It’s Enigmatist!
Looking through the archive, I find that it’s almost exactly a year since I blogged an Enigmatist puzzle. I have not attempted to solve one since then, having finally decided that they are, generally, beyond me. When I looked, shortly after midnight, to see what was in store for me, my immediate reaction was to call in sick but I decided to have a quick look before trying to get some sleep and somehow, I just seemed to keep going.
I found it a bit of a mixture. About a dozen of the clues were really straightforward but some others were completely unsolvable and, when revealed, remained a complete mystery; there are yet others where I can see tantalising bits of the parsing but just can’t piece them together. As last time, to save you searching through the blog I’ll list here the instances where I failed in solving and / or parsing: 11a, 15ac, 23ac, 7dn and 18dn. As always, my thanks in advance for the help, with my usual plea for avoidance of repetition (posting simply to agree with others – last time there were 150 comments!) – and apologies for my failings. I won’t list favourites, since I’m sure that some of the above would be included, if I’d managed to see them.
My thanks to Enigmatist – I did enjoy what I could do!
Definitions are underlined in the clues.
Across
1 Accompanied by star, left behind with knowledge of Glasgow sports venue (10,4)
KENNINGTON OVAL
KENNING (Scottish for ‘knowing’, so ‘with knowledge of Glasgow’) + TO (?) + NOVA (star) + L )left)
Venue for Surrey County Cricket Club
8 Regretful of £1000 deposited after bankruptcy (5)
RUING
RUIN (bankruptcy) + G (£1000)
9 Discarded top class team (3-5)
SET-ASIDE
SET A (top class) + SIDE (team)
11 Solo turn by crossword guru touring centre of 1ac? (7)
CADENZA
I can see a reversal (turn) of AZED (crossword guru) in here but can’t see the rest
12 Maximum and minimum values taken out of context, remarkably (7)
EXTREMA
Hidden in contEXT REMArkably
13 Change location of union meeting in telephone call? (5)
ALTER
Sounds like (in telephone call) ‘altar’ (location of union meeting)
15 Under a great burden, Ms Viner perhaps, with work (9)
OPPRESSED
OP (work) + PRESSED ???
17 An essential for burner of midnight oil hit spot (9)
LAMPLIGHT
LAM (hit) + PLIGHT (spot)
20 Guiltless about Jack Sprat’s diet, it’s implied (5)
CLEAN
C (about) + LEAN (Jack Sprat’s implied diet – he ‘could eat no fat’)
21 Arctic resident worked in retirement with supercomputer (7)
NARWHAL
A reversal (in retirement) of RAN (worked) + W (with) + HAL (supercomputer)
23 Cheese production initially stops its run (7)
SAPSAGO
25 Dodge section that is recording (8)
SIDESTEP
S (section) + ID EST (that is) + EP (recording)
26 Forest dweller there – fearfully symmetrical, according to recital (5)
TAIGA
I learned this word long ago, from crosswords – sounds like (according to recital) ‘tiger / tyger’ – a clever reference to the ‘dweller there’ in Blake’s poem:
“Tyger Tyger, burning bright,
In the forests of the night;
What immortal hand or eye,
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?”
27 Planet’s reporter takes chorus on leave, on the way to the Proms? (10,4)
KENSINGTON GORE
(Clark) KENT (Planet’s reporter) round SING (chorus) + GO (leave) + RE (on)
The site of the Royal Albert Hall, venue for the Proms
Down
1 Charles and his mum in dust-up about constant sleazy activity (4,8)
KERB CRAWLING
KING (Charles) with ER (his mum) in BRAWL (bust-up) round C (constant)
2 Water nymph transformed by Diana (5)
NAIAD
An anagram (transformed) of DIANA
3 Mostly where soldiers are trained to place their trust (2,7)
IN GENERAL
Cryptic definition
4 Harsh and unscrupulous activity, seizing racy tapes (7)
GESTAPO
GO (activity) round an anagram (racy) of TAPES – Chambers lists this as an adjective
5 Awfully sick after leaving new soup kitchen, getting better (2,3,2)
ON THE UP
An anagram (awfully) of SOUP KITCHEN minus ‘sick’
6 Start rolling the cameras here (5)
ONSET
ON SET – where the cameras roll
7 Notices surrounding hip-hop doctor’s name on envelope (9)
ADDRESSEE
ADS (notices) … DR (doctor) …
10 Sorcerer welcomes assistance getting diplomat initial crossing? (6,6)
MAIDEN VOYAGE
MAGE (sorcerer) round AID (assistance) + ENVOY (diplomat) – I liked this one
14 Actor suggesting a spot of 1dn? (3,6)
TOM CRUISE
Cryptic definition, tom being slang for prostitute
16 Sort of alpine act a daring climb? (2,7)
EL CAPITAN
An anagram (sort of) of ALPINE ACT
18 It’s a bit gluey getting up on a cycle (7)
GELATIN
19 Old drunkard beats wino up (7)
TOSSPOT
A reversal (up) of TOPS (beats) + SOT (wino) – this raised a smile
22 Spurs are improving, reportedly (still in need of work) (5)
HEELS
Sounds like (reportedly) ‘heal’ (are improving) + S[till] minus ’till’ (work – on the land) – I think
24 Friend is one shot (5)
AMIGO
AM I (is one) + GO (shot)
CADENZA
AZED (crossword guru)
Around
Centre of 1=centre of one=N
AZNED+AC (from the surface 1ac)
Turn the above
SAPSAGO
its=it+it=SASA
P in SASA
+GO (run)
ADDRESSEE
AD, SEE notces
DRES hip-hop doctor’s
GELATIN
ELATING (getting up) cycled
OPPRESSED
Struggling …
PRESS ED(itor)?
Viner is Chief Editor tho
Comment #2
Ms Viner is the Guardian editor, hence a PRESS-ED
7d is I think a reference to Dr Dre. So ‘doctor’s’ is DRES in AD plus SEE
17 a I had LAMP for ‘hits and (spot) LIGHT
ADDRESSEE
ads and see two types of notice around DRE as in Dr Dre a hiphop musical artist
KENNINGTON OVAL
accompanied by=TO
KERB CRAWLING
I had this…(not sure I am right)
Charles=K
his mum=ER
in dust-up=BRAWLING
about C
ON THE UP
There are two anagrinds
awfully for sick
and new for the longer fodder
Thanks Eileen.
When I saw the setter, I had the same reaction as Eileen and thought what’s the point, but I’m pleased to say that I managed to solve this before lights out, apart from having to reveal SAPSAGO. I liked the quasi-symmetry of KENNINGTON OVAL and KENSINGTON GORE plus KERB CRAWLING with TOM CRUISE and MAIDEN VOYAGE. I couldn’t parse CADENZA, ALTER or TAIGA.
I had ADDRESSEE as 2 x notices, ADS and SEE about Dr DRE, the hip hop artist, A tough challenge but not surprising.
Ta Enigmatist & Eileen.
Thought I was going to finish an Enigmatist – but no. NHO SAPSAGO and certainly couldn’t parse it. I suspect the bookenders at 1a and 27a might be challenging for some of our overseas solvers. TAIGA is fave today for the poetic reference.
Thanks both
PS. I have nothing against TOM CRUISE but I’m never going to be able to see his name again without thinking of kerb-crawling!
Many thanks for prompt responses.
Crispy @3 – of course: doh!
I meant to say that I wouldn’t attempt to record thanks for each piece of help as it arrived. Please take it as read, until a later summary (when I’ve had a chance to wake up. 😉 )
A mixed bad indeed. If you ignore that I had to reveal SAPSAGO and CADENZA pleased to get an Enigmatist solved in the time I put aside in the morning. I did not know or could parse afterwards either of those reveals so I was not going to get there in a million years.
Enjoyed the two Kensington related clues, KERB CRAWLING and TOM CRUISE
Thanks Eileen and Enigmatist.
Comment #12
Like Eileen I’m fearful when I see the name Enig, but this one was ok. I even parsed 4 out of the 5 Eileen left. Thanks both
@1 it = SA ?
Don’t get it
Can you help please
CRUISE is another word for KERB CRAWL. I parsed LAMPLIGHT as Mike @5.
Torture. Who’s heard of sapsago? And how is “harsh and unscrupulous” a definition for secret state police,?
I was somewhat fearful when I saw Enigmatist’s name as I’m closing in on a 100 day winning streak! I got there but not without a battle and the parsing was a slog. Neat play on kennington/kensington.
I agree about Dr Dre and Ms Viner being a PRESS ED.
I got as far as Eileen with CADENZA and bodged a desperate SAPS (ends, by taking its energy) + AGO (its [race is] run i.e. in the past).
I’d like to say I prefer KVa’s version, which is bound to be correct, but I don’t even understand that!
Can you elaborate KVa and are you ever a setter/blogger?
I was pleased to fill the grid and liked some of the clues but these tend to feel a step too far.
I will continue to engage though.
Lizzie @16 I had the same question, GESTAPO can be an adjective too.
(13 comments while I was writing mine. I look behind the times)
Thanks Enigmatist and Eileen.
TOM CRUISE
Is it a soundalike of (suggesting) “Tom crews”
Spot of (someone) Kerb Crawling?
Sorry for multiple posts.
PB@14
IT means sex/sexual relationship.
SA is sex appeal. In Crosswordostan IT=SA.
Martin@18
Thanks for the compliments.
No. I never tried setting or blogging.
Like Eileen, I nearly shelved this but I decided to have a go. The two KENs (1a & 27a) spurred me on. I eventually had to sleep and finished it shortly after waking up. I wonder if the neighbours might have me locked up as I run down the street shouting, “I finished an Enigmatist!”
PB @ #14
SA = sex appeal, or “it”
PB @14 SA=Sex Appeal = It, as in you either have it or don’t. I’ve never liked it much, but it’s common in crosswords.
I struggled with parsing in much the same places as Eileen. All seems fair with te explanations though.
KVa@7 I had KERB CRAWLING as you’ve parsed it, but I think Eileen is right. IMO Charles can only = K if you go via chess, which seems too much of a stretch I think?
I just think so much of this cluing seems as if it was rushed – lazy rather than clever.
Wow. First time this has happened but I lost the will to continue with just over half done as I was discouraged by my inability to parse a number of obviously correct solutions. I just felt ‘What’s the point?’ Relieved to see that I’m in quite decent company. First time I’d come across this setter. Will probably give it a miss next time.
Yes, MeToo, shrinking back whenever I see this setter’s name appearing. But maybe because I didn’t have a peek just past midnight this time but came to it not that long ago. Or maybe because I thought KENSINGTON GORE(which I know from my days in South Ken) straight away from the Prom reference, when I read 27ac, then wondered if 1ac could – possibly – be the almost similar KENNINGTON OVAL (where I’ve watched the cricket many a time). Anyway, both got written in, parsing sort of checked, and I was away. Last one in (had to Google that one) was SAPSAGO. Never completed an ENIGMATIST before, but somehow managed this one on a wing and a prayer
I got it all! Except that I put in SOPRANO instead of the sixth most well known type of cheese in Switzerland – which you could only solve if you are from the 1940s and still think that “it” means SA. Soprano is a brand of cheese though.
Honestly, Enigmatist is obviously very clever and talented – one of the best – so why does he need to resort to crosswordese junk like that?
Thanks Enigmatist and Eileen
I didn’t enjoy this at all. Some of the clues seemed to be allusions to the answers rather than actual clues (GESTAPO and IN GENERAL for instance).
I got SAPSAGO from a wordfinder. Has anyone heard of it?
KENSINGTON GORE is very UK specific GK.
To add to the confusion, in Barbados there is a KENSINGTON OVAL!
SAPSAGO
Martin@18
Did you want an elaborate parsing?
I didn’t get it in the first reading. Sorry.
production initially=P
its=IT+IT=SASA
run=GO
P stops (goes into) SASAGO.
(Or P stops SASA)+GO
In CADENZA
1ac in the clue expands to ONE AC
N from ONE (the central letter) and AC are used in the WP.
‘Turn by’ in the clue is the reversal indicator.
As per Postmark @9 for me. Miraculously, the solutions rolled out – don’t quite know why.
As Eileen has said, some clues were straightforward, but the planets must be aligned too, because somehow I could intuit many other answers without hacking through the parsing undergrowth.
Thanks to Enigmatist and Eileen
D’Oh! Yes, sex appeal and it. Thank you KVa and Lizzie.
Thanks for the blog, Eileen. I found this much more approachable than Enig usually is. I got the feeling that they really wanted to do the TOM CRUISE joke, and I admit it made me laugh a little guiltily. But 23a is frankly a terrible clue for an obscure word. As Digger@27 says, we aren’t in the 1940s any more.
TomyM @24: now you’ve said it, I think you’re right – it does feel rushed.
My first pass yielded 3 solutions, so I nearly binned this. Cracking the 1s opened everything up but didn’t know 26A TAIGA, so a failure in the end.
I think KVa is right about kerb crawling – his explanation makes more sense of the ‘in’. ‘To’ = ‘accompanied by’ in the sense of ‘he sang to a small guitar’ (not sure anyone has said this yet). For an Enigmatist I found this relatively easy to complete, though I couldn’t parse everything
Tough puzzle in that I had quite a few answers I could not fully parse or parse at all so it was not very satisfying but it was a good challenge.
New for me: EL CAPITAN, SAPSAGO.
I could solve 1ac from the letter count as I am familiar with the Oval but I could not really parse it, and for 27ac I needed to look at a map for street names near Royal Albert Hall.
I could not parse:
1ac the TO
11ac apart from guessing there was a ref to AZED
23ac apart from the P
25ac
26ac apart from guessing it was a homonym of tiger
14d – did not know that TOM = prostitute
18d I wrongly assumed it was something like rev of LEG=on + A + TIN = ?
Thanks to Eileen and all the bloggers who have filled in the gaps for the parsing.
Redrodney @23 I agree, Charles is nonsense for K, which is a chess or cards king, not a person. But the rest of the clue doesn’t work taking Charles as KING, which would seem to be a bigger problem (or at least, a more unlikely one).
I think we have had KENSINGTON GORE in the sense of fake blood before, so it was vaguely familiar, though I started with the wrong reporter and was looking for a Lane. TAIGA is brilliant.
Having been comprehensively beaten by IO in yesterday’s FT this felt like a vigorous sparring match. Challenging but doable
Top ticks for TOM CRUISE KERB CRAWLING & CADENZA
Cliche klaxon sounded for SA/IT
Cheers E&E
Add me to the list of people who normally quake a bit when seeing Enigmatist at the top of the crossword, but I decided to give it a go and managed all but the cheese in a very reasonable time for one of his puzzles
Thanks to Enigmatist and Eileen. My favourite clue was 26a
Perversely, I’m always pleased to see Enigmatist’s name on a weekday puzzle, for it means I have an outside chance of completing it. And on days when I do, like today, I feel childishly chuffed for several minutes, till I remember this wasn’t a Prize puzzle.
Hey ho
Last in was SAPSAGO (well yes of course I’d never heard of it, but with all the crossers twas the sole wordfinder offering). TAIGA I guessed from the Blake reference. ADDRESSEE: semi-parsed (I really must bone-up on what the much-missed Jeremy Hardy used to call hippity-hop). CADENZA: another guess (I saw Azed, hadn’t the foggiest about the rest).
1A & 27A were easy to guess (I was born & brought up in London, which helps), parsing took longer.
Fuddleduddy @25: I know what you mean – I’ve been there many times myself! There are now some Grauniad setters I’ve stopped bothering with – but I persist with Enigmatist because, unusually, he is actually capable of “being easier” sometimes. And when I do succeed, hoo boy it feels good.
Thank you to him and to Eileen
IT meaning SA meaning Sex Appeal is now 100 years old. It’s why Clara Bow was known as The ‘It’ Girl. Probably about time crossword setters stopped using it (sic) – no wonder younger people say they don’t ‘get’ cryptic crosswords and can’t solve them, when some of the references you ‘need to know’ are so old.
For 17ac Lam = hit and plight = spot?
1 Charles and his mum in dust-up about constant sleazy activity (4,8)
KERB CRAWLING
KING (Charles) with ER (his mum) in BRAWL (bust-up) round C (constant)
The problem I have with this is that ER isn’t in BRAWL – (ER + BRAWL around C) is in KING, whereas KVA’s parsing makes a bit more sense, other than K (chess notation) for Charles.
@43 I actually had LAMP = hit and LIGHT = spot (short for a spotlight). I wonder which Mr Nigmatist had in mind.
I had the same parsing as Digger @45. For me, LAMP = hit, LAM I only know as in “going on the lam” ie. running away.
(I also agree with Simon @ 42 about SA/it – but I suspect our objections will fall on deaf ears.)
I thought I was a bit of a cheese buff but SAPSAGO (LOI) was a completely new one for me. I had to resort to a website with an alphabetical list of cheeses.
QUITE satisfying to complete an enigmatist – and in one sitting, too! The name alone is enough to make me take a very deep breath and be prepared for defeat.
I could parse most of the answers, sometimes given a sideways hard stare, but as others have noted, several seemed to be a bit off.
Thanks E and I.
Muffin@28: I’m a UK solver and didn’t know KG was an actual location. I’ve only ever heard it as fake blood, so there was no way I could have solved this. Ditto SAPSAGO.
As a rhotic speaker, the less said about TAIGA the better.
I actually liked GELATIN, TOSSPOT and a few others.
Thanks for the blog , SAPSAGO has been in Azed before and of course is in Chambers 93 and the wordplay was fine .
Why oh why Guardian ? I would prefer it if you did not give me the hope in the first place .
AlanC@8 , you might like the FT crossword today .
I agree with Simon@42 on retiring IT=SA.
I spent many hours researching Swiss cheeses for our Swiss-themed Christmas last year. We bought a (truly delicious) Blue Brain, some Appenberger, Fessli and Belper Knolle as well as the usual Emmental and Gruyere. But SAPSAGO was a mystery to me nonetheless.
However, I did manage to finish this fairly quickly though many were unparsed. Lucky or on the right wavelength I guess.
Life’s too short to explore obscure Swiss cheeses, especially if, like me, you detest almost all varieties of the stuff! I also haven’t heard the Oval referred to like that in years, certainly not since naming rights sponsorship became a thing.
KVA@7 could you please elaborate on the “to” at 1AC please?
Why does it mean accompanied by?
Enjoyable crossword for an Enigmatist once we got going.
Thanks Eileen for persevering too.
Shirley@52
1AC
Mike@35 has given an example of the interchangeability of accompanied by/to.
KVa@19 Crosswordostan sounds like an amazing country to visit. Communicating with the locals would be an entertaining challenge.
I gave up after writing in ADDRESSEE and ON THE UP and EXTREMA
Pleasing to see that Eileen (my heroine) and I are on the same page regarding the clever cluing of Enigmatist. Today’s puzzle was a mixture of general knowledge—for example, 1ac and 27ac—plus a number of mysterious solutions I couldn’t solve, namely 18dn, 11ac, 23ac and 26ac.
Favourites 7dn, 13ac, 15ac,
Thx to Enigmatist and to Eileen.
If we start retiring bits of outdated slang, where do we stop? We probably have to accept these quaint crossword conventions much as we tolerate more contemporary references (eg Dr Dre). This is from someone who has never heard of SA or IT in the sense used here outside of Crosswordostan, and has no desire to know anything more about Dr Dre.
Well said, BullH @57, it’s the slight bonkersness of this hobby that appeals to me.
I filled in this grid, with a little help from elsewhere, but was left with a disappointing number of ?s. Still, solving an Enigmatist is ok for an old plodder.
Many thanks, Eileen, for the valiant blog.
Saw the name at the top and decided to take the day off.
kangcam@54
225 could well be the de facto capital of or at least a very important place in, Crosswordostan. 🙂
AlanC@15
TOM CRUISE
Even after reading your post, I went on to post my wrong parse as I misunderstood ‘a spot of’.
When I realised that my parsing was iffy, I emailed an expert friend of mine to check whether he
agreed with my parsing. In response, he explained that ‘a spot of kerb crawling ‘ = ‘ some amount of
kerb crawling/cruising’.
Didn’t know this sense of ‘spot’ before that, and that lack of knowledge derailed me (though Eileen
has clearly indicated in her blog that it’s a cryptic def).
There’s so much to learn.
I’m feeling thoroughly mauled by that experience; I enjoyed the ones I could do but the majority of the rest went in guessed at and unparsed. I knew of KENSINGTON GORE as fake blood but didn’t know it was a place near the RAH. I also spent a long time looking for a Glasgow sports venue that fitted the enumeration. LOI 23ac: I decided against skimming an alphabetical list of world cheeses and just hit “Reveal”; I’d never have worked out SAPSAGO from the clue. Thanks to Enigmatist for the (insurmountable) challenge, and to Eileen for such sterling work under pressure.
As is usual with Enigmatist, I had to use a lot of electronic help but managed to ‘solve’ it and parse everything except the GELATIN cycle. I liked the CADENZA in 1ac, the OP PRESS ED in the Guardian, and the sorcerer and diplomat in their MAIDEN VOYAGE.
Thanks Enigmatist and Eileen.
I got most of it, enjoyed very little of it.
Very accessible for an Enigmatist I thought after having struggled with his recent Prize for several days. I had written in KENSINGTON OVAL (Barbados) which would have given pleasant (if not fearful) symmetry but the parsing didn’t work. I lazily let Mr Google find actor Tom for me but kicked myself afterwards. NHO SAPSAGO (although before doing word-search the joke “How do you start a pudding race” had been in my mind so maybe something was going on subconsciously). Apropos Simon@42’s suggestion of retiring IT=SA, I recently asked Gemini when Actor = TREE (from Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree) was last used. Apparently the Crossword Editor officially “retired” its use in March 2014 although there was a nostalgic reference to Tree in November 2016 in the Guardian Cryptic No. 27,050 by Brummie, namely “Actor Tree’s half-cut old Scotsman? (9)”
…for an old codger like me, it’ll always be the KENNINGTON OVAL, complete with the strong pervading whiff on the way of the marmite factory (closed in the late Sixties?) and the Good Old Gasometer, which I believe was decommisioned about a dozen years ago. And more nostalgia, re KENSINGTON GORE – apologies – I never actually attended The Proms at the Albert Hall but did see Pink Floyd playing there once upon a time…
As frustrating for me as always with Enigmatist, although I am happy for the expert solvers here who got to stretch their legs.
“it’s” translating to SASA is a leap too far for me. If it is something common in crosswordland, as others have said, it has bypassed me, even though I know of both separately as synonyms for sex appeal. I agree that IT for sex appeal should be retired — outside of crosswords, I don’t think it’s a term that has been used for decades? And I don’t recall seeing “sex appeal” much lately, either, although the youth’s word of choice, “hot”, is IMO a downgrade.
Fun fact: the origin of the term “it girl” goes back to 1927 when Clara Bow appeared in the film “It”. The original meaning of the term was a personal magnetism that went beyond mere sex appeal. As Rudyard Kipling (yes, him again), who apparently originated the concept in 1904 put it:
It isn’t beauty, so to speak, nor good talk necessarily. It’s just ‘It’. Some women will stay in a man’s memory if they once walk down the street.
Thank you Eileen for your blog unpicking this puzzle. I especially appreciate your giving the context of TAIGA/tiger/tyger as I had not made the leap to the Blake poem. Once explained, a lovely clue.
As an Aussie solver, the London places were only vaguely known, so I needed to construct them from word play and crossers. However I do remember the KG = fake blood clue from a little while ago. Was it in a Prize?
I was as ignorant as most about the cheese. Enough said about that already.
Thanks Eileen and contributors for parsing help with many including CADENZA, ADDRESSEE, GELATIN, SAPSAGO, TAIGA.
I liked MAIDEN VOYAGE, OPPRESSED and TOSSPOT. And was amused by the KERB CRAWLING TOM CRUISE.
Thanks to Enigmatist and Eileen.
Presumably all the deleted comments contain expletives, the usual choice of vocabulary when describing this setter’s efforts. Strangely accessible today though, barring the obscenity of “sapsago”.
Googling suggests that possibly SAPSAGO is the name for the cheese only in the US; elsewhere it is called Schabziger. (Different sites have different opinions on this, though several go with the US usage.)
A minor point, but Glaswegians don’t say “ken”. That is an East Coast word for “know”.
Like fine wines, some things should be consumed slowly and savoured. Enigmatist puzzles are such things. I enjoyed all that I parsed and appreciate the clarification of the rest, thanks to Eileen’s and commenters’ joint efforts. I almost always find that everything works when carefully examined.
Favourites were CADENZA for the 1ac misdirection, KERB CRAWLING for the image of K and ER brawling and NARWHAL and HEELS for the excellent surfaces. Here’s hoping the latter is true!!
I think I’ve mispronounced TAIGA my whole life. Maybe I’ll remember it now.
I hope we have more puzzles like this. There needs to be a range of difficulties to allow us to improve.
Good to see you back, crypticsue @40.
Thank, E’s.
I finished it but there was a couple I couldn’t fully parse. Didn’t enjoy it much. Too clever just for the sake of it.
Unlike Eileen I found this surprisingly straightforward for an Enigmatist, apart from SAPSAGO (I put in unparsed SOPRANO, which is apparently a kind of cheese). The long solutions round the outside went in quickly, which was a great help. There were a couple unparsed (HEELS and CADENZA), but I felt satisfied with my work! Many thanks to E & E.
[KENSINGTON GORE is also the location of the Royal Geographical Society; it has a fascinating museum, unfortunately closed to non-members more often than not. I was shown round it several years ago – a real treat. I think you can get a bit of a look in at some of their events. ]
Phew! Many thanks, everyone, for your contributions. It’s not possible to reply to them all individually but I’ll try to draw some threads together.
It struck me that we have a few unfamiliar names here today. One or two have said that this was their first encounter with Enigmatist – something of a baptism of fire: I’m full of admiration. Some have said that the puzzle would have been better as a Saturday Prize offering, with which I would wholeheartedly concur, flattering myself that, with a few more days to ponder, and a few more sleeps, without the pressure of producing a blog, I might have made a better job of it. I’m now generally content with most of the explanations – particular chagrin for missing Ms Viner and failing to extricate AZED (that’s one of my favourite types of clue.) I’m less annoyed at missing SAPSAGO – in full agreement with the comments about IT /SA – and Dr DRE: I had heard of him but didn’t know he was hip-hop. I’m pleased that my two original favourites, TAIGA and MAIDEN VOYAGE, maintained their prime position, after the various revelations – I’ll now add ADDRESSEE, CADENZA and TOSSPOT.
Re LAMPLIGHT: I’ve taken on board the arguments for LAMP LIGHT but I’m sticking to my guns on this. Collins and Chambers both give two separate and almost identical meanings of LAM: 1. to thrash or beat; 2. a sudden flight or escape; to escape or flee (‘on the lam’)
and similar ones for PLIGHT: a difficult or dangerous situation; and ‘spot’: an awkward position or situation.
I think the jury’s still out re KERB CRAWLING. 😉
Eileen @76
Selfishly, I’m glad that this wasn’t a Prize – I wouldn’t have got close to filling the grid if the Check option hadn’t been available!
I like to think that, when she goes to the Proms, Radio 3’s Penny Gore transforms into a sort of musical superhero, Kensington Gore.
For 1ac I at first put in HAAAMPDENN PARK.
Finished! A few guesses. I went to St Anne’s primary school on the Harleyford Road and later the London Oratory in South Kensington.
Enigmatist’s used the plural to indicate two instances a couple of times: “its” to give SA .. SA (two instances of sex appeal, I guess), and “notices” to give AD .. SEE (two instances of notice, in two different senses). Comprehensively foxed me both times, I will admit!
The “Tom Cruise” pun had occurred to me before, but it’s a bit eww for me. (I was going to put “for my money”.)
About my best performance with Enigmatist so far: some good guesses, very limited internet help and a wrongly guessed limelight instead of LAMPLIGHT (which I also had as a version but couldn’t parse, either).
Proud of getting ONSET, IN GENERAL and MAIDEN VOYAGE, as well as a great CADENZA. The Blake poem was known to me from The Mentalist series. I took “still needs work” in HEELS as a comment by the setter that someone forgot to delete 🙂 I parsed SIDESTEP (wrongly it appears) as SIDE + s.t. (“such that”) + EP, and AMIGO as AMI (ie one “friend” – French) + GO. Thanks Enigmatist and Eileen!
Just because phrases or words are interchangeable in sentences doesn’t make them mean the same thing; “sang to a small guitar” implies to me that the guitar is accompanied by the singer, not the other way round.
jeceris@82 – I have to disagree with you: surely the owl was accompanied by the guitar when he sang to the pussy cat?
How about, ‘S/he arrived to a standing ovation’?
“Sang to a small guitar” – the obvious meaning is that the guitar was the recipient of the song!
I think Enigmatist is brilliant but just goes too far. Appropriate that his name contains the letters to make NASTI, which describes the solving experience of me and I think several others. [If you rearrange the remaining 5 letters too, you get an insult which is NOT appropriate!]
Since O-level Geography, more than 60 years ago, I have always thought that taiga = steppe, i.e. not forest, so I thought the answer could not be taiga. I have belatedly checked Chambers. Still managed to pass!
A difficult bit of business today for me — gave up about halfway, with half of *that*unparsed. Still, the last Enigmatist I did took me a few weeks, so I’m calling that progress! SIDESTEP my favourite today.
Anecdotally, as a cheese lover living in Switzerland for over a decade: it was years after I moved when I first heard of Schabziger (the German name for it). Let alone SAPSAGO! A few other NHOs for me including 3 out of 4 of the long ones around the edges.
Thank you for the workout to Enigmatist, and to the heroic team of Eileen and the first few commenters for the enlightenment!
Solved. Uphill battle. Some electronic help. Not a hint of sparkle in the clues for me. An exercise in engineering. Bored.
Unusually I seemed to be a bit nearer Enigmatist’s wavelength today and managed to fill the grid, which was helpfully friendly even if the clues were not. Sadly I was another to go for SOPRANO instead of SAPSAGO, so a dnf I agree wholeheartedly about the convoluted parsing, some of which I had to come here to understand. Thanks to Eileen and to Enigmatist.
Yes, like Layman@81 I read “still in need of work” as referring to the clue for HEELS being in the beta stage of development. The same remark could (should) have been applied to the clue for the (American?) Swiss cheese. (If the setter couldn’t come up with a better clue for an obscure word, why not change it to SOPRANO?)
Unusually, I had ticks for CADENZA, LAM PLIGHT (!), and AMIGO – not the first time I’ve seen this answer recently, but definitely the best clue.
A DNF for me, because I don’t use wordfinders or lists of cheeses to “solve” clues. If I can’t solve them, I can’t solve them. I get no satisfaction from filling in the grid if I didn’t do it myself. I feel Eileen’s frustration in having to reveal several answers in order to get the blog done.
Doctor Estimating got the better of me. This was like my cheese – too old and too hard. What is brown and rhymes with snoop? – Dr Dre.
Re 1ac Strictly speaking Glaswegians don’t use ‘Ken’ – it’s more of an east of Scotland thing. I haven’t posted on this site in years but as an Edinburgh-based Glaswegian I had to comment!
Closest we have ever got to completing an Enigmatist. Like several others, thwarted by Sapsago, which seems very obscure clueing for a very obscure word, especially when Google reveals that Soprano is also a cheese. Mostly good fun.
Marvellous fun but it took a brain reset to finish.
I still think 1a should be KENSINGTON OVAL.
Knowledge of Glasgow “accepted as” KEN
Accompanied by star = SING TO NOVA
Left = L
Whichever, I am just pleased to finish an Enigmatist.
Ah – and I had to look up the location of the Royal Albert Hall for 27a.
Comment #95
Thanks for SAPSAGO and its parsing NHO which I had to give up on after it nagging me all day. I found the word in the OED after finally giving up and checking the first A.
I found the rest of the crossword’s cluing familiar territory for the setter and thought it was going to be done at breakfast, oh well.
Don’t have much to add except I had heard of SAPSAGO, no idea where or why, and one thing I think nobody has mentioned:
Blog parses 3d as a cryptic definition, but I think it’s intended as a double definition:
Mostly/where soldiers are trained to place their trust = in general.
As a younger solver (28, Australian) I found 1ac and 27ac nigh on impossible, but I have no problem with sa=it. There are so many random things specific to crosswords, and this is just another. You forget it a few times, then it gets lodged. Still not lodged in mine, but that’s okay. My bigger issue is when answers reference extremely obscure, or old things.
I found plenty to enjoy in this, but had a few parsing questions left so thanks to the clever folk who explained these for me.
I once stayed in The Gore hotel, and shared a lift with Anthony Worral Thompson.
I deduced SAPSAGO and guessed that it must refer to a cheese, and it seems that it does.
@eileen Many thanks for your blog. Would you be able to edit this now to add in the collective solutions? This would really help people like me coming here to try and understand the puzzle. It’s quite hard to do this at the moment as you have to flip back and forwards between the clues at the top and the various comments containing the parsings.
I think I enjoyed the blog more than the crossword itself. I did finish it with much use of a word finder – semi-cheating, I know – but I was as stumped as Eileen by several clues in terms of parsing. Thanks everyone!
Well, I did better than I ever have before with Enigmatist, but that is self-damning with faint praise!
On the ‘it’ = ‘sex appeal’ = ‘SA’. I get the very dated first part. A bit stumped by why sex appeal is abbreviated to ‘SA’? From old personal ads?
I found this tough but acceptable, just falling down on my LOI LAMPLIGHT when I had limelight instead – the ‘hit spot’.
Paul@101 , I am no expert on this but I read once it was Hollywood in the 1920s using SA and IT in publicity material . Maybe to be trendy or to avoid censors . I like your idea of classified ads , again perhaps censorship but also to use one word instead of two , you paid per word .
With hard setters I used to fail miserably but learn a lot , fail better next time and vow to get the b…… one day . The best way to improve is to try , and then review , the hardest puzzles .
Enjoyable challenge that fell into place gradually, but a few in the SE intractable, so dnf. I also had 1a KENSINGTON OVAL instead of KENNINGTON (parsed as Mystogre@94). Not too bad of an outcome for an Enigmatist
“Sang to a guitar” = “Sang to [the sound of] a guitar”
Thanks Enigmatist, and Eileen for taking one for the team
This was one that left me desperately lacking. The arcane clueing and terribly local references had me literally knocked out!
Thanks
I just think it’s brilliant that we’ve now had both an autodiktat Swiss cheese expert and a Swiss resident who loves cheese and neither of them have heard of SAPSAGO. Best comments section in a while – where else can you find this content?
Seems to be a bit of a cautionary tale about the difference between finding a word in Chambers that fits the grid, and actually knowing something because you actually know it. KEN being a Scottish word but not a Glaswegian one, if true, is another great example.
Thank you, Eileen, for the blog!
I disagree with the comments that suggest that cluing was careless or imprecise. The clues work perfectly. You have to find the correct parsing.
Many of the clues admit incorrect parsings that seem almost good enough but not quite. If those were the actual parsings, then this would be a bad crossword. If, as a solver, you stop there and move on to the next clue (an understandable choice) then your impression of poor cluing will persist.
I found this to be a beautiful crossword. The extra work to find the right parsings was rewarded, in every case, with a satsifying “aha!”.
My cheeses are poor so I had to pattern search for SAPSAGO, and I had to look up Ms Viner. Everything else (first the words, then the parsings) came through eventually. This was an exceptionally rewarding crossword.
Is SAPSAGO a Latino import to the US, like cilantro, instead of the English – which Americans claim to speak – coriander?
Well said Girabra 107 , those are my feelings but you expressed them better than I might have done, thanks.
The Russian homophone police will be up in arms about TAIGA – for them the stress is very firmly on the second syllable.
Thanks, Eileen–glad to hear it wasn’t just me!
muffin@77, I too found the check button invaluable. What pleased me was that in every case but one my tentative entries proved to be correct, the one failure being SOPRANO for SAPSAGO. at 23a. (And in hindsight it was a pretty good guess.)
Redrodney@23 and James@37 assert that K = king can only apply to chess or cards. I don’t think that barristers got their KCs on the strength of their board or card game prowess.
This was the closest I have ever come to completing an Enigmatist, so I’m quite happy. It’s also the first time I have solved/parsed some that Eileen missed, so it’s a double-chuff day for me. 😄
Roz@103, I’m still hoping to get the b……. one day, but thanks to your advice I’m enjoying the challenge more than I used to.
Thanks E&E (Black Pepper Shiraz, anyone?) for the enjoyment and enlightenment.
Cellomaniac @111 you will get there in the end , just do not be put off by the name . I used to consider it a victory if I solved more than half the clues because I had beaten the setter more times than he had beaten me . Even when you fail on harder puzzles you learn more . I think I was the only one here who had seen SAPSAGO from Azed – Weak ninny given nutritious cereal and hard cheese (7) – hard cheese for everyone else .
One day you will be upgraded to a bright yellow square with blue letters .
Roz@112, I’m working on it, although I don’t know what I have to do to rise to the yellow/blue ranks. I’m a little surprised you weren’t able to snatch the (king) crimson square.
I do have my victory levels, based on the setters: 50% for Enigmatist, 90% for Paul, Imogen and a couple of others, and 100% for my favourites, Arachne/Rosa, Philistine/Goliath and Brendan. So my 90%+ for this week’s Enigmatist was definitely a pleasant outlier.
Sapsago must be nearly as rare as Venezuelan beaver cheese.