I thought I was on for a real flyer when the first six across clues went in straight away, but then reality kicked in. I still ended up finishing in a speedy-for-me 8:40, which as I write has me in 14th place of 16. So I suspect that this one will be sub-100 on the QUITCH.
The one clue that struck me as really tricky was MIDSUMMER, but once I got it it became my COD. Odd how often that happens, isn’t it? I suspect I’ve missed something in the clue for HILL.
Definitions underlined, synonyms in round brackets, wordplay in square brackets and deletions in strikethrough. Anagram indicators italicised in the clue, anagram fodder indicated like (this)*.
| Across | |
| 1 | Line priest’s taken unconventionally (6) |
| STRIPE – (priest)* | |
| 4 | Go by mountain route (4) |
| PASS – A double definition | |
| 9 | Having money for cleaner (7) |
| SOLVENT – Another double definition.
This clue could perhaps have done with a question mark, as not all solvents are cleaning products. |
|
| 10 | Arab perhaps runs in stockings? (5) |
| HORSE – R for runs (from cricket) in HOSE (stockings).
Think of “hose and doublet”. One of those words that has a real world definition and a separate “only in crosswords” definition. See also NEAT to mean “cow”, and I’m sure others can think of more examples. Perhaps we could compile a list. |
|
| 11 | Preach, yet strangely original (9) |
| ARCHETYPE – (preach yet)* | |
| 12 | Outstanding nobleman killing king (3) |
| DUE – Take DUKE (nobleman) and remove K for king. | |
| 13 | Spice Maggie added to fruitcake (6) |
| NUTMEG – NUT (fruitcake, looney) + MEG (Maggie).
Both Maggie and Meg are diminuitives of Margaret. |
|
| 15 | Myth of celebrity (6) |
| LEGEND – Our third double definition. | |
| 17 | Pawn surrounded by chess attack (3) |
| PIN – P (pawn, from chess notation) + IN (surrounded by).
To “pin” an opponent’s piece in chess is to prevent the piece from moving because if it were moved the opponent would be in check. Modern chess notation no longer uses “P” for pawn: all the other pieces get to keep their letters, but pawn moves are just the destination square. But I learned the older “descriptive” style, where “P-K4” started many a game. |
|
| 18 | When days are longer minute by minute perhaps? (9) |
| MIDSUMMER – The middle two letters of SUMMER [mid-summer] is “MM”. M can be an abbreviation for minute. Put M by M, you get “MM”. Hence “minute by minute” can be “mid-summer”.
Phew, that was convoluted. And no, I did not parse that when I was doing the puzzle. But now I have parsed it I like it a lot. |
|
| 21 | Ripped, pierced by hard, sharp object (5) |
| THORN – TORN (ripped) including [pierced by] H for hard (as in pencil lead designations). | |
| 22 | Revised a target for rowing competition (7) |
| REGATTA – (a target)* | |
| 23 | About to leave icy high ground (4) |
| HILL – C (circa, about) removed from CHILL (icy).
I have two quibbles with this clue. Firstly, “chill” and “icy” are not synonyms. “Icy” is an adjective. “Chill” is almost always a verb or a noun, except in the modish usage of being “chill about” something. Even in that last case, you couldn’t substitute “icy” for “chill”. And secondly, “hill” doesn’t work for me as “high ground”. The top of a hill can be high, but if all of it is high, is it really a hill? Normally when I have this many issues with a clue, it ends up being because I’ve missed how the clue works. I look forward to finding out what I’ve missed. Edit: chill = icy in “a chill wind”. Thanks to Guy du Sable for that. |
|
| 24 | In favour of suitable gains (6) |
| PROFIT – PRO (in favour of), FIT (suitable). | |
| Down | |
| 1 | Give strength to us in disgrace (7) |
| SUSTAIN – US (from the clue) in STAIN (disgrace). | |
| 2 | France, say, removing pub, a survival from the past (5) |
| RELIC – Remove PUB from REPUBLIC (France, say). | |
| 3 | Sort out beforehand perimeter being confused with end (12) |
| PREDETERMINE – (perimeter + end)* | |
| 5 | Shorten a game (7) |
| ABRIDGE – A + BRIDGE (game)
A classic. |
|
| 6 | Observed spoken part of play (5) |
| SCENE – Sounds like (spoken) “seen” (observed). | |
| 7 | Support Remain (4) |
| STAY – A fourth double definition. | |
| 8 | See grub here cooked to follow cold fast food (12) |
| CHEESEBURGER – C for cold plus (see grub here)*.
As soon as I saw the word “cooked” I was looking for an anagram. I did a quick count of the letters in “see grub here”, realised I was one short and then read the rest of the clue and – lo and behold! – found the missing letter and instructions on where it had to go. |
|
| 14 | Kitchen stuff can frustrate (7) |
| TINFOIL – TIN (can), FOIL (frustrate). | |
| 16 | Sleeping porter missing his third shift finally (7) |
| DORMANT – DOORMAN (porter) minus the third letter [missing his third] + the last letter [finally] of |
|
| 17 | Fall quiet with irritation (5) |
| PITCH – P for quiet (from music) + ITCH (irritation).
“Pitch” meaning “fall” is almost always followed by “forward”. |
|
| 19 | Concealed five hundred on Noah’s ship (4) |
| DARK – D (five hundred, in Roman numerals) on ARK (Noah’s ship). | |
| 20 | Second time I note recurring image (5) |
| MOTIF – MO (second, as in “just a mo”), T for time, I, F (a musical note). | |
Thanks Doof for parsing Pin and Midsummer. I flew through this QC too without thinking about the proper parsing of these two. Enjoyable still.
Some tricky stuff here but managed to finish. Had some mers too about some, agree about chill/ icy not quite right. And thought maybe PROFIT could be pluralised for ’gains’. I think PITCH is referring to the pitch or ‘fall’ of a roof.
Thanks d and setter.
Took a leisurely approach, surprised to finish in 11 min regardless.
Parsed PIN post-solve, after some staring.
Couldn’t parse MIDSUMMER, quite clever.
Also: Ooh, love a quibble! Look forward to the debate in the comments.
The OED has several adjectival senses of “chill”, including “unpleasantly, depressingly, or injuriously cold”. That seems to match “icy”.
The “high ground” does seem questionable.
Thanks to Joker and Doofenschmirtz.
I read 23 across as ‘chill’ meaning ‘icy’ with ‘c’ in its meani g of about/circa removed.
Ha! I biffed midsummer without even considering the cryptic and moved on. I was going great guns, but in the end I got stuck on the should-be-obvious tinfoil and hill. I saw the tin part all right, but that was it. That gave me hill, my LOI.
Time: 8:08
I got stuck on tinfoil although it seems perfectly straightforward in retrospect
20 mins including screen freeze forcing me to go out and come back. NHO PIN re chess so put PAN for ‘attack’, only to be told later that I had an error somewhere. MIDSUMMER went unparsed.
You are not alone with PAN 🙂
Indeed, form an orderly queue.
Standing ( quietly) right behind you
😐😐😐😐😐
Me too!
Is there still room in the queue? 🙄
Collins has ‘hill’ as ‘an area of land that is higher than the land that surrounds it.’ So ‘high ground’ would seem to pass muster.
6-something for the puzzle. Liked MIDSUMMER.
Enjoyable puzzle from Joker. HNI about PIN I must say, and only understood that clue + RELIC and MIDSUMMER (v clever) when enlightened by the Doof. 8.57.
3:28. I liked the PIN/TINFOIL crossing, had to think a bit about that. I knew ‘pinning’ in chess despite being terrible at the game.
🚀
Done in 5:57 very nice puzzle but alas I failed on LOI PIN opting for PAN instead. As with others needed our blogger’s explanation of that one and COD MIDSUMMER.
CHILL
Merriam-Webster
adjective
1 a: moderately cold
b: COLD, RAW
2 : affected by cold chill travelers
3: DISTANT, FORMAL a chill reception
4: DEPRESSING, DISPIRITING Chill penury …—Thomas Gray
5: informal: having a laid-back style or easy demeanor
Dictionary.com
adjective
1. moderately cold; tending to cause shivering; chilly a chill wind
2. shivering with or affected by cold; chilly.
3. depressing or discouraging chill prospects
4. Slang., cool.
5. unduly formal; unfriendly; chilly a chill reception
Yes, a chill wind is an icy wind. Thanks for that.
Really pretty fast until the SW put the brakes on. I had taken a while over SUSTAIN/SOLVENT too. Took me an impressively long time to read the clue for PIN properly – nicely played Joker – and I was just slow to HILL. Typing ‘thron’ slowed my progress to TINFOIL. Good one! All green on 11.57.
I had no problems with this one, as Guy says, I immediately thought of “it’s a chill wind blows…”
I also liked MIDSUMMER, given your avatar, Doof, I’m surprised we didn’t get a comment along the lines of “104 days in summer vacation…”
Thanks for the blog, as ever.
10ac I read as: Arab is a breed of horse. Horses run. Leg markings on a horse are known as stockings.
Nice alternative theory
I got stuck on ladder…
me too, and consider it a better solution!
That was my reasoning too.
13:51 Well pin me up and cover me with tinfoil. That’s all I have been to say about that.
Ta DAJ
Mainly straightforward but the SW put up a bit of resistance.
Not being a chess player, PIN went in unparsed with a shrug and am now relieved that ‘pan’ didn’t occur to me as an option.
Started with PASS and finished with PIN in 6.23.
Thanks to Doofers and Joker.
Thanks Joker for an enjoyable 17.15. Put in midsummer with only the m, Failed to parse so took it out again. As each crosser arrive we looked at each other and said “still could be midsummer”. Had no choice to put it in at the end and thankful to Doofers for the insight, not one we would ever have worked out. Thought pin was synonym for pawn so got the right answer in the wrong way. Is there a term for that I wonder?
4.44
Up my street with both chess and bridge in the mix. PIN was clever. Thanks Joker/Doofers.
As per vinyl, with the added delay of putting PAN, not being able to parse it, and nagging away at it until PIN arrived.
07:50 for a Meh Day. MIDSUMMER very clever now Doof has explained it!
Many thanks Joker and Doofers.
13:48, a potential fast time stymied by worrying about my L2I HILL and MIDSUMMER. Failed to parse either in the end so two biffs to end what had until then been a speedy and satisfying solve. Could, perhaps should have got the parsing of HILL but MIDSUMMER was always beyond me – one of those clues in which the wordplay only emerges after you have the solution rather than leading you to it, and I am not good at those. Fortunately the definitions for both were friendly or the clock might still be running …
Many thanks Doofers for the blog.
RH was “easier than average”, but not the LH which was a struggle. LOI HILL but couldn’t see the icy, nor how other acrosses worked: priest? nobleman? chess attack? minute by minute? Still hoping everything is nevertheless somehow correct.
Oh. No it isn’t … guessed ScRIPt, no wonder there wasn’t any priest ….
Otherwise, got away with it, thanks Doofers.
Golly HILL is somewhere between difficult and obscure. Did think about whether hill and high ground can be said to be synonymous, and could concede that if you live on a hill (as we do) you live on high ground.
Living where you do, I presume you “never stare”, because you probably “just don’t care” – as sung by Steely Dan (Aja, 1977).
18:42 – DNF
Couldn’t parse 17a and went for PAN as in attack. MIDSUMMER also went unparsed.
Had a MER with PITCH but it couldn’t have been anything else.
All in all, a good work out.
FOI: REGATTA
LOI: TINFOIL/DNF
COD: DORMANT
Thanks to Joker and Doofers
Started quickly on this enjoyable puzzle, held up a little by SW corner. LOI TINFOIL – not sure why as it was quite obvious. Biffed MIDSUMMER – clever clue once explained. Thanks Doofers and Joker.
Couldn’t start then I suddenly got going. Finished all OK. LOI PIN, after some thought.
Much biffing today so blog much needed.
Thanks vm, Doofers.
It’s snowing in Hampshire!
I couldn’t login this morning. Too many failed attempts, not sure why that happened.
14 in 20 nothing else. Didn’t like the SW corner.
Nutshell
22:04 with PIN, MIDSUMMER DORMANT and CHILL unparsed. A fairly steady solve otherwise.
A good puzzle overall but I share some beefs above (esp. PAN which was the best I could manage for the (unheard of) PIN in chess. 15.50 with time wasted in the SW and, throughout, trying to scroll up and down to get an impression of the whole grid.
I was not impressed by my unparsed MIDSUMMER – too ‘clever’ by half, even with Doofer’s blog, for which thanks.
My grid was too big again – iPad solve, as always (using The Times online Classic app and Safari). However, as I finished, the grid magically reduced somewhat in size and the setter’s name suddenly appeared for the first time. I thought the online crossword glitches had been sorted……… They are seriously distracting.
Note added: the grid is too big on the ‘new’ Times app, too.
13:42. Started off by not being able to get the STRIPE anagram at 1a until I had a couple of crossers and it didn’t get much better. NHO the ‘chess attack’ sense of PIN which went in from wordplay, admittedly not all that confidently. I did work out the parsing of MIDSUMMER though which was some consolation for the slow time.
Thanks to Doofers and Joker
9:33 for the solve. Bucking the trend on liking MIDSUMMER – I’m somewhat meh on it. PIN LOI – bit of a nasty clue giving the four options of A,E,I,U in the middle and while I know something about chess, I’ve NHO of the PIN; so had to see “surrounded by=IN”. Some good double defs in there.
Anyway 2nd fastest Joker of the year – I’ve found him to be a tough this year so pleased to get through this unscathed. Maybe he is reverting to his past form as I recall four years ago there was often a clue like (PIN/PAN) begging for you to bung in the wrong letter for the DNF.
Thanks to Doofers for the blog and to Joker.
PS Noting last Friday’s oversize grid and dodgy font are back.
I’m glad the grid glitch isn’t just me and my setup!
I initially thought of “Pan”, as in attacking/criticising something by “panning” it. However, the “an” didn’t work with the “surrounded by”, and I couldn’t see the relevance of the “chess” element with that line of thinking, so “Pin” was the only option that made sense in the end.
Seems a lot of people above DNFed with PAN for reasons you explain. I was okay today but I recall times in the past how when presented with that range of options and bewilderment at a clue, any of them could see plausible. Earlier in my solve, I’d thought PAX might be a chess move with the “by” = X trick but eventually tinfoil put paid to that stupidity!
Dear Mr Plates,
Just to say that a FORK is another chess attack. I haven’t seen it come up here, but it’s simple enough and so may well do at some stage. We’ll see, I suppose.
9:31 Delighted with a sub ten minute solve, given that it was a) a Joker which I usually find tricky and b) the ugly and distracting font was back.
Needed the blog to parse PIN and MIDSUMMER, very much liked HORSE.
Thanks to Joker and Doofs.
Very pleasent thanks to both Joker and Doofers. I also had some unease at the ones mentioned by others, but all seem ok after reading the blog. As an industrial chemist I struggle to think of a solvent that is not used for cleaning, that is by far their most common usage. I could be wrong, just none spring to mind.
Well the stuff we used to glue our Airfix kits relied on the acetone contained dissolving the polystyrene?
When I worked in the tyre industry, various solvents were used in the compounding process and also to promote adhesion between different rubber components in the tyre. Benzene was used many years ago but was banned because of a link to bladder cancer. Same idea in the “rubber solution” you get in puncture repair kits.
Both benzene and acetone are/were very commonly used for cleaning. (Quite often the equipment used to make things would be cleaned with the solvents that the finished product contained)
Not quite on the same wavelength here – coming in at 14:41, a minute over my average. But in the most enjoyable, steady way. Liked the puzzle a lot.
I am usually a fan of the reverse cryptic clues, this one however feels more convoluted than they usually are
Slow to complete the SW quadrant but otherwise ok. I finished in 17 minutes but failed to parse RELIC and MIDSUMMER. I would never have understood the latter if I had stared at it all day and now that Doofers has explained it I am less than impressed.
FOI – 1ac STRIPE
LOI – 14dn TINFOIL
CODs – I very much liked mad Maggie and the sleeping porter.
Thanks to Joker and Doofers
Heading for a rare sub teens until stalled by HILL and the NHO PIN. Opted for PAN along the lines of ‘his idea was panned by others…’ : (
Overall very pleasant. Excellent blog. Have just learnt about NEAT and COW.
Thank you Joker and Doofers
16:34
LOI SUSTAIN/SOLVENT
Thought I had a nice sub five minutes with this one, but a quibble in the back of my mind a minute after I had completed it made me change my pan to a pin.
COD to Midsummer.
I liked the pedantic quibble about whether a hill is high ground. Of course it is I thought, but was amused by the thought that the bottom of the hill is in low ground. Nice one.
It reminds me of the golfers conundrum. You hit a putt, it goes all the way round the rim of the hole and comes back towards you. Has it gone through 120° or 360° of turn?
Enjoyable, easier than normal for a Joker puzzle, or maybe I’m just having a good week. All done in 7:39. Didn’t parse duke, although now obvious realising killing is an unusual deletion indicator. Would never have parsed midsummer, still don’t really understand it. Reading these comments makes me glad I know chess, pin was fairly easy.
4:47 finishing in the NW corner. Thanks Doofers and Joker. Noticing MIDSUMMER REGATTA in the grid I looked it up. It is an annual yacht race held at midsummer from the southernmost to the northernmost point of the Baltic Sea. Read about it here. I wonder if Joker is a yachtsman?
Fortunately my schoolboy days playing chess made the solving of PIN straightforward, or I would otherwise have struggled to pick the right option. Although MIDSUMMER came quickly to me, I never got my head round the parsing, so thank you Doofers for that. A beautifully crafted puzzle as always by The Joker, and my time of 7.44 was quicker than my average for this setter.
DNF as I couldn’t decide between PIN and PaN! Also initially put in maN until PITCH arrived. Thanks Doofers for parsing MIDSUMMER.
5:52
Like Doofers, off to a flying start, which didn’t last particularly long. Ground my way through with some inspired guesswork (PREDETERMINE), finally coming to settle on the same corner as everyone else. Having played chess, I was OK with PIN, and TIN seemed obvious for CAN, but it took seemingly ages to think of FOIL for frustrate. HILL from definition only – I don’t think that was a great clue.
Thanks Doofers and Joker
Lovely stuff as usual from Joker
COD. MIDSUMMER
Toyed with pan until the PIN dropped
Thanks Joker and Doofers
From RELIC to PIN in 8:36. I hesitated for a while over PIN, not knowing the chess term, but knowing that PAN did,’t parse. Fortunately I leapt the correct way from the fence. Biffed MIDSUMMER. Also paused to consider (c)HILL, but gave it the benefit of the doubt. Thanks Joker and Doofers.
NHO PIN as a chess term – I put in POP for pawn, as in Pop goes the Weasel, but then was utterly baffled when all I could get for TINFOIL was Topsoil……
Thanks J and D.
Another PAN here in an otherwise straightforward puzzle. Since the clue meant nothing to me, I went for the synonym for ‘attack’. A bit unfair for non-chess-players, really, as there’s nothing else to make sense of.
My thanks to Joker and Doofenschmirtz.
Easy except when it wasn’t.
18a Midsummer, I saw the MM minutes but didn’t solve the clue so thanks Doofenschmirtz.
2d Relic. Took an age to see Republic.
16d Dormant. Had to reread the clue three times.
Two sittings, the second of which was needed to spot the Dormant Legend (so many to choose from!) in the SE. However that turned out to be in vain because, while I probably have come across ‘pin’ as a chess term a long time ago, it certainly didn’t come to mind when needed today. An unparsed Pan was the result for a DNF.
CoD to the other Relic, though if I had managed to parse Midsummer, that would have got the nod. Invariant
16 mins…
I found this slightly trickier than most it seems – both 17ac “Pin” and 18ac “Midsummer” causing problems. Totally misparsed 10ac “Horse”, the question mark throwing me off and having me thinking that stockings was an elaborate stable.
FOI – 4ac “Pass”
LOI – 17ac “Pin”
COD – 14dn “Tinfoil”
Thanks as usual!
7.53 Only about half done on the first pass but the rest succumbed with checkers. MIDSUMMER was a biff. LEGEND LOI. Thanks Doofers and Joker.
Still don’t get MIDSUMMER I’m afraid. Does the wordplay simply mean “a word with two adjacent Ms in it”? Seems a bit vague if so.
Specifically two Ms in the middle of ‘summer’, hence “mid-summer”
Thanks for the explanation. Hmm, a bit too clever for its own good, as my granny would have said.
I agree, Mike. The wordplay does not point specifically at MIDSUMMER. It points to any word containing a double M and an indicator of where. INCOMMODE for example. But that doesn’t fit the definition (or the crossers). As others have said, the wordplay serves to confirm the answer once you have it!
Thank you. To split hairs further, “when days are longer” doesn’t point unequivocally to mid-summer either. Days are longer now than they will be in December.
DNF in 16:44, and you know why. I opted for PAN on the grounds that it’s an attack by a critic, but without any hope. Also, curses, foiled again, it took so so long to think of foil though I knew perfectly well what I was looking for. TINFOIL, no one in my world says that any more, it evokes the kitchen of my childhood. Everything else went smoothly, with MIDSUMMER my favorite.
Thanks a lot, Joker and thanks to Doof. I wanted to question your take on “hose”, and realised I can only hear it in my grandmother’s voice. More recent than the days of hose and doublet at least.