15:43, took me a long time to get going, I needed checkers to make progress. Nice puzzle with no unknown vocab, and some smooth surfaces.
1A CARGO CULT is an interesting phenomenon. In WW2 Pacific Islanders built bamboo control towers hoping for supply planes. They tried to copy the behavioural by-products of the advanced societies that visited them instead of what made those societies advanced in the first place.
After a long career in the Tech sector, I’d argue that many corporations practice “Innovation Cargo Cult” – mimicking tech startup aesthetics such as Job Titles, dress, footwear and office layouts; then hoping that innovation will magically arrive.
Definitions underlined in bold , synonyms in (parentheses) (Abc)* indicating anagram of Abc, other wordplay in [square brackets] and deletions in {curly} brackets.
| Across | |
| 1 | Freight reduced outside Lima for religious movement (5,4) |
| CARGO CULT -CARGO (freight) + CUT (reduced) contains L (pounds) | |
| 6 | Escape from insect (3) |
| FLY – Double def
As in “fly the nest” |
|
| 8 | All of us staff helpful (7) |
| MANKIND – MAN (staff) + KIND (helpful) | |
| 9 | Gathering to celebrate, not all year (5) |
| PARTY – PART (not all) + Y {ear} | |
| 10 | Gradually manoeuvre large frame (5) |
| EASEL – EASE (Gradually Manoeuvre) + L{arge} | |
| 12 | Nuclear plant lacking a priest (6) |
| RECTOR – REACTOR (Nuclear plant) – A | |
| 14 | Applauded, having trained a reluctant dog (13) |
| CONGRATULATED – (A RELUCTANT DOG)* [trained] | |
| 16 | Fine sort of key dropped (6) |
| FALLEN – F {ine} + ALLEN (sort of key)
William G. Allen patented a method of forming screw heads around a hexagonal die in 1910, and as is often the case with simple inventions, many others claim to have also invented it. |
|
| 17 | Awful pain, caught in flap (5) |
| PANIC – (PAIN)* + C {aught} | |
| 19 | Fool almost married in characteristic style (5) |
| IDIOM – IDIO{t} (fool) [almost=truncated] + M{arried} | |
| 20 | Second cousins tantalised nurses (7) |
| INSTANT – Hidden in “cousins tantalised” | |
| 22 | Aficionado of quiche losing pounds (3) |
| FAN – FLAN (quiche) – L (pounds) | |
| 23 | Obstinate swine with such personalised notepaper (3-6) |
| PIG-HEADED – PIG (swine) + HEADED (personalised notepaper)
Whenever Piggy clues appear, I glance up to see if the setter is Oink. Not today. |
|
| Down | |
| 1 | Arrive to collect luxury car for trading (8) |
| COMMERCE – COME (arrive) contains MERC (luxury car) | |
| 2 | Manage to flee (3) |
| RUN – Double def | |
| 3 | Window, circular shape, that is held in both hands briefly (5) |
| ORIEL – O (circular shape) [i.e.=that is] inside R{ight} + L{eft}[both hands]
The “circular shape” is needed to get the O, not because that is the shape of an Oriel window, which is a type of bay window that protrudes from the main wall of a building but does not reach the ground. |
|
| 4 | Informal agreement from sitting for too long, presumably (13) |
| UNDERSTANDING – Cryptic Definition
The prefix of UNDER as in Undercooked, which means not cooked for long enough. By analogy, Understanding means not standing enough, hence “sitting for too long”. |
|
| 5 | Collapsed coalpit is in the news (7) |
| TOPICAL – (COALPIT)* [Collapsed] | |
| 6 | Try to enter stronghold with number left behind (9) |
| FORGOTTEN – GO (try) inside FORT (stronghold) + TEN (number) | |
| 7 | Toy — minus its head, twice tipped over (2-2) |
| YO-YO – Take Toy, then remove the T (minus its head) for OY, double it for OY OY, then reverse for YO YO. | |
| 11 | General feeling as tension is released (9) |
| SENSATION – (AS TENSION)* [is released] | |
| 13 | Sort of guess one’s like this after school? (8) |
| EDUCATED – Double def | |
| 15 | With bread, soak up seafood (7) |
| ROLLMOP – ROLL (bread) + MOP (soak up)
Not easy if you’ve never heard of a RollMop Herring. Interesting derivation, the Mop comes from the German for a Pug Dog (mops) which the food is supposed to resemble. It was first “rollmops”, and only later was the s assumed to be a plural indicator. |
|
| 17 | Adhesive tapes coming unstuck (5) |
| PASTE – (TAPES)*
Very smooth surface, and my COD. |
|
| 18 | Quarrel: it turns very loud (4) |
| TIFF – TI [IT reversed] + FF (very loud) | |
| 21 | Assistance said not to have succeeded (3) |
| AID – s{AID} [s=succeeded, as in genealogy lists]
I thought this was some kind of homophone (“said”), but whoever I said it I couldn’t come up with an equivalent for “to have succeeded”
|
|
Biffed CONGRATULATED, INSTANT (actually never saw the hidden). Biffed LOI FALLEN; I had no idea what was going on. 6:57.
11:30. FALLEN took the longest to figure out. SAID was slow to parse although the solution was right there in plain sight. PIG-HEADED was my favourite. I bought a book, Big Men and Cargo Cults, by a Glyn Cochrane, many years ago from a used book store. I’d love to reread it now but I never learned the Dewey Decimal System so my library is rather chaotic and often individual books are difficult to retrieve!
If you can take clear pictures of all the shelves in your library, then your phone (assuming it’s not ancient) will probably make all the text within each image searchable. You can then go to your phone’s photos app and search for the title.
Thanks, GC, good idea!
Also slow to get going, with a difficult NW corner. NHO CARGO CULT. I was going to comment on how bizarre a concept it is, but then remembered that all religions are built around leaps of faith that seem absurd to non-believers, so this is hardly any different..
Thanks Merlin and Teazel.
In parts of Vanuatu the worship of Prince Philip was a fascinating example of a cargo cult. I don’t know whether it has persisted since his death or been transferred to King Charles.
After the mourning period, the movement’s followers began to transfer their veneration to Prince Charles (now King Charles III). This transition was influenced by Prince Charles’s visit to Vanuatu in 2018, during which he met with some tribal leaders and was honoured as an honorary chief.
Or so I’m informed by ChatGPT.
I found this strange, I was right on wavelength and biffed a lot of clues, parsing afterwards, for quite a quick time. This is very unusual for me, especially for a Teazel puzzle. I think I was fortunate to be in top biffing form because some of clues looked tricky (eg ROLLMOP, AID), although it’s not so satisfying to just see the answer without having to work though the wordplay first.
Thanks Teazel & Merlin.
This one was fairly easy, with very standard cryptic gluing. Cargo cult wasn’t immediately obvious, so I left it for later. Getting the understanding/congratulated crossing quickly was most helpful. But my LOI was mankind, which should not have been hard.
Time: 6:23
Had to leave CARGO CULT until the very end and even then with all the checkers I had to study the cryptic very carefully. Nicely misdirected into thinking I only needed part of cargo and convinced myself I was looking for the name of a migration in Latin. Only three on the first pass of acrosses but then almost all of the downs – but not UNDERSTANDING, that came later. My Mum likes ROLLMOPS but she’s the only person I’ve ever heard say the word and I’ve never seen them in supermarkes -and I looked everywhere for tahini last weekend! Raw cauliflower salad, worth it. All green in 16.49 – including a bit of time realising PIG HEADED is easy if you haven’t typoed ‘ais’ for AID.
I found this tough, taking 14:15, though having eventually completed it and read Merlin’s excellent blog I am not sure why. I dragged CARGO CULT out of a deep memory but had no idea what it was – thank you for the background info – and I had a slight wobble over FALLEN as a synonym for dropped, but I think I was just very slow this morning.
10 minutes. Straightforward apart from the NHO CARGO CULT.
NHO CARGO CULT so CARGO went in without much thought but CULT was more of a head scratch as I was intent on using L & A as outside Lima and an ‘oh well, I guess’. I did like your consideration of it wrt technology companies. It’s always difficult to figure out creativity and innovation, but I agree that clothes, shoes and job titles don’t contribute much. A good coffee machine does help, and these days, a wide selection of teas.
Wrongly assumed Oink when wrote in PIG HEADED as sadly, no setter shown in App, and liked ORIEL despite being sure it wasn’t circular. COD FALLEN. Will look out for Cross head in the future.
19min so another one within par with more speed in the lower half.
Thanks Teazel and Merlin.
I hesitate to write that we’re beginning to get on Teazel’s wavelength. We used to settle down for a tough slog when we saw the setter’s name but this is the second in recent times that just seemed to flow. All done in a speedy 16.27.
NHO cargo cult and needed all the crossers to be reasonably sure it was right. COD to congratulated, brilliant anagram, also enjoyed understanding.
Thanks Teazel and Merlin.
Unlike Roundabout Here, I usually find myself quite well tuned into Teazel’s wavelength but I made very heavy weather of this puzzle. It contained all of the setter’s usual quality and wit but my brain was having an off day.
Started with FALLEN and finished with the unknown CARGO CULT in 11.03.
Thanks to Merlin and Teazel
Isn’t it annoying when you are rattling along quite nicely when a single clue brings you to a screeching halt and turns a respectable time into a really disappointing one? The answer that did for me was, of course, CARGO CULT which to my shame I’d never come across before – or if I had I’d forgotten it ages ago. A strange one for the Quick Crossword I thought.
I love Rollmops especially the M and S ones. Great puzzle. Thanks to setter and blogger.
A nice change from Teazel. I felt as though I was on the wavelength and solved this quickly. It felt like old times. My FOI was CARGO CULT and my LOI was FALLEN – the reverse of Plett’s experience, above.
Held up for too long by FALLEN; thanks for parsing it, Merlin.
Some nice clues. Thanks to both.
9:09
Hesitated over my LOI, AID, since I also read the clue as meaning a homophone, and could not think of one that made sense. Thanks Merlin for explaining it.
Argh! FALLEN is what I am today, it just wouldn’t drop for me. Not an easy solve overall, but I was in sight of a just about sub SCC finish with two to go. Kippered for a while by ROLLMOP, and then LOI never came.
CARGO CULT came from the recesses of the brain, the two long ones didn’t take too long, and then worked around to fill in.
Spent too long obsessed by the escape having something to do with flee/ flea and trying to get it down to three letters, and missing the blindingly obvious…
A good workout overall, thanks Teazel and Merlin.
Nearly bested the blogger at 15:53 but the wizard pipped me. Another NHO cargo cult but with Lima a given and checkers in place, cargo lust seemed unlikely, even to this professional half-parser.
CsOD go to the beautifully surfaced instant panic and most definitely should be congratulated.
Thought this might have been an Oink with porcine reference in the ultimate clue and answer, so pretty pleased with my effort now I discover Teazel was behind it.
Many thanks as always M & T
7.47 with a typo
Never knowingly heard of CARGO CULT but with all the checkers it had to be. Sounds interesting.
Thanks Merlin and Teazel
PDM with LOI CARGO CULT, which I do know about, come to think of it. A steady solve today, but certainly not fast. A subtly witty puzzle. Liked FALLEN, ROLLMOP, FAN, EASEL, RECTOR, among others.
Thanks vm, Merlin.
I also found this slow at first but then everything went in straight away on the second pass and I finished in 7:32 so fairly quick for me.
RE: CARGO CULT – I have most often associated this in technology with terrible attempts at “doing Agile”.
6.30, all good. CARGO CULT no problem for anyone who’s been to the delightful and fascinating islands of Vanuatu, so maybe today coming from Oz is an advantage. Thanks Merlin and Teazel.
Thanks Merlin for interesting comment on (for me NHO) CARGO CULT. 1A and 1D my L2I. Couldn’t parse AID, also thinking it would be a homophone, but otherwise no problems in a good puzzle.
Merlin – think you have typo for however in explanation of 21D.
15 and a half if you’ll give my cult without the cargo. Could the cargo later refer to the furniture store of that name, where the trendy office furniture could have come from. Almost all the east side, not so good on the west.
10 mins DNF due to NHO ROLLMOP and assuming all my life that it had been an ‘Alan Key’ and so discarding the possibility.
Otherwise not to many issues.
Slightly surprised so many haven’t heard of CARGO CULT, and that fewer haven’t heard of ROLLMOPs. But then again, I’ve never been to Germany.
CARGO CULT did get me a while to get, mind, partly because I was convinced ‘freight reduced’ had to be CARG. Lesson learned.
Gave up incomplete, DNK 1a or 3d and ended up with Carib Cult and Briel window, the former being plausible because of a possible link to the Caribbean.
Over ten minutes quicker than yesterday’s disaster finishing in a respectable 8.19. Never heard of CARGO CULT, but the generous clueing meant it was not a problem. It was good to enter RUN confidently after yesterdays lengthy debate about whether an answer in yesterdays 15×15 was RUN or RAN. The answer to 13dn EDUCATED made me smile, while I think about the number of hapless contestants on quiz shows who answer a question with “an educated guess” when it’s anything but educated!
Indeed! One of the clichés of quiz shows. Another being “I’ll take a punt on…” something which is obviously right and which the “punter” plainly knows is correct.
Phew! Made it, but no wonder the NW corner held out for ages, with two NHOs that could only be guessed from the wordplay. Liked FORGOTTEN but it wasn’t easy putting it all together. LOI MANKIND, needed all the checkers for that.
Thanks, Merlin, for all your good explanations and extra info – surely Lima is simply L in the NATO alphabet, nothing to do with pounds?
7:42
Another here that has never heard of 1a – is lack of that particular knowledge a British thing? Most of the rest was straightforward with pauses for ROLLMOP (was thinking SCALLOP without much reason until the M appeared) and LOI FORGOTTEN.
Thanks Merlin and Teazel
I eventually got going after a very patchy start. My FOsI, FLY and YO-YO, connected with each other, but nothing else did for some time. Nothing really flowed for me today, but I didn’t suffer one of my usual 10-minute mind freezes and I was pleased to cross the line in 24-25 minutes, or thereabouts.
I enjoyed UNDERSTANDING when it finally came, but I had NHO CARGO CULT and am still none the wiser, really. FALLEN was my LOI.
Many thanks to Merlin and Teazel.
As far as I remember, unsophisticated tribesmen in somewhere like Papua N Guinea thought that the planes that landed from the sky were sent from the gods so they began to worship them and their cargo. Or something like that.
From COMMERCE to AID in 8:22. CARGO CULT was eventually assembled from wordplay after I was initially misdirected by the cut CARG. Great anagram for CONGRATULATED. Thanks Teazel and Merlin.