24553

Author   petebiddlecombePosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
Solving time: 9:03

A puzzle with some interesting clues, though with quite a lot of old-fashioned looking vocabulary and some fairly gentle literary references.

Thanks to the people at the Times who decided to invite a couple of solvers (Mark Goodliffe and I me) to their very civilised annual setters’ lunch last Thursday. A good chance to meet a few of the setters who I hadn’t seen at the championship or pub gatherings, and one or two of the people behind the scenes. I probably shouldn’t say too much, but there seem to be improvements in mind in at least some areas.

Across
1 LITOTES = (T S Eliot)* – litotes is a form of understatement where you deny something’s opposite – “not unattractive” is one example. Terms from rhetoric are classic Times crossword material – here’s an instant list from wikipedia – a fair number of its entries must have made appearances over the years
5 VEND=sell,ACE=brill – the latter a brief bit of modernity. There’s no obscure plant in this puzzle, so we have an obscure fish instead – filled in from wordplay and perhaps dimly remembered from barred-grid puzzles
9 C(A,THE = “articles”,DR.)AL. – three cheers for medic = Dr. rather than one of the other abbrev’s.
10 TUDOR – D=daughter in rev. of ROUT=defeat – I garbled the def a bit, looking for something describing Elizabeth I – Tudor still fits, but the real def is “Like Henry VIII”
11 MASTER MARINER = sea captain – MASTER = “way of addressing”, I in MARNER=miser – I messed up my misers, inventing ‘Jacob Marner’ as a fellow miser of Scrooge – complete nonsense
13 NECK=cheek,LINE=”long narrow mark”
15 R(E,DEE)M. Here’s one River Dee
17 NOTATE = (at Eton)* – in music, “runs” are the bits in semiquavers in works like Handel’s Messiah.
19 CLA(Y,MO)RE – Clare is next door to Kings college and has a bridge pictured here
22 ON THE (SAFE) SIDE – my favourite clue, not just for vanity reasons – “position for a bit” = ON THE SIDE raised a laugh. One meaning of “peter” is a safe or a prison cell. Another: just before the lunch, Anax bought a copy of the Chambers Dicitonary of Slang in the Waterstones next door (you have been warned!). It revealed that peter-beater is perhaps not the word to use when announcing to the world that you’ve done a puzzle faster than me.
25 MoOnLiT bOg – more stuff for the musical mafia here – “molto” as in “molto vivace” simply means “very”. But very easy – once you see “odd parts of”, you should have the answer before you get to reading the def.
26 LIEGE LORD = “feudal superior” – (G=note, rev. of ROLE) in LIED=song
27 DERWENT = another river with multiple instances – here’s one. The wordplay is UNDERWENT = experienced, losing (U=university,(oarsme)N)
28 S(chsool),H(eed),I’VE=”the writer’s”, with ‘s = has,RY=railway=”lines”
 
Down
1 LOCK – 2 defs
2 TOTE(M1),C=cape – carry=TOTE came up pretty instantly so might be worth remembering
3 TREWS – W=wife replaces the first S=son in TRESS=lock – I was fooled a bit by expecting “nether garment” to match the euphemistic “nether regions” = “a person’s genitals and bottom” (COED) and mean some kind of underwear. But here, ‘nether’ is just ‘lower’
4 SERGEANT = (greatnes(s))* – Sgt. Troy is in Far from the Madding Crowd, which as it happens borrows its title from Gray’s Elegy, also used in this puzzle
5 Today’s deliberate omission – ask if you can’t solve/explain it from checking letters
6 NO TOR(i.e.,T)Y
7 AND=with,ANTE = rev. of Etna – “mountain to climb”.
8 EAR TRUMPET – cryptic def
12 UNI(N)FORMED – as in the old gag about the evidence being investigated by an uninformed officer
14 LI(THE,SO)ME – this is the word that’s now usually “lissom”
16 CLUELESS – double def which I hope you wrote in instantly
18 TATTLER – Clement ATTLE(e) (our favourite PM as he “took The Times each morning, but only for the announcements and the crossword”), in TR from sToRy
20 OPEROSE = industrious (in Collins, not COED) – OPE = poetic ‘open’, ROSE = flower. For a while I was fooled by O???O?E into looking for O,{3-letter flower},OPE
21 HAMLET = prince (in Shakespeare) and a fairly blunt allusion to “Each in his narrow cell for ever laid / The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep.” in Gray’s Elegy – one of the few poems you need to know in any detail for the Times puzzle these days – add The Ancient Mariner and a bit of Kubla Khan, and you’re just about done.
23 ICENI – ancient Britons lurkning in the nightwear department.
24 EDDY – two def’s

48 comments on “24553”

  1. Its not often that I finish a crossword when the discussion is still “live” let alone when it is as yet uncommented. (no doubt someone will sneak in as I type this)

    This was a strange one for me, seemed easy at times and difficult at others. Things like LIEGE LORD and OPEROSE were unknown, but came fairly easily from word play. didnt know MARNER was a miser, but it seemed likely, and didnt get the word play for the end of SHIVERY until coming on here, although there was little alternative.

    My main area of non proportional-representation was the NE corner where 5 a&d and 6d took up a large chunk at the end. I spent ages looking for where to put the T into ANTI-TORY, even though my heart had long informed my brain that it clearly wasnt going to be the right answer. I also stuck in COLUMN for 5d early on thinking it could possibly be a “bulk” and was definitely something you could read. This led to a risky CARPACE – which I knew was animal related, and also hoped that CARP could imply selling from the nagging type persistence sales people employ. This left R-T-R-E-Y for a bit which just confused matters. Having discared ANTI TORY it took a while to re-use the TORY bit, but eventually twigging NOTORIETY the rest fell into place.

    All in all a fairly enjoyable puzzle, all the more so because I get to participate on here for once. A disappointing half hour time though – should have been about 10m quicker.

    1. > no doubt someone will sneak in as I type this
      08:27 vs 08:29.
      You guessed right!
      1. thats strange – i have it the other way round – are these timestamps personal to the reader and not consistent?
  2. Did this in two lots of about 10 minutes. Couldn’t time either because of the public venues. As soon as I see “T.S. Eliot”, I automatically think “litotes”, “toilets” or “toilest” (as in “thou toliest in the field”). Wouldn’t know a VENDACE from a bar of soap, but it was easy enough from the cryptic indication. Liked LIEGE LORD the best for its resonances (“in song”) with the great Fairport album. Otherwise, it has to be said that there’s a high chestnut quoient in this one.
  3. Came to a halt after a promising start. Took a break and finished it off, except for the Dane, about which I was 16d. I wanted the prince to be Hal and couldn’t get beyond that. As for Gray, I only know the ploughman.
  4. Like Jack I finished up with OBEROSE as my last entry after a long and torrid struggle. Too many obscurities for my liking, although not getting CLUELESS until late on was inexcusable. Until then I’d been toying between SAFE SIDE and SLOW SIDE, not knowing what on earth Peter referred to, and HAMLET and ALBERT for the prince, not knowing my Elegy either.
  5. I found the top easier than the bottom with the SE corner the most difficult. I laughed at “position for a bit” – the high point of the puzzle – but not the plethora of literary references. I thought OPEROSE meant tedious rather than industrious but couldn’t see any alternative. Guessed HAMLET from checking letters – an awful clue in my opinion that represents a throwback to the 1960s. The rest is standard stuff and at times a bit chestnutty, I agree.
    1. Chestnuts: I was going to say something like “when Jim comes on he’ll be peeved”.
      1. It’s a question of mood. On another day and feeling a bit grouchy this is the sort of puzzle I might have gone a bit OTT about but I’m feeling benign so restricted myself to giving a flavour of my views. I see Barry got depressed about it and that annoys me a bit. Cheer up Barry – this puzzle isn’t worth it.
    2. I think the 1960s version would have been something like “Prince with rude forefathers”. The 2010 clue at least indicates that you need to know what someone called Gray said or wrote.
      1. My guess is that the most likely format would have been the dreaded quote with …… inserted at the key point which used to send us diving off into the reference books. One could do the same here but “prince” in 6 letters was likely HAMLET or ALBERT. Your suggested clue could also have been presented and would have been harder. Might well have solved it but never understood it – a not uncommon occurrence in those days. The clue as presented today is in my opinion simply not up to present day standards.
  6. This was like a parody of a Times crossword with university, public school, cricket, church, military, medical, musical and literary references. I finished with the two obscurities, operose and vendace. For the latter, the only words I knew that fitted were vendage and vintage so, finally, I went with the wordplay.
  7. After plodding performance yesterday this one defeated me utterly, well the SE corner anyway. Wordplay for LIEGE LORD too tricky for me. Poetry knowledge not good so could not fathom the elegiac clue and not knowing OPE or OPEROSE (Chambers has tedious rather than industrious) left me marooned. Also, early on I had entered SHIVERS so couldn’t get EDDY which no doubt I would eventually have corrected had I not by then been so depressed.
    Something a bit musty about this?
    1. Barry: I agree with Jimbo. This puzzle is not worth getting upset about. Neither was yesterday’s, come to think of it.

      We all have off days: stick at it. You have made excellent progress so far.

  8. 25 minutes but I too threw in oberose. Should’ve thought a bit more. Loved ‘on the side’ as the ‘position for a bit’. Shouldn’t there have been an American indicator for 3?
        1. At least some people in Britain use it as an informal alternative to “trousers”, but it has strong Scots connotations. I’m not aware of it being used in America.
        2. My father used to use it, along with a few other quaint abbreviations. Maybe a generational thing, as I wouldn’t say it, as being too twee.
  9. Sorry. If this comment looks familiar I missed Jimbo and Lennyco comments above me.
  10. 11:38 for this, as good as I could expect after a heavy night last night. A puzzle of two halves. The left went in almost immediately, but I made life hard for myself by putting COLUMN instead of VOLUME, and spent a couple of minutes trying to find a word for “sell” with C-N-. I also took an age to see TUDOR. As was neatly observed earlier, almost a parody of a puzzle
  11. A flying start (1ac and 1dn went straight in) to a steady 40 minute solve with no major hold-ups along the way though I had to rely on guesswork based on wordplay in a couple of places. For example I didn’t know the fish, VENDACE.

    After completing the grid I found I had one wrong at 20dn where O,BE,ROSE seemed to fit the wordplay. I was not aware of OPE as poet-speak for “open” and had never heard of the actual answer. I did know SERGEANT Troy but I’m afraid I thought of the one who used to be in Midsomer Murders before I remembered the character in Hardy.

    1. I have a feeling that the Murders Sergeant was a “trope” on the Hardy. Just a guess.
  12. 72 minutes, so just within my 6/8-times-Peter average. Rather enjoyed this myself, probably because my (horse) chestnuts haven’t been boiled in vinegar, skewered, strung and smacked about in the playground, i.e. I’ve only been doing the puzzle regularly for a few months. Thanks to the Maestro for the full wordplay of 18, which I should have got since Attlee was our most famous Old Boy – until John McCarthy, that is …

    COD to TREWS.

  13. For me, fairly straightforward, and, in the spirit of 1ac, “not unenjoyable”. No accurate timing, but somewhere between 30 and 40 mins, which I’d regard as respectable, tho plainly not in “peter-beating” territory. I thought NOTORIETY, ON THE SAFE SIDE and LIEGE LORD were all excellent clues. I’d never met OPEROSE before, but it wasn’t too difficult to guess from the wordplay. I made things a little difficult for myself by initially and over-hastily entering INCAS instead of ICENI at 23dn when only the opening “I” was available from cross-checkers. Not clever. The number of literary references in this puzzle was always going to upset the cryptic Taliban, and so it has proved. Personally, I don’t mind occasional resort to this device, whether literary or scientific, but even I would have to agree with Jimbo that HAMLET at 21dn comes about as close as you can get, without actually getting there, to those old-style (and I think generally unlamented)clues where you were asked to supply the missing word in a quotation from a well-known poem (often one of those cited by Peter in his entertaining blog).
    1. The resemblance to the quote clues (definitely unlamented here) is limited – in this clue you had a definition. With the quote clues, if you didn’t know it you just had to choose the best fit from checking letters, with the possibility of plausible traps like “the rude forefathers of the VARLET”.
      1. Point taken, Peter, though I guess that if “rude forefathers of the hamlet” was one of the phrases from the poem that happened to have lodged in your memory bank, the answer to this clue would have been just about as clear as if you’d known the quotation in one of those old-style clues. I agree, of course, that the old-style clue would not have given you the alternative prince=hamlet route to the solution if you didn’t immediately recognise the quote.
  14. Thoroughly enjoyed your blog Peter as ever – thank you! I’m pleased to say I did write in CLUELESS immediately. That slang dictionary will be a gold mine for the more mischievous setters!

    Conceded defeat with five left and was pleased to get that far because for a long time the bottom half was almost blank.

    Couldn’t get NOTORIETY despite having all five checkers. ON THE SAFE SIDE, HAMLET, DERWENT and OPEROSE eluded me too. Didn’t know the Peter/safe/cell link so couldn’t begin to think what he was doing in 22!

  16. 19:24 .. Last in OPEROSE.

    LITOTES always makes me think of John Major – “we face a not inconsiderable challenge”.

    Very amusing blog, Pete, especially the warning against reckless slang coinage (‘peter-beater’). I wonder if some people may have Googled their way to this site expecting an entirely different kind of online experience.

    1. Always keen to learn something new I read about peter-beater in amazement and then tried looking up James, Jim, etc. I had absolutely no idea!
    2. It always reminds me of the address of the Japanese Emperor after the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings “The war has taken a new turn, not necessarily to our advantage”. And Doug Piranha of course.
  17. 14 mins, last in (with a shrug) was 21D HAMLET, just after OPEROSE. 22A was my favourite as well.

    Tom B.

  18. 20 m. Like others, 1a/d seemed simple, but read rather than wrote till the long clues came easily then dodged about rather. No real hold-ups, last in that fish & 27 (thank you for full explanation). Agree some old friends here.
  19. As a fluid mechanist, albeit semi-retired, I have seen EDDY mis-defined many times in crosswords. But today’s definition (“current revolution”) is pathetic, and it doesn’t matter what the dictionaries say. It is actually quite difficult to define EDDY in its technical sense, but it’s not a current revolution!
    1. Same reply as always: if it doesn’t matter what the dictionaries say, how do the setters and editor decide what definitions are acceptable?

      As no-one else has complained about this clue, it seems that “current revolution” was an accurate enough definition for the purposes of the puzzle. It’s a crossword, not a physics exam!

  20. according to the oed a vendace is a fish found in derwentwater, which if intentional ups the ante a bit. used aids to finish off.
  21. Regards all. No time to post due to long interruptions, but it wouldn’t have been quick. Wordplay alone to solve VENDACE and OPEROSE, and I almost joined the team in the ‘Oberose’ pool. Didn’t know Sgt. Troy, or TREWS. Didn’t know the elegy allusion in 21D, and didn’t parse the wordplay in SHIVERY til reading the PB explanation, so thanks heartily. I thought ‘Ivery’ might be some kind of reference to Ives’ writings (while fervently hoping there was an Ives who wrote). And I still don’t get the wordplay for 22, which I solved late from def. and checkers, despite the PB explanation of it, suspecting there must be some cricket terms being batted around. So my COD is EAR TRUMPET, which I liked. Happy to finish unaided. Best to all.
    1. There is no cricket in 22. I hadn’t realised that “a bit on the side”, as a slang term for an extra-marital affair, is British English.
  22. I loved “A bit on the side”. Or, as Alan Bennett memorably put it in Beyond the Fringe: Is there a little bit in the corner of your life? I know there is in mine.

    By the way, Peter wrote, “Thanks to the people at the Times who decided to invite a couple of solvers (Mark Goodliffe and I)”. Can we take it that the word “me” is now officially defunct?

    1. Duly corrected above. You can take it that my efforts to avoid silly mistakes (not always successful, admittedly) are directed at the explanations of clues where the mistakes really matter.
  24. 7:16 for me. I’m moved to comment on this puzzle since I had my first clean sweep for simply ages – in fact it’s the first time I’ve come anywhere near a clean sweep for simply ages.

    It’s probably just me, but I’ve found the daily Times puzzles more tricky in recent months. While it’s comparatively rare that I go over 20 minutes, and (touch wood) even rarer that I make a mistake (one so far this year, and that a careless one: SCAMPER for SCARPER in 24466), I find myself taking over 10 minutes far too often, and will be lucky to make the Final at Cheltenham unless I can find my form again.

    1. I think I had an idea that this one might suit you when writing my report. You seem to be thrashing me on RTC, so there might not be that much to worry about (or we might bow out together …)
      1. If doing well at RTC was any guide, Helen Ougham would never reach the Final at all!

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