Sunday Times 4772 by Jeff Pearce

Author   keriothePosted on Categories Weekend Cryptic
10:15. I always used to find Jeff Pearce’s puzzles the easiest of the Sunday cryptic setters, but of late he seems to have upped his game and produced some very fine and difficult puzzles. This one is something of a return to older form, with quite a few very simple clues. There’s nothing wrong with that, of course: it’s entirely a good thing in my view to have variability in difficulty with these things, and I’m not sure the setters and editor would be able to prevent it if they tried. Whilst not difficult this is a well-put-together puzzle that was fun to solve.

I have one query at 2dn: I think my interpretation is right but I’m not entirely happy with my interpretation of the wordplay so I wonder if I’m not missing something better. Answers in the comments please!

Definitions are underlined, anagrams indicated like (THIS)*.

Across
1 Call about books used to make hearty dish
POTAGE – P(OT)AGE.
4 Yale finally reward American academic no longer in post
EMERITUS – yalE, MERIT, US.
10 Force prisoners onto coach
CONSTRAIN – CONS, TRAIN.
11 Challenge leader of Brexit party
BRAVE – Brexit, RAVE.
12 Fat Queen’s supplies of food
LARDERS – LARD, ER’S.
14 Pass cheese around old church – something to accompany it?
BRIOCHE – BRI(O, CH)E. This might seem an odd combination but burger buns are often made of BRIOCHE these days so it’s not such a stretch.
15 “Goodbye to Berlin”?
AUF WIEDERSEHEN – this is a cryptic definition, but only just.
18 Beastly New Guinean police forbid march around island
BIRD OF PARADISE – (FORBID)*, PARAD(IS)E. I thought this definition was a bit precise, since these birds are found in a wider area than just PNG. However a quick look at Wikipedia reveals that whilst this is true, they are quite geographically constrained to an area around PNG including Indonesia and parts of Australia.
22 Revolutionary London college with a top football team
CHELSEA – CHE, LSE, A.
24 Engineers enter dock on English warship
TRIREME – TRI(RE)M, E.
25 A large weapon creates panic
ALARM – A, L, ARM.
26 I ignored label put on a massive battle-axe
TERMAGANT – TERM, A, GiANT.
28 Cheap yet novel pirate equipment
EYE-PATCH – (CHEAP YET)*. What does a pirate say on his 80th birthday? ‘Aye, matey!’
29 Expose the truth about controversial food
REVEAL – RE, VEAL. It is an utterly absurd truth that veal remains controversial decades after the cruel treatment that made it so was outlawed across Europe.

Down
1 After spillage I clear up rum
PECULIAR – (I CLEAR UP)*.
2 With Sun obscured chap won’t!
TAN – the closest I can get the wordplay here is sTAN. S for ‘sun’ is in Chambers, but Chambers is notoriously liberal with abbreviations, and this one isn’t in either ODO or Collins, which I thought were the more usual sources for these puzzles.
3 Start losing support?
GET BEHIND – sort of a DD, although the first isn’t really a recognised expression: you’d say ‘fall behind’.
5 Small check for drinks found here? Possibly not
MINIBAR – MINI (small), BAR (check). Semi-&Lit, with a reference to the fact that drinks in these little fridges are notoriously expensive.
6 Inferior player has time off to become teacher
RABBI – RABBIt. I learned this term for a weak player in cricket or other sports from a past crossword, naturally.
7 Uninspired about plot to finally remove loyal Tory in the 1980s
THATCHERITE – T(HATCH, removE)RITE. There still seem to be a few of them about.
8 Surrendered say, to such top players?
SEEDED – sounds like ‘ceded’.
9 Dad exercised and took a rest
PAUSED – PA, USED.
13 Chop up rare fig tree to get cool
REFRIGERATE – (RARE FIG TREE)*.
16 After a time command without heart and commit mass
destruction
ERADICATE – ERA, DICtATE.
17 Pleased with journalist’s last moving column
PEDESTAL – (PLEASED, journalisT)*.
19 Crazy female led movement out of control
FRANTIC – F, RAN, TIC.
20 Book about older fringe performers
ACTORS – ACT(OldeR)S. A reference here to a book of the bible I have heard of.
21 Small wrap contains last of cucumber pickle
SCRAPE – S, C(cucumbeR)APE.
23 Steps taken to get son a management qualification
SAMBA – S, A, MBA.
27 Place to leave fruit for parrot
APE – APplE.

21 comments on “Sunday Times 4772 by Jeff Pearce”

  1. I biffed a couple, 18ac from checkers (are birds beasts?), finally discovering to my surprise that ‘police’ was the anagrind; not a word I would have expected in that role, but. I had the same interpretation of TAN as K did; and I suppose its being Sunday means that S=sun is to be expected. One hatches a plot, if so inclined, but does one ever just hatch intransitively? They hatched to blow up Parliament? or the Gunpowder Hatch?
    1. 18ac The King James bible certainly differentiates: ‘And out of the ground the Lord God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air’. Also other versions refer to ‘birds of the sky’.

      Chambers list of anagrinds includes ‘police’and there’s a definition ‘make orderly’. I think the only time I’ve come across it in that sense is in the Tom Lehrer song about army life:

      Now Al joined up to do his part defending you and me
      He wants to fight and bleed and kill and die for liberty
      With the hell of war he’s come to grips
      Policing up the filter tips
      It makes a fellow proud to be a soldier!

      S for ‘sun’ is a little surprising but as you say, perhaps not so in an ST puzzle.

      I completed this in 29 minutes.

      Edited at 2017-11-19 06:02 am (UTC)

      1. Not sure if I’ve ever heard that Lehrer number; I cottoned the anagram indicator from the phrase “to police one’s brass”, meaning to gather empty shell casings from the ground after firing an automatic weapon. Pops up in American police procedurals every now and again.

        I wonder if Lehrer’s filter tips line might be a direct reference to that, which would presumably be a military pastime, too…

        Edited at 2017-11-19 10:39 pm (UTC)

    2. I had the same thought about ‘hatch’ but figured it is so closely associated with the word ‘plot’ that it was OK, on a practical ‘is this solvable’ level if nothing else.
      I actually thought that S for ‘sun’ was particularly surprising in a Sunday puzzle since Peter Biddlecombe has commented on the admissibility of abbreviations in the past and said that he allows them if they’re in Collins or ODO. Mind you I’m not sure he’s ever said that he will never allow them if they’re not.

      Edited at 2017-11-19 07:49 am (UTC)

  3. I’ve got to make BIRDS OF PARADISE COD for the great Pretenders track. Chrissie Hynde is always on a LOI PEDESTAL for me. On the easyish side, at 22 minutes. I had TAN = CHAP both your way K, and from some memory of chapped for worn leather (also CHAPS as leather leggings as worn by cowboys), which I think is more likely. Thank you K and Jeff.
  4. 35 mins for me but a misspelt 15ac. I didn’t do German at school and even though the expression is familiar, for some reason I could not work out the last five letters and plumped for -seien. I didn’t get as far as looking at wordplay for a remove letter type clue in 2dn, I just thought it was a bit of a weak cryptic definition and moved on. COD 17dn. 22ac my only quibble where, as a supporter of another London club I can see the revolutionary CHE, the London college LSE and the with a A but just cannot square the definition “top football team” with the solution Chelsea. “Vulgar arrivistes with no class”, “bunch of cheating prima donnas”, “shameful mediocrities” etc perhaps but “top football team”, surely not.
    1. I guess they did win the premier league last year, SB, and they have two ex-Wanderers in Gary Cahill and Marcos Alonso, so I filled it in without too much a qualm. Gary’s a top man.
  5. An enjoyable but not too difficult puzzle which took me 21:34. I didn’t worry too much about 2d either. Thought HATCH was close enough to plot. I did wonder about beasts for birds, but it was obviously the answer. I assume special_bitter is not a Chelsea fan:-) Nice puzzle. Thanks Jeff and K.
    1. Indeed not, John. Btw you can tell how frightfully middle-class I am, I don’t think “vulgar arrivistes” is ever going to make it as a chant on the terraces. If anyone wants me I’ll be tucking into the prawn sandwiches.
  6. Sun => S: a bit of local tradition – shortly after getting the editing job, I was assured, by more than one setter IIRC, that it had been allowed in the past. And both S and Sun can represent Sunday as well as the sun. The dictionaries are not quite the final word. I’ve also told our setters that I would accept Yes=>Y and No=>N from real life, but I think we’ve had just one usage.
  7. Yes, this was fairly easy going for a Sunday I was there after 35 mins.

    FOI 15ac AUF WIEDERSEHEN – back in the sixties there used to be a butchers in Dusseldorf that went by the name of Alf Wiedersehen & Son Gmbh.

    My LOI was 17dn PEDESTAL

    COD 18ac BIRD OF PARADISE which was a ‘Snowy’ White instrumental if memory serves.

    WOD goes to 7dn THATCHERITE sounds like a Carboniferous geological term these days.

    Edited at 2017-11-19 12:16 pm (UTC)

    1. On the theme of funny German shop names, I once saw a florists in Munich called “Blumen Eck”. Ann
  8. I just noticed: you’ve got strikeout type where you want an underline, K.
    While I’ve got your attention, I meant to mention 6d: Some time ago, I objected to RABBI being defined as ‘priest’, since rabbis aren’t priests, and got into a short argument with Peter about it. Since then, RABBI has appeared I believe three times, always defined as ‘teacher’. Now if I can only get the setters to realize that the Cree live in Canada, my work here will be done.

    Edited at 2017-11-19 01:05 pm (UTC)

  9. The only problems I had were with the “beastly” bird and the veal. I kept looking for some form of foie gras… 17.18
  10. This was a good puzzle for the aspiring QCer. Relatively easy entry points at 15a and 13d; GK not too hard -Trireme from the poem.
    Bird of Paradise unparsed – I now learn the POLICE was the anagrind.
    LOI was Tan as nothing much else would fit. Took me a while and enjoyed it thoroughly. David
  11. Bit late in the day with my comment I’m afraid K, but for what it’s worth (which is really nothing following PB’s helpful intervention from on high) I also tentatively assumed your parsing re. TAN but bunged it in with a bit of a shrug.

    Two relatively straightforward STs in a row – kind of dreading today’s from Dean (not had a chance to look at it yet…)

    Thanks K and Jeff.

  12. 51 minutes for me. FOI 1d PECULIAR, LOI 15 AUF WIEDERSEHEN, but only because I wasn’t sure how to spell it. I never studied German, nor watched enough Auf Wiedersehen, Pet to memorise in which order the letters went! Had to wait for my second-to-last 3d GET BEHIND before I could finish it off with certainty.

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