Times 24326 – memento mori?

Author   petebiddlecombePosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
Solving time: 8:38

Apart from some carelessness at 15D and a partly self-inflicted brief struggle with the last few in the SW corner (16, 14D, 20, 25), this was fairly plain sailing combined with some skipping of the wordplay analysis until afterwards – 8 answers went in without complete understanding: 9, 11, 16, 21, 25, 26, 10, 15.

A straightforward puzzle, but there’s plenty to write about so I think it’s the right kind of straightforward puzzle. With a wake and a bier to go with being accident-prone and lying down, this seems a bit funereal.

Across
1 STANHOPE = the carriage – STAN=Laurel, HOPE=Bob, both of whom we’ve seen before.
5 VI(R)GIL – here “wake” is not a party after a funeral, but events before
9 ABYSS=pit,IN=all the rage,IA=reverse of A1 = “way”
11 STILT – three defs, though the “post supporting a building” one seems to work only in words. Unless someone can suggest a STILT which props up a building from the side, or a SHORE which goes underneath the building, this doesn’t work for me. On reflection, two defs – the pole and wading bird, as suggested by others.
12 F.A.,N.(TAS=sat rev.)Y. – if sit=brood seems far-fetched, think of chickens
13 C(RIME)AN – Crimea is part of Ukraine, though probably the most Russian part, and the clue refers to the crossword setter’s second favourite poem (after If), Coleridge’s Rime of the Ancient Mariner
14 DIDO AND AENEAS – opera by Purcell – (Aida, one, sad end)*
16 INS(T.(A)N.T.)ANE,O,U.S. – I liked “mad old American”.
20 BEN(GAL)I(n)
21 PREVAIL – AVER=maintain in LIP=impudence, all reversed
23 R,EACH – an all-in-one/&lit, a REACH being a stretch of waterway Tom’s right – not quite a perfect &lit, as “part of” plays no role in the wordplay
24 GROUNDING – 2 defs, one the RAF term now mainly used for teenagers temporarily banned from partying
25 YIELDS – a very smooth clue which disguised its wordplay longer than any other for me – alternate letters in “bY fInE bLaDeS”.
26 ME(R,CH.)ANT – “head of Roman church” has to be divided up carefully here. Antonio, not Shylock, plays the title role in the Shakespeare play
 
Down
1 STAFF,A – “crook” as used by shepherds and bishops
3 H(USB)AND – USB for “sort of port” is great stuff
4 PENNY-FARTHING – old-fashioned push-bike, also known as an “ordinary”, harking back to yesterday’s puzzle. A farthing being a quarter of an old penny, it’s “five times the minimum charge, once”
6 INSP. as in Morse,IRE
7 GUILELESS = (I’ll use legs – L)* – I award the usual brownie point for indicating removal of just the one L
8 LUTE,NIST=isn’t* – lute is “liquid clay or cement, used to seal a joint, coat a crucible, or protect a graft” (COED), which “protective covering” summarises rather well
10 ACC(I’D)ENT,PRONE=lying down
14 DI=female,S.E.N.,GAGE – another brownie point for reflecting the fact that you can no longer become an SEN.
15 BI(LB.)ER,RY – I hastily wrote in MULBERRY from fruit and lb., not bothering to wonder whether MUER was actually a word – saved later by the difficulty of completing 14A. A bier is a frame used to support a coffin.
17 A(BASH=party),ED.
18 OCEAN=canoe*,I,C
19 FLIGHT – the vanquished may “take flight” – solved after a bold guess at GROUNDING from 24.
22 AN(I’M)A – your true inner self in Jungian psychology.

37 comments on “Times 24326 – memento mori?”

  1. Away early this morning (and next few days) and no time to ponder. Pretty quick but no answers at 11ac (where I have S?I?T) and 13ac (where I have C?I?E?N).
    Probably means I have something wrong? Any early birds with the answers I would be grateful.
  2. Thanks Mike and Peter and anyone else who answers in the meantime.
    CRIMEA is me being thick but STILT I wouldn’t have got ever and I suspect will cause others problems.
    Will be able to relax now for the rest of the day.
  3. About 30 mins today but with a question mark over LUTENIST. Obviously, the end is an anagram of “isn’t”, but LUTE for protective covering?
  4. A complete bastard this morning. So 37 minutes. Had to look up the alt. meaning of LUTE. And got fooled again by the apostrophe-S at 6dn. Would never use this myself during mad fits of trying to compile. But I did have a go at an alt. for 4dn that had to do with “Here I sit, broken hearted…”. COD to ABYSSINIA for the nice straight charade. I like those. Don’t think I’ve ever spilt so much Waterman’s bleu des mers du sud on a Times before.
  5. 11A – I’m staring at the same S-I-T.
    13A – CRIMEAN – RIME (of the ancient mariner) inside CAN = jail.
    Mike, Skiathos
    1. The following stolen from Chambers…
      ana n pl (or collective sing with pl a’na’s or a’nas) a collection of someone’s table talk or of gossip, literary anecdotes or possessions.
      Mike, Skiathos
  7. 40 minutes when I ran out of time on the journey to work with 11ac and 20ac missing. On arrival a quick cheat got me BENGALI and there’s really no excuse for not seeing this earlier other than I had become fixated on ANN or ANNA being the girl in question.

    At 20acI had considered STILT but even having cheated and with a list of possibilities in front of me I couldn’t justify any of the words. I didn’t know the bird and was actually looking for a 4-letter one _I_T as I assumed the S was accounted for in the clue by “pole”.

    Other than that I was quite pleased the way this turned out after a very slow start as for the first 15 minutes or so I thought I might be very lucky to complete even half of it on the commute.

  8. Is STILT really 3 definitions? I can only see two – stilts are wading birds. Perhaps I’m missing something.
    It took me a few minutes to see why it’s PENNY-FARTHING, because I can’t count.
    14a quite pleasing (although of course Aida also has a pretty sad end).
      1. Hang on Penfold …

        “my” is not part of the answer, and “embedded” is not part of the clue! Taking it slowly: this writer’s = this writer is = I am = I’m

        “embodied” isn’t doing much here so “embedded” is an understandable misreading – I’ve done this kind of thing myself when reading clues quickly.

  10. Yes, but “this writer’s” is “I’m”.
    Lute – “A substance, such as dried clay or cement, used to pack and seal pipe joints and other connections or coat a porous surface in order to make it tight” – The American Heritage dictionary.
    I’m in the wilds of California with no Chambers anywhere so I have to admit that was Google.
  11. I had no problems with this one and worked down top to bottom left to right making steady progress to finish in 20 minutes.

    I never thought STILT would present a problem. I also had it as just two meanings 1=pole 2=wading bird found on the shore (the definition I got straight away).

    No quibbles – nice enjoyable puzzle.

  12. So “nurse once” is SEN? A horribly obsolete acronym – but I suppose it balances “USB” in 3d.
  13. Could STILT not just be the two definitions, “pole” and “bird found on shore”? A stilt is very much a bird found on shore, and only on shore.
  14. STILT and REACH notes now amended to match the correct analysis of Tom, Jimbo and others.
  15. I raced through this before faltering in the top right. The only plucker that I could think of was lutenist but I did not write it in because I could not justify lute. Then I got Virgil which gave me the confidence to go with lutenist. This left me with the bird and, after trying to justify swift and snipe, I finally arrived at stilt.

    Stanhope reminded me of how many obscure coaches and carriages there are waiting to catch us out. If you do a reverse search for carriage on Chamber’s CD-Rom you get about 170 hits. I’ve just found a new one: désobligeante for a one-seater carriage, from the French for unaccommodating.

    1. Never seen that one, but do watch out for the English equivalent – a “sulky”.

      Edited at 2009-09-09 10:53 am (UTC)

  16. 23 mins, a bit of a struggle but enjoyable. Last in was 8d LUTENIST. 3D HUSBAND is my COD, I liked ‘pass round sort of port’. I’m another who sees only 2 defs. in 11A STILT. I don’t think 23A REACH is a pure &lit. but can’t now remember Mark Thakkar’s term for these.

    Tom B.

  17. A longer-than-average 31 minutes due to grinding to a complete halt in the NE where I had nought but blanks before eventually seeing Crimean. I knew I was in for a rough ride when I put 3 ‘N’s in penny early doors. That’s inflation for you.

    One quiblette: Can anybody explain what “one’s” is doing in 21? It looks superfluous to me and misled me for a while.

    I really must increase my cultural knowledge. The only Dido and Aeneas I know are the pop singer and the policeman in the Dukes of Hazard. What a dipstick.

    COD husband.

    Right, I’m off to B&Q for a bag of lute as my crucible needs coating.

      1. No – assuming “construction” means “wordplay”, “returning” is a reversal indicator and therefore part of the construction. “one” is just an imaginary person (effectively the solver) arranging the letters as per the instructions. It’s not required for the wordplay but helps the surface.
  18. A long solve under difficult conditions. Didn’t know lute or ana. Completely stumped in NW corner for about an hour. Make mental note to self: memorise all islands in Hebrides.
  19. Tough for me, but no real quibbles. Lack of intimate knowledge of Hebridean islands held me up in the NW, but once I got 1D the rest fell immediately. The SW held me up also, especially DISENGAGE since I was unaware of both S.E.N. as a nurse, and gage as a fruit. I went with it only with all the checkers in place, which took a while because BENGALI, YIELDS and REACH were all pretty clever. I also admit having to go to the dictionary for the sealant definition of lute, and checking that a PENNY FARTHING existed. About 50 minutes all told, I think. I agree with COD choice of HUSBAND. First in STANHOPE, last LUTENIST. Overall, I really liked this, despite taking so long. Regards to all.
    1. “Gage” is a fruit worth remembering. We had “greengage” as part of the wordplay only a couple of days ago. And given certain tendencies in the Times cryptic as discussed here last week it may also turn up meaning “marijuana”.

      I’d never met that meaning of of “lute” before, but apparently it’s the same as “luting” which I have come across with reference to pie-making.

  20. couldnt get this clue at all…apart from that done in 45 minutes
    tugh but fair
    dont know Ana will look it up
  21. 27 min, so they are slowly getting harder for me. Did like it though, with only ANIMA in without some degree of understanding. ANA was used used a couple of years ago in a clue construction, but defined differently (something like “mementos”). My COD? Probably HUSBAND.

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