Saturday Times 25717 (22nd Feb)

Posted on Categories Weekend Cryptic
Solved in 15:44, so about average in difficulty. I didn’t realise until I came to do the blog, but there’s a long run of double definitions and semi-cryptic double definitions in the middle of the acrosses. Seems to be a new feature of Saturday puzzles as there were loads last week as well. COD to 25ac for the humour value.

Across
1 BIASED – BASED (grounded) around I (one).
5 CALENDAR – cryptic definition.
9 PANDEMIC – PAN (god) + DEMI (half) + C(aught).
10 CANOPY – COPY (contribution to magazine) around A N(ew).
11 LAYMAN – LAY MAN.
12 LAST POST – double definition.
14 NUTS AND BOLTS – double definition (NUTS = headbutts, but I’ve a feeling Americans might not be aware of that slang).
17 BOW AND SCRAPE – double definition.
20 GREY AREA – double definition, one cryptic.
22 ROUTER – double definition.
23 TIVOLI – I LOVE IT, minus the E from the end of “pleasure”. Also appeared last Thursday with a very similar clue – “Town near Rome – I adore that place when English must go back (6)”
25 RETAILER – RE-TAILER. Made me chuckle anyway.
26 PEARMAIN – (th)E + ARM inside PAIN (French bread). Despite the name, it’s a variety of apple.
27 COGENT – CO GENT.

Down
2 IN A WAY – IN (home) + AWAY (the opposite).
3 SEDIMENTARY – (dynamiters, E)*.
4 DOMINATED – ATE (took meal) inside DO MIND (actually care).
5 CECILIA – CE (church) + CILIA (lashes). Patron saint of musicians.
6 LOCUS – LOC(k) (nearly secure) + US (American).
7 NUN – hidden in London University.
8 APPOSITE – OPPOSITE (against) with a different first letter.
13 PROSECUTING – PROSE (be boring) + CUT IN (interrupt) + G(ood). I didn’t know PROSE could be used as a verb that way, but Chambers has it “to speak or write tediously”.
15 DIACRITIC – ID (papers) reversed + A CRITIC (a judge). Any mark on a letter, such as an acute accent or umlaut etc.
16 LORRAINE – LORE (old wives’ tales) around RAIN (bad weather).
18 CHAGRIN – GR (king) inside CHAIN (badge of office perhaps).
19 AEGEAN – sounds like E.G. (for example) + AN.
21 RAITA – sounds like RIGHTER, i.e. more APPOSITE. I lot of people will make a fuss about this one, but to me a homophone just has to “sound like”, not “sound exactly identical to”. Anyway, the answer is an Indian dip, usually made with yoghurt and cucumber.
24 OAR – HOAR (frost) without the H.

22 comments on “Saturday Times 25717 (22nd Feb)”

  1. No time for this one but I know I had problems finishing off the SE corner. Several unknowns including PROSE, CILIA and OAR = “sweep”.
  2. Overall a puzzle of average difficulty but containing two features that when I was a setter my editor would have kicked firmly into the long grass

    The first is the tedious long run of double-definitions

    The second is the homophone used to clue a foreign word. To get a homophone to work in received English can be difficult; to also work in most regional accents is much harder; to throw in a foreign word for good measure is asking for trouble!

    1. I’m generally a homophone libertarian but I’d have to agree on this one, mainly because I’ve always pronounced RAITA with 3 distinct syllables and didn’t realise anyone pronounced it any other way.

      I hadn’t noticed the run of DDs because I solve in a somewhat random manner, but seeing them listed above the imbalance does rather leap out.

      1. The trouble is Rowan Atkinson’s ‘Paperback Raita’ gag doesn’t work if it isn’t a homophone.
        1. I had to Google that one. I’ve obviously been going to the wrong curry houses.
  3. 20m for this, but with one wrong: CECELIA. I thought that was how you spelled the name and as far as I was concerned CELIA was as likely as CILIA. On reflection it isn’t.
    A few rather irritating things in this:
    > Excessive quantity of DDs
    > The non-homophone in 19dn. I didn’t mind 21dn – that’s how I say RAITA – but that’s not how I say AEGEAN.
    > 26ac. PEARMAIN is an obscure word. I dislike it when obscure words are clued using other obscure words, but for Pete’s sake can we at least stick to English?
    It was very odd on Thursday to have almost exactly the same clue in exactly the same place. And frustrating today to spend half an hour staring at two clues!

    Edited at 2014-03-01 10:35 am (UTC)

  4. About 50 mins for this one and I certainly didn’t find it easy. I finished in the SW with the OAR/PEARMAIN crossers, and I really didn’t like the way the clue for OAR read.
  5. Hmm.. I see the Irritation Brigade (IB, Sotira) has spread to the weekend now. I am surprised to see the Worcester Pearmain (among many other cultivars)relegated to obscurity, but then I am surrounded by orchards here in Kent. Among other claims to fame it is a parent of the Discovery variety.
    Both homophones work for me, but surely a little elasticity is needed, if homophones are to be used as clues at all? I can’t imagine 19dn actually being a hard clue to solve.
    Prose as a verb will be well known to the G. Heyer brigade!

    Edited at 2014-03-01 11:11 am (UTC)

    1. For a moment there, Jerry, I though you were suggesting I had Irritable Bowel Syndrome and it was affecting my comments but I now realise you were offering another abbreviation for the list. Quite a relief as, despite my comment above, I like to think I’m more often in the Setters Defence League these days.
      1. SDL.. I like it! Count me in..

        The abbreviation database must be getting quite large now?

        1. “Abbreviation Database” might be rather overstating the grandeur of it. It’s more back of a fag packet, computer-wise, but it is growing, yes. One day, when I need another distraction from work, I’ll try to collate it all (back of an envelope, maybe).
  6. Well, I liked this a lot, even though it took an age. I took ‘pain’ to be derivable indirectly from ‘stick’ = punishment via ‘grief’, which would be a synonym for either. Maybe I wasn’t using my loaf….No problem with the homophones, but then, so long as they’re not Spoonerisms, there hardly ever is from this quarter.
  7. Found this a real slog, with much time at the end spent on the OAR/PEARMAIN crossing, as I wanted OAR to be OFF (with office being some word for “front of house” that I’d never heard of, and OFF being some word meaning sweep that I’d never heard of) and I’d considered PEARMAIN but thought it was a drink and couldn’t see any likely parsing anyway. Eventually realised that I had the wrong frost, though the wording of the clue is at best clunky.

    I (finally) parsed PEARMAIN as PIN around E+ARM+A, so no French needed.

    I must admit that I don’t get any great enjoyment out of puzzles like this.

  8. I appear to have found this hard work too – 28 mins with Tippex and writing over. Still having TIVOLI in this one helped with another puzzle elsewhere during the week.
  9. About 35 mins apparently.

    I am all for the new Editor clamping down on homophones. I wrote in AEGEAN but rightly or wrongly, I do not pronounce it EG. RAITA was fine as I know no other way of pronouncing it but I am sure that Nairobi Wallah would have a slightly different take on it. Solving crosswords should not depend on your accent.

  10. For 21dn I assumed that the setter’s pronounciation of RAITA was more like ‘rater’ (to rhyme with crater) than ‘righter’, so the homophone is easier to explain as composed of ‘eighter’ (more 8) with ‘r’ (our). However I always use the three syllable version espoused by sotira when I’m in my local Indian restaurant.
  11. I liked this one (which, no doubt, translates as “happened to coincide with my current level of capability and also just happened to have the required GK – e.g. cross of Lorraine” – challenging but got there in the end).

    Interested to read the homophone debate in the comments. Personally I had no issues with Raita or Aegean, which probably just means I happen to share the setter’s pronunciation.

    That said, I see the force of the regional accents issue, particularly as my wanderings have resulted in my acquiring a most peculiar hybrid mode of pronunciation that is part Somerset and part Australian, whilst still retaining a splash of the rounded vowels favoured at Cambridge and the London bar in the late 70’s / early 80’s.

    I await with some trepidation the homophones dished up by a setter from Wigan. An old pal of mine from that fine town pronounced “fair hair” as “fur her”: sadly, I have no recollection of him ever having been called upon to pronounce Raita, so no idea what would have happened at that point…

    Edited at 2014-03-02 12:42 am (UTC)

  12. I mistakenly parsed CALENDAR as a very forced “Call Linda” homophone (don’t ask how I missed the other definitions, I don’t know), so I was ready for an IB vs SDL tiff. I don’t know RAITA, so a) had to use aids, and b) can’t appreciate the finer points of the discussion above.
  13. I disagree that this has anything to do with a French stick (Pain). I took ‘stick’ = ‘pin’ and the explanation is therefore:
    PEARMAIN – (th)E + ARM + A inside PIN.
    Sorry about anon. message. Must get round to registering.
    1. Yes sorry, I hadn’t noticed mohn2’s message either, but I see your point. I hadn’t realised the importance of “tip of the”, and postulated “stick = French bread = pain” as a last resort at the time.

  14. Only just noticed that mohn2 has already pointed this out. Comment superfluous.

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