For a while I wondered whether they would last the course; if there might be a story, as in Hornby's, of a normal life capitulating in the face of obsession, or whether he might find in crossword clues a stochastic interpretation of his own situation, the way "Outcry at Tory assassination (4,6)" appeared in the Telegraph on the day Ian Gow was blown up.
Nicholas Lezard, Guardian, 22 February 2003, Guardian
reviewing Sandy Balfour's Pretty Girl in Crimson Rose (8): A Memoir of Love, Exile and Crosswords. Amazon
Cricket, he says, contains all the elements economists need: vast amounts of publicly available data, variable and (partially) substitutable inputs of known quality (batsmen, bowlers, etc) clearly defined intermediate (runs, wickets, catches) and final (wins) outputs, key choices over on-field organisational structure (field setting, batting order) and, not least, important stochastic elements such as the toss, the weather and state of the pitch.
Ashley Seager, Guardian, 31 October 2005. Guardian
His first word is said to have been "stochastic," while nursery tales proved to be problematic.
Richard Adams, Guardian, 4 December 2002. Guardian
