Guardian 24,255 (Sat 8 Dec)/Araucaria - Coined words
Posted by rightback on 16th December 2007
Solving time: 21:45, one missing (17ac)
Across clues had wordplay leading to the defined answer minus a coin. The (normal) down clues weren’t too bad though so this wasn’t much more difficult than usual, though a few on the left hand side took me a while to get and 17ac defeated me. Clue of the day: 6dn.
I haven’t had any Internet access at all for the last two weeks, and I don’t think the previous Saturday’s Guardian got blogged, so sorry about that, and for this post being a day late. Normal service should resume as of now, for the time being at least.
Music of the day: Money by Pink Floyd.
* = anagram, “X” = sounds like ‘X’, bold text indicates a coin omitted in the wordplay.
| Across | |
|---|---|
| 1 | N + EURO + SIS - a fairly easy across starter. |
| 9 | ER + RAND |
| 10 | SOU + P - according to Chambers, ’soup’ means ’stolen plate melted down’. I had guessed this, but didn’t suspect anything along those lines. |
| 11 | CH(ANGEL)ESS - an angel is a former English coin, which was new to me. |
| 12 | BOB + BIN |
| 14 | GO + R(DIME)R - a guess. Nadime Gordimer has won the Nobel Prize for Literature, as well as the Booker Prize (for The Conservationist). |
| 15 | CE + REAL |
| 17 | PE(LEU)S - I knew the Romanian currency LEU, but didn’t know Achilles’ father’s name and couldn’t think of PES for ‘foot’. |
| 20 | P + ECU + LIAR - with the final ‘r’ in place I thought the definition was probably ’story-teller’ so struggled with this. |
| 22 | C(AS)INO; COIN* |
| 23 | QUID PRO QUO; ROQU[efort] in P.O. (= ‘[Postal] Order’) - virtually impossible wordplay, but maybe that’s fair enough when the enumeration is so helpful. |
| 24 | BIT + E |
| 25 | ANNA + LS (= ‘learners’) |
| 26 | E(DUCAT)OR; rev. of ROE |
| Down | |
|---|---|
| 1 | MESOZOIC; (MICE + ZOOS)* |
| 2 | TRAP; rev. of PART |
| 3 | ASH + CAN[can] |
| 4 | [ba]KED + GERE + E |
| 5 | FR + ILL(I)NESS |
| 6 | ENISLE (hidden) - not sure if the beret reference in this clue (’Maroon in place of green is legitimate’) was intentional or not, but hats off (ho ho) if it was. UK paratroopers wear the maroon beret, commandos the green one. My allegiances lie with the former, but I have to concede that this T-shirt is absolutely brilliant. |
| 8 | SHAGGY (double definition) - refers to the phrase ’shaggy dog story’. This reminds me of Christopher Isherwood’s poem:
The common cormorant (or shag) Lays eggs inside a paper bag You follow the idea, no doubt? It is to keep the lightning out. But what these unobservant birds Have never thought of, is that herds Of wandering bears might come with buns And steal the bags to hold the crumbs. …and back to the crossword. |
| 13 | BUR(G)UNDI + AN |
| 16 | A + P(I)ARIS + T (= ‘model’) - I hate ‘model’ = T. |
| 19 | B + RAQUE[l] |
| 21 | [s]EQUINE[d] |
| 22 | CROC + US |
| 24 | BEAR (double definition) |
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