Quick Cryptic No 1083 by Izetti

Author   TheRotterPosted on Categories Quick Cryptic
13 minutes for this little cracker from Izetti. This does require a modicum of General Knowledge, 1a, 12a, 18a, 20a, 9d and 13d, but nothing too difficult (and well short of Teazel’s 100th on Monday!).  A good sprinkling of anagrams gave me a good start, and there were more than the usual number of &lit clues.  It is hard to choose a CoD, but if pushed I would go for 15d.  It might have been 8a but for the dubious redundant containment indicator.

I hope you all enjoyed it.  I have indulged myself a little in the following:

Across
1  Material the old man’s going over as a soldier (6)
SAPPER – REP (material) plus PA’S (the old man’s) all reversed (going over).  I was unfamiliar with REP for material, but my Chambers gives its third definition as ‘a corded cloth’.  SAPPER is, as I am sure you are aware, a private in the Royal Engineers, formerly the Royal Sappers and Miners.
4  One could get you having less hair maybe around front of bonce (6)
BARBER – BARER (having less hair maybe) around B{once} (‘front of’ indicates first letter).  I have marked this as an &Lit (the whole clue provides the definition), but older wiser heads may disagree.
8  See about eating food brought back amidst hurrays – this fast food (13)
CHEESEBURGERS – The construction here is a little convoluted because I think we have one too many containment indicators, but I read it as; SEE containing (about or eating, choose one and ignore t’other) GRUB (food) reversed (brought back) to give SEBURGE and the whole assembly is then inserted into (or is amidst) CHEERS (hurrays).  This interpretation means that either the second or third word in the clue is redundant.  I tried using ‘about’ as an anagram indicator and playing with the letters in SEE, which could work, but then SEE doesn’t ‘eat’ GRUB.  Oh well, someone will come up with a parsing that removes the redundancy in mine – maybe!
10  Friendly disposition of little woman hugging Italian (5)
AMITY – AMY (Amy Curtis March – the youngest sister in the Little Women novel by Louisa May Alcott) hugging IT{alian}.  I can’t see the word AMITY without thinking about the island that is the setting for JAWS.
11  Cleric gets sanction by journalist overturned (7)
REVOKED – REV (cleric) and OK (sanction) and ED (journalist)
12 Unfortunate lad ending up in place where fire broke out (7,4)
PUDDING LANE – The fire referred to is the Great Fire of London in 1666, which every English schoolchild knows started in PUDDING LANE.  This is an anagram (unfortunate) of [LAD ENDING UP]
16 Moans of lots losing love including word of prayer (7)
LAMENTS – L{o}TS (losing love) containing AMEN (word of prayer).  AMEN means ‘so let it be’ and is said, especially, at the end of a prayer.
17  Generous bit to try out, not the first (5)
AMPLE – A bit to try out could be a {s}AMPLE, dropping the first letter as instructed
18  I am frailest pa, struggling as head of the tribe (13)
PATERFAMILIAS – Anagram of {I AM FRAILEST PA]
19  Power demonstrated by singer – who wiggled this (6)
PELVIS – P{ower} and ELVIS who was famous for wiggling his PELVIS amongst other things.  Not that he wiggled other things necessarily, but he was famous for more than a bit of wiggling!
20  Oxford college chaps full of silly rot (6)
MERTON – MEN (chaps) ‘full of’ anagram (silly) of [ROT].  Merton (full name ‘The House or College of Scholars of Merton in the University of Oxford’) was founded in the 1260’s by Walter de Merton (Bishop of Rochester).

Down
1 I also worried about Conservative Party (6)
SOCIAL – Anagram of [I ALSO] and C{onservative}
2  Valuable material in place moisture ruined (8,5)
PRECIOUS METAL – Nice anagram of (ruined) [PLACE MOISTURE].
3  Try to produce written work for tutor? (5)
ESSAY – Double definition, the first a transitive verb, the second a noun
5 Coming of a king and one who would like to overthrow him? (7)
ARRIVAL – A (a) R (king, from Rex (latin)) and RIVAL (one who would like to overthrow him, possibly (hence the question mark).
6  Silly ego trip in bank when situation gets critical (8,5)
BREAKING POINT – Anagram of (silly) [EGO TRIP IN BANK].
7 Live presidentially, somewhat (6)
RESIDE – Concealed in (somewhat) {p}RESIDE{ntially}
9 Swimming bears in eg water off Alaska (6,3)
BERING SEA – Anagram (swimming) of [BEARS IN EG].  The Bering Sea separates Alaska and the Russian far east , and is named after Vitus Bering, a Danish navigator, who was the first to systematically explore it.
13 Money once obtainable from raid in Egypt’s capital (7)
DENARII – Anagram (obtainable from) [RAID IN] and E (Egypt’s capital).  DENARII were the chief Roman silver coin (amusingly divided into 10 asses!) and were translated ‘penny’ in the New Testament, which led to the old UK currency of Pounds, Shillings and Pence being designated LSD.  The L comes from Libra, again Latin, and is usually written £.
14  Revolutionary friends at university like a good meal (4-2)
SLAP-UP – Revolutionary friends are SLAP (pals ‘revolved’) and at university is UP (standard fare in Crosswordland).  A SLAP-UP meal is lavish or sumptuous.
15  A boy?  Quite possibly! (6)
PERSON – PER usually means ‘for each’, but can also mean ‘a’, as in ‘one apple per child’ can be read as ‘one apple for each child’ or ‘one apple a child’.  SON is boy.  Put the two together and we get PERSON, which could be a boy.  Another $lit clue.
17  A team not taken into account (5)
ASIDE – A (a) and SIDE (team).  When conjoined, meaning apart or private, or not taken into account.
 

27 comments on “Quick Cryptic No 1083 by Izetti”

  1. I struggled with this one; if I recall correctly, PELVIS, PERSON, SOCIAL especially took time, but all in all it was slow going. At 4ac I was thinking of ‘balder’ rather than ‘barer’, and that didn’t help matters. I biffed 8ac and never went back to figure it out; maybe just as well, since as far as I can tell, our blogger is right and ‘about’ is otiose. (I tried taking ‘see about’ as EES, but that gets the wrong eater and eatee.) 11:26.
  2. 15dn might be a challenge for newer solvers not used to the setters’ ploy of using “a” for “per” – quite validly of course. A number of other clues were on the hard side too – and I didn’t know Pudding Lane, so had to work the anagram.
  3. 12 minutes for this nice offering. I thought DENARII was particularly cunning and pretty tough. Good to see my alma mater get a mention.
  4. 19 minutes with at least the last 5 spent on alphabet trawls at 19ac before eventually remembering ‘Elvis the Pelvis’ as he was famously known at least in his early years.

    I agree there’s quite a lot of potential here to frighten the colts and the fillies but little to worry those of us already out to grass.

    Edited at 2018-05-03 05:35 am (UTC)

    1. Hi Jackkt,

      Given that we have had a couple of ton-ups recently, I wonder if you know how many QCs Mr Manley has been responsible for under his various disguises and pseudonyms?

      1. Rotter, as far as I’m aware he only sets QCs as Izetti and he reached his ton last week as noted here. Today’s is his 101st.
  5. I always find Izetti tough but fair and came in around 35 minutes with, like Jack, Pelvis holding me up for a while at the end. I think Rotter you may be harking back to your schooldays as I’m not convinced the Stuarts are on the curriculum these days. Cue much harrumphing: in my day etc etc
    Thanks to Rotter and Izetti
  6. 37 minutes, found a few clues clunky (barber, cheeseburgers)

    Spent ages on social, sample, sapper, person and LOI pelvis.

    Dnk rep for material.

    COD Social, like yesterday, I was glad to finally see it was an anagram.

  7. I seem to have bucked the trend and come in with a third sub average time in a row at 18:24. It helped that I knew the more obscure words and in the end just put in Sapper and Person without fully understanding how they worked. Thanks for the explanations as always. It’s interesting that Per/Rep can find its way into answers in so many different ways, forwards or backwards.
  8. Some clever clues here. Thanks, Izetti. 18.12 was a bit closer to my normal time (low teens) – I am working back down after some tough ‘quick’ cryptics this week (for me, at least, if not for the 4 minute solvers…….).
  9. I seem to have been bowled a googly by this puzzle. I found it tricky all the way, but was held up for almost 10 minutes by my LOI PELVIS. As usual it seemed so obvious afterwards. No trouble with CHEESEBURGERS or PATERFAMILIAS, but BARBER held me up. DENARII was no great hold up, but overall I was stretched to 26:23, so I think that counts as a personal worst!! Touche Izetti and thanks Rotter.
  10. But enjoyable, thanks Izetti. And thanks Rotter too for the explanations – I’m glad I wasn’t the only one who couldn’t see quite how CHEESEBURGER works.

    I didn’t know REP as material or PER as A, so I am better informed. Spent a very (very) long time on my last two, which were PERSON and BARBER, and only got there with trawling. Fortunately Kevin struggled (for him) too so I was within my target three Kevins today. Even though I now see I spelt BERING wrong (ahem).

    Izetti likes a long anagram in the QC, doesn’t (s)he?

    Templar

    1. Don Manley (Izetti) is definitely a ‘he’ – as I believe are all our current setters, but I’m sure others will be able to confirm. Invariant
  11. The 3rd really tough puzzle this week, but I wasn’t helped by my old foe anagram blindness striking again, particularly at 12a. This was doubly annoying as I always associate Izetti using more anagrams than other setters (although I have no evidence for this).
    Spent an age on trying and failing to parse person and seeing what on earth was going on with LOI 19a. Stumbled across the line in 39.07. COD 13d
    My thanks to rotter for clearing things up in the blog
  12. This had a real old-fashioned feel to it, with the long anagrams, Latin solutions, long and wordy clues. I thought ‘barber’ particularly clunky. A total inability to spell ‘denarii’ made ‘pelvis’ extremely elusive until I returned to the anagrist and corrected my error. COD to ‘person’ for its brevity. WOD ‘paterfamilias’.
    9’45”
  13. Hard work today. Never heard of REP as a material. Didn’t get into the detailed parsing of CHEESEBURGERS as the components were pretty obvious. PER meaning “a” seems a stretch to me especially as “Each boy?” would work just as well. DENARII my COD. The anagram was neatly hidden I thought. As an aside recent research suggests that the Fire of London started in the yard behind the bakery in Pudding Lane and not in Pudding Lane itself.
    PlayUpPompey
  14. A struggle. Lots of trawling through the alphabet to complete in 22:25. LOI 13dn DENARII.
  15. A second very hard puzzle this week. Not quite as bad as Monday’s but not a quick cryptic .

    Personally I want a puzzle I can do in about 20 minutes and have absolutely no interest in being trained for the main times puzzle. Perhaps the Times,or setters can think about puzzles for those of us who just want a reasonable QC.

  16. Only knew this from Carry on Cleo with Warren Mitchell the slave auctioneer. John
  17. I had this one done and dusted in just over 30 mins, but then I looked again at loi 15d, Person. Not having come across per = a before (though in truth it’s not too great a stretch from for each) I managed to convince myself that my answer was wrong. After a few more minutes thought I changed Person to Reason and looked at Rotter’s blog. . . Setting aside that mistake, I thought most of today’s clues followed the hard but fair rule – though I have the same quibble as others with the parsing of 8ac, and Rap for material was more than just a tad obscure. I particularly liked 5d, so Arrival gets my CoD vote. Invariant
  18. Just under average time for me… I guess I’m familiar with Izetti’s style and cunning. Seeing the long anagrams straightaway helped, I think. I never noticed the double containment in 8a, and can’t explain it either. I hate to differ Rotter, but I think the definition in 19a is just “this”… i.e. the thing that is wiggled. As you say, rather a plethora of anagrams today. PERSON my COD. Nice puzzle as ever from Izetti, and nice blog too – thanks!
  19. Some tricky anagrams here. After 20 minutes I needed 15d and 19a. I got Person quite quickly and then stared for ages at 19a. I thought Izetti would jump at the chance of clueing PULPIT but it clearly did not fit.
    I nearly gave up but suddenly Elvis occurred to me; I was thinking of birds. Over 30 minutes in total. COD to 19a. David
  20. Some clever clues here. Thanks, Izetti. 18.12 was a bit closer to my normal time (low teens) – I am working back down after some tough ‘quick’ cryptics this week (for me, at least, if not for the 4 minute solvers…….).
  22. I am a newbie and found this tough but managed to complete it. I would ask certain bloggers not to confuse “inexperienced ” with “ignorant ” We’re quite well educated actually. Moan over. Thanks as usual to setter and blogger who is very helpful to us beginners.

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