Guardian 24,479/Pasquale
Posted by golgonooza on August 28th, 2008
Another great crossword from The Don. I find he pitches them just right for daily cryptics - this wasn’t really tough but did require switching on the rusty old brain cells for some very elegant clueing.
Across
1 SCHEMA S+CHEM+A
4 CIRCULAR cryptic/double def.
9 OSCAR O+SCAR
10 ARCHITECT A+R(CH)ITE+CT this took me a while to work out the wordplay, writing down all the possible combinations until something popped up!
11 DINING CAR cryptic/double def.
12 SPAWN S+PAWN with ‘man’ being ‘pawn’
13 WAYS AND MEANS SWAYEDMAN*+ANS from Chambers: ” Committee of Ways and Means - the House of Commons sitting in the character of a committee to consider methods of raising money supplies”
17 STANDARD ROSE sounds like past improvement
20 REPRO REPRO(OF)
21 POINTLESS cryptic def.
23 PANTALOON PAN+TA(LOO)N who was a character in Italian comedy, a feeble old man
24 TRAIN to school is to train, and a train is also an alternative to a bus - I like this clue.
25 PULITZER UP(rev)+LIT+ZER(O)
26 THETIS THE+TIS the memoir is ‘Tis” from Frank McCourt, the rather disappointing follow-up to Angela’s Ashes
Down
1 SHOWDOWN ie show the county, part of Ulster
2 HACKNEYS HACK+NEYS (knees)
3 MORAN MO+RAN Churchill’s doctor friend and confidant, which makes this an &lit!
5 INCARCERATION IN+CAR(C)E+RATION nicely misleading - the whole thing is porridge - slang for jail, under custody is ‘in care’ with fixed portion of food being ‘ration’ with a ‘c’ for cold in.
6 CRIMSONED CRIM(SON)E+D
7 LEEWAY L(WEErev)AY
8 RATING RA(TIN)G
10 ACCIDENT-PRONE cryptic def
14 ASTRONAUT UNTOASTAR* another &lit
15 FOREPART FOR(RAPErev)T
16 PEASANTS P(EA+S)ANTS
18 TRIP UP cryptic/double def.
19 S(PIN)AL
August 28th, 2008 at 11:58 am
Goodness, I found this one rather difficult compared the the past week of dailies… Thanks for the blog on it - particularly the explanation of THETIS, which had me completely baffled.
I think the surface of 13 across is referring the committee of the same name in the US Congress, which is better known to fans of the West Wing, anyway ;)
There were lots of very satisfying clues in this puzzle… (TRAIN and INCARCERATION also particularly appealed to me.)
August 28th, 2008 at 1:26 pm
Of course, the Congress part refers to the American version, thanks for pointing that out mhl. I’ve never watched West Wing!
August 28th, 2008 at 4:10 pm
Crimsoned??
August 28th, 2008 at 4:24 pm
‘crimson’ as in ‘to blush’
August 28th, 2008 at 4:29 pm
Geoff: I think the reference is to having blood on one’s hands, but personally I’ve never seen crimson used in this way, i.e. to be crimsoned.
August 28th, 2008 at 4:39 pm
That was my first reaction, John, then somewhere in the back of the mind stirred the memory of ‘O’ Level Literature: ‘Signed in thy spoil and crimsoned in thy Lethe’ [Julius Caesar III i 75].
I found this one quite tough to begin with but much more satisfying than some recent puzzles. I knew 26 was THETIS and looked up Collins to see if there was such a word as “tis”. I found “’tis” - and still the penny didn’t drop! Thanks, Golgonooza - I’ve actually read the book but, as you say it’s [obviously!] less memorable than ‘Angela’s ashes’.
I liked 25ac and also 17ac, although I was looking for a homophone to begin with, because of ‘report suggesting’. Am I missing something? [I think there should be an acronym for this - we use it so often - but AIMS would be a bit confusing.]
August 28th, 2008 at 4:56 pm
John
I originally thought the boy must have ‘blushed with shame’ but on revisiting the clue I can see that you have a valid point regarding the hand becoming red.
August 28th, 2008 at 5:46 pm
I agree with Eileen — I too was looking for a homophone. golgonooza say “sounds like past improvement” but why “sounds like”?
In 23A, another meaning for pantaloon is a buffoon in pantomimes, the butt of a clown’s jokes.
August 28th, 2008 at 6:17 pm
Could it be school report?
August 28th, 2008 at 6:50 pm
Jvh: Standard Rose is a sort of homophone where the words are the same but they have two meanings; you could say “last year the standard rose” if you were talking about improvement in the past, and obviously it also is a type of Rose. As a teacher this is the sort of thing I might well find myself saying!
August 28th, 2008 at 7:00 pm
Thanks. I like John’s school report suggestion. I was taking “report” to mean different words could sound the same.
August 28th, 2008 at 10:04 pm
Golgonooza - as one [ex] teacher to another, I totally agree with what one might [hope to] say! However, although Collins defines a homophone as ‘one of a group of words pronounced in the same way but differing in meaning OR spelling’, I would have thought that, in general usage, and on this site in particular, the latter definition, i.e spelling, is more usual eg ’standard rose / rows’ Wouldn’t this solution be more normally defined as a double definition? The presence of both ‘report’ and ’suggesting’ did definitely lead me towards a ’sounds like’! [I'm beginning to wonder if either word was strictly necessary, especially in view of the question mark!]