They include using a
symmetric
Symmetry (from grc, συμμετρία "agreement in dimensions, due proportion, arrangement") in everyday language refers to a sense of harmonious and beautiful proportion and balance. In mathematics, "symmetry" has a more precise definiti ...
grid, and the specification of maximum and minimum numbers of "unches" (unchecked letters i.e. ones that only appear in one word in the grid) for a given length of answer. More importantly, he insisted that all clues must be scrupulously fair via rules that were summed up by his successor,
Azed
Azed is a crossword which appears every Sunday in ''The Observer'' newspaper. Since it first appeared in March 1972, every puzzle has been composed by Jonathan Crowther who also judges the monthly clue-writing competition.Jonathan Crowther (200 ...
, as:
:A good cryptic clue contains three elements:
#a precise definition
#a fair subsidiary indication
#nothing else
He made a number of innovations in crossword setting such as the special clue/puzzle types 'Misprints' and 'Right and Left'.
[''Ximenes on the art of the crossword'' Chapter XIV ''Specialized Crosswords'']
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Macnutt
Crossword compilers
1902 births
1971 deaths
Alumni of Jesus College, Cambridge
People educated at Marlborough College
Christ's Hospital staff
People from Eastbourne
People from Billingshurst