Solving time: 24 minutes until I hit a wall with 5 answers missing and after that I lost track. It counts as a DNF anyway as I revealed the answer to one clue (12dn).
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]. “Aural wordplay” is in quotation marks. I usually omit all reference to juxtaposition indicators unless there is a specific point that requires clarification.
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1 | Torch is initially held for waving (8) |
BRANDISH | |
BRAND (torch), IS, H{eld}. I was concerned about this until I found that ‘brandish’ can be a noun defined as (an act of) brandishing, so it follows that it can also be defined as waving. | |
6 | Heathen almost incarcerates old duke in temple (6) |
PAGODA | |
PAGA{n} (heathen) [almost] contains [incarcerates] O (old) + D (duke) | |
9 | Queue to leave when stuck in bumptious social gathering? (8,5) |
COCKTAIL PARTY | |
TAIL (queue) + PART (leave) contained by [stuck in] COCKY (bumptious) | |
10 | Dreaded police succeeded in state allowing no change (6) |
STASIS | |
STASI (dreaded police), S (succeeded) | |
11 | Lie low we’re told by Scottish explorer in green space (4,4) |
HYDE PARK | |
Aural wordplay [we’re told]: HYDE / “hide” (lie low), PARK (Scottish explorer). Mungo Park (1771 – 1806). | |
13 | Italian friend crossing delta in kayak? (10) |
PALINDROME | |
PAL IN ROME (Italian friend) containing [crossing] D (delta). Definition by misleading example! | |
15 | Rest last of vertebrae in nuchal region (4) |
NAPE | |
NAP (rest), {vertebra}E [last of..]. NHO ‘nuchal’ which relates to the nape of the neck and the upper spinal cord. | |
16 | Continent lives recalled among group forgoing alcohol (4) |
ASIA | |
IS (lives) reversed [recalled] contained by [among] AA (group forgoing alcohol – Alcoholics Anonymous] | |
18 | Associate successfully completed replacing outbuilding with church (10) |
ACCOMPLICE | |
‘Accomplished’ (successfully completed) becomes ACCOMPLICE when ‘shed’ (outbuilding) is replaced with CE (church) | |
21 | Very keen to grasp fabulous wit (8) |
RAVENOUS | |
RAVE (fabulous), NOUS (wit). I thought of RAVENOUS as a word that fitted the grid but I couldn’t see the definition or wordplay so I used Word Wizard to look for something better but failed to find it. It was only when writing the blog that I found ‘ravenous’ defined as rapacious, grasping, excessively or violently greedy. Then I spotted the wordplay with ‘fabulous / RAVE’ as in a rave review. For ‘wit / NOUS’ we have to think of intelligence rather than humour, as in having the wit to solve a problem. | |
22 | Quarrelsome carpenter (6) |
CHIPPY | |
Two meanings | |
23 | County nuts get near senior NCO (5,8) |
STAFF SERGEANT | |
STAFFS (county – Staffordshire), anagram [nuts] of GET NEAR | |
25 | Subordinate action attributed to freedom of movement (2-4) |
BY-PLAY | |
BY (attributed to), PLAY (freedom of movement). SOED: Subsidiary action, especially on stage. | |
26 | Weird rites, secretive veils — like nuns perhaps (8) |
SISTERLY | |
SLY (secretive) contains [veils] anagram [weird] of RITES |
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2 | Cheese: artist devours it when circling function (7) |
RICOTTA | |
RA (artist) contains [devours] IT, then containing [circling] COT (function – cotangent] | |
3 | Demand from cineaste: set to be rebuilt (11) |
NECESSITATE | |
Anagram [rebuilt] of CINEASTE SET | |
4 | Horrified grimace right away showing stress (5) |
ICTUS | |
{r}ICTUS (horrified grimace) [right away]. Rhythmical or metrical stress. | |
5 | Weary remark from drunk taken around English house (5-2) |
HEIGH-HO | |
HIGH (drunk) containing [taken around] E (English), then HO (house) | |
6 | Blackball news boss: paper giving unrealistic hope (4,5) |
PIPE DREAM | |
PIP (blackball), ED (news boss), REAM (paper). I am advised that ‘pip’ can be used informally to mean to defeat or to blackball someone, especially when their success seems certain. I knew meanings of both words but hadn’t thought of them as synonymous. | |
7 | Swimmer seen in Ghasri periodically (3) |
GAR | |
G{h}A{s}R{i} [periodically] | |
8 | Outing Democrat — one in beaten party (3,4) |
DAY TRIP | |
D (Democrat), then I (one) contained by [in] anagram [beaten] of PARTY | |
12 | Might time’s character be so described in Ariosto? (11) |
PENULTIMATE | |
T (time) is the PENULTIMATE letter in Ariosto. I used ‘reveal’ on this one having got nowhere by checking to see who Ariosto was, thinking he might have some bearing on the matter. Only after revealing the answer did I understand what was going on here. | |
14 | Spooner’s no drink in the pot for this creature? (9) |
DRAGONFLY | |
Aural wordplay [Spooner’s]: DRAGON FLY / “flagon dry” (no drink in the pot) | |
17 | He’d often check blue pens make the grade (7) |
SPASSKY | |
SKY (blue) contains [pens] PASS (make the grade). Boris at chess. | |
19 | That female feeding rook calls for some nuts (7) |
CASHEWS | |
SHE (that female) contained by [feeding] CAWS (rook calls) | |
20 | Yen withdrawn from somehow atypical City resource? (7) |
CAPITAL | |
Anagram [somehow] of AT{y}PICAL [Yen withdrawn]. I assume this refers to cities with financial districts where vast sums of money are traded. | |
22 | Structures making use of bars belonging to US composer (5) |
CAGES | |
CAGE’S (belonging to US composer – John Cage) | |
24 | Trouble’s coming up in Parliament (3) |
AIL | |
Reversed [coming up] and hidden [in] {par}LIA{ment} |
Biffed PENULTIMATE when all the checkers were in but never bothered to parse it, clever. I failed on ICTUS and RAVENOUS as I had never heard of the former and couldn’t parse the latter, even though I saw nous as wit. Some great stuff here, PALINDROME, HYDE PARK (quickly changed from hide) and ACCOMPLICE when knocking down the shed and building a church in its place! Liked SPASSKY too. Great fun.
Thanks Jack.
DNF
I thought of RAVENOUS, but couldn’t see how it would work; never would have thought of ‘fabulous’=rave. And I never got 17d, although I briefly considered SPASSAD. Biffed PALINDROME, parsed post-submission. Thought of PENULTIMATE once I had all the checkers, only then saw the wordplay.
And you’d be justified in not thinking it.
About 70 minutes. I had all except the SW corner out in less than 30 minutes but in error had DAMSELFLY and SATISFY (for 17dn). As a consequence 18ac and 21ac became impossible though I struggled for some time before realising I had errors. I finally saw DRAGONFLY and ACCOMPLICE fell into place but fixing 17dn took longer. I was a very good chess player in my youth and saw SPASSKY fitted but could not see the clear indication about someone who “checked”.
Thanks Jack
Hard but fair, 43.37 and pleased just to get across the line. LOsI were STAFF SERGEANT and the tricky but rather good SPASSKY. Couldn’t parse RAVENOUS, COCKTAIL PARTY or PENULTIMATE and had to look up nuchal which at least opened up the NE. Thanks to Jack for the helpful blog.
From Idiot Wind:
It was gravity which pulled us down and destiny which broke us apart
You tamed the lion in my CAGE but it just wasn’t enough to change my heart
Now everything’s a little upside down, as a matter of fact the wheels have stopped
What’s good is bad, what’s bad is good, you’ll find out when you reach the top
You’re on the bottom
It feels as if our new editor is encouraging slightly more difficult puzzles – so a couple cheers for that if he is. Today he also got some witty cluing.
Thanks for Ravenous and Penultimate, jackkt, and thanks, setter, for expanding my vocabulary by two words at 4d.
Slightly more difficult is fine. Last Friday more difficult, not so much ..
Last Friday excluded, SNITCH doesn’t really agree with my sense of generally more tricky, so maybe it’s just my having a thick- headed week or two
If you want crosswords successfully completed by fewer solvers that’s definitely the way to go. And in the long term that can only mean the end of The Times crossword as we know it.
There’s no balance these days. More and more it seems the crossword can only be solved by a trawl through a dictionary. That wasn’t the original intention and it shouldn’t need to be the intention now.
The place for these type of crosswords is the Monthly Special or the Mephisto.
RICTUS is a favourite word of Updike’s, which jogged my ever less reliable memory of ICTUS from schooldays. Just about parsed LOI RAVENOUS by the time I submitted, NOUS falling first, as wit and intelligence go together for me, as their synonymity is discussed by C S Lewis in his ‘Studies in Words.’
I have always considered CAGE a most environment-friendly composer, as he recycles all his music.
Top puzzle. 27:29
Not sure what you mean about Cagr.
He objected to recordings of his work (though he allowed them) on the grounds that when you listen more than once to chance-produced sounds your mind imposes a pattern from memory and the randomness is lost.
I solved it, but since I was in a hurry to get to bed, I turned it into a biff-fest. I biffed penultimate, pipe dream, accomplice, cocktail party, and ravenous – my LOI. I did try to parse ravenous, but couldn’t. I thought the Spooner clue was going to be hard, but then I thought of flagon – perfect!
Time: 23:50
I didn’t know HEIGH-HO could be an expression of weariness (it can mean various things) because I always assumed the Seven Dwarves were happy to do their work. (I always say, “Wotk is the best therapy.”)
Had the right side finished before I slowed down. Part of that, I’m sure, was just hunger.
Took a minute to accept RAVE as “fabulous”—but “fabulous” is indeed a RAVE.
I would pronounce the weary version ‘hay-ho’
Not only the best therapy. It even makes you free. As we were reminded yesterday.
The bells go ‘heigh-ho, heigh-ho, heigh-ho, heigh-ho’ in Ulysses.
I didn‘t think that was sooo hard. Finished in 32:03 of which the last maybe 5 minutes or so were spent on PENULTIMATE (when I finally realised why it was just Ariosto and not Ariosto Furioso) and then LOI PALINDROME where I was close to giving up but then thought, what if I pencil in PAL for the friend and then saw PALINDROME and realised what the kayak was about.
Thanks setter for an enjoyably tricky puzzle and Jack for the blog
24.00, with the last 5 minutes spent trying to work out why “fabulous” might mean RAVE (still not entirely convinced).
Unfortunately the time has long passed when one could make a joke about the Governor of Alaska building a kayak venue and calling it the Palin-drome.
To quote Max Quordlepleen in ‘The Restaurant at the End of the Universe’, “There’s nothing PENULTIMATE about this one”.
LOI RAVENOUS
COD SPASSKY
That was fun! 21:33 with a number of witty clues (PALINDROME, SPASSKY my joint COD). Thanks J and setter.
Failed in SW on the RAVENOUS/SPASSKY crosser. I did think of RAVENOUS but not of Chess. PENULTIMATE was the only word I could make fit the crossers. COD to RICOTTA even if Cotangent is pushing it a bit. Thank you Jack and setter. Rave on.
9.14
A fun puzzle, which I seem to have been on the wavelength for. I was only about 80% sure of RAVENOUS at the end, but in it went after I thought of ‘rave reviews’. I’ve had trouble before with clues that relate to something within the clue, but thankfully got PENULTIMATE almost immediately without worrying about the unknown Italian poet. SPASSKY was another favourite.
I assume I wasn’t the only person who briefly wondered if the very nice PALINDROME might end in -CANODE…
Thanks both.
You weren’t!
Well, a DNF really as I had to check ICTUS & I just couldn’t see RAVENOUS. I did get (and parse) PENULTIMATE, and PALINDROME ( very clever) and a few other tricky ones. NHO BY-PLAY but what else could it be. HEIGH-HO.
I liked COCKTAIL PARTY.
Thanks Jack and setter.
Same as many others – did all but RAVENOUS in 30′ but wouldn’t put it in unparsed. Really liked SPASSKY.
Thanks jack and setter.
DNF, defeated by RAVENOUS – I thought of it, but didn’t see how fabulous=rave (I was trying to put a word meaning ‘very keen’ around ‘ace’ for ‘fabulous’, with ‘wit’ as the definition).
– Had to trust there was a Scottish explorer called Park for HYDE PARK
– NHO nuchal but the wordplay for NAPE was kind
– Not familiar with CHIPPY as a carpenter – I guess it’s the same kind of term as sparky
– Forgot cot=cotangent so held off on RICOTTA until COCKTAIL PARTY made it inevitable
– Didn’t know blackball=pip but PIPE DREAM was clear enough
Thanks Jack and setter.
COD Sisterly
12:01, of which over 25% was spent trying to come up with a better answer than RAVENOUS. ‘Very keen to grasp’ is a loose definition and ‘fabulous’ is simply not synonymous with ‘rave’. A very poor clue IMO.
I think 20ac is a reference to the City, i.e. the City of London. In fact I think it must be because I can’t see any other justification for the capital C.
I assumed rave = fabulous must be a gen Z expression… but you would know better than me, K!
I know nothing about gen Z expressions, but I don’t get what the perceived problem with ‘fabulous / RAVE’ is. I gave an example in the blog of ‘a rave review’ (an expression that’s been widely used for decades) where ‘rave’ is understood to mean enthusiastic, favourable, excellent, etc. If I said a review was fabulous, in common parlance it would be understood to mean exactly the same.
‘Fabulous’ in this context refers to the review, not its content. A A Gill wrote many fabulous reviews panning restaurants.
“The restaurant got fabulous/rave reviews from the critics” works – but I don’t especially like synonyms where there’s only one context in which they can be synonymous. Another example would be ‘wing/protection’, where they’re synonymous in the phrase ‘under one’s…’ but not otherwise.
If I were a setter, which thankfully I’m not, I would say “Hey! One’s enough, surely? How many synonyms do you need for two words? Have you ever tried setting?!”
We’ll have to disagree over this as I simply don’t get it. If I got a rave review for something I’d done I’d be very pleased and grateful even it was expressed in mundane terms.
Agree. ‘Rave’, as yoked to ‘review’, means ‘very admiring’. It is descriptive of the tone and approach of the review, not the review’s verdict (on whatever it’s judging). It’s simply incorrect to suggest that ‘rave’ can mean ‘fabulous’ in this context. And this must be the context the setter is invoking; ‘rave review’ is a captive epithet that’s unique. Unless somebody can think of another use of ‘rave’ as an adjective?
I take it as meaning that “fabulous” is a RAVE. I don’t know that “fabulous review” is at all idiomatic the way “RAVE review” is.
Not as far as I’m aware!
I think you mean 20dn?
Yes!
I thought the same about the City. The capital C gave me the solution pretty well immediately.
29:59
I laboured mightily over that one but got there in the end. A letter trawl finally uncovered ICTUS (unknown) and RAVENOUS but I never quite felt I was on the right wavelength. It didn’t help that I always get caught out by the PALINDROME clues and I hate, hate, hate Spoonerisms, maybe because I am so bad at them. Sky for blue is another blind spot as I’m always tempted by sad and other variants.
A good and fair challenge though so thanks to both.
19:11. Held up for ages at the end by RAVENOUS, which I eventually found as something that fitted the checkers and definition but couldn’t parse, so bunged it in anyway. DNK nuchal, so derived NAPE from the wordplay, I’d have been quicker if I’d spelt SERGEANT correctly which delayed CASHEWS, CAGES and PENULTIMATE. Thanks Jackkt and setter.
I had blue as sad, so could not make spassad work, not knowing the chess chap. Did not think of rave as fabulous, so although i came up with the word, I ignored it (and generous and covetous) and could not arrive at by-play, had in play, at play but knew they were not working. So did well apart from those three! fun morning! Thanks, Carolyn
Beaten by RAVENOUS and PENULTIMATE, even with all crossers. “Rave” = “fabulous” must be brilliantly clever, because it goes right over my head.
57:33
Always on the brink of failure, but I got there in the end. Got nuchal from the French word nuque – another clue where it pays to be a linguist, I guess. Brandish as a noun was a surprise.
Thanks, jack.
Me too!
20:59
Good puzzle with some ingenious clueing. Particularly liked SPASSKY and PALINDROME. Dodged a bullet wih HIDE PARK. The checkers made PENULTIMATE easy but I was furioso when Jack explained the answer. Doh!
Thanks to Jack and the setter
1a Brandish, I never thought of any complexity here, just didn’t notice it had to be a noun. Oh dear.
13a Palindrome. Hard to spot. I was inventing all kinds of words here such as Cami?anode=Italian for friend. No. Amoeba was on a similar pointless trail it seems.
15a Nape. NHO nuchal, but guessed it.
5d. Heigh-Ho. Thought of Rachael Heyhoe Flint (record 179 n.o.) rather than dwarves.
6d Pipe dream. Wasn’t 100% on pip=blackball, but it seems OK I suppose.
12d Penultimate. NHO Ludovico Ariosto, but I must have done as he is in Cheating Machine!
22d Caged. Had forgot about Mr Cage but he’s in C.M. as well.
Think RAVE adj means ‘excellent’ and the clue seems to go with a syn for that. ‘Rave reviews’ etc. It gets an ‘informal’ tag in the BRB. Might have been some leeway there!
I really liked this witty puzzle. I’m no speed solver, so it look me a longish time, around 50 minutes, but it seemed packed with inventive stuff, offering a nice surprise in every other clue. Favourites for today include COCKTAIL PARTY, HYDE PARK, PALINDROME (maybe the pick), RAVENOUS, HEIGH-HO & PENULTIMATE (also maybe the pick).
Thanks setter for a fun work-out, and cheers jackkt for the info.
Enjoyed this, not too hard but took embarrassingly long to spot Mr Spassky, despite having once met him.
Interesting…
DNF. 52 mins of hard slog and everything fully parsed only to get a pink with a stupid HIDE PARK. Fingers seem to work phonetically after the brain has already moved on.
There was some witty and clever stuff in there but the clueing was often tantalisingly outside my peripheral vision.
35′ but not quite sure how I got there! I did peek to see who Ariosto was, (but since it had nothing to do with the clue I’ll let that pass..) PENULTIMATE was LOI and a biff. Came here for the parsing.
I always thought a CHIPPY was a joiner, not carpenter; there’s a big difference (at least according to carpenters).
Enjoyed SPASSKY and PALINDROME (once I got it). RAVENOUS not so much, I saw the parsing but didn’t quite believe it
I’d spent some time with Orlando Furioso last summer, which definitely slowed down getting on the right track for Penultimate.
What unexpected fun! It started as an average sort of crossword, heigh ho or perhaps ho hum, but blossomed in the middle with clues that looked impossible but turned out to be teasing masterpieces. Prince among them of course, PENULTIMATE. Ariosto turns up enough in these quarters for me to know he’s a poet, with connoisseurs insisting that Orlando Furioso should be on everyone’s shelf, but with me forgetting whether or not he’s really Dante. So off you go trying to remember what you should know about him, until the penny drops and you realise the precious little you do know is irrelevant. Just his T.
Similarly PALINDROME, straining one’s Italian and Inuit to come up with an alternative to kayak.
A decent Spooner, a half-forgotten COT (I toyed with retSINa) and the stretchy PIP and RAVE, the not-blue-pencilling checker and the shed divinely rebuilt all helped to make this a fine 21.33 romp.
I started with the ISH at the end of 1a, but it was a bit later when BRAND went tentatively in due to the apparent tense conflict. Most of the puzzle yielded to sustained assault, even PENULTIMATE went in confidently, although unparsed, but I was breeze blocked by 3d, 9a, 13a and LOI, RAVENOUS. Eventually I spotted COCKTAIL and was able to get NECESSITATE. Then PALINDROME surfaced, but RAVENOUS needed another few minutes and I still submitted with crossed fingers. 33:25. Thanks setter and Jack.
50 minutes – held up by Ravenous/Spassky/By Play at the end.
What everyone else has said about Ravenous but a very nice puzzle.
My COD Dragonfly.
Someone above complained about COT for ‘function’. Nothing wrong with it for me. Setters always seem to stick to SIN, when they also have COT — along with TAN, COS, SEC, COSEC available in their armoury. And then of course there are the hyperbolic functions too, especially COSH. Nice puzzle, by the way.
I finished this in the slow time of 54 minutes. No fault of the setter but an unsatisfactory solve relying on biffing, crossers and especially guesswork. I lost count of the number I couldn’t parse and was surprised there were no pink squares at the end. Thanks for the blog explaining the new words/senses which had never occurred to me. I did like PALINDROME, HEIGH-HO and SPASSKY (doesn’t seem like 52 years since his 15 minutes of popular culture fame in Reykjavik), all of which I did manage to parse.
18:32
Plenty to enjoy here, though plenty missed too:
Failed to parse:
COCKTAIL PARTY – bunged in and moved on, though did register TAIL for follow
HYDE PARK – didn’t know the Scottish explorer
NAPE – guessed, but on reflection, I am aware of the nuchal test during pregnancy for Down’s Syndrome
RAVENOUS – bifd, but didn’t see the RAVE = fabulous connection
PENULTIMATE – no idea what was going on here!
NHO:
ICTUS – not sure if I’d heard of it but had heard of (R)ICTUS smiles
PIP = blackball
HEIGH-HO – I would have written as HEY HO
Thanks setter, and for unravelling, Jack
Excellent crossword I thought. Everything was solvable, but a MER at pip = blackball. Why the setter needed ‘nuchal region’ I can’t see, since it was quite possible to have something straightforward along the lines of ‘at the top’. As it was I guessed it based on the wordplay. 36 minutes.
How is rave not a synonym of fabulous, if we regard rave not as a verb but as an adjective, which we surely can? Collins doesn’t, but Chambers does (informal)?
Pulled up stumps at the hour mark with two clues unsolved. Thought of RAVENOUS but just couldn’t parse it, so didn’t take a chance. If I had, perhaps SPASSKY would have come to mind, but it didn’t! Frustrating but nevertheless enjoyable.
36 – couldn’t crack the NW until the end so started at the bottom and took the slow route going up from there. Plenty to like, but the naughty RAVENOUS wasn’t among it.
14.27, but admit I looked up meaning of nuchal ( which came out as my Hal – what does predictive text know?)
Palindrome was vg.
Thought of RAVENOUS but failed to maje sense of it, which meant I couldn’t get SPASSKY either, though I’d thought of both sky and pass. However, by then, I had IN-PLAY, as I’m not familiar with the term by-play, so DNF. Other than those three, a nice set of clues.
I was pleased to get there in the end, but very slow to see the NHO BY-PLAY, SPASSKY, and LOI RAVENOUS. Relieved that RAVENOUS was correct since I wondered if there was a better choice than RAVE for fabulous. Nice crossword.
What
26:10. Another who hesitated over ravenous.
COD: SISTERLY
A DNF again. I seem to be going backwards- maybe the new editor has upped the difficulty. I got all of the right side, but came unstuck on the LH. I should have got SPASSKy and NECESSITATE, but don’t. I’ve NHO a BY-PLAY.
Clever puzzle, but it gave me a headache.
Thank you Jack and Setter
DNF Had all bar two in 25 mins but totally defeated by ravenous and Spassky. Probably should have got Spassky but I had not a clue for ravenous .
26:59, with RAVENOUS my LOI. SPASSKY took a while to see, as I assumed blue=sad, and SPASSDA made no sense. NHO pip=blackball.
Thanks Jack and setter
38 mins but I got boggled because I was trying to put in SATISFY but was convinced that RAVENOUS was right. In the end, I gave up and got a little help to complete. Never thought of chess.
20 mins, but it took me a few more to parse RAVENOUS – then I, too, thought of “rave review”. Like others, I wasn’t acquainted with “brandish” as a noun.
No problem with ‘rave’ for ‘fabulous’ and I wouldn’t have any with ‘wing’ for ‘protection’ either as synonyms should only have to be substitutable in one instance and not in all instances. A ‘fabulous review’ could also theoretically mean one that’s fabled to exist as well as a well-written one, or a complimentary one, FWIW.
Not in all instances, certainly, but substitutable in a single phrase is a bit limp.
35 mins, with 3D necessitating more time than it should have. I particularly liked PALINDROME and PENULTIMATE, though I suspect both may have come from the same chapter in the Crossword Setter’s Book Of Tricks (should such a work exist).
Something about RAVE isn’t right, but I’ll let it pass . Got it all done in just over 20 but let myself down by spelling HYDE as HIDE. Foolish me.
33.41. A couple of times I thought that I was going to be defeated but the pennies dropped in timely fashion. Some superb misdirection in the puzzle, though I had the same misgivings as others have expressed: nevertheless, overall, a most enjoyable challenge.