I know, I know. Just like me, through Google Books, you found Stephen Sondheim's "Code I" puzzle in the May 12, 1969 issue of New York Magazine. But the encoded clue for 16 Down doesn't make sense! Sure, you checked the solution to the puzzle, as printed in the June 2, 1969 issue. And okay, while the solution acknowledges the error — "Apologies for the letters omitted from the clue for 16 Down" — it doesn't say what the missing letters are! And to make matters worse, the mistake wasn't even corrected for publication in the book Stephen Sondheim's Crossword Puzzles!
No problem. I figured it out. It was not easy, oh no, it was not easy, and so I'm going to say it again in all caps: I FIGURED IT OUT. (I used Adobe InDesign to solve it. No joke.)
16 Down isn't:
HINETAG LSIHNGT HNOSAKSH EOFGITNP ONFOAHYI
It's:
HINETAG LSIHNGT HSTIW NNOSAKSH EOFGITNP ONFOAHYI
There. You're welcome. I feel certain this post will be the one to skyrocket my blog to the heights of popularity in the blogosphere.
I am, as I have previously stated, a big fan of Fantagraphics' republishing of Walt Kelly's Pogo comic strip. In the second volume, I was interested to see the last panel of the strip for September 15, 1952. One corner of the panel has clearly been redrawn and relettered, and rather crudely and inaccurately. A quick search on newspapers.com shows that Fantagraphics used the Spokane Chronicle as their source for this strip. The Chronicle scan on newspapers.com was made with the top right corner of the page folded back, obscuring that corner of the panel. In every other newspaper on that date, the strip appears intact.
The same panel also appears, perfectly intact as Kelly wrote and drew it, in the book The Pogo Papers. For the sake of anyone who might have noticed this in the Fantagraphics book, below are both versions. (You'll see that in the Pogo Papers version, there's a great deal more detail in the line work as well.)
As my research has revealed, there were 42 Sondheim puzzles published in New York. (The book has 41, omitting the puzzle "Un-American", which has a central theme that became outdated just a few months after magazine publication.) 34 of the puzzles are readily available online, through Google Books. Below is my chronological list of which puzzles appeared in which issues, starting with New York's first issue. There were a few "holes" in 1968 in which puzzles were contributed by other people, at least three by Richard Maltby Jr., but I'm only concerning myself with the Sondheim puzzles here. In 1969 Sondheim switched to an every-third-week schedule, but apparently even that was too much for him to maintain as he was busy writing Company.
Note: The published errata notwithstanding, there are still some mistakes in these puzzles. These may be due more to New York's editors than to Sondheim himself. But even in the book, mistakes went uncorrected. I solved one such error here.
I read, and enjoyed, Dale Wasserman's book The Impossible Musical, chronicling his writing the TV teleplay I, Don Quixote which he eventually turned into the Broadway musical Man of La Mancha. Almost everyone is familiar with the song "The Quest", which begins "To dream the impossible dream/To fight the unbeatable foe..."
In his book, Wasserman repeatedly emphasizes that those two lines originated verbatim in his original teleplay, and generally laments the lot of the librettist. He writes:
It works like this: I, the "bookwriter" wrote, "To dream the impossible dream, to fight the unbeatable foe..." The lyricist then wrote:
To dream the impossible dream, to fight the unbeatable foe...
— whereupon, through the alchemy of contractual usage the words became his forever.
Later, Wasserman elaborates on this:
Once upon a time I invented a phrase, "the impossible dream." People think it comes from a song, but it doesn't. It's from my original television play, "I, Don Quixote". The phrase has gone into the language and traveled far and wide. It's been used (and abused) countless times, and will continue into the future. I invented it simply to explain Don Quixote's quest — indeed, the song's proper title is "The Quest." But the public seized upon the eponymous phrase and won't let go.
...Sometimes I'm sorry I invented it. Sometimes I feel I opened a verbal Pandora's box and wish it could be slammed shut again.
Poor Wasserman. It must have been quite a burden for him. Of course, it would be much easier to sympathize with him IF HE HAD ACTUALLY INVENTED THE PHRASE. Thanks to the research of Dr. Howard Mancing, Professor of Spanish at Purdue University, we know that the lines "To dream the impossible dream, to fight the unbeatable foe" actually originated in the press materials at the back of the Samuel French publication of Paul Kester's 1908 play, "Don Quixote". Here's a 2008 news report dating from the month before Wasserman's death, that tells the story:
I wondered if it was possible that the script Mancing found might have been a later edition, and so the press materials were actually quoting the musical. I contacted Samuel French — they didn't know anything about the whole affair — and I heard back from two very helpful and interested employees. The script was long out of print, but one of the employees sent me a PDF of the entire thing. After examining it, it is unquestionable to me that the publication dates back to 1930, no later.
It's already pretty "impossible" to believe Wasserman's claim that he came up with the exact same ten sequential words, all on his own. But wait: There's more! Wasserman's Wikipedia page mentions that the phrase "To each his Dulcinea" appears in Kester's play as well. (I'm guessing this information stems from Mancing's research too, but I'm not certain.) "To Each His Dulcinea" is a song in "La Mancha", sung by the Padre.
Sure enough, there it is on page 30 of Kester's script:
PRIEST. (Smiling sadly) To each his Dulcinea!
Wasserman included his "I, Don Quixote" teleplay at the end of "The Impossible Musical". And lo and behold, on page 263 of that book, what do we find?
PADRE (A pause. With a sad smile:) To each his Dulcinea.
Wasserman borrowed not only the exact line, but also the sad smile!
And really, it's fine that he appropriated these words. It's inarguable that on the whole, Wasserman used Cervantes' novel as a springboard for his own original work. But his vehement, angry, defensive emailed denials in the video are still troubling. Someone with a lot of time and interest should study first Cervantes' novel, then Kester's play, then Wasserman's teleplay, and finally the "La Mancha" script, to see just how much of a debt Wasserman owes to Kester. It sounds like a most interesting Quest.
I finished Jim Henson: The Biography this morning, and highly recommend it. Author Brian Jay Jones has done a superlative job of researching and writing about Henson's life, and there are many fascinating things to be learned in the book. I was especially surprised and pleased with the many insightful quotes from Richard Hunt, who died only two years after Jim. Jones was able to draw from an unpublished interview Hunt gave in his final years.
It's sobering to realize that of the early Muppets crew, only Frank Oz is still alive. Jane Henson, Jerry Juhl, Jerry Nelson, Don Sahlin — all gone. It's wonderful that Jones was able to interview Henson and Nelson for the book; it was written "just in the nick of time", so to speak.
Jones quotes most, but not all, of Jocelyn Stevenson's beautiful words from her speech at the London memorial service for Jim, which were published in It's Not Easy Being Green, and Other Things to Consider.
Here's the rest of that quote:
He changed our lives. He changed the world. And we'll continue his work, because that's how inspiration operates. People die, but inspiration lives and grows. Inspired by his gentleness, we'll fill the world with gentleness. Inspired by his vision, we'll fill the world with vision. Inspired by his chicken imitation, we'll fill the world with laughter.
