Sunday Times 4966 by David McLean

Author   keriothePosted on Categories Weekend Cryptic
12:00. A relatively straightforward offering from Harry this week. Writing up the blog I was struck by how many fairly simple DDs and anagram clues there are. A fun puzzle though, with some neat touches notably the definitions in 20ac, 3dn, 16dn.

Definitions are underlined, anagrams indicated like (TIHS)*, anagram indicators are in italics.

Across
1 Getting winded is so exhilarating
BREATHTAKING – two definitions, one very mildly cryptic: if you’re winded your breath is taken.
9 Celtic love thrashing United
COLLECTIVE – (CELTIC LOVE)*.
10 Mouthy old dons judge addressed in court
LOUD – m’L(O)UD.
11 Curt member’s position at Lord’s?
SHORT LEG – SHORT (curt), LEG (member).
12 Company of soldiers in hearing
TROUPE – sounds like ‘troop’.
13 Express pleasure for Conservative line
CROW – C, ROW. Slightly imprecise definition.
15 Female rips up climber’s charts?
RELIEF MAPS – (FEMALE RIPS)*.
17 Data vegans distributed about benefits
ADVANTAGES – (DATA VEGANS)*.
19 Orderly volunteers nurse for retirement
NEAT – reversal of TA (volunteers), EN (Enrolled Nurse).
20 Meat and a lot of fancy food as a prize
HAMPER – HAM, PER (a). A neat clue, where the hidden a=PER and rather long-winded definition fool you (or me, anyway) into looking for wordplay where there is none.
22 Salt firm regret backing foe of Farage
EUROCRAT – reversal of TAR, CO, RUE.
24 Set containing a pearl
BEAD – BE(A)D. Set/bed here are verbs, I think, as used in jewellery.
25 Dairy product cattle dole out
DOLCELATTE – (CATTLE DOLE)*.
26 Spirit that’s a double
DOPPELGANGER – CD. A DOPPELGANGER is ‘a ghostly duplicate of a living person’. I’ve only ever come across it with a non-ghostly meaning, just referring to a look-alike.
Down
2 One employed to measure up The Queen?
RULER – DD.
3 Caterer cooked with coal and gas?
ACCELERATOR – (CATERER COAL)*. Good one, the definition isn’t easy to spot here.
4 Raleigh manufactured product used on crops
HAIR GEL – (RALEIGH)*.
5 Parrot or gorilla?
APE – DD.
6 One’s left by lover hiding drug dependency
ISLE OF MAN – I’S, L (E), OF (by), MAN (lover). Of/by is a bit oblique to me but the meanings intersect in the phrase ‘he was beloved of/by all.’ At least that’s the best I can come up with. The IoM is a Crown Dependency.
7 Good cut of meat — beef?
GRUMP – G, RUMP.
8 Got to love article on queen infiltrating plot
BOTHERED – B(O, THE, R)ED.
12 Climber dealing with a broken limb?
TREE SURGEON – CD.
14 Done with wearing winter clothes?
WRAPPED UP – DD.
16 Game flappers not hot for louts
PEASANTS – PhEASANTS. ‘Game flappers’, ho ho.
18 Dismal criminal getting bird
GREYLAG – GREY, LAG.
21 A commander at the front
AHEAD – A, HEAD.
23 Charlie worried about queen’s old car
CRATE – C(R), ATE.
25 One involved in Yahtzee or Go.
DIE – DD.

23 comments on “Sunday Times 4966 by David McLean”

  1. 6D: The best of=by example I thought of was “the works of William Shakespeare”
    1. Hmm. To me the words don’t mean the same thing in that context, even if the end result is the same. Although I don’t think anyone would even say ‘the works by William Shakespeare’.

      Edited at 2021-08-08 05:42 am (UTC)

        1. But my point is that you can’t substitute ‘of’ with ‘by’ in the phrase ‘the plays of Shakespeare’. ‘Without’ does mean ‘outside’, although it’s archaic (and very similar to the Scottish ‘outwith’).
          1. I like the plays of William Shakespeare but not the plays by Pinter.

            I like the plays of Pinter but not the plays by William Shakespeare.

            Surely close enough?

            1. Not to me. One conveys possession (they are his) the other the act of authorship (he wrote them).
              If I say ‘I like the shoes that Jane bought’ or ‘I like the shoes that Jane owns’, I am conveying the same message but that doesn’t mean that ‘owns’ is synonymous with ‘bought’.
              [Leaving aside the fact that no-one would ever actually say ‘I like the plays by Shakespeare’ in place of ‘I like the plays of Shakespeare’]

              Edited at 2021-08-08 03:44 pm (UTC)

  2. I, on the contrary, was first aware of the word as denoting a supernatural, or at least uncanny, apparition. Shelley was sure spooked when he met his.

    Edited at 2021-08-08 01:18 am (UTC)

  3. What Guy said, although I first came across the word in Poe. The clue hardly seemed cryptic. I worried about BEAD, but couldn’t see anything else. DNK DOLCELATTE. Didn’t much care for APE or TROUPE, but I liked COLLECTIVE.
    1. As the bookmobile that made regular stops in the remote West Virginia hamlet of my childhood was supplied, for some reason, with The Complete Edgar Allan Poe, in multiple annotated volumes, each of which I eagerly consumed, it is highly probable that I first encountered this word in “William Wilson” (I haven’t checked, but it must be there). Shelley’s allegedly first-person account was just what sprang to mind tonight.

      Edited at 2021-08-08 04:40 am (UTC)

  4. Man=lover in 6d? I still don’t get this, and so hesitated to put it in until all the crossers left no alternative. Louts as peasants left me cold too. A gentle Sunday otherwise 17:29
    1. He’s not much for looks/and no hero out of books/is my man. for instance
      I agree with you on PEASANTS.
  5. 23 minutes, so quite easy for a Sunday puzzle.

    I thought the HAMPER definition was rather good as it may be a prize in an auction in which case it might be termed a ‘lot’.

    I’m not sure if those disliking peasant/lout are disputing it or simply saying they don’t care for the definition, but it’s valid and SOED dates it back to the 16th century: peasant – a person of low social status; an ignorant, stupid, or unsophisticated person; a boor, a lout. Now colloq.

    Edited at 2021-08-08 05:40 am (UTC)

    1. Collins and ODE have the same meaning for “peasant”, though without “lout” in the text.
  6. ….but he was doing her wrong”. I just didn’t get 6D, but biffed it anyway — I had my original honeymoon in the IOM in 1970 and haven’t been back since. I must rectify that omission before I shuffle off this mortal coil.

    The easiest ST for quite some time, but overall an enjoyable puzzle.

    FOI BREATHTAKING
    LOI BEAD
    COD DOPPELGANGER
    TIME 7:51

  7. Took me a while to get going with this one.
    I’m still a bit dubious about ISLE OF MAN, but it had to be that.
    In 17ac is the word ‘about’ superfluous?
    FOI: SHORT LEG
    LOI: PEASANTS
    COD: TREE SURGEON.
    Thank you keriothe!
    1. It’s needed for the surface reading, and ‘distributed about’ seems fine to me as an anagram indicator.
  8. I found this reasonably straightforward taking 24 minutes on it. COD to HAIR GEL. I could think of enough examples of ‘by’ meaning ‘of’ not to worry about the Isle of Man, but it did offend this proud owner of a 1961 O level Latin, with ‘of’ genitive and ‘by’ ablative. Grammar schools have a lot to answer for. A pleasant puzzle. Thank you K and David.
  9. Enjoyable. Liked ACCELERATOR (nice surface) and HAMPER (nicely misleading definition). Sure I wont be the only one looking for a four letter word for “fancy” starting PER_.

    Thanks Keriothe and setter

  10. An enjoyable puzzle which I managed to complete.
    I was another who could not parse Isle of Man. I too have been there once in my life, on the ferry from Fleetwood. It was a day trip so didn’t have much time there before the return.
    David
  11. Pleasant enough as I remember and finished in about 35 minutes.

    For 6d, I saw ‘One’s’ and ‘lover’ and thought, great, it’s IS and LEMAN and didn’t fuss too much about where the OF bit fitted in. Laziness triumphs again. The ghostly meaning of DOPPELGÄNGER was new to me too and I learnt yet another crossword-land bird in GREYLAG.

    Thanks to setter and blogger

  12. An enjoyable puzzle. I had the same reservations as many and didn’t know the ghostly meaning of the double, but I was happy enough with the finished product. 22:55. Thanks Harry and K.
  13. 21.32. A straightforward solve with a few nice touches. My inability to fully parse IoM (the by lover / of man bit) was frustrating but I got enough of it to get the answer. Otherwise I thought the clues for collective, accelerator and relief maps were all very neat.
  14. Thanks Harry and keriothe
    Late to this one and was able to complete it in about average time – 48 min. Made the error with my unparsed SEED at 24a though – it usually rings true, if you can’t parse it, it is most likely wrong !!
    The only other won had issues with the full parsing of was 25d – had Yahtzee with dice, but Go to me was the Chinese games with black and white stones. Did find another game called International Go which did have a die that I had not heard of before and whether it was just known as Go.
    ISLE OF MAN presented no problems however, being aware of ‘my man’ for someone’s lover or partner. No other problems in what was quite an enjoyable solve.
    Finished in the SW corner with that DIE, AHEAD (taking longer than it should have) and the erroneous SEED as the last one in.

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