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The hint to think about the title hasn't illuminated my darkness - darkness which has clouded everything for several hours now. It's good to know that I shall be amazed at the eventual denoument, but without a hint that shedding of light may be three weeks away. It would be a big help to know the size of the required thing - that way madness might still be averted. Translating the whole grid into numbers hasn't led, as I hoped it would, to enlightenment. And it's dark at the Oval, so there's not even any distraction there. Oh dear.

This is an astonishing achievement in grid setting. Congratulations to the setter. As for the title - a great help and humorous. It certainly was!

cockie, have you looked up the 2nd and 3rd words of the message in Chambers? Test out that information on your grid.

I totalled every row and column and noticed something interesting - but without a spreadsheet it was even more of a drudge (hopefully you'll be able to use one). Don't expect to correct all of the anomolies in a oner.

The grid-fill was a trivial affair for the most part and took no time at all - as usual with Harribobs the endgame dragged on and on and...

Hated it (but maths is such a popular discipline let's keep wheeling it out ad nauseam).

...sorry, 'anomolies' is an anomaly.

To accelerate the end game, Google for a word value calculator. Will save quite some time

Only been solving the Listener since early this year, and this is my first time posting on the forum, but to this neophyte this puzzle seems like a remarkable construction!

As jlc said @26 an online calcultor can speed up the endgame a lot, but nevertheless it's less of a gridstare to me than some others this year.

Thanks Harribobs

Ah! thanks, drxx - I wouldn't have thought on so large a scale. And congratulations, harribobs! The AGC beckons surely.

This has nothing much to with mathematics, drxx. The subject is a very nerdy one which I (as a mathematician) find very boring, and I do not even possess a calculator. It is worth bearing in mind that the pattern will apply to letters as well as numbers. I will say no more and I might already have overstepped the mark.

I was disappointed by the Oedipus puzzle. The fate of the protagonist was not the loss of an eye (or even two): it was EXILE, and it is this which is explored in Oedipus at Colonus. Near the bottom of the grid you could see the letters of EXILE , but I could not find any way to use them. I cannot help wondering whether Dysart had this in mind, but was unable to implement the idea in time. The interweaving of the two principals was achieved elegantly, as well as the inclusion of sage and victim.

I am not longer submitting solutions - it is not worth the postage -but I shall continue to do the solving, and I would have to spend ages on Google researching films, pop songs, personalities and the like.

As you say, he lost both his eyes. Do we know he is going into exile at the first play?

I thought Jocasta was in the jumble and didn't find Tiresias

But I still think you're being a bit grumpy