Merry Christmas, cruciverbalists everywhere! I found time to knock this one off in 16 minutes while getting the turkey stuffed and in the oven. Nothing to add, except now I am a bit more certain about how I would spell Kazakhstan and Liechtenstein, if I needed to. And a poet I didn’t need to know.
Definitions underlined in bold, (ABC)* indicating anagram of ABC, anagrinds in italics, [deleted letters in square brackets].
| Across | |
| 1 | Rest — then time to visit church perfect for one in the country (13) |
| LIECHTENSTEIN – LIE IN (rest), insert CH[urch], and TENSE (perfect, for one) with T[ime] inserted. Phew! | |
| 9 | Small child taking almost everything off (5) |
| TOTAL – TOT (small child), AL[l]. As in off, kill, total, in USA. | |
| 10 | One making eyes at Louis dancing with Rex and Charlie (9) |
| OCULARIST – (AT LOUIS R C)*. | |
| 11 | Completely ignored by wife, pledges flowers (10) |
| HOLLYHOCKS – [w]HOLLY, HOCKS = pledges. | |
| 12 | Soldier hired car (4) |
| MERC – double definition. | |
| 14 | In need of oil to be so clean? (7) |
| SQUEAKY – cryptic definition, or double definition, squeaky clean being very clean. Is this an &lit? I’m never sure what that is. | |
| 16 | Poet in unfamiliar bar (7) |
| NEWBOLT – NEW = unfamiliar, BOLT = bar. Apparently Henry Newbolt was an English poet, can’t say I’d heard of him. | |
| 17 | Shots not unique in assassination (7) |
| DOUBLES – aSSaSSination has two double letters, so the double is not unique. | |
| 19 | Case for subtenant providing flat for firm (7) |
| STIFFEN – S[ubtenan]T, IF (providing), FEN (flat land). Firm as a verb. | |
| 20 | Lottery that’s without a winner? (4) |
| DRAW – cryptic definition. | |
| 21 | A thousand thanks for organisation protecting a Zulu land (10) |
| KAZAKHSTAN – (A K THANKS)* with A Z inserted. | |
| 24 | Will and Henry messing with poor Eddy (9) |
| WHIRLPOOL – (WILL H POOR)*, the H for Henry. | |
| 25 | Where Eagles Dare? Not All Their Yesterdays, on reflection (5) |
| EYRIE – reversed hidden as above, where eagles nest. | |
| 26 | One very virtuous, sporting pair? (5,3-5) |
| GOODY TWO-SHOES – cryptic definition. | |
| Down | |
| 1 | Lower profile, perhaps, to disappoint friends? (3,3,4,4) |
| LET THE SIDE DOWN – Cryptic double definition, one prosaic. | |
| 2 | Praise from number of former partners outspoken? (5) |
| EXTOL – an EX TOLL could be a count of ex partners. | |
| 3 | Type of profit which farmer makes in advance, incurring large fine (4-6) |
| HALF-YEARLY – HAY EARLY (what farmer makes, in advance), insert L[arge] F[ine]. | |
| 4 | Little use raising a single glass after wasting fifty years! (7) |
| ECONOMY – a single glass being a MONOCLE, reverse it, remove the L (fifty), add Y[ears]. | |
| 5 | Enamoured of one’s child, eating his food? (5,2) |
| STUCK ON – SON with his TUCK inserted. | |
| 6 | My outdated suggestion if looking for publicity? (4) |
| EGAD – E.G. (for example, a suggestion), AD (publicity). | |
| 7 | What’s made by no one on stage, but just outside, so very loud? (6,3) |
| NOISES OFF – well, tricky to explain exactly how this works; I think a NOISE is made by someone just offstage, then SO FF ( so very loud). The answer is a famous play by Michael Frayn in 1982. | |
| 8 | Town to keep golfing equipment? No, not surprisingly cutting it (8-2-4) |
| STOCKTON-ON-TEES – STOCK (keep) TEES (used by golfers), insert (NO NOT)*. Didn’t we have this place the other day? | |
| 13 | Wish lesson somehow could impart such wisdom (10) |
| OWLISHNESS – (WISH LESSON)*. | |
| 15 | Close to you, bear holding tongue? Apparently not! (9) |
| ULULATING – [yo]U, LUG (bear), insert LATIN a tongue, if anyone knew how to pronounce it. Wailing, so not holding tongue. | |
| 18 | Sinister trail pursued by Yankee (7) |
| SHADOWY – SHADOW (trail), Y[ankee]. | |
| 19 | Bird from which to get down? (7) |
| SWALLOW – double definition, sort of. | |
| 22 | What has no members — originally thirty, approximately (5) |
| TORSO – T[hirty], OR SO = approximately. | |
| 23 | Voice of host, clear, periodically rising (4) |
| ALTO – hidden reversed in alternate letters. | |
A very enjoyable puzzle if on the tough side for me. I needed 51 minutes with ULULATING and the unknown NEWBOLT holding out to the bitter end. I wasn’t helped by writing in SPARROW at 19dn based on ‘bird’, the enumeration and the S and W checkers. That led to an unnecessary delay coming up with WHIRLPOOL, but I got there in the end.
I would take the whole clue at 7dn as a definition which also has wordplay:
NOISES OFF – NO (no), I (one), S{tag}E [but just outside], SO (so), FF (very loud).
The title of the Frayn play is taken from the generic stage instruction. I saw the original production at the Lyric in Hammersmith before it opened in the West End (starring Paul Eddington and Patricia Routledge) and it was one of the funniest plays I have seen. The subsequent film starring Michael Caine was rubbish. It’s a piece that needs to be seen live on stage.
Most out in about an hour but another hour to finish. COD OCULARIST. LOI NOISES OFF. Most enjoyable.
Thanks Piquet. Parsing was my problem with this one.
Apparently there are two ways to pronounce ULULATE ie
YOU YOU LATE and ULL YOU LATE (they vary even between different Oxford dictionaries)
Wouldn’t the first pronunciation be you-lou-late?
I listened to the pronunciation on 9 dictionaries. The first has no first L sound at all. It occurs in Aust. Oxford, ODE, SOED, Collins and Wiktionary. The second is in WordWebPro, Canad. Oxford, NOAD and Chambers.
I guess just because I pronounce that first L doesn’t mean the rest of the world does!
The second one pronounces the first L but is ULL like null. I would guess the two versions come out about even. I looked up the pronunciations because I had no idea how to say it by looking at the spelling.
I biffed LIECHTENSTEIN, I can’t remember why, never parsed it. DNK NEWBOLT, but when I googled him afterwards, I realized that for some reason I knew his line, “Play up, play up, and play the game!”.
Sir Henry Newbolt’s poem Vitai Lampada has been referenced several times in this hallowed blog.
Most enjoyable – finished in about 25 minutes, LOI KAZAKHSTAN.
Thanks for parsing DOUBLES.
Vital Lampada by Sir Henry Newbolt
“There’s a deathly hush in the close tonight….
Play up, play up and play the game!
…..the Colonel’s dead and the Gatling’s jammed….”
These fragments I’ll shore against my ruin….
Happy Christmas
The Close is the main playing field of Clifton College in Bristol. Newbolt was a nineteenth century Old Cliftonian. Only the best games players had fixtures on the Close itself, while untalented folk like me were bused into North Somerset instead. Was once made to run round it three times in the snow as a punishment for being late for Gym. We had it tough in the Sixties.
Vitai not Vital if I may be so bold.
Auto correct strikes again.
A very blessed Christmas to all.
There’s a breathless hush…
15’36”, watching the sun rise.
Thanks pip and setter.
Happy Christmas piquet and setter.
At 20a I had it as a DD: lottery + without a winner.
Do we have some sort of NINA? Liechtenstein and Kazakhstan have indeed been drawn from a pool to play two matches against each other next year.
29.30. Got really stuck between doubles and ululating. Almost 9 am so I better get a bottle open! Or I might just nap for a while.
Merry Christmas, God bless us every one.
Just read the commentary. Doubles- v good, Ululating not so much.
32.35. Best wishes on Christmas Day to everyone. 17a all round for those who like to indulge.
Thanks for the parsing of DOUBLES, which I still find a bit underwhelming. Newbolt’s famous line is immortalised on the wall running along Lord’s cricket ground. 27:03
44 minutes. A Christmas treat, but not a doddle for me. I missed the parsing of DOUBLES and as if working out the convoluted parsing of LIECHTENSTEIN, NOISES OFF and STOCKTON-ON-TEES wasn’t enough, there was also the difficult HALF-YEARLY and finally the unknown poet at 16a to contend with. I couldn’t be bothered doing a full alphabet trawl for _O_T but NEWBOLT seemed to work and sounded plausible; first Christmas present of the day to be shown an all green grid.
Thanks to Pip and setter and merry Christmas to everyone
I enjoyed this once I’d backed out “Khazakstan”……
FOI TOTAL
LOI ULULATING
COD EYRIE
TIME 13:43
Nice Christmas Fayre, even if the stars fell on Stockton again. LOI ULULATING. COD STUCK ON you courtesy of Elvis. Thank you Pip and setter.
I didn’t know the poet and wouldn’t have thought of BOLT, although I’m not too Scroogeish about it.
Thanks both, and merry Christmas all.
I quite like the fact that our esteemed Editor chose this 100% Christmas-free puzzle for this day, and I navigated its eccentricities in just over 20 minutes. It’s definitely one to savour, with the brilliant EYRIE and the impressive (once Jackkt had worked it out) &lit for NOISES OFF.
Wondering if there were more Christmas eggs than the World Cup match-up Sawbill noticed (good spot!) I wondered if Sir Henry NEWBOLT might have been known as SQUEAKY from his high ALTO voice when ULULATING. So I Googled it, and Google’s still infant AI came up with “Here are some things you can try if your newbolt is squeaking:
lubricate it: a common way to fix squeaks is to apply lubrication.” That’s made my Christmas!
Joy to the world, and especially to all TftT readers and writers!
The word EXACT on row 2 has been bothering me.
I could point out that more evidence of The Times getting jiggy with it is referenced in column 4 with CALEBWRO: Caleb’s Story by W.R.O King J is a thing available on Spotify.
But that might be excessive!
Re Newbolt, and my apologies for failing the Xmas Spelling Test:
“Drake’s Drum”
Drake he’s in his hammock an’ a thousand mile away,
(Capten, art tha sleepin’ there below?)
Slung atween the round shot in Nombre Dios Bay,
An’ dreamin’ arl the time o’ Plymouth Hoe.
Yarnder lumes the island, yarnder lie the ships,
Wi’ sailor lads a-dancin’ heel-an’-toe,
An’ the shore-lights flashin’, an’ the night-tide dashin’
He sees et arl so plainly as he saw et long ago.
DNF – I knew Henry Newbolt, but couldn’t bring him to mind at the critical moment. A fine puzzle nonetheless. A merry Christmas to all Times setters, bloggers, commentators and passengers on the TftT express.
Got there in the end including a snooze in 51 mins. ULULATING, NEWBOLT and ECONOMY, the main hold ups, never did get the cryptic for the last.
Some dictionaries specify how the kind of ULULATION that is heard in the Arab world (which I heard once from women in the Bois de Boulogne at dusk) involves the tongue. Here’s Wikipedia: « from Latin ululo), trilling or lele, is a long, wavering, high-pitched vocal sound resembling a howl with a trilling quality. It is produced by emitting a high pitched loud voice accompanied with a rapid back and forth movement of the tongue and the uvula. »
A 49 minute DNF, since I have (fortunately?) never heard of Henry NEWBOLT just as you all have never heard of my poet NEWPOST — that was the best I could come up with for “bar”, although I did wonder if there might be a nautical meaning allowing NEWPORT (now I know there isn’t). The rest was a bit strange in places but a lot of fun. Happy Christmas to all.
I am struggling with the definitions for 3d and 4d. In what sense is Half-yearly a “type” of profit? How can Economy substitute for Little Use in a sentence. Obviously too many sherbets to get m6 head round these today!
I was also not a fan of HALF-YEARLY….…even before parsing.
ASSASSINATION doesn’t just have two lots of double letters, it has two DOUBLE S. Steady solve with fingers crossed that I’d got the right NHO poet since before I had the final crosser NEWPOLE seemed just a plausible.
Missed this one….there being no print edition on Christmas Day. Did 29109 only appear in the Crossword Club?