Title:
(Untitled)Title:
(Untitled)
Author: Kit Williams
Year: 1984
Prize: A beautiful bee box containing the titled book made by Kit himself
To claim: By post, conveying the title to Kit without using the written word
Closing Date: 25 May 1985
Type of book: A4 portrait colour picture and story book
Description: Another book of exquisite paintings and story by Kit Williams. This time there's no burried treasure, but you have to discover the title of the book, then send in the title without using the written word, and Kit would judge the most imaginative way the title was conveyed.
Solution:
Look at the first full-page illustration opposite the beginning
of the story. Two mythical animals are to be found in the top left and
top right of the picture. On the left there is a mouse crossed with a horse,
which gives you the word morse, on the right a cat crossed with a toad,
giving you code. The seventh illustration (opposite the page with text
beginning 'The wind and the rain abated..... has morse code in the marquetry
frame which spells out END TO END TO END ALL ANIMALS ARE EQUAL IN A TALE
OF TAIL TO TAIL. (The phrase is also in the border of one painting in Kit
Williams's first book, Masquerade.) There is an animal hidden in each picture.
'Find them all and put them in the order in which they appear in the book:
parrot, fish, goose, crab, mouse, horse, kangaroo, wren, elephant, moth,
whale, muntjac (look at the clues on the fins of shoe polish on the shelf
to the right), armadillo, ram, lamb. Take each 'tail' - the last letter
of their names - and you have the title: THE BEE ON THE COMB
Personal opinions: Imagine my joy after solving the puzzle in 11 days, but then having to make and send in my answer. Kit picked the winner on the Terry Wogan TV show from 3000 entries - it wasn't me. Once more the text did not contain any of the solution.
Other information: The book was later re-issued with a new dust jacket containing the title and the solution.
solstice@stonehenge.