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I have three words highlighted at the moment (6, 6, and 4 letters) plus the two-word summary. I'm slightly troubled by smellyharry's mention that (if I'm reading the post correctly) determining some of the highlighting resulted in determining the first letter of 35d--at least in my grid, I can't see any way that that letter would plausibly be involved in the theme, based on its surroundings. This may augur poorly for my grid. Of course I may also be misunderstanding the nature of all the highlighting.

(On a related note, I had the same curiosity as smellyharry about the conspicuous similarity between 13ac and something else redolent of the theme. I'm assuming at this point that's a red herring or a coincidence.)

Chrisremo, I had two x 6 letters and two longer answers. 35 D was integral to my highlighting, though it was only Wiki that got me there.

Re: I'm assuming at this point that's a red herring or a coincidence.

Not a coincidence. Usually favourably regarded as ‘lots of thematic material scattered within the clues’ or similar.

Usually gives a pleasing moment when the theme is arrived at, to explain the subliminal sense that something was going on.

Aha, I see!

(I must say, this is probably the most difficult puzzle of any sort I've attempted in my life. I'm sure it's par for the course for many here, but having only done a small handful of Listeners so far, this is certainly stretching my brain to what feels like its limits.)

Probably a Magpie B on a five point scale (other solvers will of course have different views). No small achievement at all to finish from a background of US style crosswords.

Harder puzzles do come along - we’re probably due one. See an explanation for a hardish one below.

Cheers.

—————

Two Solutions by Quinapalus

Puzzle explanation

The corrections to clue misprints spelt out “indices, surds; move both Xs vertically”. The grid entries containing two words gave Rev. C. L. Dodgson, his nom de plume Lewis Carroll, and the (abbreviated) titles of two of his books, Rhyme? And Reason? and Phantasmagoria (and Other Poems). A verse cited in both books includes:

Yet what are all such gaieties to me
Whose thoughts are full of indices and surds?

x^2 + 7x + 53
= 11/3.

The quadratic equation has two complex solutions, (−7 ± √(−445/3))/2, which are approximately x = −3.5 ± 6.0896i. Nudging the two Xs in the grid to a distance of more or less 6.1 cells above and below the central axis, encroaching on the previously empty cells to form new words reading across, marks the two complex numbers as in an Argand diagram.

For the cells containing two letters, it didn’t matter which (opposite) corners they were placed into, as long as the letters of each of the two entries, as well as ARGAND DIAGRAM, could be read normally, as stated in the preamble.

Hi just trying to finish this and cannot make sense of the message.
I have 13 down clues with extra words, which I gather is one too many - 1,2,3,4,5,8,9,12,16,17,21,29 and 37. Can someone please tell me where I’ve gone wrong

Thanks

louweed - 34 is incorrect but there is the final extra word after 29...

1 does not have extra word ... look up all meanings of 'patron'...

Hi Louweed. Like you, I thought (still think!) there's an extra word in 1 down but it simply doesn't work as part of the quotation.

All of the elements in clue 37 down are essential to its solving. You need to look at a slightly earlier clue for the last extra word.

typing error ... my last should have started '37 is incorrect...'

typing error ... my last should have started '37 is incorrect...'