This week’s Sunday cryptic crossword from the Guardian – found here
I found this a mostly straightforward Quiptic from Pangakupu – there are links where I suspect the general knowledge may be less well known. And there’s one clue where I really cannot see how the word play works.
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | BUTCHER |
Make a mess of Schubert, missing opening when playing (7)
|
| anagram minus – ([s]CHUBERT)* with an anagrind of “playing” and the instruction to remove the first letter (missing opening) – and the definition is misleading as it too could be an anagram indicator | ||
| 5 | CHICAGO |
US city smart in the past (7)
|
| charade of CHIC (smart) + AGO (in the past) | ||
| 9 | GROAN |
Sound of discomfort from good red horse? (5)
|
| charade of G (good) ROAN (red horse) with another misleading definition – “sound” is often a soundalike indicator | ||
| 10 | COMPLAINT |
Frenchman not elaborate in bed, leading to protest (9)
|
| insertion (in) of M (Frenchman) + PLAIN (not elaborate) inserted into COT (bed). M for Frenchman is the abbreviation for Monsieur | ||
| 11 | TESTAMENT |
What’s left in religious text? (9)
|
| double definition – ish (which is why the question mark) – what’s left is the last will and testament – and the Bible is divided into Old and New TESTAMENTS | ||
| 12 | EQUIP |
Provide material for joke after end of game (5)
|
| charade of QUIP (joke) after E (end of gamE) – with an instruction to order the clue components (after) | ||
| 13 | DRESS |
Garment rejected among lesser designs? (5)
|
| hidden reversal (rejected among) leSSER Designs < – the indicators do two jobs rejected (reversal) + among (hidden) | ||
| 15 | TRAMLINES |
Rebuilt terminals for transport routes (9)
|
| anagram (rebuilt) of (TERMINALS)* | ||
| 18 | PLUTOCRAT |
Cartoon dog and cat seizing tail of another fat cat? (9)
|
| charade of PLUTO (cartoon dog) + CAT (from the clue) around (seizing) R (tail of anotheR) | ||
| 19 | HAREM |
Area of New York evicting 50 women living together? (5)
|
| deletion – HARLEM (area of New York) removing (evicting) L (50 in Roman numerals) | ||
| 21 | LINED |
End of quatrain, say, showing signs of age? (5)
|
| double definition – ish (with another question mark) – a quatrain is a verse of four lines, so the end of a quatrain could be LINE D, if the lines are numbered A, B, C and D. | ||
| 23 | SWEET PEAS |
Multiple bloomers in having veg after dessert (5,4)
|
| charade of PEAS (veg) after SWEET (dessert) for these flowers – bloomers is a crosswordese way of saying flowers becasue they bloom. Sweet peas could be multiple bloomers either because there are several flowers on a stem or because the keep flowering if they are regularly cut. | ||
| 25 | RESILIENT |
Is taken aback by deception in lease? Readily recovering (9)
|
| insertion of IS < (IS taken aback) + (by) LIE (deception) in RENT (lease) = RE SI LIE NT. Yes, there are technical differences between “rent” and “lease” but they are often used interchangeably in many circumstances. | ||
| 26 | BRACE |
Support British competition (5)
|
| charade of B (British) + RACE (competition) | ||
| 27 | MALAYAN |
Some south-east Asian fellow penning a song (7)
|
| insertion (penning) of A LAY (a song) into MAN (fellow) – a LAY is a poem designed to be sung – see here | ||
| 28 | CHEDDAR |
Gorge in Somerset? He had to take daughter in car (7)
|
| insertion (to take) of HE’D (he had) + D (daughter) in CAR (from the clue) – for this place | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 1 | BIGOTED |
Substantial religious books edited, ignoring alternative views? (7)
|
| charade of BIG (substantial) + OT (religious books) + ED (edited). OT is the abbreviation for the Old Testament and is a regular in crosswords | ||
| 2 | TROUSSEAU |
Uses a tour to move around? It’s for after the wedding (9)
|
| anagram (to move around) of (USES A TOUR)* – and traditionally the TROUSSEAU was the bundle of clothes made by a bride to be to wear after her marriage, it comes from the French, means small bundle, and meant the personal possessions of the bride. | ||
| 3 | HENNA |
Hair dye Anne Hathaway initially promoted (5)
|
| this looks like a hidden reversal – found in ANNE Hathaway, when solving, I read it as an anagram of ANNE* + H is brought to the front (Initially promoted) – but there are no indicators for an anagram or something hidden. Promoted suggests a reversal in a down clue | ||
| 4 | ROCHESTER |
List includes revolutionary romantic hero (9)
|
| insertion (includes) of ROSTER (list) around (includes) CHE (revolutionary). CHE is crosswordlands favourite revolutionary. ROCHESTER is a romantic hero in Jane Eyre | ||
| 5 | COMET |
Old aeroplane company satisfied (5)
|
| charade of CO (company) + MET (satisfied) for the de Havilland COMET – the first commercial jet airliner | ||
| 6 | ILL HEALTH |
I left the hall, struggling – sickness? (3,6)
|
| charade plus anagram of I (from the clue) + L (left) + (THE HALL)* (struggling) | ||
| 7 | ADIEU |
Finish investing in a University? Farewell (5)
|
| insertion (investing) of DIE (finish) in A (from the clue) + U (university) | ||
| 8 | OCTOPUS |
A month’s work to get sea creature (7)
|
| charade of OCT (October – month) + OPUS (work) | ||
| 14 | SWORDPLAY |
Small component of clue? It’s combative stuff (9)
|
| charade of S (small) + WORD PLAY (component of a clue) | ||
| 16 | AUTHENTIC |
Real gold subsequently getting mark of correctness? Not quite (9)
|
| charade of AU (gold) + THEN (subsequently) + (getting) TIC[k] (mark of correctness) – not quite is an instruction to remove the last letter from “TICk”. | ||
| 17 | NURSEMAID |
Nanny with fake surname on documents? (9)
|
| anagram (fake) of (SURNAME)* to get NURSEMA + ID (documents) | ||
| 18 | PILGRIM |
Large house dismissing last dour religious traveller (7)
|
| charade of PIL[e] (large house, dismissing last) + GRIM (dour) | ||
| 20 | MISHEAR |
Fail to understand I’m upset over cut (7)
|
| reversal of IM < (I’m upset) + SHEAR (cut) | ||
| 22 | NASAL |
American agency taking line regarding the nose (5)
|
| charade of NASA (American agency) + (taking) L (line) | ||
| 23 | STERN |
Rear of ship is part of coaster, note (5)
|
| hidden word (is part of) coaSTER Note | ||
| 24 | TABLE |
Furniture item not likely to wobble? Not at first (5)
|
| decapitation (not at first) from [s]TABLE (not likely to wobble) |
It’s this setter’s third puzzle this week (counting Phi in the Independent) and another TESTAMENT to his clueing, if made easier here. My favourites were OCTOPUS and SWORDPLAY. I couldn’t parse LINED, which is another great clue. Thanks Pangakupu and Shanne!
I didn’t check the setter until I came here. It was a fitting puzzle for the slot with no resistance to talk of and just that meaning of LAY that I didn’t know.
I liked ROCHESTER, SWORDPLAY and PILGRIM.
Thanks Pangakupu and Shanne.
3d is perhaps better interpreted as a charade of ANNE (from the clue) + H (Hathaway initially) reversed (promoted in down clue).
Thanks to Pangakupu for a well-judged Quiptic and to Shanne for the usual clarity of her explanations.
QUIPTIC is there as a Nina.
Enjoyable Quiptic. My only quibble was with 3d as I couldn’t see a hidden indicator only the reversal although the answer was clear. Reading here I think AlanJ#3 has got it right in how the wordplay operates. Thanks Pangakupu and Shanne.
A very pleasant puzzle, maybe a bit on the easier end even for a Quiptic: but no complaints from me about that. Sunday breakfast crosswording is not for giving one a hard time!
ROCHESTER and SWORDPLAY were my favourites.
LINED was a bung-in, on the simple basis that “well, poems have lines, don’t they?”, so thank you, Shanne, for the deeper explanation (and the rest of the blog), and to Pangakupu for the entertainment.
Very good, and a nice clear blog. I wondered whether there should have been some indication that MALAYAN is the former (colonial) term for present-day Malaysians, as otherwise it comes across as a bit dated, possibly also slightly dismissive given the definition (‘some south-east Asian’). But otherwise all good, particularly PLUTOCRAT and RESILIENT.
That’s funny, I thought this was a quite hard for a Quiptic, but others clearly had a different experience. I wonder how much it depends on which clues you try first. (I’m a flitter.)
To try to put my finger on why I felt that, I think LINE D is quite an advanced trick (especially if you’ve not heard of a quatrain; I looked it up), the American agency is quite vague (could have been shuttle agency which would have made the surface more sensical), multiple bloomers is a bit ambiguous (posey?) tho in the end I think it just refers to the plural, and MALAYAN is a bit of a headscratcher for the slightly odd “some” and the (nho for me) “lay”
Because I found myself working on the LHS first, in the SW in particular, I came across all of those early on.
Funnily enough my loi was the straightforward EQUIP – I have a bit of a blind spot for unusual letter combinations which look impossibly at first glance, here the “i” in E – U – P.
Still, there was plenty of accessible stuff too, which made for a nice solving experience overall.
Tx both
An enjoyable Quiptic for a Sunday morning coffee break. Thanks Pangakupu and Shanne.
Shanne’s comment about bloomers on 23 SWEET PEAS brought a smile, as of course ‘flower’ is another “crosswordese” for ‘river’.
AP @8, same here. The comments over on the site are pretty much universal in describing this as a perfect Quiptic – fair enough, but a fair chunk of it was a struggle for me. A good crossword and many Quiptic clues but I took far longer over it than I would have expected for this slot.
Nice quiptic. “Rejected” for reversal seemed a bit strange to me (but the answer was straightforward enough) and I struggled parsing GROAN (my equine GK is nonexistent). I once flew on a COMET 4b (back in 1965!) so that was a write-in. Favourites PILGRIM and PLUTOCRAT. Thanks Pangakupu and Shanne
Delightful. Favourites, PLUTOCRAT, TRAMLINES, RESILIENT, ROCHESTER and SWORDPLAY.
Ta Pangakupu & Shanne.
AntonJ@11: the DH Comet is well-known to students of materials science: they feature as example of the unpleasantness of metal fatigue. When they were initially designed, not as much was known about the phenomenon as it was a bit later, especially in the aluminium alloys used in the the fuselage and wings. The square windows were an especially bad idea, providing stress concentrations at each corner from which cracks grew with each pressurisation cycle. I hope the one you few in had the round windows of later models!
I think the definition for BUTCHER is “make a mess of“
gladys @14 – that’s what I’ve underlined as the definition.
A delightful quiptic which we don’t think many novice or improving solvers should have found much of a problem – possibly the GK for Mr Rochester and the Comet might cause a bit of delay. We saw 3dn as parsed by AlanJ @3 without giving it another thought.
Thanks, Pangakupu and Shanne.
Shanne @ 15 . I think Gladys is saying “of” should be part of the definition and, therefore, underlined, which it isn’t
NHO TROUSSEAU, and “lay” meaning song is a new one on me too.
Started well but struggled with the last half on this one, but enjoyable nonetheless.
Thanks Pangakupu and Shanne for a stellar blog.
Great Quiptic and blog; thanks very much to Pangakupu and Shanne. I too loved SWORDPLAY and OCTOPUS, got NURSEMAID though I was too thick to see how it worked, and struggled unreasonably long with EQUIP!
I loved it and thought it was perfectly pitched, a little harder than last week but all the better for it, until I hit a wall with my last two clues and couldn’t finish it.
The trouble I had was I hadn’t heard of quatrain so I bunged in LINES for signs of age. I don’t think I would have parsed it as line D even if I knew it was a verse. I cycled through the alphabet several times for 14D but that rogue S defeated me.
I guessed MALAYAN but I wasn’t confident so I revealed 14D and 27A in the end. I don’t think I’ve seen penning as an insertion indicator before. I’ll have to remember that one. And as said above, I thought ‘some south-east Asian’ was a bit rum and not the best way to clue an ethnic group.
Loved it. Great fun. Parsed most and guessed the rest with crossers.
Thanks Pangakupu & Shanne.
In my perhaps naive way, I understood ‘initially’ in 3 down ‘HENNA’ as indicating that the reversal (promotion) started from the initial letter of Hathaway.