Saturday Times 24239 (May 30th)

Author   linxitPosted on Categories Weekend Cryptic
Solving time 16:20, although it probably wasn’t that difficult as I had a major hangover at the time and found it hard to concentrate! Quite a fun puzzle though, with some amusing definitions and a bit of literary knowledge required.

Across
1 DARKROOM – ARK, R inside DOOM. A couple of good definitions here, “flood carrier” and “developing area”, both deceptive but fair.
5 CHANEL – CHAN(n)EL
8 SUS – S + US.
9 MAIDENHOOD – AID in MEN, + HOOD.
10 AVAILING – A + V(olume) + AILING
11 OPENER – P.E. (sports) inside ONE (united), + R(esistance). Definition is “first in” (in e.g. cricket).
12 TOFU – hidden in “sorT OF Un-meat”.
14 HORSE SENSE – cryptic definition. In Gulliver’s Travels, the Yahoos are a group of savage humanoids, as opposed to the intelligent and rational Houyhnhnms, who are horses.
17 EAST OF EDEN – (to see Dean + f)*. a 1955 film starring James Dean, so the clue is &lit.
20 TAKE – double definition. Think of “approach” as a noun. Also used (as 20) in the first couple of down clues.
23 BODICE – BOD + ICE
24 CLEAN-CUT – C(old) + LEAN + CUT
25 INTERTWINE – T(annin) inside INERT + WINE
26 ADO – D(ram)A reversed + O, ref. the Shakespeare play Much Ado About Nothing.
27 LEADED – A.D. (these days) inside LEED (singular northern city!)
28 TENTACLE – L(ength) inside TENT ACE.

Down
1 DISMANTLE – DI’S MAN + (let)*.
2 RESTAFF – REST + A + FF
3 RUMBLE – double definition.
4 ONION DOME – (mood in)* inside ONE.
5 CONSOLE – CON + SOLE
6 ATONEMENT – (Mount Etna -U + E)*
7 ENDLESS – END + LESS
13 UNTAINTED – (attend uni)*
15 SHELLFIRE – S + HELLFIRE
16 ELECTRODE – RODE underneath ELECT.
18 AGONISE – ON,IS inside AGE.
19 FUEL ROD – cryptic definition. In films they always get retracted with 2 seconds to go before reactor meltdown.
21 ARCHAIC – CHAI(r) inside ARC.
22 LAMENT – L(ine) + AMEN + T(imed)

18 comments on “Saturday Times 24239 (May 30th)”

  1. Took me about 13 mins from memory and thought it was quite entertaining. Over to Jimbo …
  2. I also enjoyed this one but didn’t find it particularly difficult. I can never remember a week after the event how long they took me but I recall I was on to my second mug of coffee whereas the previous two Saturdays were finished before my first, so say 25 minutes. I liked the James Dean reference although easy for me because all the girls of my generation used to swoon over him.

    It’s a pity these Saturday puzzles don’t get a wider audience on the blog because I think today’s would spark a comment or three, unless I’m not understanding it properly yet.

    1. It’s certainly one of the toughest this year for me – hopefully it’ll herald in a new spell of classic Saturday puzzles. BTW, today’s Guardian puzzle is interesting: a new setter (Biggles), and several other setters’ names appearing in the clues. I haven’t started solving it yet so I don’t know how hard it is, but as I said, looks interesting!
      1. Biggles is occasional rather than new – Biggles author was W.E. Johns so the setters are “We Johns” – at least Henderson and Halpern, probably one or two others.
      2. With two interlocking clues in the NE corner unsolved I had to go out for a while. I’ve just sat down and finished it off – phew! All completely fair but tough – just what the doctor ordered. Now I can have a go at the Guardian.
  3. The fact that it is so many puzzles ago means one has either sorted it without the blog, or lost interest. I like to read the explanations even if I didn’t think I needed them, and the comments however few, but for the Saturdays and Jumbos it seems less important!
  4. More than half an hour for this, with FUEL ROD defeating me for a long time. I loved DARK ROOM.

    I’m still scratching my head over today’s with one clue still unsolved. I have a horrible feeling I’ve goofed somewhere. Still, I’ve got a week to figure it out!

    1. 8 down finally dawned on me. And it only took 36 hours for the one clue. As the man wrote in his letter to The Times: “Sir, I have a large black disc with a hole in the middle. Is this a record?”
  5. Enjoyed this one and thought ELECTRODE was pretty good. I have my own strange way of evaluating puzzles as opposed to the completion time or the QED score.
    To get myself off to sleep, I try to remember the answers from that morning’s puzzle (they get here at 7am which is pretty late in the day for us country folk!) I guess this is a measure of how *memorable* a puzzle is. Rarely score more than about 15/16 — about half the answers on average.
    I think today’s (24245) will get a pretty high M-score though. There are notes all over the page and loads of things I don’t understand but … at least there’s a letter in every square!
  6. unfortuately a comment on a xword 7 days after seems somehow irrelevant. equally im sure yesterdays xword would have encouraged much debate if it happened on the day. however if anyone is alive out there could they explain bod(y) = soul. to me they are opposites.
    1. bod = person, soul = person, therefore bod = soul. Only one of the various meanings has to match.
  7. 11:29, with one mistake: FREE ROD for FUEL ROD (19dn), the last in.  That was just me being thick, but it’s a nice illustration of the dark side of cryptic definitions: once you’ve understood them, you only have one route to the answer.  Thanks for the explanation of 14ac (HORSE SENSE) – yet another reminder that I must read Gulliver’s Travels some time.  A Tale of a Tub is wonderful.

    I don’t see how 17ac (“Potential to see Dean with film’s lead”) works as a definition of EAST OF EDEN.  And AMEN (22dn) confirms a wish or a statement, so it would be odd to say it at the end of a hymn; only the Concise Oxford mentions such a use.

    Clues of the Day: 12ac (TOFU), 5dn (CONSOLE).

    1. I think the COED reference is justification enough for Times Cryptic purposes however, going back to my days as a choirboy (yes, I know this hard to imagine and I can hardly believe it myself now) we used to sing “Amen” at the end of every hymn.
      1. In that case, fair enough!  (But still odd.)  On the general point, though, editors shouldn’t rely on dictionaries without using their discretion.  The Concise Oxford is usually precise with its definitions, but Collins is regrettably loose, as contributors to this blog have often noted, and the scattergun approach in Chambers means that it should be used with extreme caution (which it isn’t).
          1. That’s fascinating – thanks for seeking it out.  I’m glad to have the Presbyterian Association of Musicians on my side.
    2. Less than 20 minutes with HORSE SENSE jumping out as I had just finished re-reading Gulliver’s Travels. It was a mere nanosecond for EAST OF EDEN to go in. One of those instances when seemingly no thought is involved Now, on reflection, having come here I see it’s an
      anagram. TO SEE DEAN (F)ilm’s.
      Oddly it was SUS that had me for a while.
      And ditto to jackkt’s comment below.

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