Times 26931 – Back to the past?

Author   piquetPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
Normal service is resumed on Wednesdays again, now we have dealt with all nine TCC puzzles, six of which each of our “UK elite” had already had in front of them, if not completed.
This to me had an old fashioned feel to it, with Classical references, a 1930s movie, a 1960s movie and a 1960s “invention” among the answers. It took me about 25 minutes and I had to check 13a and 27a aftwerwards to ensure I had plumped correctly and educate myself and those among you who were equally in the dark.

Definitions underlined, anagram fodder ( )*, anagrind in italics.

Across
1 Gold bangle — asset converted where labourer cleaned up (6,7)
AUGEAN STABLES – I thought, it begins with OR or AU, and was somewhere someone cleaned up. Even with my sparse Classical education I remembered the chap with twelve labours. Follow AU with (BANGLE ASSET)*.
8 Support second article having expunged first (4)
STEM – S for second, ITEM has its I removed.
9 Consider some text in manuscript for propriety (10)
SEEMLINESS – SEE = consider, then Insert LINES into MS.
10 Paying for others to dine in Hertfordshire town? (8)
TREATING – TRING is a small, ancient market town near Aylesbury on the A41 (well, bypassed). Insert EAT into it.
11 Drive out in attempt to cross North Island (6)
BANISH – Have a BASH = try; insert NI for north island.
13 Drunken priests initially botching psalm in services (10)
BACCHANTES – This was my least favourite clue, but probably Verlaine’s fav. B = initially botching, ACES = services in tennis, insert CHANT = psalm. All a bit of a stretch, for the name of an obscure film or an alternative name for Euripides’ most acclaimed tragedy and the inebriated female priests starring in it. Also a French movie of 1961 based on the play. For some reason a BACCANTE in French is a kind of moustache.
16 Coiffeur in Keighley shows where curlers are found (4)
RINK – Nowt to do with Yorkshire, it’s a barely hidden word in COIFFEU(R IN K)EIGHLEY, an ice rink where chaps and maidens, “CURLERS” perform, often Scottish but now a worldwide sport, a form of bowls played with chunks of granite weighing 20 kilos or so.
17 Eleven minutes after the interval at Lord’s (4)
TEAM – TEA interval, M(inutes). A clue has escaped from the Quickie, or somewhere simpler.
18 Our set raving about repair that’s fantastic (10)
TREMENDOUS – MEND = repair; insert into (OUR SET)*.
20 Superman repelled by feeding dog that lacks tail (6)
CYBORG – YB = repelled BY, feed that into CORG(I). Cyborgs were first described in 1960 in comics and appeared shortly after as the CYBERMEN in Doctor Who.
22 Stepped over mud outside new Ruhr location (8)
DORTMUND – DORT = TROD (stepped) reversed; MUD, insert N for new. German city now most known for its football team.
24 Celebs refuse to enter Georgia — and it’s over (10)
GLITTERATI – Insert LITTER = refuse, into GA = Georgia, USA; add IT reversed.
26 Approval withheld in retreat? (4)
NOOK – No O.K. would be approval withheld.
27 Arab perhaps down for an old movie (5,8)
HORSE FEATHERS – I hadn’t heard of this Marx Brothers 1932 romp (suspect I didn’t miss much) but guessed it from the checkers; HORSE = arab perhaps, FEATHERS = down.

Down
1 Characters from Rye thus observed in Argyle? (11)
ALTERNATELY – I stared at this for a while before the penny dropped with a clang. SImply a R g Y l E.
2 Instrument one exported from African country (5)
GAMBA – The Gambia is a small West African country, I think it’s technically wrong to omit the THE, but our setter disagrees, and then drops the I, giving us the name of a VIOLA GAMBA or just a viola.
3 Alsatians let loose to find aggressor (9)
ASSAILANT – (ALSATIANS)*.
4 European ensnared in small deception (7)
SLEIGHT – E inside SLIGHT = small. As in sleight of hand.
5 Improvised excellent book about Donegal’s borders (2-3)
AD-LIB – A 1 B = excellent book; insert D L being DonegaL’s borders.
6 Liberal revelling in danger in Soviet city (9)
LENINGRAD – L = Liberal, (IN DANGER)*.
7 MI6 finds relative shortly (3)
SIS – DD. SIS short for sister, or for UK Secret Intelligence Service = MI6.
12 Bloody genius on USA reforms (11)
SANGUINEOUS – (GENIUS ON USA)*.
14 French count runs round for Holy Spirit? (9)
COMFORTER – COMTE = French for Count, add R for run, insert FOR as instructed. I’m too much of an Atheist to know if the Holy Spirit is a comforter, but presumably some people find it so. Odd definition, all the same.
15 Singular fruit with perfect flavour (9)
SPEARMINT – S = singular, PEAR = fruit, MINT = perfect, unused.
19 Sound final whistle, perhaps, leading to drama (7)
ENDGAME – You END the GAME when you blow the final whistle.
21 Bird black in colour? Not completely! (5)
GREBE – Insert B for black into GREEN truncated.
23 Chop‘s rotten at one end, consumed by rodents (5)
MINCE – Insert N = end of rotten, into MICE = rodents.
25 Note adviser initially grasped in left hand (3)
LAH – first letter of Adviser between L and H. Sixth note of tonic scale. In my youth LAH was usually lithium aluminium hydride.

52 comments on “Times 26931 – Back to the past?”

  1. knocked my socks off!

    Had to come here to get the secret message behind SIS.

    I was brought up in the Baptist Church, and I remember John 16:7: “Nevertheless I tell you the truth; It is expedient for you that I go away: for if I go not away, the Comforter will come not unto you; but if I depart, I will send Him unto you.”

  2. This was right up my alley, obviously, with multiple classical and literary references. I too hesitated over the unknown SIS, but to be fair there wasn’t really anything else it could be.

    You’ll be pleased to hear BACCHANTES was actually one of my last in though, as even with the classics degree it took some time for all the requisite pennies to drop…

  3. All but three completed within my target half-hour but I needed another 5 minutes to finish with COMFORTER, TEAM and BACCHANTES in that order.

    I endured a lot of RE in my childhood via church and school but I don’t recall COMFORTER ever being mentioned.

    I didn’t think 17ac was easy at all as I needed both checkers to think of it.

    I worked out the unknown BACCAHNTES eventually from wordplay and knowing Bacchus as the god of booze giving the ‘drunken’ connection.

    I think we had a long discussion here previously about whether chopping is the same as mincing but I can’t remember the conclusion that was reached. To my mind they are not the same, but heigh-ho!

  4. Another tick here, with Euripides’s Bacchae one of my A-level texts. CYBORG was rather cunning, as was ALTERNATELY.

    COD to COMFORTER for rather getting the short stick of it Trinity-wise.

    48 mins.

  5. Had about half of this one left after 55 minutes, so threw in the towel and came here to get educated. Mostly GK that I was missing, I think. Not least with BACCHANTES (and “chant” for “psalm”), but also GAMBA, both DORTMUND and the Ruhr, the spelling of the French count—I thought it had a “p” in it, which didn’t help with the wordplay—or the definition of the Holy Spirit, ENDGAME for drama, and so on…

    Always feels very unsatisfying when you come here to have some pennies drop and instead realise you’d never have got the answers in a million years. Ah well. At least I guessed the unknown film, knew the intelligence service and had, as it turned out, spelled SANGUINEOUS right (really wasn’t sure that “e” should be where it was!)

    Edited at 2018-01-10 07:51 am (UTC)

  6. Held up at the end with BACCHANTES and LOI COMFORTER, both of which I had to piece together from wordplay which was rather satisfying. As jackkt said, Bacchus helped with BACCHANTES.

    COD to ALTERNATELY.

  7. DNF after 40 mins (20 racing through the RSH, then 20 staring blankly at the Left) – all accompanied by yoghurt, compote, granola, etc. Scrummy.
    My problems stemmed from 8ac – just didn’t see it and that made the hard 1dn and 2dn undoable for me. Not to mention 13 and 20ac.
    Good grief. Roll on tomorrow.
    Thanks Pip for explaining and brainy setter.
  8. Off to a good start with 1A and 1D going straight in. Steady rather than spectacular progress thereafter.

    Like Jack and Pootle got 13A from Bacchus + wordplay. Didn’t remember the film but knew the Cyborgs

    Well blogged Pip

  9. 33 minutes. NW took most time, not yielding until ALTERNATELY hit me, with STEM then falling into place. DNK LOI GAMBA and until that point was favouring a ‘gunea’, an instrument in the weaponry section of the orchestra along with the cannon kept for the 1812. I was hoping too that the Keighley coiffeur was going to ‘urdu’ until I spotted the RINK. COD CYBORG. Enjoyable puzzle. Thank you Pip and setter.
    1. The words coming from the Te Deum… Handel’s Utrecht setting in this Academy of Ancient Music recording being a favourite of mine.
      22:39 for me, held up by the labour of Hercules (not for the first time this year!) and the old movie – both unknown but deduced correctly from the wordplay. BACCHANTES was, at least vaguely familiar. Otherwise no great difficulty. Thanks Pip and setter.
      1. I see Z8 was also triggered by the Comforter clue to think of the Te Deum As a lifelong middle-of-the-road Anglican, I also thought of the hymn Our Blest Redeemer: ‘…A guide, a comforter bequeathed, with us to dwell.’ It’s difficult to get either of them in a Church in these modern times.
  10. Brilliant clue for ALTERNATELY in what is, for me, an excellent puzzle. Many lovely clues, I was discomfited by COMFORTER, and HORSE FEATHERS I saw, though only through its meaning of ‘nonsense’, rather late.

    Some references here and there today, but well-judged, do we feel?

  11. 11:29 … like others, positing the BACCHA- bit straight off then figuring out the rest from wordplay. Not totally unfamiliar, having last popped up in the daily puzzle in 2014, I think: https://times-xwd-times.livejournal.com/1109838.html

    I wrongly assumed Holy Spirit/COMFORTER here were playful terms for a slug of booze, ungodly so and so that I am.

    I really wanted there to be some belated festive nina involving MINCE and the spies at 7d

    1. Thanks for the link – I see Jack claimed Bacchante as unknown in 2014 so it’s not stuck in the memory! Though I didn’t post on the 2014 one I’m sure the same goes for me.
      1. Met once and instantly forgotten still rates as unknown in my book. I can hardly remember what happened yesterday!
    3. I with you there! I tried, unsuccessfully of course, to make 14d, with only the M as a checker, ARMAGNAC. lol. I still have 2 mince pies left. I think you’ve just persuaded me to have one of them with a snifter; easily led astray as I am.
  12. Brilliant crossword today. Stumped by ALTERNATELY and had to resort to aids.
    thought ENDGAME was referring to the Samual Beckett play.
        1. The underlined definition is ‘drama’ which ENDGAME is. I should perhaps have been more specific in explaining whose drama we were alluding to.
  13. 22:04. I loved this: tough, but all perfectly fair as long as you are able to grapple with the wordplay in the right way. Is BACCHANTE more or less obscure than a long-forgotten Victorian novel? The wordplay is unambiguous and clear (if not easy to unravel) so it doesn’t matter. The same goes for the movie and the Holy Spirit. Very satisfying stuff.
  14. I don’t remember either but I to my mind they are different but close enough. I think of steak tartare, which can be chopped or minced to much the same effect.
  15. 25′ 20″. COMFORTER no problem, dnk BACCHANTES, dnk they were female, lesson learned. ALTERNATELY excellent. I have been to LENINGRAD. Thanks pip and setter.
  16. DNF, beaten by the unknown BACCHANTES which I doubt I would ever have constructed because chants=psalms is not a connection likely to spring to this irreligious mind. An odd one because I found three quarters of it very straightforward but ran aground in the NW.
    1. Ah yes. The art of precisely sung and elegantly phrased plainsong psalms accompanied only by the sound of the sputtering of candles at a late night choral Compline is a vanishing contemplative delight.
  17. Maybe in past tense as in your example but as active verbs chop and mince are different processes.
    1. Fair point. Actually looking at Collins it defines ‘mince’ as ‘to chop, grind or cut into very small pieces’. I’m not sure I agree with this (does anyone ever refer to mincing with a knife?) but it does mean our argument is not with the setter!
      1. Ken Hom the Chinese cook definitely does. “Chefs use two cleavers to mince, rapidly chopping with them in unison for fast results”
  18. Some very clever misdirection here: at 1dn, I simply couldn’t see where to begin, as there didn’t seem to be any way that Kent and patterned knitwear could be involved in the answer, at which point I thought I had exhausted my entire knowledge of Rye and Argyle. One of the most satisfying penny drops, that one. Then I was another rueful classicist for whom 13ac was the LOI, mostly becuase the wordplay seemed to be crying out for an anagram, even though I couldn’t see exactly what should be used to make it…
  19. Miles off the wavelength with this despite having seen the stables in a recent Guardian (I think) and knowing the movie and classics references. It took me ages to get TEAM and ALTERNATELY. I’ve spent so long in the US that I think of COMFORTER as the word for eiderdown/quilt that you see in white sale catalogues this time of year (duvets never really caught on).

    HORSE FEATHERS isn’t one of the lads’ best ones and apparently was lifted almost verbatim from their stage act “Fun In Hi Skule” (shades of Molesworth). Besides I spent time looking for an equivalent to “horse opera”. 27.11

  20. 25.45. Any Marx Bros. film is surely worth seeing Pip, if only for the manically brilliant fluff. As Beckett’s Endgame for the blinding spear of ice. With the Euripides blast, what a trio. Pseuds’-Cornerish I know, but dammit had to say it.
  22. This rather clever offering took me just short of 25 minutes, with the innocuous NOOK my last in, but the same three as everyone else causing the majority of the head scratching.
    I suppose I should have got COMFORTER more readily, not least because my avatar sports one, but I was looking to over-complicate the clue, assuming that Holy and Spirit were to be separated rather than being taken together as the definition. And I’ve sung the Te Deum often enough, where the HS/HG gets a mentions as “also the Holy Ghost the Comforter” as a kind of afterthought.
  23. STEM was my FOI, but the rest of the NW took a while longer to assemble. Like Matt I had to shake off my conviction that the French count had a P in it, but the penny dropped eventually. 1d was another clanger moment and I finally put Bacchus together with the rest of the wordplay to assemble the unknown 13a as my LOI. I was dissuaded from putting a tentative ZAMBA at 2d by the anagrist for 1a. Unforgivable not to have known it really, as I actually have a viola. The S from 4d finally brought the stables to mind. I really enjoyed this puzzle. 1d, 13a and 14d accounted for the last 6 minutes of my 32:07. Thanks setter and Pip.

    Edited at 2018-01-10 02:35 pm (UTC)

  24. Really enjoyed this ‘old fashioned’ puzzle even though my pace was turgid. 46mins

    FOI 24ac GITTERATI

    SOI SIS as MI6 prefer

    LOI 20ac CYBORG Bjorn’s brother

    COD 1dn ALTERNATELY

    WOD 13ac BACCHANTES

    Will Mr. Penfold, believed to be somewhere in the Yorkshire area, please contact Lady Sotira of Cornwall
    so that the Dishonourable Memeber for Shanghai West can send him the book-prize he has demanded!

  25. 40m but didn’t get the play so another DNF and, as Matt says above, slightly disgruntled in that I never would have got that one. So it’s obviously an unfair clue! Other than that I was about 30m for the rest which I enjoyed especially 1d, 19ac and 1ac, which gets my COD. good blog, Pip and an almost excellent puzzle.
  26. Again not easy for me, taking 35 minutes or so and finishing with BACCHANTES. ALTERNATELY was a great clue which had me befuddled for a long time, and I was also held up by overlooking the ‘for’ in the cluing for COMFORTER, which was hidden in plain sight, to me, anyway. Regards.
  27. 41:41 says the timer, interestingly enough, so for me that means that this was fairly easy. Of course if I look at some of the clues and answers (BACCHANTES, ALTERNATELY, even GLITTERATI which I can’t recall having seen before) maybe it wasn’t. But I did manage to understand all the details of everything, except why ACE is a service, so that was all right.
    1. In tennis, an ace is a legal serve that is not touched by the receiver, winning the point.
  28. I managed to solve most of this; in fact some of the clues seemed familiar (has this puzzle been used before?).
    Anyway I still failed to get Bacchantes ( I had the Chant bit) and the clever Alternately.
    I also managed a Stoa (in the QC yesterday I think) and Ghana. David
  29. Very much a puzzle of two halves for me today being split along the diagonal running from the first “a” of “Augean” to the last “s” of “horse feathers”. Everything in the NE went in swiftly and without too much difficulty; not so for everything in the SW half. Particular problems were 13ac, even though I saw a production of the Bacchae not so long ago featuring “Q” from the more recent Bond films, the unknown Def of comforter at 14dn, the G at the end of 20ac made me think the dog might be a dingo for a time, at 17ac I was toying with XI and M for far too long. Dortmund and mince also took ages. LOI and pdm 1dn. Knew the film at 27ac. I have a Marx Bros box set containing Animal Crackers, Duck Soup, Monkey Business and Horse Feathers. I have watched the first two of those more often than the last two.
  30. A small point, Pip, but Viola da Gamba, or, more informally, GAMBA (2d) is actually a Viol and, unlike a viola, played vertically rather than under the chin. Along with your least favourite 13a, a second early music reference of the day. Back to the past, as you say!

    Edited at 2018-01-10 08:41 pm (UTC)

    1. I stand corrected, had not seen the distinction between viol being only a viola da gamba not the same as a modern viola, At least I realised the gamba bit meant ‘leg’ not ‘prawn’ as in Spanish. Wiki agrees with you I see. Thank you.
  31. Five minutes for this one. Oh, and an hour.

    Like our esteemed blogger (to whom, thanks), I wasn’t sure if the stables were Augean or Orgean*, and didn’t stop see-sawing until ALTERNATELY went in (nice clue, I thought, by the way). BACCHANTES almost stumped me, even with all the checkers, because I was off sick the day we did culture. COMFORTER was over my head too – I assumed it was some reference to spirits of the more drinkable kind.

    All in all, I was quite pleased to have finished this one, even though it took a long time.

    (*Mr. Baden, if you are still alive, many thanks for the Latin O-level and for mentioning the Au/Or-gean stables. Also, congratulations on your 130th birthday.)

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