ST 4262 (Sun 3 Feb) – Essay crisis

Author   talbinhoPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
Solving time: 8:45

Unless I am very much mistaken there are two faulty clues in this puzzle, 23ac (OSIERS) and 20dn (ESSAYED). That a Sunday broadsheet crossword with a wide circulation and significant prize should contain such basic errors almost every week is really quite staggering. Perhaps the editor is blissfully unaware? Maybe I’ll write a letter one of these days.

* = anagram, “X” = sounds like ‘X’.

Across
1 RE(BUFF)S – I wrote in ‘bare’ for ‘naked’ here, which held me up.
5 COUP + LET
9 QUARRY (= ‘prey’) + MEN (= ‘chaps’) – this clue has a double definition; The Quarrymen was a ‘beat combo’ that evolved into The Beatles.
10 GIG + OT – ‘to return’ for ‘reverse of TO’ is pretty horrible; ‘with’ as a link word isn’t great either.
12 GRANDSON – just a pun on ‘grand’ = ‘august’, I think.
19 WAGE-FREEZE; (A GEEZER FEW)*
22 STAN + HOPE
23 OSIERS; O + (RISE)* [sic] – I suppose this was meant to say ‘Duck rises…’. The typist / printers may be the most likely culprits here.
26 OLIVE; O + rev. of EVIL
28 FIGMENT – a pun on ‘fruity’/’fig’; cf 12ac.
29 DI(S + US)ED

Down
3 F(ORB)EARS
5 CONFRONTED; CON + (FRED NOT)* – when solving I assumed this was a meaning of ‘confronted’ I’d never seen. In fact it’s the opposite: ‘beard’ can mean ‘to oppose resolutely’.
6 UR + GENT
7 LEG + IS + LATE
8 TITANIA; (I ATTAIN)*
13 ESCARPMENT; (RECENT MAPS)* – a good clue, but why the question mark?
15 ENDEARING; (IN A GENDER)*
17 PRES(AGE)S – I’d never heard the phrase ‘the fourth estate’, meaning ‘the press’, or for that matter of any of the first three estates: explanation here.
18 CAST OFF
20 ESSAYED; AY in (SEEDS)* ? – I don’t know where the AY comes from. The clue is: Endeavoured to make known seeds have been scattered around (7); I strongly suspect that ‘SAY’ in (SEED)* is intended. If it is, I don’t think the printers can be blamed for this one as ‘seed have been’ wouldn’t make sense.

3 comments on “ST 4262 (Sun 3 Feb) – Essay crisis”

  1. I guess the setter could just wriggle out of this one by pointing out that as the plural of seed can be seed or seeds, ‘seeds’ could be used as a synonym for ‘seed’. For the word itself I’d count this as very sneaky but just OK. But using this kind of substitution with an anagram would still be beyond the pale for me.
    1. I assumed the Ay was an alternative of Aye. Meaning an affirmative vote or possibly ‘to make known’
  2. There are XI answers on the bench – i.e. left out of the blog:

    11a One of two or (three I)* take out (6)
    EITHER

    14a (One is right)*, maybe, to be indulging in speculation (10)
    THEORISING

    16a Thanks and cheerio! (2,2)
    TA TA

    18a Novel ending for fish with a tail (4)
    COD A. Funny – I have only seen a CODA in a piece of music. Do books have them too?

    27a (Green! Mercy)* trip right away needed, to this ward (9)
    EMERGENCY. The extra R is expelled by the “right away”.

    1d Demand engineers join the expedition (7)
    RE QUEST

    2d Be a good person, or a rotter (5)
    BE A ST

    4d Wrestling score – nil (4)
    SUM 0

    21d A good idea, so to breathe? (6)
    WHEEZE

    24d Occupants of the biggER NESts? (5)
    ERNES. Sea eagles from Loch Erne?

    25d Clue found in subtLE ADmission (4)
    LEAD

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