27394 Thursday, 4 July 2019 What Is This Thing Called, Love?

Author   ZabadakPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
Happy 4th July to our transatlantic friends: if you happen to be anywhere near the Lincoln Memorial do try to enjoy the parade of tanks (so far I’ve spotted two), other military hardware and whatever 45 has to say. I think this crossword was (most likely) more entertaining, at least for my 20 minutes’ worth. Though there’s a few proper names scattered around, they’re kindly clued and shouldn’t present too many problems. I trundled steadily from top to bottom taking time out to make sure I had the wordplay right.
I’ve not spotted any theme, apart from the fact that there are more Austrians on display than we usually see.
My workings are presented with clues, definitions and SOLUTIONS: have fun.

ACROSS
1 Felicity initially lacking flexibility (9)
LITHENESS Felicity is happiness is BLITHENESS, which without its initial F provides our answer
6 Star of French New Wave’s last book (5)
DENEB  Oddly enough, I today tried to insert this star into a word game I play but failed to gain approval. Pity: Chambers tells me it’s the brightest star in Cygnus. Of French DE, N(ew) (wav)E’s last B(ook)
9 Uncle Sam welcomes more reliable loan sharks (7)
USURERS Possibly with a nod to Independence Day U(ncle) S(am) takes SURER, or more reliable, into its firm embrace
10 Break nail on inverted curve of skull (7)
CRANIAL The curve to be inverted is ARC, and attach the anagram (broken) of NAIL
11 I teach trim jockeys some maths (10)
ARITHMETIC Our anagram indicator here is “jockeys”, and the bits to fling around are I TEACH TRIM
12 Singer found in conversation (4)
BASS  A soundslike (“in conversation”) clue: found as a verb is BASE
14 Withdraw personnel from Kurt Waldheim? (5)
UNMAN You need to know that former Nazi Waldheim was Secretary General of the United Nations, qualifying for inclusion in this puzzle by dying in 2007. He was therefore a U.N. MAN
15 Retired contractor missing bachelor friend in particular (9)
SPECIALLY The contractor you seek is the BICEPS. Remove the B(achelor) and tag on ALLY for friend
16 Songwriter with mature bearing (9)
PORTERAGE As well as being the charge for carriage, it’s the carriage itself, so bearing is OK. The songwriter is Cole PORTER (believe me, you know loads of his songs) and mature as a verb gives you the AGE.
18 Watering hole of Aussies scrubbed periodically (5)
OASIS Today’s every other letter clue in Of AuSsIeS
20 Rapturous state, moving right to the front (4)
RAVE The nearest I can get to a parallel definition of “rapturous” is extravagantly enthusiastic, so it will have to do; I think the setter has rave review in mind. State (not one of the 4th July set) is AVER, in which the R(ight) migrates to the front
21 See head of state wearing majestic old crown (10)
EPISCOPATE See is the seat of a bishop, and so is our answer. Construct from head of S(tate) enclosed in EPIC (majestic) plus O(ld) and PATE for crown (of head)
25 Pardon daughters ejected from accursed, filthy place (7)
AMNESTY Rather fun, this. An accursed, filthy place is a DAMNED STY. Knock out both occurrences of D(aughter)
26 It makes one wing of chateau timelessly smarter (7)
UNIFIER One wing of a chateau is the east wing, U. Add NIFTIER for smarter, but forget about the T(ime)
27 Disheartened drunk chasing last of the hard stuff (5)
EMERY I tried to make ebony work at first, but “drunk” is MERRY, from which you extract the heart, and tack it on to the last of thE. Emery is a variety of corundum, and well hard.
28 Girl coming out of westbound Underground pinched by poet (9)
DEBUTANTE QEII put an end to royal patronage of the “coming out” of young gels in 1958, but you can see one here by viewing TUBE (underground) backwards in DANTE, an infernally good poet.

DOWN
1 Praise ace racing driver (5)
LAUDA Must be the first appearance of Niki, as he became eligible for inclusion scant weeks ago. Praise LAUD plus A(ce)
2 Business belonging to us is protected by trademark in America (7)
TOURISM Well it is a business. Belonging to us: OUR plus IS protected by ™. Did the setter know it was my turn? That would be nice. Not sure why “in America”, though. Perhaps I should be
3 Just finished going round New Haven (4-6)
EVEN-HANDED Here we have ENDED derived from finished encompassing a new version of HAVEN
4 Remove it from bathroom, then proceed (5)
ENSUE  Presumably the bathroom is the increasingly common EN SUITE. Take out the IT
5 Impious act of plunder endlessly upset revolutionary say (9)
SACRILEGE Plunder is SACK, but its end is discarded. Upset is RILE and our revolutionary isn’t Che but an instruction to reverse EG, say.
6 Cases of listeria had raised pulse (4)
DHAL Cases here means the first and last letters, of ListeriA and HaD. Reverse them, for they are raised.
7 Return of bees at first unnerves leading novelist (7)
NAIPAUL Not a novelist I would confidently spell, but VS is clued by “of bees” APIAN returned plus “at first” both Unnerves and Leading
8 Sweets unsettle Sue’s belly (5-4)
BULLS EYES just “unsettle” SUE’S BELLY
13 Chinese scholar alone grasps mind’s interior essence (10)
SINOLOGIST Not some Confucius you’ve never heard of, thankfully, but a student of all things Chinese. Alone: SOLO grasps the interior of mINd and adds essence, as John Cleese would say, the very nub of my GIST
14 Something that stimulates action in capital (5-4)
UPPER CASE A disingenuous punctuation rather than geography clue. A stimulant is an UPPER, and a (legal) action is a CASE
15 Quick to notice dog without tail regularly yields (5-4)
SHARP-EYED Pay attention at the back. The SHAR PEI turned up on Tuesday, so you have no excuse for not knowing the vicious little brute. Rip its tail off, and attach the odd letters of YiElDs
17 Return from Europe not at all uplifted (7)
REVENUE Europe abbreviates to UE, not at all translates to NEVER. Conjoin and reverse both.
19 It’s not a foreign channel (7)
STATION Sneaky anagram which doesn’t look like one but which is cued by “foreign”. Mix up IT’S NOT A for a (radio) channel.
22 Dumpy individual succeeded by virtue of being British (5)
SQUAB I’m more familiar with this as a pigeonlet, but it can just mean fat. S(ucceeded) QUA (by virtue of being) B(ritish)
23 Ontario neighbour keeping Japanese currency in inaccessible place (5)
EYRIE So this will be Lake Ontario and its neighbour ERIE “keeping” Y(en). If you’re doing this on treeware, you can add the extra lines ¥: your OCD secret is safe with me.
24 Wife shuns fine game (1-3)
I-SPY “Game” and (1-3) doesn’t present many options. This will be WISPY pretending to be fine with the W(ife) missing

48 comments on “27394 Thursday, 4 July 2019 What Is This Thing Called, Love?”

  1. Never heard of him, but the wordplay was plain enough. Must have seen BULL’S-EYES here somewhere before, with that sense. But EN SUITE? “increasingly common” as it may be, it had yet to impinge on my awareness. Merci bien !
    1. Guy, seriously never heard of Niki Lauda!?? He died just last month. The Austrian Grand Prix on Sunday did a special tribute to him. F1 Champion 3 times with Ferrari and McLaren, mentor to Lewis Hamilton and my FOI.

      America Last! Perhaps you’ve heard of Mario Andretti?

      Edited at 2019-07-04 07:31 am (UTC)

        1. As per Mr. Pootle Lauda

          Bobby Unser (1 F1 DNF) – who could forget!?

          And good luck with them Shermans/Abrahams (see Zed)

  2. Not sure of the time, as I had to go offline after 10′ or so to catch a train, but it hardly matters since I got two wrong: OASES–a typo, I think–and APOSTOLATE, which I forgot to go back to and figure out. I had CHAT at 12ac, which seemed fine until it was time to deal with 7d and 8d. Never did see how NAIPAUL worked.
    1. I’m really glad I didn’t think of CHAT (I already had BULLS-EYES) because it would have gone in without hesitation. For once, not thinking beyond the more prosaic meanings of “singer” paid dividends.
  3. 21:21 … in which I never failed to grasp the wrong end of every stick, but greatly enjoyed myself regardless. Nice work, setter and Z8.

    I had the same CHAT as kevingregg at 12a, and took a very long time to realise that its final T wasn’t actually in the anagram fodder for 8d.

    Self-imposed problems apart, the southeast was very tricky for me. Last in the UNIFIER / EYRIE pair.

  4. I did about 2/3 of this quickly then took considerable time to finish, particularly struggling with DENEB, NAIPAUL, EPISCOPATE and SINOLOGIST. I’d also been tempted by CHAT instead of BASS but held off as there was no T in the apparent anagrist of 8D. My main self induced hold up was putting in EAGLE EYED, thinking the dog involved to be a beagle (albeit I’d be removing the wrong end).

    LAUDA always reminds me of my dad asking me in childhood, “What’s the name of that racing driver, Niki…?”, to which I replied LAUDA. He then raised his voice and repeated “What’s the name of that racing driver, Niki…?”. I think I replied about 5 times before the penny finally dropped.

  5. I gave up on this with a minute to go; unfortunately I should’ve given up about twenty minutes earlier, given that I doubt I’d ever have got the unknown NAIPAUL, the unknown EPISCOPATE or the unknown meaning of SQUAB, especially as I didn’t really know what “qua” meant, either. I suppose if I’d stared long enough I might’ve come up with UNIFIER, which was my other recalcitrant one, but I’m not even sure about that one…

    (I’d also not heard of Kurt Waldheim, but I was a bit more sure of the wordplay there…)

    Edited at 2019-07-04 07:22 am (UTC)

  6. “Though there’s a few proper names scattered around, they’re kindly clued and shouldn’t present too many problems”.
    OK, OK, I was wrong. Sorry!
    1. It’s also my (raised tiny letters) abbreviation for trademark, or so says me!
  8. 40 mins with yoghurt, blueberries, granola, etc.
    And 10 of these on the Episcopate/Squab/Eyrie combo.
    Very familiar with all the proper names (including Dick Emery).
    Mostly I liked: Retired contractor, Unifier and COD to Naipaul (return of bees).
    Thanks setter and Z.
  9. Kurt Waldheim in a crossword!? Zany!

    FOI 1dn LAUDA

    SOI 8dn BULL’S EYES

    LOI 17dn REVENUE

    COD 28ac DEBUTANTE

    WOD 6ac DENEB

    I found this puzzle somewhat insipid and unsatisfying.

    No time at all.

  10. Fell into all of the traps – EAGLE-EYED, CHAT, EBONY etc.
    More worryingly I thought that “Singer found in conversation” was telling me to look for a hidden answer. I could only see SATI which I thought would be in very bad taste for “singer”.
    COD to the en-suite.
  11. …but I know what you want.” 29 minutes LOI EMERY, biffed as hard stuff, after REVENUE finally parsed. I also had a CHAT singing merrily for a long time before VS NAIPAUL and BULL’S EYES told me differently. Never heard of DENEB and thought it might be DUNEB, but decided that would have required ‘of the’, so I got it right. I had a lawyer once who was fond of the word QUA, so I was happy with SQUAB. COD to EPISCOPATE on grounds of length. Thank you Z and setter.
  12. About 35m, held up with 15d thinking the dog must be ‘samoyed’ as it ends in yed and ‘eyed’ was clearly the last word. Kept going back to ‘sharp eyed’ though and biffed it in the end, so thanks for the reminder about ‘sharpei’, Z. Good all round crossword today.
  13. A bit of a slog but got there eventually. DENEB a write in which gave me BULLS EYE so never considered CHAT. Didn’t know NAIPAUL but “bees” and “apian” go together so guessed him. Good blog z8.

    Remember Kurt from the huge fuss when it emerged he had been a member of the Wehrmacht. Don’t remember anything about him as head of UN other than a punch up with Idi Amin and the prolonged US v China battle to get rid of him!

  14. I managed less than a third of this last night before deciding it was going to be too tricky for my tired brain.

    On resumption this morning I still struggled but eventually completed it.

    LOI was the unknown NAIPAUL who appears to be on his first visit to the 15×15 and as such might have been defined a little more helpfully by mentioning nationality for example. I was on the verge of giving up on him until I suddenly thought of APIAN as ‘of bees’.

    Another CHAT here at 12ac and I was unable to think of a context for RAVE = rapturous (so thanks for that one, z).

    UNMAN reminded me of the film ‘Unman Wittering and Zigo’ a rather creepy thriller made in 1971 and starring David Hemmings. It was adapted from a stage play of the same title by Giles Cooper and is well worth a look if you like that sort of thing and if you get an opportunity.

    Edited at 2019-07-04 08:28 am (UTC)

    1. Good grief yes, I remember taking part (I think I was Cuthbun) in an extract from UW&Z set up by my inspiring English teacher. I don’t think we knew how lucky we were.
      1. It seems to be widely believed that Rowan Atkinson based his ‘School Register’ sketch on scenes from UZ&W but I think the ritual is (or was) pretty common in certain types of school so I’m not so sure. I suppose the idea of increasingly bizarre surnames might have had some influence.
  15. I knew – knew with absolute certainty – that it was sinologist, but got hooked by the mind’s interior being the id. And so, on the principle that wp is infallible, I stupidly went for sidologist, knowing it to be wrong, and fruitlessly hoping that it would be a never-heard-of obscurity 🙁
  16. 15:15. Quite tricky this.
    I took ‘Ontario’ to be a reference to the province, but EYRIE is partially in (rather than neighbouring) it so the lake works better. I’m looking forward to seeing it in a couple of weeks.
  17. Thanks weathergirl! Old ‘Two-Tanks’ better not forget his ‘Pac-a-Mac’! Shouldagonta Florida.
  18. Bang on wavelength at 12.33 – perhaps to make up for yesterday’s tanking. Speaking of which, I believe Z is right that there are only two appearing in today’s festivities which were shipped in on flatbed trucks (so as not to tear up the fragile streets of DC) and parked. And although you-know-who said they were Shermans they aren’t which is par for the course. In a convoluted way I thought that “state” in 20A might be doing double duty as describing the rapturous state of mind as well as providing the “aver” material. But I think Z’s take is better. Heavy rain, thunder and lightening predicted for this evening in DC.
  19. Screwed up my 55:04 struggle with a careless REVENGE at 17d. Drat! Was blindsided by the geography at 14d and had to do an alpha trawl for CASE. Didn’t help that I needed to get to S for the third letter. Should’ve started from the first one. SQUAB eventually opened up the recalcitrant SE quarter. Had DENEB and BULLS EYES before trying the singer. Enjoyable if ultimately dispiriting puzzle. Thanks setter and Z.
    1. I made the same mistake. When will I learn ? If it doesn’t parse it’s probably wrong, so think longer George.
      1. I’m glad I’m not alone, but it just looks like you and me George. Hope you and Jennifer are well.
  20. ….clueing NAIPAUL as “two men back-to-back”, so we should at least be grateful for that ! The guy passed away only recently, so I suppose he’ll appear here again before long. Hopefully then I won’t require a double alpha-trawl of such proportions that it added 20% to my finishing time !

    I was another who wasted time trying to justify “ebony”, and also didn’t know SQUAB in the given context, only biffing it once I nailed UNIFIER.

    FOI USURERS
    LOI NAIPAUL
    COD SPECIALLY
    TIME 18:03

  21. A real struggle in the SE corner, as SQUAB, UNIFIER, EYRIE & my LOI EPISCOPATE all took some time to fall. I wasn’t helped by the fact that I’d written SINOLEGIST at 13d, as a result of – yet again – thinking of SOLE but not SOLO. 16m 14s.

    The “in America” in 2d also surprised me.

  22. Zed states that V.S. Naipaul (Trinidadian) was ‘Not a novelist.’

    Simply not true. He wrote manynovels, I have read a couple when I lived in Trinidad. Why state such a thing!?

    Fact check.

    Naipaul won the Booker Prize in 1971 for his novel ‘In a Free State’. In 1989, he was awarded the Trinity Cross, Trinidad and Tobago’s highest national honour. He received a knighthood in Britain in 1990, and in 2001, the Nobel Prize in Literature.(Wikipedia)

    Edited at 2019-07-04 11:51 am (UTC)

    1. I fear you have misconstrued our blogger. He is not saying that VS is not a novelist but that he is not a novelist whose name he might readily spell.
      1. Thank you, I am happily vindicated.
        I have similar trouble with a Facebook “friend” who never reads past the first few words of a comment before flying into a rage over some imagined slight. Life’s too short…
  23. Gave up with the same blanks as Gothic Matt with EYRIE thrown in for good measure. Bad brain day.

    Edited at 2019-07-04 12:36 pm (UTC)

  24. Today I learnt that VS Naipaul has died .. who says crosswords are a timewaster?
    1. For a moment I thought I might have read one of his books. The VS seemed familiar, but then I found the book and it’s actually by Vikram Seth. An Unequal Music. An enjoyable book nevertheless.
  25. At school, I raged at my English teacher for making us read “A House for Mr Biswas”, railing at him that it was a waste of time, and would serve no purpose whatsoever in my future life.

    30 years later, I can admit that it did serve a purpose, in that the author, Naipaul was a write-in for me.

    Shame we never read “The Squab and the Episcopate”, or I might not have DNF’d.

  26. …considerably naffed off that doing this on the phone has given me two pink squares. RAVR instead of RAVE and a blank at the end of UPPER CAS/beginning of MERY.

    Was very pleased to get NAIPAUL with only the I checker, though wasn’t entirely sure that he was dead.

    LITHENESS entirely from checkers and flexibility. Didn’t see the missing B for felicity. Didn’t see the NIFTIER bit either – just chucked in the F hoping it makes one.

    Couldn’t get BULLS EYES from the anag for ages must be the multitude of vowels and half vowels in EYES tripping me up.

    Heard of Kurt but apart from being something to do with Germany perhaps, no idea he was something to do with UN.

    Edited at 2019-07-04 05:53 pm (UTC)

  27. Trying to complete this in reasonable time and watch Wimbledon at the same time Wimbledon won. Ended up with unknown which had to be looked up- EPISCOPATE, and was discombobulated by the capital.
  28. 41 mins of toil but all to no avail as I put apostolate instead of episcopate. Very annoying because whilst not a write-in, it should’ve been well within my grasp. I’m not the sentimental sort but I did feel somehow saddened to see Lauda make his first appearance. Naipaul was a write-in. I read A House for Mr Biswas during my long struggle to get on the property ladder and it struck something of a chord.
  29. Yes, sad that the great Niki LAUDA now appears in a Times crossword, but at the same time good to see that he was acknowledged.

    Finished in 46 minutes. Held up by trying to fit SS (maybe he wasn’t in the SS?) somewhere in to the ‘Kurt Waldheim’ clue.

    Still cravin’ for old New Haven.

    Thanks to setter and blogger

  30. Thanks setter and z (entertaining blog)
    This was completed over a couple of days with numerous 5-10 minute periods where I could grab them. Probably worked in my favour as it wasn’t an easy puzzle with a bit of general knowledge required. Had forgotten that Niki had passed on, but he was my first one in. Funny what one remembers from puzzles with DENEB being an early entry too.
    Worked out UNMAN from the definition and sort of remembered Waldenheim as head of the UN afterwards. Think that I may have picked up a second hand copy of V S NAIPAUL book, but don’t think that I have read it yet – made him easier to get than what others here have found though.
    Was another who finished in the SE corner with UNIFIER and the clever EYRIE the last couple in.

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