Listener Crossword No 4280 Face Off By Bero

[trux]

Another rather gentle exercise with easier than normal clues (perhaps perforce) and a not too complex endgame, neatly tieing up all of the thematic material. Will be interesting to see how solvers interpret "identifiably entered" in the preamble. Thanks to BeRo for a brief but nonetheless enjoyable entertainment.

[starwalker]

Just got a full grid without any idea of what is going on. Think I'll save the rest for a rainy day - ie tomorrow. Thanks BeRo, so far.

[AHearer]

As trux says, a pretty easy grid fill. The endgame is not too difficult. For the least obvious "identifiable" I'm going with the first entry for the adjective in the BRB. Thanks, BeRo, for sending me back to some enjoyable poetry.

[BobHWW]

Poetry is not one of my strengths but managed to sort it all out after a bit if googling. Overall I though this was a nice puzzle BeRo and I can't see that there will too much of an issue about letter entering.

[Contrarian]

After BeRo's last puzzle (the number-coded Heraclitus-themed one that took me all weekend), I was expecting something a little tougher.

[lyrabelacqua]

Very enjoyable. My fastest completion yet.

[olichant]

Not nearly as tricky as the Heraclitian one, but no less enjoyable. Many thanks to the setter(s?) - and hope all who congregate here have a lovely weeekend.

[emcee]

All seemed fair enough. Another quick gridfill -- we must have a brute in the pipeline.

[perseverer]

All done, though obviously not as quickly as some of you. The sort of preamble which must discourage many from even attempting the Listener.

[doctormatt]

Not too difficult but nice touches

[jim360]

Entering one of the four is non-obvious. I suppose I might have to be careful in entering the non-thematic elements.

Thought that the grid-fill was relatively easy, though was held up for a while by not realising how the theme word was going to be entered. Thanks BeRo anyway for an introduction to poetry beyond my usual, "There was a young man from Venus..."

[olichant]

Not wanting to give anything away, but my initial concerns about the method of entry of one of the words were resolved by carefully re-reading the whole poem.

[AHearer]

I had the same experience as olichant as I reread the poem to make sure before filling in my fair copy. I wonder if both possibilities will be marked as correct?

[IainGrace]

Completed grid and know what's going on and how the grid is to look. Just need to identify a couple of items in the grid for our own satisfaction. Enjoyable and different, drawing us too back to the poems. Marred only by some feeble clueing at times.

[Scorpius]

Filling the grid was about as easy as it gets. I have the poets, theme and the four features from one poem, but not the other poem with the couplet. I may have to trawl through the relevant part of ODQ. Can anyone tell me if it's there? I don't think that will give anything away to people who haven't solved the basic theme.

[dr b]

I found it by googling the poet and the keyword.

[Mesnilpat]

Mostly done pretty quickly, but I am stuck on the 'initially observable' word pairs. Perhaps the fog will clear later

[Mesnilpat]

Doh! Got it.

[s_pugh]

Knew it was a bad sign when I rattled through the clues. Then hours staring at the grid in yet another tedious word search looking (in vain) for two probably obscure poets who's names are I guess jumbled and not even in a straight line. Another one for the bin ... If I wanted to do word searches I'd buy a puzzle book. Not impressed.

[Scorpius]

s_pugh, I think you're dismissing the puzzle and the setter prematurely. The setter has provided all the guidance necessary to find the two poets. All it needs is a close reading of the preamble and a bit of reasoning.

[TheBear69]

The poets are far from obscure...

The definition in 25a is marred by an inapt preposition.