Times 25848

Author   jackktPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
This one started out as a slow but steady solve and I seemed to be heading for about 40 minutes, but time slipped away and I became bogged down with 27ac outstanding and the whole of the SW quarter other than 18dn and the easy hidden answer at 28ac. In the end I ran well over the hour and only finally sorted out the literal at 27ac just now, having written and revised the rest of the blog. Off for a lie down.

Across
1 SARCASTIC – CAST (asked to act) inside SARI (dress), Chap
6 FOCUS – OF reversed, Camp, US (America). The order of the first two elements appears wrong but I believe it’s a convention that ‘with’ is not intended to indicate any particular order.
9 RUB IT IN– Two definitions of sorts
10 TRUSTEE – Anagram of SET inside TRUE (honest)
11 DOC – DOCk (cut). One of the two dwarfs who doesn’t end with Y
12 CHESHIRE CAT – Anagram of REACHES ITCH
14 MUNICH – I inside MUNCH (make a noise eating). The capital city of Bavaria.
15 BLUDGEON – L (large) inside BUDGE (reluctantly move), ON (forward)
17 SORBONNE – BONN (former capital, of West Germany) inside SORE (very old-fashioned, i.e. an old-fashioned word for ‘very’)
19 QUIVER – Double definition, the second being where archers carried their arrows.
22 COMME IL FAUT – Anagram of ATOMIC FUEL + M (motorway)
23 GYM – G (good), MY reversed
25 IMAGIST – I’M, AGIST (no use for old people)
27 HEBREWS – The first part leads us cryptically to HE BREWS. The literal clue is ‘letter’ giving us the book of the Bible which in the King James version is fully entitled “The Epistle of Paul the Apostle to the Hebrews” You can see why it usually gets abbreviated!
28 TATTY – Hidden
29 DATA ENTRY – A+TAD (little) all reversed, ENTRY (door)

Down
1 SHRED – Rubbish inside SHED (building)
2 RUBICON – Sounds like ‘Rubik’ (creator of puzzle), ON (working). The definition refers to the river crossed by Caesar’s army during his seizure of power. It’s used as a metaphor for the point of no return.
3 ANTICYCLONE – ON (going) inside ANTICYCLE (not helpful to riders)
4 TINKER – TINiER (much smaller) with its I changed to K (King)
5 CATCHALL – H (heroin) inside CATCALL (sound disapproving)
6 FLU – FeeL, Unwell
7 CUTICLE – CUbICLE (changing-room) with its B (black) changed to T (time)
8 SWEETENER – WEE (small) inside anagram of ERNEST
13 REDOUBTABLE – Two definitions, one cryptic
14 MASOCHIST – SOCHI (Russian resort) inside MAST (pole)
16 INFLATED – LATE (dead) inside anagram of FIND
18 RAMPANT – A+MP (member of the House) inside RANT (passionate speech)
20 VAGUEST – VA GUEST (visitor). Cryptic definition with VA standing for the Commonwealth of Virginia of which Richmond is the capital.
21 CACHET – Sounds like “cash, eh?”
24 MUSTY – MUST (has to), staY
26 IVY – LIVY (Roman writer)

39 comments on “Times 25848”

  1. Would have snuck in under the hour, but being the wife’s birthday I thought I should make the cuppa. Least I could do.

    I got COMME IL FAUT by throwing a bunch of scrabble tiles into the air and seeing how they landed. Other than that one, it’s hard to see in hindsight why it was such a challenge. The sign of a good puzzle I would say, so well done setter and thanks blogger.

    Now off for a cheeky little birthday lunch. Tough life.

  2. Probably a bit pedantic Jack, but I would have separated BUDGE (reluctantly move) from ON (forward). Although perhaps that’s what you meant.
    1. That’s what I have in my original notes so I have amended accordingly. I’ve no idea why it was different in the blog. Thanks.

      Edited at 2014-07-25 05:01 am (UTC)

  3. A similar experience to Jack, getting everything bar 4 clues (16d(!), 22a (too much Frnech stuff recently?), 25a and 27a) well within the hour and then struggling to the line.

    I don’t think anyone now believes that Hebrews was written by Paul, but the author remains a mystery.

    At 20d, I can see how VAGUEST can mean ‘clueless’ (‘he had a very vague expression on his face’), but can’t see how the ‘not’ fits in.

    1. If you’re clueless, you don’t have the vaguest. Not you personally of course.
        1. Our cricket team are doing abysmally enough already without the added reminders.. 🙁
  4. 27a had me – as landlords don’t just brew but also let (as do letters) so I ended up with SUBLETS which made 21d v.tricky indeed!
    (I imagined it was WHATSIT fore some reason.)

    I do wish that The Times would give their weekday setters monickers – add a little bit more interest.

    horryd

    1. Personally, I think it’s much better that we don’t know who the setters are: either nicknames or real names. (In the Guardian, this distinction is eroded, anyway, at least to some extent, as you can look up who the setter is in real life in many cases.)

      We have real names in the Sunday Times puzzles, and, combining my experience of that with the Guardian situation, I feel the disadvantages outweigh the benefits.

      Forums like this work best when comments are made without fear or favour, but with courtesy, of course. These types of comment are likely to be most appreciated by the setter, I would imagine. Plus, anonymity is a tradition, and traditions are good!

    2. I very briefly considered that too, and your reasoning, but fortunately I already had the H in place so it was a non-starter.

      I know others share your view about names of setters but I am vehemently against the idea as I don’t want any indication of what to expect from a puzzle before I start to solve it. And I dislike all the stuff that goes with it as people latch on to particular setters as their favourites thereby relegating others to the B-league etc etc. I like to enjoy each puzzle for what it is.

      Edited at 2014-07-25 05:14 am (UTC)

      1. completely agree… I really dislike the way my expectations are preset for ST Cryptics, even though I really don’t want them to be!
        1. Yes, the ST situation is exactly what I had in mind, and I am uncomfortable with all the fawning that goes on with regard to a particular setter which I’m sure he doesn’t need or want.

          With regard to the suggestion below that the setter’s name could be revealed when the solution is published, I don’t see that as an option because it would lead inevitably to people speculating all day about who the setter was and basing their comments on that. I simply don’t care who the setter is and don’t understand why it’s of such importance to some solvers.

          Edited at 2014-07-26 07:40 am (UTC)

    3. In addition to the above comments, it has been mentioned elsewhere that Times crossword editors tend to muck around more with the clues than perhaps is the case in other publications, meaning it would be unfair to attach a setter’s name to a puzzle that might have seen significant modifications that were the editor’s work, not theirs.

      I kind of agree with ulaca and jackkt’s comments above – though personally I would have no objection to seeing a setter’s name, you only need to look at some of the comments that people leave on the blogs for puzzles with named setters to know that the puzzles are being judged on the name and not on the merits of the puzzle.

  5. Not knowing much about the Bible (although enough for most purposes) I took the letter to be the Hebrew “S” – I assume there is one.
    1. Several: Samekh, Sadhe, Sin and Shin could all count, though the last is just Sin with an extra dot.
    2. I wasted a lot of time on the same thought but then realised it wouldn’t work as a 7-letter answer.
        1. Well I’d have thought if HEBREW S is the literal then it would need to be enumerated as 6,1 not 7.
          1. Agreed! I’d taken it as a double cryptic but there probably isn’t one of those. Or is there?
            1. Not that I’m aware of (in the Times anyway). There needs to be a literal of some sort even if only &lit.
  6. 22.25, tough without being will this ever end. I think I would be delighted if all landlords brewed: far too many don’t even know how to store the stuff, or believe Boddingtons or John Smiths are both beers (other not beers are available, I’m afraid).
    My last in was IMAGIST, and I spent some time trying to justify a visitor from Mephisto, ITALIOT, from the wordplay at the wrong end of the clue.
    Lots to like: I was tickled by VAGUEST, twisty in both definition and wordplay, and MASOCHIST, with its suggestion with the question mark that maybe one would enjoy Sochi after all.
    In my experience, CUTICLEs that engender whitlows are a long way from dead.
    I’d have got CHESHIRE CAT much quicker if I had bothered to check the letter count.

    Edited at 2014-07-25 07:10 am (UTC)

  7. +1 foiled by sublets. Would never have got the right answer.

    Never heard of COMME IL FAUT.

    I enjoyed this puzzle. Thanks for the blog Jack.

  8. Fast start, slow finish, with IMAGIST taking several minutes at the end, firstly in actually thinking of the word and secondly in trying to make it fit the wordplay. Didn’t help myself by having SUBLETS for HEBREWS at first, and also spent an inordinate amount of time on COMME IL FAUT, assuming the middle word must be OF.
  9. 18 mins. Fortunately I knew COMME IL FAUT so the SW corner opened up faster than it otherwise might have done, although the IMAGIST/INFLATED crossers still held me up towards the end. HEBREWS was my LOI and it took at least two minutes before the penny dropped, despite the very helpful crossers. Thankfully I got CACHET very early on so I was never sidetracked by thoughts of “sublets”.

    As a segue, I solve on treeware and I always do the times2 Crossword and the Codeword before I do the main puzzle. In today’s Codeword one of the across entries was an expression rather than a single word, and that’s the first time I can remember such a thing.

  10. A trudging 46′, the last several ‘ staring at the checkers for 27. An able puzzle if not soaring. One wonders what a Martian might make of the apparent humour of the surfaces. There’s probably an interesting point to be made about illusory meaning somewhere. But having trudged to the end of the grid I baulk at it. A bit too C. Cat-like anyway.
  11. 15 minutes, on form after the quickie work, thanks Jack for parsing SORBONNE for me, my LOI was IMAGIST. Much to applaud here from the setter. Any crossword with CHESHIRE CAT in it has to be a goodie as I am a Lewis Carroll trekkie.
    I agree with the comments above in favour of anonymity of setters.
  12. Like ianb and others, I was seduced by the subletter, which damaged my prestige at 21d and in turn made unscrambling the obvious anagram at 22a tortuous. However, I got a somewhat 14d-ic pleasure out of finally getting there in a little more than 60 minutes. My COD was 13d.

    Thanks setter and blogger.

  13. Stupidly misspelled Rubicon as Rubicom so was never going to get Munich. Also didn’t get Imagist, Tinker, Trustee, Sorbonne and Hebrews.
    Loved the Cachet clue.
  14. 17 mins – last one in the HEBREWS which I got via a combination of working through the vowels and then muttering until the penny clanged loudly to the floor
  15. Another slow solve. It took me ages to get the first clue, and I didn’t feel I was making much progress until thirty-five minutes had passed. Once I had a few in the NE corner, I progressed more quickly, but still needed five minutes over the hour to finish.
    Some very good surfaces and skilful clueing, especially the disguise of the superlative form in 20. An enjoyable challenge.
  16. After 20 minutes I had all but imagist and ivy and I thought that those two were going to do for me. After a bit of head-sucking and pen-scratching my brain managed to combine “wasn’t there an old Roman geezer called Livy?” and “Oh, THAT sort of trailer!” into a single thought to give me ivy.

    That didn’t help a great deal though and with the clock on 28½ minutes I bunged in imagist on the basis that it rang a feint poetical bell somewhere but I couldn’t see the wordplay.

    Some clever stuff in here and the clues needed careful scrutiny to work out where the definition lay. I liked the dwarf clue best.

    Well done Jack, you drew a toughie here.

  17. Had to come back after a break to see HEBREWS and CACHET. Didn’t see the wordplay for RUBICON and when I saw QUIVER I thought we may have been in for a pangram but it’s a little way away from one.
  18. I got through in 20 minutes, held up only by the French phrase and my LOI, HEBREWS. For the former, after getting all the checkers in place I made the (to me) only likely arrangement of the remainder. Didn’t know the phrase. I got HEBREWS from ‘letter’. I have no idea why a landlord could be said to brew in any sense. I got a kick out of VAGUEST. Nice puzzle. Regards.

    Edited at 2014-07-25 05:14 pm (UTC)

    1. Kevin, the landlord in the sense required here is the owner or manager of a pub, and in the UK in recent years there has been a trend for some pubs to have a microbrewery on site.

      Edited at 2014-07-25 06:44 pm (UTC)

      1. Thanks Andy. News to me. I figured it was something like that from the clue, but I hadn’t known of that before.
  19. 19:33 for me, making light of the top half but then becoming completely bogged down in the bottom half, with HEBREWS taking me an age at the end. No complaints though.

    I initially bunged in FEU at 6dn, but couldn’t justify it so had another think. Phew! (Pun definitely intended this time.)

    I’m one of those who’d like Times setters to be identified, but I’d be quite happy for the setter’s monicker to appear at the same time as the solution.

  20. 33 minutes for me, with VAGUEST and QUIVER my LOsI. It would be mean-spirited (but honest) of me to say I was quite pleased to see that some of the serious solvers here weren’t as swift as usual!

    I enjoyed this one a lot more than the last few, if only because there ween’t many (if any) obscurisms. Give me a rubicon over an eagre any day.

    The warm weather here is working its magic. There’s been an invigorating up-tick in punting accidents (three today, which is something of a record even for Cambridge), three barbecue misadventures (not counting food poisoning, though that’s also up), one anaphylactically spectacular reaction to a bee sting and one attack by an overheated spaniel (tip: either don’t leave your dog in the car, or get someone else to open the tailgate). Ah, I do love summer.

  21. Count me in for SUBLETS, and IMAGIST as LOI.
    Over an hour to miss them with HEBREWS. Can’t complain about the clues, though – tough but fair.
  22. 33m. I found this very tough, but I enjoyed the struggle. We do seem to be getting a lot of these toughies at the moment. I wasn’t at all convinced by landlord = brewer. Some landlords might brew their own beer but I have a friend who used to make his own sausages for his restaurant and I wouldn’t say a restaurateur is the same thing as a sausage-maker.
    A late comment from me: crossing the Atlantic rather got in the way.

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