ST 4374 (Sun 28 Mar) – Ghouls ‘n’ Gobelins

Solving time: 10:15

This was a pleasant surprise, being very good in parts. There was an enumeration error at 12dn (IN-TRAY), one or two clues were a mess and I had quibbles with a few more, but generally this was an improvement for the less ‘Ximenean’ half of the setting team (from which I’m fairly sure this puzzle comes). The grid is a horror, badly-connected and under-checked (especially in the four central answers) so not conducive to quick times; EGRETS, GHARRY and GOBELIN held me up at the end.

* = anagram, “X” = sounds like ‘X’.

Across
1	FAROUCHE; OUCH in FARE – a French word for ‘shy’ or ‘savage’ used in English to mean ‘ill at ease’ or ‘sullen and unsociable’.
5	[r]EGRETS
9	IN FORM + A + L
10	S + AMPLE
12	IN-TRAY (cryptic definition) – given as (2,4) but should have been (2-4). A shame because I liked the clue.
13	TEAR DROP; (PREDATOR)* – nice anagram and decent surface reading, though ‘could be’ is rather tenuous as the indicator.
15	CORRODE; ROD in CORE
16	HER + E – ‘E’ being a key in music, along with all other letters from A to G.
20	IRON (2 defs) – the second definition here refers to the phrase ‘iron ration’, meaning a ration of concentrated food for use in an emergency.
21	GOBELIN; rev. of (NILE + BOG) – this was my last entry, and it took me a good couple of minutes to come up with something plausible from the wordplay; I didn’t know the answer word, although it must have rung a vague bell or I’d have guessed ‘bogelin’ instead. That said I’m not convinced by the wordplay (‘river ebbing into marsh’): why is ‘bog’ reversed?
25	BEDAUBED; BED,BED around AU – decent clue.
26	ATTUNE; “A TUNE”
28	RA + REST
29	OUT + RIGHT – I can’t see how ‘Exclude’ = ‘out’. Possibly this clue was supposed to read ‘Excluded…’.
30	EDDIES (cryptic definition) – not too hard to see through but nicely worded.
31	STRATEGY (hidden) – extremely good.

Down
1	FRIGID; FRI[day] + (DIG)*
2	REFITS; (STRIFE)*
3	UNREASON; (RUNE)* + A SON
4	HEAP (2 defs)
6	GHARRY; G (as in ‘G-force’) + HARRY – a vehicle for hire in India, from the Hindi gari meaning ‘a cart’.
7	EX-PORTER – poorly defined.
8	SHEEP KED; (KEEP)* in SHED
11	TEDDIES (2 defs) – guessed from the second definition.
14	TRIO LET – I’m slightly surprised I haven’t come across this word before. It’s French, meaning an 8-lined poem rhyming ab aa abab, with repeated lines (1,4,7 and 2,8). Here are some examples.
17	AIRBORNE; (ROBIN[s] ARE)* – not sure about the ‘off’ in the definition, the second comma or the surface reading of this.
18	PONDERED; POND around (DEER)*
19	WISTARIA; W.I. (= Women’s Institute) + STAR + rev. of A1 (= ‘first-class’)
22	PURSUE; rev. of UP + (RUSE)* – completely botched, unless I am missing something: ‘upset’ can’t mean ‘up upwards’ in any sense and ‘macabre’ is a dodgy anagram indicator.
23	BU(R)GLE
24	S + ENTRY
27	BUTT (2 defs)

5 comments on “ST 4374 (Sun 28 Mar) – Ghouls ‘n’ Gobelins”

Chambers gives: out = (vt) to put (throw, knock) out.

11:35 for me, not helped by taking ages to spot that I’d read “Sullen” in 1A as “Sudden”! At least I wasn’t that much slower than you this week – GOBELIN, TRIOLET, etc being thoroughly familiar.

I quite agree with your criticisms of the flawed wordplay for GOBELIN and PURSUE, but overall I found this an enjoyable enough puzzle.

Set = arrange (Chambers); thus, ‘up’ is anagrammed to ‘pu’. Macabre = dreadful = horrible = anagram indicator.

Is ‘having NO river’ OK as an instruction to delete one of two R’s?

Perhaps the setter is relying on the meaning of ‘no’ indicated in ‘did it in no time’, where the meaning of ‘no’ = ‘hardly any’ (Oxford Dictionary of Current English, Canadian Oxford Dictionary). Thus, dropping only one ‘r’ from ‘regrets’ would seem to be justified. It is true that in the example given, amount rather than number is indicated, but often the ST cryptics don’y worry about such distinstions.

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