Times Cryptic 27296

Author   jackktPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic

I found this rather tricky and needed 47 minutes to complete it, but it was enormously enjoyable with a number of very inventive devices and an inspired cryptic clue at 22ac that made me laugh.

As usual definitions are underlined in bold italics, {deletions and substitutions are in curly brackets} and [anagrinds, containment, reversal and other indicators in square ones]

Across
1 Wanting to drop off old coins, carrying burden (10)
SLUMBEROUS – SOUS (old coins) containing [carrying] LUMBER (burden). I think LUMBER and ‘burden’ have to be taken as verbs here.
6 Mrs Norman, say, rebuffed a title (4)
EMMA – MME (Mrs Norman, say – Madame in French) reversed [rebuffed], A. Devious wordplay and surely the vaguest imaginable definition.
9 Lacking will to embrace right American way (10)
INTERSTATE – INTESTATE (lacking will) containing [to embrace] R (right). The wordplay here was helped by TESTATE having appeared in yesterday’s puzzle.
10 Look the wrong way for honour (4)
KEEP – PEEK (look) reversed [the wrong way]. If you honour your obligations you keep to them.
12 Subsistence in lodgings containing study, say (5,3,6)
BREAD AND BUTTER – B AND B (lodgings – Bed & Breakfast) containing READ, then UTTER (say). A B&B can be the establishment itself as well as a description of the accommodation it offers.
14 Some fantasy, as seen from the right texts (6)
ESSAYS – Hidden [some] and reversed [from the right] in {fanta}SY AS SE{en}
15 Stick with Labour leader? It’s a problem for member (4-4)
CLUB-FOOT – CLUB (stick), FOOT (Labour leader). A cryptic definition. Michael Foot was the leader of the Labour Party for 3 years in the early 1980s.
17 Irregular army tour departed here? (8)
MORTUARY – Anagram [irregular] of ARMY TOUR
19 Hesitate to accept current surrender (6)
WAIVER – WAVER (hesitate) containing [to accept] I (current)
22 Belated attempt to raise legitimate issue? (7,7)
SHOTGUN WEDDING – A brilliant cryptic definition!
24 A fan of eastern religion wanting silence (4)
INTO – {sh}INTO (eastern religion) [wanting silence – Sh!)
25 In Slough, swimming pool is the worse for use (10)
SHOPSOILED – Anagram [swimming] of POOL IS, contained by [in] SHED (slough). Plants slough their leaves and snakes slough their skins.
26 Bring in pot that’s picked up (4)
EARN – Sounds like [that’s picked up] “urn” (pot)
27 Impertinent rogue never associated with trial (10)
IRRELEVANT – Anagram [rogue] of NEVER TRIAL. I imagine most people would first think of ‘impertinent’ in the sense of ‘impudent, but if something’s pertinent to a subject it’s ‘relevant’ and by contrast what’s IRRELEVANT is ‘impertinent’.
Down
1 Drop of beer knocked back (4)
SLIP – PILS (beer) reversed [knocked back]. The slightest of MERs over the definition here but I’m probably over-thinking it. Does anyone else have misgivings?
2 Rises in pressure routine in America (7)
UPTURNS – P (pressure) + TURN (routine – e.g. a stage act) contained by [in] US (America)
3 E.g. Bradbury with an innovative story (7,5)
BARNABY RUDGE – Anagram [innovative] of EG BRADBURY AN. Only marginally more helpful a definition than at 6ac, but the enumeration helps a bit.
4 Catch sun by desert palm (6)
RATTAN – RAT (desert), TAN (catch sun). I only know this because it’s used in furniture-making and basket-weaving.
5 Without order, entity lazily moves one three places back (8)
UNTIDILY – UNIT (entity) + IDLY (lazily) becomes UNTIDILY when the first I (one) moves three places towards the back of the word
7 Big Eddy’s out of line and ultimately lacking genius (7)
MAESTRO – MAE{l}STRO{m} (big eddy) [out of line – remove the l] and [ultimately lacking – remove the very last letter]
8 Mostly criminal men punching mug or suckers (10)
ASPIRATORS – PIRAT{e} (criminal) [mostly] + OR (men) contained by [punching] ASS (mug). SOED has ‘aspirate’ as: remove or draw (esp. a fluid) by suction.
11 Assumed warmth‘s from part of bulb around high piece of wood (8,4)
CUPBOARD LOVE – CLOVE (part of bulb) contains [around] UP (high) + BOARD (piece of wood).  Thinking of garlic helps here as its cloves are combined into a bulb. An insincere show of love inspired by a selfish or greedy motive. Cats do a nice line in this!
13 Free agent returned letter (10)
PERMISSIVE – REP (agent) reversed (returned), MISSIVE (letter)
16 Ditch royal bearer of food (8)
TRENCHER – TRENCH (ditch), ER (royal – HMQ).  A large plate or platter.
18 Style so retro for male with comb (7)
ROOSTER – Anagram [style] of SO RETRO. ‘Comb’ is the red crest on the head of a cockerel.
20 Bland individual wholly bowled over by avant-garde (7)
VANILLA – VAN (avant-garde), I (individual),  ALL (wholly) reversed [bowled over]. VAN here is short for ‘vanguard’ as in people or ideas at the forefront of a political, cultural, or artistic movement; the French ‘avant-garde’ has a similar meaning.
21 Something very sugary has little pastry (6)
WEEPIE – WEE (little), PIE (pastry). Also spelt ‘weepy’ this is a story or a film that’s sentimental or otherwise designed to jerk tears
23 Reversal of current change (4)
EDIT – TIDE (current) reversed

33 comments on “Times Cryptic 27296”

  1. Very enjoyable, but hard work for me and I ended up taking close to an hour and a half. Still, there were some very good clues and it was worth spending the extra time trying to work out the sometimes not so obvious parsing. ‘Big Eddy’ for ‘maelstrom’ was a good example.

    Quite a few words or senses I didn’t know including TRENCHER, CUPBOARD LOVE,and IRRELEVANT for ‘Impertinent’. The second crossword-land appearance of BARNABY RUDGE in a week helped with 3d which otherwise would have been a struggle. EMMA was unparsed – I had the wordplay and def the wrong way round, wondering if there was a famous ‘Emma Norman’ but apparently not. As you say, a pretty vague definition, but occasionally we’ve had ‘work’ as a definition for a specific eg book or play in a similar sense.

    I liked many other clues including the wordplay for UNTIDILY and the defs for SHOTGUN WEDDING, CLUB FOOT (memories of the early 80’s) and WEEPIE.

    Thank you to setter and blogger.

  3. Soundly beaten by this one. After my hour, I had most of the right-hand half still to get. I took a break for exercise and a shower, and coming back to it, spent twenty minutes getting exactly no further! Annoyingly, I’d assumed “madame” would be Mrs Norman, but hadn’t considered the abbreviation, and that one and others seemed rather biff-resistant this morning…
  4. 70 minutes for me with LOI an unparsed ASPIRATORS. I also didn’t parse EMMA. I thought that Emma Norman must be a character in a novel, and then realised that she is in mine. ( Where’s Sailor Jack?, available at Amazon if anybody is interested.) Penultimate was CLUB-FOOT. I’m not sure that a SHOPSOILED item has got that way through overuse. COD to SHOTGUN WEDDING. This was a tough one. Thank you Jack and setter.
    1. Dear John I bought your book from Amazon as advised.
      Where does the name Swarbrick come from? There was a very well known philatelist, who collected Jamaica postmarks, who appears briefly in my last book. He too was Lancastrian. Any bells rung?

      WOD Swarbrick

      1. Dave Swarbrick played fiddle and mandolin for Fairport Convention. Sadly he has now passed on to the great Folk Club in the sky.
        1. I remember seeing Dave Swarbrick live once in a small folk club over a pub in Rochester. I sat in the front row and was utterly spellbound… I don’t think i have ever seen any instrument played better in my life. His ability to light, smoke and extinguish a cigarette without once stopping playing was also v impressive!
          1. I wish I could have seen him! I heard the tales about his tobacco habit:-) But for sure he was an incredible musician. When I went to see FC in Stockton a couple of weeks ago the current line up still talk about him in awe!
      2. Thank you very much for buying, H. I hope you enjoy it. You’ll have noticed from the first page that Bob Swarbrick is from the village of St Chad’s. St Chad’s is a fictional cloak for the real village of Poulton-le- Fylde, my mother’s family home, where I spent the first six years of my life too. My mother’s grandmother was an Elizabeth Swarbrick. It was a common name in the Fylde, and so that’s why I decided to use the name for Bob. Swarbrick is a hamlet between Weeton and Singleton, east of Poulton.

        Edited at 2019-03-12 03:43 pm (UTC)

          1. Not as far as I know, John. I’ve googled Dave Swarbrick and he was born in New Malden, so presumably part of the Swarbrick diaspora. Elizabeth S’s son was my maternal side Granddad, Richard Willacy. He used to sing for coppers in the Royal Oak pub in Poulton. I was only 12 when he died but the year before was Grannie’s and his Golden Wedding. He was prevailed upon to sing “A Farmer’s Boy” at the party, what he had been in his youth. It was beautiful. Sadly, I didn’t inherit the gift. Is it a song you sing?
            1. Ah nice! No it’s not a song I know. Off the top of my head, the nearest I get to a farming song is The Dalesman’s Litany(and that’s more about not farming:-)) or Scarborough Fair(An acre of land).
  5. I had VERA not that EMMA would have helped me finish.
    COD to SHOTGUN WEDDING (although when I had S-O-G– I immediadely thought of STOPGAP MEASURE).
  6. Disappointed with myself over this one, as I fell sound asleep with one to go, then managed 2 pinks for three errors. Still, a challenging puzzle, the lower left half creating most trouble for me. While I “get” the cryptic definition at 22, there’s something about “attempt” that doesn’t quite work for me though possibly out of slumberousness I can’t quite articulate why.
  7. ….BREAD AND BUTTER puzzle, and I needed Jack’s usual excellent blog to explain EMMA, IRRELEVANT (only the eventual crossing A stopped my attempted justification of “irreverent”), MAESTRO, and VANILLA. DNK ASPIRATORS.

    I share Jack’s misgivings regarding SLIP (I’m an IPA man myself), but otherwise an excellent puzzle.

    FOI MORTUARY
    LOI SHOPSOILED
    COD SHOTGUN WEDDING
    TIME 18:02

  8. Never felt I was on the right wavelength today – one of those puzzles where you end up battering it into submission without any flashes of inspiration – though on reflection, I should probably be glad just to have finished with everything parsed, given how much there was to be unknotted. Very tricky.
  9. Thanks. I wasn’t thinking of the beer aspect but rather of slip and fall being synonymous. But i’ve now thought of an example: slip / fall from top position, so I no longer have misgivings.
  10. 59:42 with fully 20 minutes on the NE corner. KEEP required an alphabet trawl, and I was only convinced to put in EMMA once I eventually found ASPIRATORS. This was tough, but I was glad to finish. All good fun, though. I liked SHOTGUN WEDDING, MAESTRO and CUPBOARD LOVE. Thanks for the excellent blog!

    Edited at 2019-03-12 11:45 am (UTC)

  11. 16:47 … much admiration for MAESTRO, CUPBOARD LOVE and SHOTGUN WEDDING.

    Not so crazy about EMMA — that ‘title’ def. and the ‘Mrs Norman’ device in one clue seems a bit much! I ‘solved’ it like one or two others by completely misunderstanding it.

    I wasn’t so sure about that archaic ‘impertinent’ at 27a while solving, but looking back it’s a nice clue that leads you to understanding through the clearly signposted anagram. Good stuff.

  12. I came late to this after taking my husband to a doctor’s appointment and thought I’d left my mojo in the taxi, so it’s nice to have company in the struggle. It didn’t help that I read “change” as “charge” initially in 23d. Perry Mason came to mind with IRRELEVANT (incompetent and immaterial). Some very good cluing here, particularly BREAD AND BUTTER. Lord Byron had a CLUB FOOT before the age of discos (I hesitated a bit because I thought the Labour leader had an E on the end). Sorry, forgot to put in my time – 25.42

    Edited at 2019-03-12 12:15 pm (UTC)

    1. does have an E on the end if you are considering the writer who penned a book on the Political Warfare Executive – David Bowes-Lyon, Claude Dansey, Sefton Delmer, Robert Vansittart et al.

      Edited at 2019-03-12 03:04 pm (UTC)

  13. After rattling through this in about 20 mins I was left totally befuddled by ASPIRATORS which I didn’t know and EMMA which needed the A to have any clue about, and had to come here for the answers. WOD CUPBOARD LOVE which is well known to Meg our ancient hound who is staring at me as I type.
  15. This was tough! Having said that, I was slow in the uptake with things like CLUB-FOOT. 24m 44s with the SE corner taking as age to fall.
  16. EMMA and ASPIRATORS were my last 2 in, and although I parsed the latter, I got to EMMA as Sotira describes, in a backwards sort of way, and was relieved to find it was correct. Prior to that mini battle, I’d struggled with MAESTRO as I couldn’t get past removing an L and a G (ultimately (lackin)G) from the word for big Eddy, but shrugged and moved on as it fitted the genius definition. SHOTGUN WEDDING and MORTUARY raised wry smiles. On the whole, a worthy challenge and I was happy to complete it in 39:54. Thanks setter and Jack.
  17. Feeling both one across and 25 across (thanks to a wakeful toddler) I found this heavy going. Some of those four-letter clues were nasty. I’m looking at you, Emma.
  18. A DNF as I stuck in KEWPIE @ 21dn. I was thinking of KEWPIE DIDI a cute baby in a top knot who used to appear on a brand of mayonnaise in Hong Kong. Very sugary! Still around in Shanghai!

    No matter – this was a tough cookie.

    I was also convinced that 26ac was THREADBARE (fits the definition far better than SHOPSOILED usage over neglect – as per the Bolton Wanderer) until 11dn CUPBOARD LOVE appeared.

    FOI 3dn BARNABY RUDGE

    COD 15ac CLUB FOOT – the only politician I know with such an impediment was Joseph Goebbels. There may well have been others – they could have formed a club.

    WOD (21dn) KEWPIE

    Could not parse 6ac EMMA as per Sotira not a great clue.

    Re-1dn my slight MER was that PILSner is strictly speaking a lager and not a beer. However one swallow doesn’t make a mer-mer.

    Edited at 2019-03-12 03:18 pm (UTC)

  19. This one took me over an hour. Work was a bit frantic today and I wasn’t really in an appropriately relaxed mood when I tackled this puzzle, so I’m sure that added to my time. But from other comments I can see it was also difficult in parts. Dnk the expression at 11dn. I thought that was something indulged in by German former tennis champions. Didn’t understand why impertinent was irrelevant but I see it now. Most trouble in the maestro, aspirators, Emma NE corner. Hard work. I liked mortuary where I was trying to find something like Yarmouth for far too long. Shotgun wedding also a nice cryptic definition.
  20. DNF after an hour, thanks to the top-east corner. I considered KEEP, but rejected it as I didn’t make the connection with honour. MAESTRO and ASPIRATOR also defeated me – the latter inexcusably so. Nice to see a mention of Michael Foot – a leg end in his own lifetime.
    1. Much derided for his lack of sartorial elegance, but a highly intellectual man and had more principles than most of today’s politicians can muster.
      As for the puzzle, I completed it and worked put how the clue for aspirators worked, but then carelessly spelled it with an ‘e’ instead of the ‘o’ I knew it should be. While I keep away from hospitals as much as possible, my wife was a nurse specialising in operating theatre work, and I picked up some of the terminology from conversations about her activities.
  21. Thanks setter and jack
    Found this quite difficult and taking just under the hour to complete and almost parse – couldn’t untangle VANILLA apart from the ALL bit. Didn’t properly get EMMA despite seeing the A MME wordplay – was fastened to an Emma Norman instead of seeing the clever instruction to look for the French title via Mrs Norman and although the book passed through my mind, didn’t connect it to ‘title’ – thought that it was a tough but excellent clue when fully explained.
    Nearly came to grief in the SW with PERMISSION / NARK until i did my final parsing run through and saw the mistake.
    Finished in the SE corner with that VANILLA, IRRELEVANT (with the new to me ‘impertinent’ meaning) and WEEPIE (which looked so simple afterwards) the last few in.

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