A great collection of anagrams here. I think that six clues were straight anagrams (including all four of the long 13-letter clues) and another two involved them. There were also I think three double definitions of which five definitions were straight and only one cryptic. Most of the other clues were straight insertions, which made for a pretty straightforward puzzle overall. Having said that I found it very entertaining as all the anagrams (and indeed all of the clues) were very pleasing with natural surfaces and didn’t feel strained at all (apart from 2D perhaps). Many thanks to Izetti therefore for a very neat and entertaining start to the week.
I have no idea of time as I was just getting into my stride when the BT engineer came to call and I spent the next half hour with him diagnosing that the reason one of my telephone lines had gone down was that a fox had eaten it. But as I say it felt pretty straightforward and there may well be a few PBs out there.
My FOI was the hidden word at 1A and my LOI was 15D (reversing SIR was obvious to me but then revesing BED seemed more difficult for some strange reason). COD would be one of those neat anagrams but it’s difficult to choose between them. I probably liked 6D best in the end.
My NATRAF (Nina And Them Radar And Filter) twitched slightly when it spotted the beginnings of a story being told in the final grid:
DAMASK AMUSES ROGUE’S GALLERY
And then if you ignore the hyphen of ‘SIT-IN’:
SIT IN UNTAKEN SARCOPHAGUS
Which reminds me of one of my father’s favourite sayings. If you sat in his chair in front of the TV when he got up and left the room for a moment he would invariably say upon his return: “Would ye jump into my grave as quick?”
And then we have:
AVERAGE THOSE, THE PARTY’S OVER and SINGER SEVENS
Reading downwards we have:
DIREST CASTES MIGHT HAVE BEEN STERN CHARADE
And also:
GRUMPIEST MILITIA TASTE STEAK AU POIVRE SAYING DEBRIS
Or perhaps the long anagrams are giving some sort of BREXIT commentary:
ROGUES GALLERY – THE PARTY’S OVER, MIGHT HAVE BEEN STEAK AU POIVRE
As I say, it all sort of nearly makes sense. But not quite. Which makes me believe it’s all just a bit of a coincidence after all. Or maybe Izetti is just playing around with me. Like Hamlet and Polonius:
Hamlet: Do you see yonder cloud that’s almost in shape of a camel?
Polonius: By th’ Mass, and ’tis like a camel, indeed.
Hamlet: Methinks it is like a weasel.
Polonius: It is backed like a weasel.
Hamlet: Or like a whale.
Polonius: Very like a whale.
Definitions are underlined as usual and everything else is explained just as I see it in the simplest language I can manage.
| Across | |
| 1 | Madam, a skirt will contain this material (6) |
| DAMASK – hidden word: maDAM A SKirt | |
| 4 | A maiden exploits charms (6) |
| AMUSES – A + M (maiden) + USES (exploits). | |
| 8 | A group of undesirables regularly goes wild (6,7) |
| ROGUES GALLERY – straight anagram (‘wild’) of REGULARLY GOES. | |
| 10 | Something wicked about Italian making protest (3-2) |
| SIT-IN – SIN (something wicked) ‘about’ IT (Italian). | |
| 11 | Eccentric aunt with range of knowledge left on the shelf? (7) |
| UNTAKEN – UNTA (anagram of aunt (‘eccentric’)) + KEN (range of knowledge). | |
| 12 | A group’s cash thrown into a stone box (11) |
| SARCOPHAGUS – straight anagram (‘thrown’) of A GROUPS CASH. | |
| 16 | Girl in time seen to be ordinary? (7) |
| AVERAGE – VERA (girl) ‘in’ AGE (time). | |
| 17 | That group of map-makers featured in article (5) |
| THOSE – OS (Ordnance Survey – map-makers) ‘featured in’ THE (article). | |
| 18 | Hearts broken with poverty — expect no more fun (3,6,4) |
| THE PARTYS OVER – straight anagram (‘broken’) of HEARTS + POVERTY. | |
| 19 | Entertainer, one who got things stitched up! (6) |
| SINGER – double definition, one cryptic. The name of SINGER was once to sewing machines what HOOVER is to vacuum cleaners. | |
| 20 | Ball game in uniform aboard ship (6) |
| SEVENS – SS (Steam Ship) with EVEN (uniform) ‘aboard’. | |
| Down | |
| 1 | I’d flipped over, repose being most terrible (6) |
| DIREST – DI (I’D ‘flipped over’) + REST (repose). | |
| 2 | What would excite them? Big heaven? It never came to pass (5-4-4) |
| MIGHT-HAVE-BEEN – straight anagram (‘what would excite’) of THEM BIG HEAVEN. | |
| 3 | Hard back (5) |
| STERN – double definition. | |
| 5 | Fighting force initially might, it’s likely, if trained in advance (7) |
| MILITIA – take the initial letters of Might It’s Likely If Trained In Advance. | |
| 6 | Take a previous, re-cooked, meat dish (5,2,6) |
| STEAK AU POIVRE – straight anagram (‘re-cooked’) of TAKE A PREVIOUS. | |
| 7 | Remaining, not time for speaking (6) |
| SAYING – STAYING (remaining) minus T (time). | |
| 9 | Tum suffering with gripes making one most irritable (9) |
| GRUMPIEST – straight anagram (‘suffering’) of TUM + GRIPES. | |
| 13 | Tea awfully dear — it’s a travesty (7) |
| CHARADE – CHA (tea) + RADE (anagram (‘awfully’) of DEAR). | |
| 14 | Classes of people left out of grand buildings (6) |
| CASTES – CASTLES (grand buildings) minus L (left). | |
| 15 | Rubbish in plot upset gentleman turning up (6) |
| DEBRIS – DEB (BED (plot) ‘upset’) + RIS (SIR reversed, or ‘turning up’ in this down clue). | |
| 17 | Liking decorum (5) |
| TASTE – double definition. | |
FOI AMUSES and LOI DEBRIS. Excellent anagrams which I largely had to write down to decode. Not that easy but nothing really obscure.
Looking at Steak au Poivre makes me realise how we can mix French and English words in the same term; for a short time I was looking for a French word for steak.
Nice start to the week. David
Edited at 2019-03-25 09:54 am (UTC)
Thanks for the blog
Brian
Cod those and singer.
15×15 is not too hard today.
Templar
Thanks for your amusing blog especially your father’s favourite saying.
In our house my mother used to say “That’s what makes the land dear” whenever chair-grabbing incident occurred
KPC
NeilC
I biffed MILITIA, and finally SINGER, which I get – but isn’t the “who” wrong ? It’s a machine, so “that” would be more correct. I was prepared to be a DNF but was determined to break 3 minutes – just made it.
FOI DAMASK
LOI SINGER
COD THE PARTY’S OVER (no Theresa May gags !)
TIME 2:56
Edited at 2019-03-25 11:56 am (UTC)
I didn’t see the fun The Don is having here, but he nearly always has an outrageous pun across the top line in his Mephisto puzzles. Mephisto, SCC, is the puzzle that is much more difficult than the 15 x 15, which the solvers who do the Quickie in under 3 minutes are wont to tackle. The chances of you ever getting to that level are rather remote.
Are you warning everybody off tackling the Mephisto though? I have never devoted the time to finishing one yet although I am sure I could. I can certainly generally get a few clues straight off that would provide a launchpad (I’ve just looked up this Sunday’s for instance and picked off 3 or 4 in a couple of minutes), and it has often been said here that managing the cryptic and trusting the result to lead to real words is the key as there are likely to be several that one will have never heard of. Indeed, that is a skill that is very occasionally required in the 15×15.
I should have thought that anybody who looks in here and tries the QC eventually aspires to regular 15×15 success though, and that a similar step up can be made from the 15×15 to the Mephisto. And I would want to say to any beginner “start here and go as far as your ability will take you”. So I for one am not giving up hope yet!
By the way what did you mean by SCC?
Yes, some of them might conceivably get to be a really good, but few people who start solving in their middle age get that far. The top solvers seem to have had the knack from childhood, and have been solving since they were teenagers. Adults who take it up rarely get to that level.
I congratulate those who graduate to the 15 x 15, and manage to finish it regularly. That is good. However, if you look at those solving Mephisto, they are mostly the very top solvers who can knock of the 15 x 15 in less than 12 minutes, and who tend to show up in the Finals of the championships.
I always compare this to golf. If you take up the game, and practice diligently, you may get to be a 15 handicap, or a 12 handicap, or maybe even a 6. But you will never be as good as the top pros who compete on the major tours. Mark Goodliffe is our Tiger Woods, and our very own Mohn2 and Verlaine the ones who might manage to beat him.
Edited at 2019-03-25 06:50 pm (UTC)
** Note. I used the term ‘slowcoach’ early on Nov. 19th 2018 and sonofjim picked up on it less than half an hour later. I think quite a few people now take some pride in enjoying their crossword solving as members of the SCC.
Edited at 2019-03-25 07:58 pm (UTC)