Times Cryptic 27422

Author   jackktPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic

I found this quite hard in places and needed 59 minutes to complete the grid.

As usual definitions are underlined in bold italics, {deletions and substitutions are in curly brackets} and [anagrinds, containment, reversal and other indicators in square ones]

Across
1 Highlander born outside areas of settlement (8)
NEPALESE – NÉE (born) contains [outside] PALES (areas of settlement). ODO has ‘pale’ as ‘an area within determined bounds, or subject to a particular jurisdiction’, which could apply to a settlement as in the clue. From this we get the expression ‘beyond the pale’.
5 Fail to penetrate record that’s restricted (6)
CLOSED – LOSE (fail) contained by [to penetrate] CD (record)
10 Right time, curiously, to punch Lord’s boundary (9)
PERIMETER – R (right) + anagram [curiously] of TIME, contained by [to punch] PEER ( lord)
11 Losing height, river gets less fierce (5)
TAMES – T{h}AMES (river) [losing height]
12 Wow! New for old material (4)
CORN – COR (wow!), N (new) –  as in ‘corny joke’
13 It could turn into some great outlet (9)
MEGASTORE – Anagram of [turn into] SOME  GREAT
15 A vehicle finally left US yard, almost boldly innovative (5-5)
AVANT-GARDE – A, VAN (vehicle), {lef}T (finally), GARDE{n} (US yard) [almost]
17 Our team’s shortened clothing (4)
WEAR – WE AR{e} (our team’s) [shortened], as in ‘We are the champions!’
19 As far as university, carry on reading (2,2)
UP TO – U (university), PTO (carry on reading – Please Turn Over)
20 Stuntman died – son swallowing this stiff drink (4,6)
BODY DOUBLE – BOY (son) containing [swallowing] D (died), then DOUBLE (stiff drink)
22 Smother with praise meal cooked without fault (9)
BLAMELESS – Anagram [cooked] of MEAL contained by [smother with] BLESS (praise)
24 Young bird’s heading into tree (4)
BABY – B{ird} [heading] contained by [into] BAY (tree)
26 Fast? Old and slow (5)
LENTO – LENT (fast), O (old)
27 Part of bridge nearly collapsed on Moriarty, for one (4-5)
ARCH-FELON – ARCH (part of bridge), FEL{l} (collapsed) [nearly], ON. I tried biffing ‘arch-enemy’ here and lost time later when I was forced to rethink it.
28 One old king’s returning in state (6)
ISRAEL – I (one), LEAR’S (old king’s) reversed [returning]
29 Regularly delaying a relative’s treatment (8)
DIALYSIS – ‘Daily’ (regularly) becomes DIALY [delaying a], SIS (relative)
Down
1 Exercise cancelled? On the contrary (4)
NOPE – NO PE (exercise cancelled)
2 Who makes one fit one’s own footwear? (8,7)
PERSONAL TRAINER – PERSONAL (one’s own), TRAINER (footwear)
3 In protective coat, regularly beat beast up (8)
LAMINATE – {b}E{a}T [regularly] + ANIMAL (beast) all reversed [up]
4 Dumb, forms words silently in turn, picking Oscar out (5)
SHTUM – M{o}UTHS (forms words silently) [picking Oscar out] reversed [turn]
6 Extremely fashionable city, international (6)
LATEST – LA (city), TEST (international)
7 Autobiography the Brontės ordered? (8,2,5)
SUMMONED BY BELLS – Only the vaguest definition here, but there is also a cryptic hint to point in the right direction provided one knows that the three Brontė sisters originally published their novels under the pseudonym surname BELL and one has also heard of the title of John Betjeman’s work in blank verse describing his early life. SUMMONED (ordered) might also help. I never tire of listening to JB reading from this but for some extraordinary reason the recording is no longer available so the experience is not readily available to many. It was originally put out by the BBC as a double cassette tape but was never reissued on CD so I have converted my own  copy to MP3 format. The DVD of the TV programme based on the book is still on sale and is of some merit, but I find the visuals and particularly the addition of peripheral music distract from the poetry which was in any case drastically abridged to fit the original TV time-slot.
8 Deprive of spirits, but find way to make better beer? (10)
DISHEARTEN – DISHEARTEN ‘be{tt}er’ to make ‘beer’
9 Without feeling stiff, race round (8)
FRIGIDLY – FLY (race) contains [round] RIGID (stiff)
14 Averting maiden, miscue balls horribly: declaration follows this? (5,5)
CASUS BELLI – Anagram [horribly] of {m}ISCUE BALLS [averting maiden]. An act or situation justifying or precipitating war.
16 All agreed a descendant has rejected title (2,3,3)
AS ONE MAN – A,  SON (descendant), NAME (title) reversed [rejected]
18 It’s unclear Thomas was like this (8)
DOUBTFUL – Double definition. Lifted from Wiki: a reference to the Apostle Thomas, who refused to believe that the resurrected Jesus had appeared to the ten other apostles, until he could see and feel the wounds received by Jesus on the cross.
21 Prepare to be shot again? Relax (6)
REPOSE – RE-POSE (prepare to be shot again)
23 Resort very fashionable, not cold (5)
SOCHI – SO (very), CHI{c} (fashionable) [not cold]. Never ‘eard of it, but it’s a Russian city on the Black Sea probably well-known to those who follow Winter Olympics and World Cup football. I got it entirely from wordplay.
25 Announced 6, big game (4)
GNUS – Allegedly sounds like [announced] “news” (6 – 6dn ‘latest’), but not to this child of the 1950s for whom it will always be pronounced ‘ger-noo’. It’s not the first animal I’d have thought of as ‘big game’ so I was surprised to find that Wiki advises ‘the blue wildebeest (gnu) is the most abundant big-game species’.

63 comments on “Times Cryptic 27422”

  1. I went down the ARCH-ENEMY dead-end too. And I had some vague memory of SUMMONED BY BELLS but I couldn’t tell you whose autobiography it was or what it had to do with the Brontës. Also couldn’t understnad the wordplay on DIALYSIS for ages since I was trying to get DIALY out of taking the odd letters of DELAYING (or something…it has all the letters there just not in a way that makes anything work)
  2. Eventually finished, but in over 90 minutes. Thanks for explaining 7d (I only managed to get the BELLS bit and not the def) and the parsing of DIALYSIS. I took ages to see DISHEARTEN but at least it helped me later with a similar clue elsewhere today. SOCHI is where the Russian Grand Prix is held so it’s also familiar to motor racing fans.

    Favourite was the reminder of Flanders and Swann at 25d.

    Thanks to setter and blogger.

  3. 44 minutes, so on the tricky side. Rather like the TLS-ish 7 down, although I had to get it via the Betjeman connection. Thanks to Jack for unravelling my last one, DISHEARTEN. Lots of nice, slightly quirky stuff here (ARCH-FELON, for example).

    A good, old-fashioned Thunderer puzzle, sans cross-references etc. Well done, chaps!

  4. I think I spent the last 4 or 5 minutes trying to justify CORN after trying other letters for the gaps. It didn’t help that I took ‘new for old’ as a O –> N substitution. POI DISHEARTEN; the H didn’t occur to me, until it finally did. At 24ac I had the initial B, which led to considering BOAK, BELM, and BASH (but at least not BBAY). And I took (I was misreading a lot of clues) ‘extremely fashionable’ to be FE. Fortunately we’ve had the autobiography before, and I finally summoned it from memory. I tried ARCH-FIEND first, then got the L. Ages ago a friend loaned me her copy of the F & S album because she thought it was so funny; all I remember is the gnu song, and thinking none of this was at all amusing. I especially liked DIALYSIS (biffed, parsed post-submission) and UP TO.
  5. Having the F it was hard to get ARCH-FIEND out of mind, but got there eventually.
    The Brontes did for me, didn’t know their pseudonym and never heard of the autobiography. Or the bloke who wrote it. Probably both Betjeman and Bell have come up in the Times before, but their names haven’t stuck.
    An excellent puzzle nevertheless.
  6. Good exercise? Yep!
    I’m glad others also found it chewy.
    SHTUM I remembered from somewhere, and “Bröntes” rang the right BELLS. I, too, thought of ARCH-Fiend first (a more common term, if ARCH-FELON is common at all) but didn’t ink it in.
    1. Interesting point. ARCH-FELON pops up alongside ARCH-ENEMY, ARCH-FIEND and ARCH-FOE in the 1801 supplement to Johnson’s Dictionary. The authors cite Book IV of Paradise Lost: ‘Which when th’ Arch felon saw, Due entrance he disdain’d’.
      1. Aha, thanks! Been a while since I read that. The prototypical anti-hero was merely an arch-felon, not an arch-fiend…
  7. 23:09, though with a silly typo.

    Long delay at the end over WEAR, which only just about hangs together in my mind. ARCH-FELON rather painfully arrived at, and the inevitable delay over GNUS. It’s terrible really, I’ve known of the existence of gnus since early childhood but wouldn’t know one if I saw one.

    COD to DIALYSIS, once the penny dropped on the delayed A. Smooth surface.

  8. “Never heard of Betjeman”, and the surely the first ever word of dissent here re the humour of Flanders and Swann. I may need a lie down!

    Edited at 2019-08-06 05:13 am (UTC)

    1. It was always a choice between F&S and Tom Lehrer in my childhood, but I think Lehrer was the winner! However I have recently resurrected the Hippopotamus song for my grandchildren.
      1. I think the hippopotamus song is one of their worst. But the one they did in ‘At the Drop of Another hat’: ‘The amorous hippopotamus whose love-song you know/Is now married and father of ten./He murmurs ‘God rott’em’ as he watches them play/And he longs to be single again.’ is one of their better ones. But so much competition.
      2. I’m a big fan of Lehrer too, but I don’t think he can really be compared with F&S, nor vice versa as their styles and philosophies are totally different.
  9. I was a bit peeved to gradually pick my way through this only to find that I’d put in PERIMITER. The Snitch reflects how I found this putting it at the hard end of Harder.

    My COD to CORN for managing to misdirect me in such a concise surface – I spent ages trying to find a word for ‘wow’ in which I could substitute an O for an N to give me a type of material.

  10. Squeezed in a smidge under 30 minutes, only partly understanding the Betjamin clue – I’d forgotten the collective noun for a bunch of Brontës, but knew the title.
    Two clues, no less, had a nasty trick of apparently deleting a letter that was already in the crossing: N(ew) for O(ld) in 12 and no C(old) in 23.
    I lost time wondering whether the GNU was one of the “Big Five” (it isn’t).
    Lots of neat devices here, not least how you get beer from better, and how delayed dialysis works. Very little easy solving, but worth the persevering.

    Edited at 2019-08-06 07:12 am (UTC)

  11. My worst outing for many years! I just wasn’t on the pace at all.

    I had 13ac as GASOMETER which really screwed things up!!
    (It’s where they let out the gas!)

    8dn DISHEARTEN was beyond sneaky. Whatever next?

    It was 7dn that I should have gotten rather easily.
    Not heard of (‘the bloke that wrote it.’ Betjamen!!) Dear me Isla3! He was on ‘Parkie’ every month with Miss Joan Hunter Dunne!? Your Christmas present should be on order early from Amazon’s poetry department.

    Jack, Kev finding Flanders and Swann non-amusant is merely transpondular. Try watching old Abbot and Costello routines or Laurel and Hardy…. not a titter hereabouts!
    The Three Stooges!!! Yikes!

    FOI 2dn PERSONAL TRAINER good start.

    LOI I came to a bad end.

    COD 19ac UP TO – by a country mile.

    WOD 7dn SUMMONED BY BELLS

    I’m going out. I may be some time.

    Edited at 2019-08-06 07:34 am (UTC)

    1. I don’t think it can be a ‘transpondular’ matter. F&S ran very successfully on Broadway and around the US for a long time.
      2. Yes, and the recording of their Broadway show made for transmission on US TV is the only surviving colour footage we have of them performing. Other than that all remains is a very grainy telerecording made by the BBC at the TV Theatre in Shepherd’s Bush.
        1. I stand corrected. F&S were described by one critic as ‘witty and explosively funny.’ And they toured 12 other American cities and Canada (twice). Packed houses.
          But our Kevin, ‘found none of this at all amusing.’ Do perhaps court jesters suffer from professional jealousy?
          Or has he no sense of humour?
        2. And as for Laurel and Hardy! Wonderful humour with the subtlest of undertones.

          And Stan was English anyway.

    2. I’m glad I didn’t think of GASOMETER. I think it may be in a crossword near me soon, however.
      1. I got to Multiplex – it’s got the IT backwards, and if you can get to multiple = a great number… then you won’t finish the NE corner.
    3. Actually I do find this one by Abbott and Costello pretty funny, but I agree about the 3 Stooges.
      1. I always liked one Three Stooges routine. Shemp confidently says, “I don’t think. I know.” Moe replies, “I don’t think you know either.”
        1. Yes, that’s a good one BW. I think it’s the slapstick I don’t find funny.
          1. I don’t think I’ve ever met a woman, or a grown man, who liked the Stooges.
            1. Can’t stand the Stooges! The eye-poking especially! Jerry Seinfeld is a fan, so that tells you something.
              1. Humour’s a funny thing. I love The Office, and read that Ricky Gervais loved Curb Your Enthusiasm. I dutifully watched an episode or two and it was completely lost on me. A lot of British stuff that others rave over I don’t find at all funny, so it’s not just a cultural thing.
                1. I watched every episode of CYE, and the Seinfeld show as well. But the real genius behind the latter (behind the scenes) was Larry David. David unadulterated by Seinfeld would have been too much for old network TV!
                2. ‘Curb’ is my favourite American TV show. Utterly brilliant. M*A*S*H was a divine comedy. I like both the English and American Offices. But I don’t think I could ever watch repeats of the Gervais original – just too excruciating!
  12. Completely defeated by 7D even with all the checkers. Not really troubled by the rest of it.
  13. …for I have GNUS for you. 49 minutes, a bit surprised that the WEAR/ DISHEARTEN crosser was right, the latter unparsed. FOI was PERSONAL TRAINER, not that I’ve ever had one. My body is a temple, not a factory. LOI was GNUS, g-not pronounced as NEWS for g-many a long year. I think I used SUMMONED BY BELLS in a recent comment, and that was an allusion to the Betjeman collection. I also had ARCH-ENEMY written in lightly until Doubting Thomas revealed ARCH-FELON, which has to be COD. A very good puzzle. Thank you Jack and setter.
  14. 45 mins before I gave up, with yoghurt, granola, etc.
    Gave up on Corn. I thought there must be an actual old material called Corn, or Lorn, or Coon, or something. The ‘Corny’ def never occurred to me.
    Thanks setter and J.
  15. Just had DISHEARTEN and WEAR left. Some clever stuff. Biffed the autobiography – not sure this crossword is the place for it. COD to either the better beer or to the treatment if you drink too much of it.
  16. Gave up after an hour and ten with a few leftovers. I might’ve got the WEAR/DISHEARTEN crossover eventually, but not knowing SOCHI, not pronouncing GNUS like that and, to my shame, not being able to spell DIALYSIS even after I’d thought of it would probably have left me defeated in the SE. I was still working on the wordplay like paulmcl when I decided enough was enough.

    I have very definitely heard of Betjeman (he was Poet Laureate for the first eleven years of my life) but count me as another who didn’t know the autobiography… It looks like it’s still available as an audiobook (is that the right version, Jack?) so I may give it a try.

    Edited at 2019-08-06 08:52 am (UTC)

    1. Yes that looks like the right version but I’m not clear from the link what format it comes in (MP3 download?) or whether it’s actually still available. I hunted high and low for it recently but couldn’t find anything so I digitised my audiotape copy. Good luck!
  17. Clearly right up my street, but it was, in the language of modern algorithms, relevant to my interests – a bit of Latin, a bit of Betjeman, a major sporting venue, and even a passing reminder of F&S (the gnu came up as an answer on a recent episode of The Chase, and was pronounced sans ‘g’, which led the wife and I to look it up, only to realise that we’d been apparently led astray by a comic song all these years).
  18. 38’50, some tough but fair clues with ever-inventive twists. Liked the terrors of the earth, myrtilus.
  19. ….”That’s the end of the GNUS, and now for the weather forecast”.

    Enjoyed getting my teeth into this, though I thought WEAR was a poor clue, and I didn’t like the cross-reference for GNUS. I was helped by actually knowing everything on offer, but am indebted to Jack for parsing DIALYSIS.

    FOI CLOSED
    LOI CORN
    COD DISHEARTEN
    TIME 15:46

  20. I’ve got a rather dog-eared copy of the Betjeman somewhere and I’d known about the Bells aka Brontes since one of my Girl Annuals featured a strip about them back in the 1950s. What with the GNUS this was definitely a trip down Memory Lane. All I could recall about SOCHI was reading that it was a bit like putting on the 2014 winter Olympics in Palm Beach and importing all the snow. 21.31
  21. This was a nice puzzle and I must have been more or less on the wavelength – 9m 25s, with the only doubt being about CORN. I don’t think I’ve ever heard it used that way, although of course ‘corny’ is well known.

    I had never come across JB’s autobiography but I remembered Acton, Currer & Ellis from GCSE days, so BELLS was a write-in and I just had to figure out something to fit the checkers for my LOI. Once I’d dragged my mind away from SOMEONE’S, I was there.

    PERSONAL TRAINER was COD for me.

    Edited at 2019-08-06 11:35 am (UTC)

  22. I suspected I was in for a battle when I looked at the SNITCH for yesterday before going to bed and saw it was at 145 for today. Nevertheless I made reasonable progress on the LHS. My daughter has just started her own business in Cheddar as a Personal Trainer. The RHS, however, was another matter. The only things I remembered about JB was that he was Poet Laureate and that he wrote “Come friendly bombs and fall on Slough, It isn’t fit for people now.” I’d also forgotten the Brontes’ alias, so 7d was conjured up from the checkers and the unlikeliness of anything being summoned by balls, bulls, bolls or bills, although the latter was a vague possibility. A bill of fare might attract me to a restaurant. I got the ARCH FELON fairly quickly along with DIALYSIS, Sis being the clincher there. GNUS was my POI, with DISHEARTENED bringing up the rear. I spent more than 5 minutes trying to justify it or find an alternative, but in vain. That dallying took me over the hour to 64:15, but at least there were no pink squares. I see the SNITCH is down to 121 now. Tough work, but rewarding. Thanks setter and Jack.
  23. 22:17 so a bit of a struggle. Unlike TT Latin-y stuff and Betjeman are not really up my street.

    I thought the clue for DOUBTFUL was a bit weak but I liked the one for PERSONAL TRAINER.

  25. Might “Summoned By Bells” be a reference to the fact that all three Brontë sisters worked as governesses, who might be summoned by a bell being rung? (That was my retrospective reasoning after realising that Betjeman’s work, which I knew, fitted.)
  26. 18d is barely cryptic. ‘Wear’ is an atrocious clue-‘we are’ doesn’t equate to ‘our team’. Corny jokes aren’t necessarily ‘old’ jokes are they? They’re just lame jokes. 7d is a complete outlier in this crossword, making it unsolvable for Philistines like me. Stuntmen are usually called ‘stunt doubles’. Body doubles might sometimes be used for stunts (if they’re insured to do so), but that’s not really their job. They’re just used when a better shot is required where the actor or actress-acting ability notwithstanding-is not suitable for the shot. Simple things like running, or just walking down a crowded street. Or the routine driving of a vehicle (some actors don’t drive), or driving a vehicle actors aren’t qualified to dive, or simply unable to drive (eg bus or lorry). And also that old favourite, the sex scene. Stuntmen wouldn’t get involved in mundane stuff like this. They’re too expensive. Mr Grumpy
    1. I’m not going to bother to argue the points you make (interesting as some of them may be) as from past experience I know that nothing is going to sway you, but I would only mention that as indicated in my blog, the definition at 17 is “our team’s” i.e. “our team is” which is supposed to equate with “we are”. Having said that I agree it’s not much cop as a clue but I liked most of the others.
      1. Well I do try not to inflict myself on you as often these days! I’m well aware this blog isn’t really the appropriate place to continually whinge. The setters don’t seem to take any notice of anyone anyway, either on here or on the ToL comments page. Perhaps it’s just ‘different’ to how it used to be and it’s simply that I don’t like it! Ha ha-I honestly do get that, but I do seem to be the only one that cares. To show how I’m really not that negative, I actually run a monthly cryptic crossword club where we do the Jumbo. Possible attendees were Initially wary, but I attracted participants by assuring them that it’s not that difficult once you’ve had a bit of practice with the cryptic devices, along with the cachet of ‘it’s The Times’ (gasp). But I can’t really justify that ‘sell’ anymore. But hey, I promise not to darken these doors again with my negativity. Well, not too often anyway! A dissenting voice is good for you every now and then . Mr Grumpy
  27. Couldn’t get SUMMONED BY BELLS, so had to look it up. Enjoyed everything else very much, including SWHTUM, which came via the wordplay only, as I’m not familiar with it. That’s odd, since I would venture that we here in the NY area are very used to hearing Yiddish-isms on an almost daily basis. Regards.
  28. A bit late, but had to comment on this stinker. LOI was CORN for which I managed to work out that it was old material, but CORN just didn’t work for me. Other than that, I got the hard ones like SUMMONED BY BELLS but as usual it was the easy/poor clues that got me.
  29. Managed to get about 2/3rds of the way through this before I had to use aids. Even then, I needed Jackkt’s blog to understand 8, 20 and 29. Strangely enough, 7d was a write in for me with just the two Bs in place – I thought it was a well known autobiography ! If you haven’t come across them, I can also recommend the CDs of Betjeman’s poems: Banana Blush etc. Invariant
  30. Struggled a lot with this, though ‘Summoned by Bells’ was one of my early entries.
    Failed on 12a by entering ‘coon’ on the assumption that it might be a fabric made to look like coonskin. Not really impressed with the clue for reasons others have mentioned, but it’s better than the one for ‘wear’ at 17a. I also agree that a body double is a very different animal to a stuntman. Otherwise, lots of good clues to offset the ones I found dodgy.
  31. I took about 55 mins to DNF this. I found it tricky in parts and finally came a cropper on Summoned by Bells. Remembered Currer Bell so the by Bells bit went in ok but didn’t know or more likely couldn’t remember the Betjeman autobiography and struggled to see beyond someone’s for the first word. I knew it wasn’t right but couldn’t summon a better alternative.
  32. A bit late, but had to comment on this stinker. LOI was CORN for which I managed to work out that it was old material, but CORN just didn’t work for me. Other than that, I got the hard ones like SUMMONED BY BELLS but as usual it was the easy/poor clues that got me.
  33. Not as late as me, [e]. Total time was a shade over an hour and a half, split over several bashes. Quite where I dredged SUMMONED BY BELLS from I have no idea. It’s obviously another one of things I know but didn’t think I knew; I often wonder just how clever I’d be if I knew all the things I know.

    13ac took me an unreasonably long time to disentangle (having but few checkers at the time), and not helped by being unable to get ‘gasometer’ out of my head. LOI was DISHEARTEN.

    A gorgeous piece of work, this one, I thought.

  34. The final four or five over which I’d thought for ages came as a bolt of lightning. Had already thought of BABY and had tried to justify DISHEARTEN but the sudden clang of SUMMONED BY BELLS led to DIALYSIS and WEAR. I have a habit of thinking AUNT whenever I see relative but BELLS released me from that particular shackle….

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