Posted by smiffy on 18th September 2007
I didn’t spot anything unduly devious today so, coupled with the fact that the answers are all basic vocab, most clues are pretty self-evident. The only possible gripe would be that the wordplay/definitions elements of 18A and 6D are effectively the same, so not desperately cryptic.
Across
1 HAD,DOCK
9 L,ILL,E - I initially thought that this was a flawed definition (”port”), as I know that Lille stands quite some way inland. However, Wikipee lists it as the 3rd largest river port in France.
10 CAME,MBE,RT - A ripple of applause for the heresy of straying from grindingly orthodox approach (MEMBER inside CAT) here.
13 TOAST - double def. I think I’ve seen “soldiers” used in the culinary sense more in the last year than the previous fifteen combined. Maybe “dippy eggs” are back in vogue?
15 A,DUMB,RATE
18 PRESENT,ED - As mentioned above, I think that although two meanings of present are different (verb “gave”/give, and noun “gift”), they’re a little too close for comfort.
21 (h)UMBER
Down
1 HAL,I,BUT - creating a fishy confluence with 1A.
2 DELFTWARE (water fled)*
4 KICKS,TART - Maybe a more evocative definition than “Gets engine going” would have complemented the innuendo-laden wordplay better?
6 BUMBLE,BEE - a partially self-referential construction.
14 THE BROADS
17 AMP,LIT,UDE (due)*
18 PLUM,PER
23 A,SHE,S - don’t recall seeing this defined by “trees” before. Again, at least Highlander takes the (non-cricketing) road less travelled.
Posted in FT | 1 Comment »
Posted by petebiddlecombe on 18th September 2007
(this version added Weds 19 Sep, 8:20 p.m. - the first two comments relate to the corrected clue to 23D printed with no. 1842)
Solving time: roughly 90 mins from memory
This puzzle includes two mistakes, one much more important than the other, at 3 and 23 down. At 23 down, the wrong clue was printed, and the solution to the original clue led to a clash of letters in the grid. Full details when we get to the clue, just in case anyone reaches this from an old copy of the paper or an uncorrected PDF from the Grauniad/Observer xwd site. At 3D it’s easy enough to see what went wrong and get the correct answer that Azed clearly intended.
| Across |
| 6 |
CLANG - 2 defs. The one you know about also means the cry of birds such as geese. Another meaning is the same as the German word klang - a complex tone. |
| 10 |
T(REE)HUGGER(y) - it doesn’t take many barred-grid puzzles to learn that ree or reeve is the female ruff (a kind of sandpiper) |
| 11 |
CHLORDANE - (hard on l(i)ce)* |
| 13 |
L,EGO - nice unbalanced worplday here - L is indicated in two ways - left = L or {right side of wall} = L. Then the rest of the answer is indicated by a one-leter word. “constructed cheaply” is a colloquial meaning of Lego. |
| 14 |
WURM - a complicated geological &lit. The four stages of glaciation in the Alps are, in helpful alphabetical and chronological order, the Günz, Mindel, Riss and Würm. That gives you the def. interpretation of the clue. The wordplay interpretation: initial letters of the middle two plus ‘warming up’ are melted, i.e. anagrammed. |
| 18 |
SOLGEL - hidden backwards in ‘male glossies’ |
| 19 |
A,VA(I)LE - the Spenserian contribution to this puzzle, meaning ‘alight’ in the ‘get off a bus’ sense. |
| 21 |
SPAIN,G - Chambers tells us that the noun ’spa’ has been verbed. |
| 23 |
CO(ME)ON - coon = a sly thief, and prig3 is also a thief. |
| 24 |
CHIKARA - K in (a chair)*- sarangi and chikara2 are both Indian fiddles. |
| 26 |
O.(IN)K. - careful parsing needed here - the “in” in the answer is indicated by “involved with”, and the “in” in the clue is a containment indicator. |
| 28 |
AD,I,T - ad. and van3 are both short for ‘advantage’ in tennis, or so says the big red book - I’ll have to listen out for mention of the ‘van court’ in next year’s Wimbledon commentaries. |
| 29 |
TIMOCRACY = (cry atomic)* - a form of govt. in which ambition is a guiding principle |
| 30 |
CINQUE-PACE - an old dance (if you can have one-step and two-step, why not five?). Watch out for the Shak. version ’sinke-a-pace’. |
| 31 |
TAG,U.S. - the Protuguese river on which Lisbon stands. |
| 32 |
SCROWLE - edges of scene = SE, and the overlapping birds inside are the crow and owl. |
| |
| Down |
| 2 |
EPHEBO=Phoebe*,PHILI=”filly”,A - passion for ephebes = young males |
| 3 |
DROOB - Aussie informal for ‘ineffectual person’. The children ‘brought up’ are ‘brood’, but the reverse of brood is of course doorb not droob. |
| 4 |
SERK(in) - ref. Rudolf Serkin, concert pianist. |
| 5 |
THANNA - Han = Chinese in rev. of ANT. A thanna (check C for several other spellings) is an Indian police or military station. |
| 6 |
CUNJEVOI - C = coloured (S Afr),then un je voi(s) if my memory of school Fr. is right |
| 7 |
AG(OUT,I)ES |
| 8 |
NECROLOGICAL - log = record, in (nice carol)* |
| 12 |
DOOL - Scots for ‘bourne’ if you’ve seen that word as boundary/goal recently. I didn’t quite get the ‘mad McCoist’ bit, but linxit points out below that it’s doolally less Ally (McCoist). |
| 15 |
P(LAIN)ING - ‘ping’ as of a gunshot. The whole is a Shak. word for ‘complaint’, and a bitch is an act of complaining. |
| 16 |
SENARIUS - E in Russian* - a verse of six iambs |
| 20 |
ENS,TY(L)E - tye2 = an area of pasture |
| 22 |
GRIMES - the unfortunate lad in Peter Grimes is called Tom. |
| 23 |
GAJO - hidden in ‘making a journey’ - was the original solution, but 23A starts with a C. The replacement clue given a week later is “Band leader, one on piano in small company (4)” which gives C(A,P)O. |
| 24 |
COA(C)T - note that a Chesterfield is a garment as well as furniture. |
| 27 |
SCAR(let) - straightforward enough but worth noting that scarlet = “bright red cloth” as well as “bright red” - or even “fine cloth, not always red” |
Posted in Azed | 3 Comments »
Posted by Colin Blackburn on 18th September 2007
A typically good Virgilius puzzle with a few tough clues. I made one significant error early on which left me flummoxed over the last two entries.
| Across |
| 7 |
TICKET COLLECTOR — double def. — a driver committing parking or speeding offences might collect tickets! For some reason I wrote in TICKET INSPECTOR very early on without fully resolving the second cryptic definition. This was great for a while as almost all the crossing lights went in okay. Then at the end I was left with 3 and 4 down. I spent too long trying to force in wrong answers before I realised my error was in this clue! |
| 10 |
LIVELIHOOD — (HOLD OIL I’VE)* — this is a great anagram because it is such an awkward answer to see without a few checking letters. For a while I had just the final D and so moved ‘handled’ from the word play to the definition, desperate to find a word ending in -ED. |
| 12 |
ENDORSED — (RED-NOSED)* — another good angram and great, but simple, surface. |
| 13 |
MIDAIR — austRIA DIMly — excellent reverse hidden word. |
| 18 |
OUTGENERAL — OUT+GENERAL — I didn’t know this word at all and despite having OUT for a time I didn’t connect usual and GENERAL. |
| 19 |
BLUE — double def. — BLUE refers to adult in the sense of blue joke, blue movie, etc. |
| 21 |
SHIP OF THE DESERT — cryptic def. — a camel would be seen in a caravan. |
| 22 |
DIFFERENTLY — (FRIEND LEFT)* + (part)Y — yet another good anagram with potential anagrinds at both ends of the clue just to confuse things further. |
| |
| Down |
1 |
RICHARD THE THIRD — cryptic def. — mounting desperation from, “A horse, a horse, my kingdom for a horse.” |
| 2 |
FLEW — L in FEW — The Few refers to the RAF in 1940. The term arises from a speech by Churchill about the Battle of Britain. |
| 4 |
ALLIED — L in A LIED — LIED = a German song = number. |
| 5 |
INELIGIBLE — (I.E. BEING ILL)* |
| 6 |
NATIONAL GALLERY — “art-of-the-state”. Just the opposite usually signifies a reversal in the word play from that stated, here it creates a cryptic definition. |
| 8 |
RED CRESCENT — RE + CR after D in DESCENT — an insertion clue with a precise location specified. The Red Crescent is the equivalent of the Red Cross in Islamic countries. |
| 14 |
MILANESE — M1 LANES + E — parts of motorway = M1 LANES |
| 20 |
BEAT — BE AT — a real doh! moment to end on. |
Posted in Independent | 6 Comments »
Posted by ilancaron on 18th September 2007
Another out of character Araucarian opus – not cross-refs, not long anagrams and actually quite a pleasant puzzle with reasonable surfaces.
Across
| 1 |
FR(EE)BIE – [w]EE[k] in brief* |
| 5 |
CAT’S-PAW – had to wait for all the crossing letters for this |
| 10 |
BLOODLESS – “Cold” and “war” separate def and wordplay. |
| 12 |
GAL,A |
| 18 |
MARK MY WORDS – two meanings |
| 21 |
CUMMERBUND – v. misleading surface! “Centre” is your waist and DJ is dinner jacket. |
| 25 |
CON,TENDER |
| 26 |
P(HOT)O – HOT in rev(op=operation) |
| 27 |
TATTIER – (treat it)* — not sure if this is an anag &lit… is the answer the anagrind? “In a worse condition? Treat it to get improvement”. |
| 28 |
THES,EUS – [a]THE[n]S followed by use*. |
Down
| 1 |
FLA(B,B)Y |
| 2 |
EG,GNOG=rev(gong=medal=decoration) |
| 4 |
EMBER – I see this is a pretty transparent cryptic def but maybe there’s something cricket related to “The Ashes” that makes this clever? ‘”The Ashes” piece is likely to be glowing” |
| 5 |
COOK’S TOUR – (our cost OK)*. Ref. Cook travel tours (and the Bourdain book??) |
| 8 |
WISE=”Y’s”,ACRE=care* - Y is our unknown quantity here (as in math) – but I thought that a WISEACRE was a smart-ass not a “sage” per se. |
| 13 |
APOSTROPHE – a cryptic def worthy of Rufus himself! |
| 15 |
DOWN-UNDER – two meanings: one cryptic (“feathers inferior”). |
| 17 |
DRAG(O)NET – it’s a fish. |
| 19 |
FUR,ORE |
| 20 |
[mel]ODIOUS – I had to look for words starting with ODIOUS to solve this in TEA. MEL is “honey” in Chambers. |
| 24 |
DEL,I=rev(I led) |
Posted in Guardian | 13 Comments »