The puzzle may be found at https://www.theguardian.com/crosswords/cryptic/30133.
Pasquale in overdrive, with unusual words scattered liberally – including 23A AIGRETTE, uncommon in itself, and with wordplay using an uncommon meaning of vinaigrette (and it is generally a box containing a vinegar-soaked sponge, rather than a bottle).
| ACROSS | ||
| 8, 9 | CLERICAL COLLAR |
What minister is encircled by? (8,6)
|
| A cryptic definition. | ||
| 9 |
See 8
|
|
| 10 | EPOPEE |
Eastern poet, Eastern poem (6)
|
| A charade of E (‘Eastern’) plus POPE (Alexander, ‘poet’) plus E (‘Eastern’), for an epic poem or saga. | ||
| 12 | OHMMETER |
Electrical current goes through it – mother somehow protects me (8)
|
| An envelope (‘protects’) of ‘me’ in OHMTER, an anagram (‘somehow’) of ‘mother’. | ||
| 13 | SOW |
Thus wife appears to be greedy female? (3)
|
| A charade of SO (‘thus’) plus W (‘wife’). | ||
| 14 | STAVES |
Slats of wood – they may be found at fronts of bars (6)
|
| The wordplay seems to be a reference to musical bars, but it seems to me to be misplaced: ‘at the fronts of bars’ might be clefs, key or time signatures, or bar lines; the staves are the sets of horizontal lines, usually five, on and between which the notes are written to determine their pitch, in conjunction with the clef. Perhaps a bar line might be called a stave, but I cannot find the justifivation. | ||
| 16 | EXOCRINE |
On ice Rex tumbles on account of a certain gland (8)
|
| An anagram (‘tumbles’) of ‘on ice rex’. Now I know what a gland is if it is not endocrine. | ||
| 17 | CALL BOX |
Spooner’s bathroom parts in wayside booth (4,3)
|
| A Spoonerism of BALLCOCKS, the mechanism controlling the flow of water filling a toilet tank. | ||
| 20 | BELINDA |
Female band playing to entertain priest (7)
|
| An envelope (‘to entertain’) of ELI (‘priest’) in BNDA, an anagram (‘playing’) of ‘band’. | ||
| 23 | AIGRETTE |
Small bottle pouring out French wine shows type of decoration (8)
|
| A subtraction [vin]AIGRETTE (‘small bottle’; in addition to the meaning of a salad dressing, the word may mean a box or bottle to hold vinegar) minus VIN (‘pouring out French wine’). An AIGRETTE is an egret plume which was at one time an elaborate decoration for a hat or headdress. | ||
| 24 | SATINY |
Lustrous metal in express (6)
|
| An envelope (‘in’) of TIN (‘metal’) in SAY (‘express’). | ||
| 26 | SKA |
Request leader to back popular music (3)
|
| ASK (‘request’) with the first letter moved to the end (‘leader to back’). | ||
| 27 | TEGUMENT |
Last bit of the sticky stuff holding canvas together in protective layer (8)
|
| An envelope (‘holding … together’; without ‘together’ the envelope would be the other way round) of E (‘last bit of thE‘) plus GUM (‘sticky stuff’) in TENT (‘canvas’). | ||
| 28 | RESECT |
Remove support outside London’s business quarter (6)
|
| An envelope (‘outside’) of EC (‘London’s business quarter’) in REST (‘support’ for a billiards cue) | ||
| 31 | STYLER |
Foremost of singers, Bonnie? One establishing a fashion … (6)
|
| Acharade of S (‘foremost of Singers’) plus TYLER (‘Bonnie’, Welsh singer). | ||
| 32 | TOP-NOTCH |
… a cut above? (3-5)
|
| An unusual cryptic definition, with TOP-NOTCH read idiomatically as describing something excellent in its class, or literally as a cut at the top. | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 1, 2 | CLAPTRAP |
Nonsense about chum that’s set up trick (8)
|
| A charade of C (circa, ‘about’) plus LAP, a reversal (‘that’s set up’) of PAL (‘chum’) plus TRAP (‘trick’). | ||
| 2 |
See 1
|
|
| 3 | ACCESS |
A favourable outcome with US about to withdraw, making admission? (6)
|
| A charade of ‘a’ plus [su]CCESS (‘favourable outcome’) minus SU (‘US about to withdrw’). | ||
| 4 | ALLOWED |
Everyone was in debt? Not against the rules (7)
|
| A charade of ALL (‘everyone’) plus OWED (‘was in debt’). | ||
| 5 | SCHMOOZE |
School with English communications platform set up for chat (8)
|
| A charade of SCH (‘school’) plus MOOZE, a reversal (‘set up’ in a down light) of E (‘English’) plus ZOOM (videoconferencing ‘communucations platform’). | ||
| 6 | ALGEBRAIST |
One dealing with the unknowns? (10)
|
| Cryptic definition. | ||
| 7 | CAVERNED |
A French author breaking record, shut inside Liverpool club? (8)
|
| An envelope (‘breaking’) of ‘a’ plus VERNE (Jules, ‘French author’) in CD (‘record’). The Cavern is a prominent music club in Liverpool. | ||
| 11 | OCA |
Plant a firm built up (3)
|
| A reversal (‘built up’ in a down light) of ‘a’ plus CO (‘firm’). | ||
| 14 | SAC |
Bob and Bill in enclosed space (3)
|
| A charade of S (solidi or shilling, ‘bob’) plus A/C (‘bill’). | ||
| 15 | VALOROUSLY |
A lecturer facing men in very old university, cunning in a heroic manner (10)
|
| An envelope (‘in’) of ‘a’ plus L (‘lecturer’) plus (‘facing’) OR (‘men’) in V (‘very’) plus O (‘old’) plus U (‘university’) plus SLY (‘cunning’). | ||
| 18 | ALIMENTS |
Meal isn’t bad for providing nutrients (8)
|
| An anagram (‘bad’) of ‘meal isn’t’. | ||
| 19 | OUTWEARS |
Our waste recycled ‘goes on beyond’ in material terms? (8)
|
| An anagram (‘recycled’) of ‘our waste’. | ||
| 21 | AMY |
Little woman host puts right off (3)
|
| A subtraction: A[r]MY (‘host’) minus the R (‘right off’), for one of the sisters in Little Women by louisa May Alcott. | ||
| 22 | TESTATE |
One who has made legal provision needs time to look over property (7)
|
| A charade of T (‘time’) plus ESTATE (‘property’). | ||
| 24 | SARAPE |
Leader of expeditionary soldiers heading north in Mexican garb (6)
|
| A reversal (‘heading north’) of E (‘leader of Expeditionary’) plus PARAS (‘soldiers’). An alternative spelling of serape. | ||
| 25 | IKE |
President that is entertaining king (3)
|
| An envelope (‘entertaining’) of K (‘king’) in I.E. (‘that is’), for the nickname of President Eisenhower. | ||
| 29, 30 | STOPCOCK |
Old computer in store – something that can be switched on and off (8)
|
| An envelope (‘in’) of O (‘old’) plus PC (‘computer’) in STOCK (‘store’). | ||
| 30 |
See 29
|
|
Didn’t find the rarer words as big a problem as I have in the past, all fairly clued. But I must admit, I pressed the “Check Word” button a couple of times.
STYLER was interesting because it has at least 2 more musical associations – a fan of Harry Styles or the wife of Sting.
Tx
Some early write ins (SOW, STYLER, ALLOWED), but tougher thereafter.
I knew the word vinaigrette from Bargain Hunt, but failed on the spelling, so couldn’t finish the clue without a word completion.
The Beatles used to appear at the CAVERN, of course. I am not convinced cd is a record.
CALL BOX an excellent clue.
Thanks to the two Ps.
Found this a bit of a grind to be honest. Eventually got CALL BOX but I am not totally happy with it. The blog has ‘ballcocks’ as ‘the mechanism’ in the singular but that would be just ‘ballcock’. I don’t like it because you wouldn’t normally have lots of toilets in a bathroom and, there again, where there are lots of toilets (public ones) there isn’t a bath. And a ballcock is part of a toilet rather than a bathroom anyway. We are supposed to take ‘bathroom’ as a sort of vague adjective I guess but I don’t like it. It’s not precise clueing imo. Raised an eyebrow at AIGRETTE because to me it is the content not the container. Agree about STAVES. That’s just wrong.
Had a misstep at 32, entering TOP-SLICE to start with (which also works quite well as a cryptic definition). The ellipsis from 31 to 32 means…nothing?
Just “… found in bars” might’ve been better for staves. Loi was schmooze, had to stare hard at the crossers, why I now know not. All else chewy but good, thx to the Don and Peter.
My least favourite setter provides a typical offering. Littered with obscurities, weak definitions unsolvable without crossers, two women’s names adjoining, all alongside write-ins that wouldn’t make a Monday puzzle. I don’t mind a tough slog, sometimes any easy solve has charms, but this was an inconsistent, partly unfair bore. Harrumph.
On reflection, I’m being too harsh when someone has put forward something they believe in, so apologies and thanks Pasquale but I still didn’t enjoy it .Thanks PeterO for explanations.
.
This was tough but mostly very enjoyable. A DNF for me; I was defeated by AIGRETTE for the reasons Peter gives, raised an eyebrow at STAVES (my LOI before the DNF) and I wasn’t very happy about CD for record — although I know this is probably overly pedantic!
Plenty of other unusual words, but all fairly clued, so no complaints from my end about things like OCA.
Thanks Pasquale and Peter!
Pasquale at his best: probably breaking a record for unknown words (I’ve only seen more in Gemelo) but all solvable. I’ve only known VINAIGRETTE as a sauce or a vegetable dish prepared using it; misspelling ALIMENTS prevented me from getting it until the end. A slight quibble is that CAVERNED has no definition, strictly speaking. Thanks Pasquale and PeterO!
Layman@9 I think CAVERNED does have a def (‘shut inside Liverpool club?’) and whether you’re OK with that depends on your view of cheeky/cryptic definitions and the use of the question mark to signal them.
Enjoyable challenge with quite a few new words for me as to be expected with this setter.
New for me: RESECT = remove; OCA = plant; EPOPEE; CLERICAL COLLAR (I only ever heard it referred to as a ‘dog collar’); OHMMETER; SARAPE; AIGRETTE = headdress/decoration; BALLCOCKS (for 17ac); TEGUMENT (loi).
Another TOP-SLICE here, and I needed the wordfinder for AIGRETTE and ALGEBRAIST (before I had all the crossers I wondered if that might be ENIGMATIST…) I expect a liberal sprinkling of unfamiliar words from Pasquale, but he has really gone to town here, and after a while I ceased to enjoy working out yet another jorum (OCA, EXOCRINE, SARAPE, EPOPEE and so on, plus nearly-unknowns like TEGUMENT and OHMMETER). CALL BOX was fun and so was the CLERICAL COLLAR. Yes, the STAVES are wrong.
And we have another female name, though an easier one than yesterday’s EDWINA.
Got about a quarter in, was making slow progress and not enjoying it much, so I abandoned ship and went to Sleuth’s in the FT. I have noted previously that this setter seems to like obscurities. (For the record, I don’t mind — even enjoy — one or two.)
Tom@10: I guess I might misunderstand the notion of a cryptic definition, then. I’m definitely fine with those but I thought they stood on their own rather than served as a definition in for another clue. Live and learn…
I don’t think you ‘switch’ a stopcock, you turn it.
A toughie, but mostly doable.
The rarer words EPOPEE and AIGRETTE were my downfall, and I had to reveal them. Not sure I’ve heard of either before.
Very clever, but as a purely personal reaction I’m afraid it contained too many of my betes noires in Spoonerisms, personal names and cryptic definitions without other wordplay. Still, out of the way now, and thanks for the exercise.
I bunged in “vignette” for AIGRETTE. I was vaguely aware of all the other rarer words.
I’m just grateful for Fifteen Squared putting me out of my misery on this one but I’ll thank PeterO.
Phew. Only got there with a liberal amount of word searching & checking.
Really surprised at The Don going for STAVES ‘at the front of bars’. Seems just plain wrong but perhaps he’ll drop in to explain.
I thought the whimsical def at CAVERNED was fine when hinted at with a question mark.
Many thanks, both.
Just wondering, does anyone actually still have cisterns with ballcocks? [I do, but that’s because the previous owner, a vintage obsessive, actually installed them!]
I found this fun and more accessible that the average Pasquale. Still a DNF, of course! Vin/aigrette is outside of my weight class.
I parsed the “bathroom parts”, er, somewhat differently.
Thanks to Pasquale and PeterO!
Calabar@22 – Haha!! I also briefly thought there was a Pauline reference, until the penny dropped!
This was tough but fair, I thought. Like many others there were 4 or 5 words I was unfamiliar with, but the cluing gave them clearly, I felt. So thanks to the Don and PeterO.
Thanks for the blog , I thought this was really good . Agree with Andy@23 for the unfamiliar words , I like to solve just with wordplay , my lack of musical knowledge helped for STAVES . SKA was neat for a short word , CAVERNED is clever , good subtraction for ACCESS .
vinAIGRETTE – usually small silver boxes at auction but these are more likely to survive , the very small glass bottles are rare , and expensive , because they are easily broken . I have a cranberry glass acorn vinaigrette from 1882 .
17a evoked an image of a hardware store with lots of ballcocks in the ‘bathroom parts’ section, so no problems with that.
Thanks P and P
Re stave – there is the type of bar called the ‘stave bar’, so ‘stave’ might be in front of ‘bar’. Doesn’t really work still though.
The Stave Bar (Venue): “The Stave” is also the name of specific tavern or whiskey-style bars (such as The Stave Bar) that feature an extensive menu of scotches, ryes, bourbons, whiskeys, craft beers, and signature cocktails served in a whiskey-centric environment.
For 21d the puzzle in the paper has “Little woman not right for fighting force”, which seems to me at least as good a surface as “Little woman host puts right off”. Why the change? I suppose “host” gives an extra bit of misdirection.
Thanks Pasquale and PeterO.
Strictly speaking a SARAPE is a blanket, the garment is called a serape, although it’s a very common mistake.
NHO EPOPEE, EXOCRINE, AIGRETTE, TEGUMENT, & RESECT, which is rather too many dictionary checks for the puzzle to be truly enjoyable.
When the first two that I tentatively pencilled in were EPOPEE and OCA, and then had to google to check they were actually something, I thought that maybe Pasquale was really going to stretch my personal vocab today. But things settled down thereafter. Though I did think that both of VALOROUSLY and CAVERNED were rather contrived and tricky to put together. STOP COCK and CALL BOX seemed both to inhabit the same environment of the bathroom in their solving, too.
Fun and games all round for me, I felt…
I found it tough but fair. I had an advantage with French words like [vin]AIGRETTE, ALIMENTS and ÉPOPÉE (yes, yes, they’re English too).
ALGEBRAIST went straight in thanks to the space opera by Iain M Banks.
Like Roz @24, my lack of musical knowledge meant I recognised the dual meanings of STAVE without questioning the detail.
STYLER to me, is Sting’s wife’s surname, but I was happy enough with this one.
RESECT, OCA and SARAPE were new or forgotten.
I liked CALL BOX, SCHMOOZE, OHMMETER and TOP NOTCH.
Thanks Pasquale and PeterO.
You wouldn’t see a ball cock in a bathroom unless you were in Trumpland.
I’ve nho what everybody else has nho. Also aliment, which I got from the celebrated canal but have never heard of on its own. I forgot about call boxes, because I call them phone booths. And there’s some vinaigrette in a jam jar on my kitchen shelf, but I’ve never heard of it as a container.
I realized I don’t know what either exocrine or endocrine actually mean, so I educated myself by looking them up.
Thanks, Pasquale and PeterO.
It’s years since I last saw anyone in a proper clerical collar that goes all the way round the neck. Nowadays they all seem to wear those shirts with a slot for a token white square at the front.
This really grew on me, as I started to realise all my guesses for the unknowns might actually be right. Couldn’t get AIGRETTE in the end, and never would have, but the rest checked out. Thanks Pasquale, and given it might not be all that much fun to have to figure out and parse all these obscure things, thanks PeterO.
It always puzzles me when people say they don’t like Spoonerisms. I love them as they give you multiple ways into the clue. Today’s was a cracker.
I agree DuncT @35 and this not only sounded accurate, but was a genuine term in both directions.
I don’t see a single basis for complaint with this one (and personally don’t care when they are whimsical at best!)
Pasquale in his classic Reithian ‘Educate and Entertain’ mode, I enjoy the learning because for my money he always follows Araucaria’s rule: the rarer the word the more obvious the wordplay. STAVES was an unfortunate error that should have been rooted out in editing.
Meh. It wasn’t difficult, but too many obscure words for my liking. I liked CALL BOX and STOP COCK.
Tough in the unfamiliar vocab, with several I just stuck in with no idea whether they were real words or not.
Maybe just me, but I found 8/9 somewhat lacking as a cryptic definition
Oh dear.
Like Valentine, my list of “wossat den?” was lengthy, many crossing with each other, and each has already been mentioned. Several times.
A thousand thanks for the blog, PeterO: especially for SAC, which I wouldn’t have been able to parse in a million years.
I agree with Fuddleduddy and TonyM about ballcocks and stopcocks.
And with the various comments about STAVES.
SCHMOOZE is rather more than a “chat”.
I liked AMY.
(I’m now going to lie down in a darkened room with a damp cloth on my brow)
If you like crosswords then it seems natural to enjoy seeing new words , especially when the wordplay is very fair .
For those who like Spoonerisms it is probably easy to track down Azed specials with each involving a Spoonerism in some way .
Reclaim my rightful position .
I found this pretty tough & had to Google some of the suspected answer to check they were real words, but it was a good Friday work-out.
I tend to agree with the crowd – not the most difficult, too many obscure words and a few tricksy clues to be enjoyable with some not quite accurate uses (or very obscure) making it even more difficult,
Too many obscurities for me, so a definite dnf. Thanks PeterO for enlightenment and to Pasquale for one that was just too hard for me.
I often find that what gladys(@12 today) offers chimes with my own thoughts and that is the case today (and I’m taking the lazy option). I would only offer (Oofyprosser@6) that AMY has at least the merit of referring to ‘Little Women’ of which Amy was one. But, to me, BELINDA (and yesterday’s Edwina) just represent setter cdbs.*
And I heartily agree with Wellbeck@40 that ‘chat’ and SCHMOOZE are just not the same thing.
It’s so long since I learned to read music that I cannot be certain that I recall that the upright ‘bar-lines’ were also called staff-lines or STAVES, but I do think I recall that.
*(could do better (since you ask))
Awesome, challenging crossword
Alphalpha@46 if you were taught that your teacher was wrong I’m afraid, barlines are vertical, staves are horizontal