I have no solving time for this as I nodded off and lost track of it. Probably just as well as I struggled throughout and needed a lot more than my target half-hour.
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 now use a tilde sign ~ to indicate an insertion point in containment clues. I usually omit all reference to juxtaposition indicators unless there is a specific point that requires clarification.
 Across |
|
|---|---|
| 1 | Dropping sadly can limit cacti in development (13) |
| ANTICLIMACTIC – Anagram [in development] of CAN LIMIT CACTI | |
| 9 | Illusory images of neutrino particles? (2,3) |
| OP ART – Hidden in [of – belonging to] {neutrin}O PART{icles}. ODE: A form of abstract art that gives the illusion of movement by the precise use of pattern and colour, or in which conflicting patterns emerge and overlap. | |
| 10 | Gross rage is out of order for assailant (9) |
| AGGRESSOR – Anagram [out of order] of GROSS RAGE | |
| 11 | Unimportant note, for instance, readable with a typo? (10) |
| NEGLIGIBLE – N (note), EG (for instance), LIGIBLE i.e. LEGIBLE (readable) [with a typo]. I don’t like this device at all and hope it will not become commonplace. | |
| 12 | Letter of thanks after Beeb has abolished repeats (4) |
| BETA – BE{eb} [abolished repeats], TA (thanks) | |
| 14 | Scrap, a bit of thin muslin (7) |
| TIFFANY – TIFF (scrap), ANY (a bit of). Would you like any / a bit of, cake? | |
| 16 | Italian composer writes music endlessly, flipping bad (7) |
| CORELLI – {s}CORE{s} (writes music) [endlessly] then ILL (bad) reversed [flipping] | |
| 17 | Gradually losing stone, say, cut by sculptor (7) |
| ERODING – E~G (say) containing [cut by] RODIN (sculptor) | |
| 19 | Atonement not unknown in pirates’ home (7) |
| PENANCE – PEN{z}ANCE (pirates’ home) [not unknown in…]. The Pirates of Penzance is a comic opera by Gilbert and Sullivan. | |
| 20 | What’s used to catch birds in tree (4) |
| LIME – Two meanings. I didn’t know the first: lime aka birdlime is a sticky adhesive smeared on branches to capture small birds. | |
| 21 | Big and impenetrable loch I’m into, swimming (10) |
| MONOLITHIC – Anagram [swimming] of LOCH I’M INTO | |
| 24 | Hors d’œuvre of fish I love after starters of artisanal cold cuts (9) |
| CARPACCIO – CARP (fish), A{rtisanal} + C{old} + C{uts} [starters of…], I, O (love). An Italian hors d’oeuvre consisting of thin slices of raw beef or fish served with a sauce. | |
| 25 | West end of Hispaniola island — not all of it? (5) |
| HAITI – H{ispaniola} [west end of… ], AIT (island), I{t} [not all of…]. A very good &lit clue, perfectly combining wordplay and definition as this description from Wiki indicates: Haiti…is a country in the Caribbean Sea on the island of Hispaniola. It occupies the western side of the island, which it shares with the Dominican Republic. | |
| 26 | Washing car outside university residential area (7,6) |
| HOUSING ESTATE – HO~SING ESTATE (washing car) containing [outside] U (university) | |
| Down |
|
|---|---|
| 1 | Where hands go through three consecutive eight-hour shifts? (6,3,5) |
| AROUND THE CLOCK – Cryptic | |
| 2 | Tons persistently worry over nasal sound (5) |
| TWANG – T (tons), then GNAW (persistently worry) reversed [over] | |
| 3 | What could be sharp chintz raincoat child’s regularly taken out (6,4) |
| CITRIC ACID – C{h}I{n}T{z} R{a}I{n}C{o}A{t} C{h}I{l}D [regularly taken out]. Not sure why ‘could be’. | |
| 4 | Foolishness and madness banishing son (7) |
| INANITY – IN{s}ANITY (madness) [banishing son] | |
| 5 | Pure northern Gaelic must be translated (7) |
| ANGELIC – Anagram [translated] of N (northern) GAELIC | |
| 6 | One securing rank (4) |
| TIER – Two meanings, the first pronounced ‘tie-er’ | |
| 7 | Star locked up by prison governor (9) |
| CASTELLAN – STELLA (star) contained by [locked up by] CA~N (prison). The governor of a castle. | |
| 8 | Is Carmine gored getting involved in this? (9,5) |
| ORGANISED CRIME – Anagram [involved] of IS CARMINE GORED. Okay, the anagram works, but in my opinion if the definition is a reflexive word such as ‘this’ there ought to be something in the rest of the clue to indicate the subject it’s referring to, and I can’t see that here. When I saw ‘gored’ I thought bullfighting but that was no help at all so I was left with simply arranging the anagrist into something that fitted the grid. |
|
| 13 | Excitedly waves health food recipes (10) |
| BRANDISHES – BRAN (health food), DISHES (recipes) | |
| 15 | Forcibly move ornamental coat fastener on border (9) |
| FROGMARCH – FROG (ornamental coat fastener), MARCH (border). Collins: march / marchland – a frontier, border, or boundary or the land lying along it, often of disputed ownership. The ornamental frog has come up before. | |
| 18 | Dumplings — no small volume covered in butter (7) |
| GNOCCHI – NO + CC (small volume) contained by [covered in] G~HI (butter) | |
| 19 | Delay Broadway’s opening of play around November (7) |
| PROLONG – PROLO~G (Broadway’s opening of play – US spelling) containing [around] N (November) | |
| 22 | Port city of Nova Scotia unfinished and not large (5) |
| HAIFA – HA{l}IFA{x} (city of Nova Scotia) [unfinished and not large] | |
| 23 | Cross about book being forbidden (4) |
| TABU – TA~U (cross) containing [about] B (book) | |
18:49
I’m glad you animadverted on the ligible/legible w/p; I hope we don’t see this sort of thing again. Do people still use birdlime? I only knew the word from Shakespeare. Frogs are fasteners; are they any more ornamental than buttons?
Fully agree ….where might this end- one letter, two letters etc.
Carmine Lupertazzi was a mob boss in ‘The Sopranos’, so the clue works very well!
I have to say I thought the typo clue rather good. Another arrow in the setter’s quiver.
22:29.
No- see above
Brilliant! A blast! BRANDISHES haha
About 25, nice puzzle. Not sure about the NEGLIGIBLE clue and actually doubt whether Papa Soprano was intentionally shoe-horned into 8dn, but thought HAITI was brilliant. Especially after Jack pointed out how brilliant it was.
From Highlands:
Well my heart’s in the Highlands with the horses and hounds
Way up in the border country, far from the towns
With the TWANG of the arrow and a snap of the bow…
I saw ‘West end of Hispaniola Island’ and bunged in HAITI; nothing brilliant, or even cryptic, until I got around to parsing it later.
DNF. I didn’t know HAIFA and couldn’t work it out. Also I had COSTELLAN with CON as a prisoner when I needed a prison.
COD. PENANCE.
Thanks to jack and our setter.
I found this one a curious mixture of delightful and irritating. I agree strongly with your complaints about ORGANISED CRIME, I don’t think it works at all as a clue. I presume “Carmine” is supposed to clue us towards the Mafia, but that doesn’t seem enough to me when “gored” points the other way. I liked NEGLIGIBLE in this case although you’re right it would rapidly become wearing if overused, and BEEB delighted. I don’t mind the odd unusual spelling but having both “ghi” instead of “ghee” and “tabu” instead of “taboo” so close to each felt a bit off to me. Thanks setter and jackkt.
19’27”, steady solve. Didn’t know TIFFANY but know the word through the film and song.
The typo thing is a slippery slope – ‘nearly’, ‘not quite’ spring to mind.
Thanks jack and setter.
18.36. On the right wavelength today. Popped in tiffany after unveiling the t and the f. Tiffany not something I’ve come across before.
6:45. Another gentle one, lots of fun though.
I didn’t understand 8dn when solving – I’ve never watched The Sopranos – but now that I do I think it’s brilliant. ‘Gored’ doesn’t necessarily refer to bullfighting and the fact that it normally does makes for a particularly felicitous bit of misdirection.
Didn’t know that meaning of TIFFANY, so that was LOI. Like others, I didn’t like NEGLIGIBLE. but the crossers were kind. COD to HOUSING ESTATE by a short head from AROUND THE CLOCK. Good puzzle, though I could have done without the bird-catching technique. Thank you Jack and setter.
12:11. A couple of unknowns – TIFFANY and birdlime, but they didn’t hold me up much. LOI ORGANISED CRIME took a while to come. Some great clues, HAITI the standout one. Thank-you Jackkt and setter.
46 mins. I had most of the grid filled in after 30 min but the SW was annoyingly holding me up. After 15 mins of head scratching i finally saw FROGMARCH and TIFFANY, LIME (first meaning unknown here too) & CARPACCIO all went quickly in. Down here, its as often served as a main course as much as a starter.
I am in agreement too re the « typo » thingy.
I enjoyed the long anagrams.
Thanks Jack and setter.
Well this one is certainly stirring some reactions. Add my name to the list of those feeling ‘the typo device is OK but I wouldn’t want to see it too frequently’: I seriously doubt we would encounter this in the Times but it does feel like a device that could enable setters simply to get away without properly cluing something. But I smiled on the first encounter. ORGANISED CRIME is trickier – ‘gore’ is so very strongly associated with horns, bulls and bullfights that, yes, it makes the ‘this’ slightly frustrating as a self-referential def.
Those observations aside, plenty to enjoy in a (for me) surprisingly accessible puzzle (20 minutes) with favourites inc OP ART, BETA, PENANCE, ERODING, BRANDISHES and, COTD, HAITI. It is a strange characteristic of the &lit that the better it is, the more chance there is of a write-in. With the consequent danger that its construction might be overlooked. Beautiful job.
Thanks setter and blogger
Just under half an hour.
– Don’t mind the ‘with a typo’ device in NEGLIGIBLE, though maybe that’s because the rest of the cluing was fairly kind
– Didn’t know that TIFFANY is thin muslin or that LIME can be used to trap birds
– Couldn’t have told you that HAITI is on Hispaniola
– Trusted the wordplay for the unknown CASTELLAN
– Guessed that Carmine was a reference to The Sopranos to get ORGANISED CRIME
– Took ages to get BRANDISHES as I kept thinking ‘excitedly’ might be an anagrind
– Got HAIFA from the checkers some time before I worked out the parsing
Thanks Jack and setter.
FOI Haiti
LOI Brandishes
COD Housing estate
25:11. A very mixed bag. It was certainly educational: not seen GHI or TABU spellings before, didn’t know TIFFANY was muslin, VHO Frogs and Birdlime. Should have been quicker, felt slower.
8d was clunky but others were very good: PENANCE, HAITI and COD BRANDISHES. Thanks setter and Jackkt.
Managed this in under 20, so very happy! It seemed very straightforward at the beginning, and might have been even quicker, but I found the ORGANISED CRIME anagram slow and needed all the crossers. Some of the other clues weren’t so easy, like CASTELLAN. ERODING was my LOI but on reflection should have been gettable long before.
Really liked this one, though 8dn went straight over my head. And still looks like a car crash, to me. Haiti on the other hand, very elegant indeed – sadly it didn’t really need to be as the answer was obvious. But a fine clue nonetheless..
I liked the typo and am pleased to see setters being creative. Probably s/he got the typo idea from reading comments on TfTT 🙂
Didn’t know tiffany = thin muslin. As a paid-up member of the Heyer fan club, I probably should have known..
I’m a GH fan too and she’s never mentioned tiffany, except once as a girl’s name. Rather too obscure to my mind. DNF after 40 minutes 8 dn, 22 dn, 13 dn all defeated me. I disagree with ‘angelic’ being defined by ‘pure’, have never watched Sopranos so was never going to get ORGANISED CRIME anyway. COD ERODING. Thanks to jackkt for all the parsing.
Purchased another year of The Times (it’s cheaper outside the UK by the way) after a break from Crosswords. Managed nearly all of yesterday’s, but found this difficult, although I appreciated the HAITI clue.
Practice, practice.
Good to see the familiar names again.
Welcome back.
19 mins today. I didn’t know CASTELLAN but felt it must be related to the French chatelain. I was OK with ‘with a typo’ in 11A. My last one in was CITRIC ACID. My favourite clues were to HAITI and HAIFA. Thank you to Setter and Blogger.
36mins for me, which is about average. Agree wholeheartedly about 8d which required me to get all the crossing letters before I solved it.
I largely enjoyed this but using obscure spellings like GHI and TABU that possibly only exist in mass market dictionaries aimed at Scrabble enthusiasts seems a bit cheap. But as ever, thanks for the blog.
15.52
No problems here – liked ORGANISED CRIME. Nho TIFFANY but seemed very likely.
No time as I was interrupted for a while and didn’t pause. Probably around 20, with 1 and 8 both needing all the checkers before I could unscramble the letters. “Carmine” is not in my watchlist!
After fruitlessly trying anagrams of WAVES HEALTH (too many letters, idiot) I loved BRAN DISHES. PENANCE and HAITI high on my list of goodies.
According to Chambers, GHI and TABU are the direct transliterations of Hindi and Polynesian respectively: I would have though both were familiar enough alternatives outside Scrabble™ and crosswords.
I’ve never much liked “any letter” clues, though at least the typo for NEGLEGIBLE didn’t give many options. We (sort of) accept “any note” clues, though the range of choices is smaller. What I might say is that E and I are rather far apart to generate a typo, and believe me, I shoulf knoq.
😂
About 25′. Seemed to be a higher incidence of anagrams, each of which I was able to solve straightforwardly (if not always fully appreciate, assuming Carmine is the Soprano reference..).
That gave me a good hold on the rest of the grid alongside a few other write-ins (unfortunately including the obvious Haiti, so again the subtlety passed me by). Only unknowns were the muslin and governors, both fairly easily solved from wordplay.
Re the typo debate, I have enough groans to myself about non-rhotic homonyms, Spoonerisms and cockerney slang to get too worked up about it!!
Thanks Jack and setter
24:06
A fraction outside my 24m target for a Snitch of 78. Good progress throughout but some bits missed, as ever:
ANTICLIMACTIC – wasn’t entirely sure which words should make up the anagrist, but eventually thought of the answer with just one checker missing.
TIFFANY – no idea about the muslin connection
LIME – from the checkers, the obvious answer, but I’d completely forgotten about birdlime
HAITI – yes, a very good clue
FROGMARCH – entirely failed to parse – expect the FROG has been here some time back, though only recalled when I read the blog. Had forgotten too about the MARCH being on the border – thinking Herefordshire?
HAIFA – complete fail on wordplay – kind of aware there is a HALIFAX somewhere in Canada, but failed to recall it here
ORGANISED CRIME – yes, a bit underwhelmed, with only the vague Carmine suggesting a mafia connection – should this have been a particular Carmine?
Thanks Jack and setter
I had three quarters of this finished in under 10 mins, but the NHO CASTELLAN and the SW corner then held me up for a further 20. DNK LIME (first meaning) or TIFFANY, which were both ultimately guessed with a shrug.
21.01, on the wavelength today. I parsed TWANG as T over WANG as in David Cameron’s plaintive appeal to “stop wanging on about Europe”, seeing “wang” as a colloquialism meaning “fret” or “nag” in a tiresome way. LOI CORELLI which I didn’t understand at all so I’m particularly grateful for the parsing.
Thanks Jack and setter.
All completed without any real holdups. I have never watched The Sopranos and have never heard the name Carmine, so it seemed like a made-up name to get the setter out of a hole with the anagram. But now that it’s been explained here the clue seems very good. As does Haiti, which I initially thought was a mistake, with ‘island’ being both ait and i; missed i[t]. Tried to get nitric acid to work at 3dn before seeing how clever the setter had been.
14:10 – NEGLIGIBLE seemed easy enough to make any liberties in the clue forgiveable. NHO TIFFANY or CASTELLAN, but I assumed the latter was a castle-y version of a chatelain, though according to Chambers they are synonymous.
My thanks to jackkt and setter.
Quite Tuesday-ish I thought.
I’m OK with the typo in 11a Negligible.
16a I think Arcangelo Corelli has come up before, but I’m more inclined to think of Captain Corelli’s Mandolin.
26a Hosing down the Estate car made me chuckle.
1d Around the clock I took to be a DD. Around the physical clock, as hands, would be 12 hours not 24.
A lot I didn’t like – all covered by other posters. However, none of it held me up unduly.
FOI OP ART
LOI TIFFANY
COD HAITI
TIME 9:40
34 minutes. Stop-start progress with the GHI variant spelling, the bird catching LIME and the NHO TIFFANY giving cause for doubt, even if no other answers seemed possible. I was too sloppy to notice the ‘typo’ trick in NEGLIGIBLE and the elegant HAITI &lit. Good to see CORELLI crack another mention.
Thanks to Jack and setter
Very pleased to have almost completed this. The two left at the end were “tiffany” (not knowing the material) and “citric acid” which I really like now it has been kindly explained here!
Couldn’t fully parse any of “frogmarch”, “gnocchi” or “prolong” and grateful to jackkt for unravelling those (“frog” and “ghi” very well outside my knowledge but live and learn).
This took me getting on for twenty four minutes, but I spoiled it with an extremely careless ANTECLIMACTIC. EEjit!! NHO TIFFANY as thin muslin. Liked BRANDISHES. Thanks setter and Jack.
I don’t comment often these days, but regards nonetheless.
My LOI was ORGANIZED CRIME, which left me feeling that it was somehow a reverse cryptic where CARMINE gets ‘gored’ by losing A and N thus turning into CRIME. How precisely that occurs, though, is not apparent.
Anyway, I got through this in a bit over 12 minutes. Best to all of you.
‘But clip him?’ *sips espresso* ‘No.’
Carmine the elder is one of the best Sopranos characters.
Nice puzzle.
Thanks, jack.
23:10 but very slow to get the two long down clues so feel it could have been a lot quicker.
Didn’t know the ornamental frog or one of the meanings of LIME. HAITI was solved as a general knowledge question.
COD PENANCE
Thanks blogger and setter
Gosh! I’m usually the slow one, but this seemed to be the easiest for a long time with a time of 15 mins. I must be on the wavelength today. Or maybe it’s cos I’ve got in the habit of doing these in the evening in front of the telly!
No probs, under 20 mins, but didn’t like the ‘typo’ cluing device -open to abuse by less scrupulous setters. Where will it end?
Bunged in Haifa without parsing, so tx for explanation. Thought Tiffany was a glassmaker, but turns out it’s one of those words with many meanings. Tau is now the go-to word for cross these days.
About 13 min. I’m among those who didn’t much like the typo device and thought the use of GORED in 8dn was a bit weak. HAITI was brilliant though and HOUSING ESTATE made me smile.
Quite pleased with 31 minutes today. Delayed by CASTELLAN (NHO but seemed feasible) and CITRIC ACID (? could be sharp?). 11ac was ok with me as I seem to live in a fug of typo’s lately. Also had to persuade myself that TIFFANY was not alluding to glass.
COD and LOI ORGANISED CRIME.
Thanks to setter and jackkt.
Luckily TAU cropped up very recently, so that was FOI. I dearly wanted to put etching for 17a, but couldn’t parse it, but once FROGMARCH went in the answer was obvious, and very clever misdirection, I thought. All parsed, but CASTELLAN and that meaning of TIFFANY were unknown, though kindly clued. I liked the car wash and HAIFA. LOI HAITI, as I didn’t know it was on Hispaniola, but the crossers made it an easy finish, amd also clever.
23:55 I whizzed through this – but fell at the last hurdle needing 10 mins to get NHOs CASTELLAN and CORELLI. Decent enough time though and feel like the brain fog may have eventually lifted. needless to say I really enjoyed the puzzle!
NHO CASTELLAN but the wordplay pointed to it well enough and it sort of sounded ok. Don’t understand all the objections to TABU and GHI, especially as Chambers gives their origins as Tongan and Hindi respectively.
I quite enjoyed this, all done in 31 minutes during the more boring bits of the Winter Olympics. No issues, but I agree with those who suggest that the device used in NEGLIGIBLE should not be a regular occurrence.
FOI – OP ART
LOI – ORGANISED CRIME
COD – BRANDISH
Thanks to jackkt and other contributors
25 minutes, TIE-R FOI and a write-in.
HAITI was brilliant. But sadly — like a lot of brilliant clues — very easy too. I got the CARMINE Sopranos connection, so didn’t mind that he was GORED. I mean, why not? Doesn’t have to be by a bull. Missed the NEGLIGIBLE row because I didn’t parse it. Share the view that it’s a bit lame. And what’s all this about HALIFAX, NOVA SCOTIA? What about the real one, in the West Riding. All done in 14′ 5O”, so hoping for a reasonable NITCH.
I spent a very long time on CITRIC ACID until I finally saw it, great clue.
I love the Sopranos but still couldn’t get it, not a great clue imo. CARPACCIO was satisfying, unlike the dish itself.
36 minutes, but not really a puzzle I enjoyed. I found many of the clues rather weak or with quite contrived surface readings which detract significantly from the elegance of the clue. That said, I had no problems with ORGANISED CRIME (I suppose they might gore you as easily as carry out any other aggressive act), but although it is not really a mistake, I don’t really like just “of” as an inclusion indicator in 9ac. But I agree with most of you that BRANDISH was quite good.
I trundled contentedly through this in about 40 minutes, much enjoyed HAITI and HAIFA. I too jibbed at ORGANISED CRIME, but kind of persuaded myself that by squinting I could interpret “gored” as “bloodied”. LOI CASTELLAN after finally getting ANTICLIMACTIC from its crossers.
Thanks setter and jackkt.