Posted by ilancaron on 18th December 2006
Virtually every clue is holiday related (xmas, parties, trees, pantos, carols…). I probably missed an allusion or two being of the other faith. I think this is the first of the Xmas-related themes that I’m sure we’ll be solving until 2007.
Across
| 9 |
APERIT(IF)S – (parties)* containing IF (for “provided”). APERITIFS are drinks to stimulate your appetite – so they qualify as appetizers (I suspect this is the literal French meaning anyway). |
| 11 |
TUCK BOX – Friar TUCK but not sure how BOX is “Christmas tip”? |
| 12 |
A+LAD+DIN – standard UK pantomime fare |
| 13 |
CH+OIR – abbrev(“Church”) followed by rev(Rio) – a v. popular cryptic port. |
| 14 |
SHEPHERDS – A kind of mincemeat pie and of course “men” with a role to play… at Christmas. |
| 16 |
A CHRISTMAS CAROL – This hardly qualifies as a cryptic definition – though perhaps it does given that it’s the title of a book rather than a song. |
| 19 |
STOCKINGS – cryptic definition |
| 21 |
SALLY – double definition – but perhaps triple? What’s “party” doing there? |
| 23 |
TORN+A+DO – jokey definition of “wind-up” thus the question-mark. |
| 24 |
CAROL – “it” is the song being performed that’s also a girl’s name. Not sure how “waits” is used in the wordplay. |
| 25 |
EVERGREEN – double definition. There’s a meaning of EVERGREEN that implies always fresh and well-liked thus popular. |
Down
| 1 |
SANTA CLAUS – he’s the guy that does the hard delivery work. |
| 2 |
TEA CLOTH – Clergy as a whole are referred to as the CLOTH. |
| 4 |
MINX =”minks” – but in this post-Brigitte Bardot age do women still really want furs? |
| 5 |
ESTATE CARS – station wagons in the UK. Bit of a jokey pun. Perhaps this clue isn’t Xmas-related after all. |
| 6 |
SERAPH+I.C. – (phrase)*+initials of “Introducing Christmas”. |
| 8 |
STUN – rev(nuts=crackers). Xmas allusion via crackers. |
| 14 |
SET IN ORDER – Not a bad clue – I hazarded “put it right” at first. “Monks” have ORDERs (if they don’t set crosswords) and your “party” is your SET. |
| 15 |
SILLY POINT – cricket fielding position. Not Xmas related? |
| 17 |
INKWELLS – cryptic definition. Not Xmas related? |
| 18 |
RELOADED – cryptic definition: ref. loading a gun with a charge. Not Xmas related? |
| 20 |
ON+WARD – not Xmas related? |
| 21 |
SPRIGS – you do your kissing under SPRIGS of mistletoe and it also means to fasten. |
Posted in Guardian | 6 Comments »
Posted by neildubya on 18th December 2006
I really enjoyed this. Quite tricky in parts, with some subtle and genuinely inventive wordplay. I got one wrong (18D), confirmed one on the Interweb and filled in a couple without fully understanding why but these clicked into place when I looked again. Great start to the week.
| Across |
| 1 |
“sham pain” |
| 10 |
M in LEON - took me a while to twig that Mike is M in the Nato alphabet. |
| 11 |
(p)INTERPLAY - the last one I filled in but without understanding why. Google told me that “Comedy of Menace” is a dramatic style invented by Harold Pinter, the playwright…famous for his..long…pregnant…pauses. I wonder how many people would have needed to look that up though? |
| 13 |
MP,I in LUSH - “richly attired” is neat wordplay. |
| 21 |
A(r)MADA in RN - everything about this clue is excellent. The surface reading and definition are misleading and the handling of the wordplay is accomplished. I really liked “ours (RN - Royal Navy, our armada) to port and starboard” to indicate the container. |
| 24 |
(GET BUS AND)* |
| 25 |
IN,SUD< - is “banker” a slightly cheesy way of defining a river? No matter, seems to work well here. |
| 26 |
SA(r)T(r)E - another one that I filled in from the definition. Have only just realised that Jean-Paul Sartre is the philosopher. |
| 27 |
OVERT,RAIN - spookily for me, I was on my way to the gym when I was solving this puzzle. |
| |
| Down |
| 1 |
IST in CALL,O - the second largest moon of Jupiter. The question mark at the end of the clue is there, I guess, because “call” and “o” are two different “rings”. |
| 3 |
INSAN(e) in PD,NEEDLES - took me a while to parse this one because of the wording, which makes sense on the surface but seems a bit awkward as wordplay. To my simple brain, “Lunatic not all there in Police Department…” would seem to make more sense, but maybe I’m missing something? |
| 4 |
H,SIEG(e)<,AS - the surface reading seems to strain a bit here but the handling of the wordplay is very good. |
| 7 |
(SAILS,NETS)* |
| 9 |
(MORE KILLINGS TO)* |
| 15 |
MINE in ESTAT(e) - the Concise Oxford defines this as a “small bar” only, not mentioning “shabby”, but Chambers does. Not a very familiar word, to me at least, but the wordplay is quite straightforward. |
| 16 |
AND,ERSE,N - a tricky one this, not least because you have to nail “with” as “and”, get Erse as a word for the Gaelic language and then not get deceived into reading “close” as an adjective. Nicely done. |
| 18 |
ANNA,OTT< - I filled in ANNETTO (I’m hopeless with trees and plants). |
| 19 |
EC,LOG,U,E - the surface reading sends you off in another direction. My first thought was that “City” was the definition. |
Posted in Independent | 6 Comments »