Times Cryptic No 27042 – Saturday, 19 May 2018. Woman’s Work.

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This was a quick solve – done on paper in about 20 minutes. Despite that, all the clues felt suitably challenging. A number of clues exposed knowledge or vocabulary gaps without slowing me down unduly. (I took the fish at 1ac, the gentleman at 6ac, the dance at 15ac and the pigment at 19dn on trust, for example.)

On my first scan I got two-thirds of the way through the across clues before I saw any daylight, but then after my FOI 22ac I quickly finished the bottom half and then worked through the top right before finally cracking the top left. LOI was 13ac.

My clue of the day was 9ac, with an honourable mention for 22ac, which I’m sure accurately describes the likely outcome if I were to try to read Proust! Thanks to the setter for a very enjoyable puzzle.

Clues are in blue, with definitions underlined. Answers are in BOLD CAPS, followed by the wordplay. (ABC*) means ‘anagram of ABC’, with the anagram indicator in bold italics. Deletions are in {curly brackets}.

Across
1 Like classy cutlery Victor needs before slicing fish (8)
SILVERED: V (Victor) and ERE (before) inside today’s unknown fish, a SILD. (It’s a young herring.)

6 Engineer succeeded separating gold from another metal (6)
AUSTIN: AU (gold) S (succeeded) TIN (another metal), giving the unknown engineer. I assume the reference is to the man who founded Austin Motors in 1905 – Herbert Austin.

9 Woman’s work in male domain — football pitch (9,4)
MANSFIELD PARK: MAN’S FIELD (male domain), then PARK (football pitch). Cute definition – we know a woman’s work is never done, but here it’s a work written by a woman.

10 Roman things are returned in rubber (6)
ERASER: RES (Latin for “thing”), then ARE – all reversed.

11 Coil‘s reliable one put back in (8)
SOLENOID: SOLID holding ONE backwards. Are there still such things as solenoids, or does everything use solid state electronics these days?

13 Brings solace when upset, very ill at ease! (10)
ALLEVIATES: (V. ILL AT EASE*).

15 Seafaring NCO gets turn to dance as punk (4)
POGO: PO (petty officer), GO (turn), giving the unknown dance – from the 1970s apparently.

16 Present suppliers not entirely marvellous (4)
MAGI: MAGI{c} = marvellous. Nice definition!

18 Local artist, lord and clergyman retired (10)
VERNACULAR: RA (artist), LUCAN (Lord), REV (clergyman) – all reversed. “Local” for “vernacular” was another vocabulary surprise, but I confirmed it’s  in Chambers for one.

21 Problem one’s presumably unable to sleep on (8)
INSOMNIA: cryptic definition.

22 Proust reinterpreted produces mental dullness (6)
STUPOR: (PROUST*). Lovely surface for this clue!

23 Portrait session with painter holding couple in good position (7,6)
SITTING PRETTY: SITTING (portrait session), PR (couple), ETTY (painter).

25 Hypocritical talk about administrative division (6)
CANTON: CANT (hypocrisy), ON (about).

26 Electrical device consumer brought to theatre (8)
REPEATER: REP (theatre), EATER (consumer). When they strung the Inland Telegraph across Australia, they had a Repeater Station near Alice Springs. Worth visiting for the vast nothingness!

Down
2 Bad mark repeatedly given in current exam (7)
IMMORAL: two M’s inside I (current) ORAL (exam).

3 See semi-nude restored — see disarmingly beautiful work! (5,2,4)
VENUS DE MILO: V (short for vide = see), then (SEMI NUDE*), then LO (another form of “see”).

4 Consult match official here in middle (5)
REFER: REF (match official), then {h}ER{e}.

5 Sunk in ready under the sea (4-3)
DEEP SET: DEEP (sea), SET (ready). For once, “ready” isn’t money.

6 Sundial fixed in two areas in Spanish region (9)
ANDALUSIA: A (area), then (SUNDIAL*), then another A.

7 Beginners in studio photographed as well (3)
SPA: spelled out by the first letters of each word.

8 With it, leader gets round large suspicion (7)
INKLING: IN (with it), KING (leader) around L (large).

12 What could make late run for summit? (2,4,5)
NE PLUS ULTRA: a reverse clue. Look at the answer and observe that “NE” plus “ULTRA” gives an anagram of “LATE RUN”.

14 Pub brings in satellite after opening — that’s born of necessity (9)
INVENTION: INN around VENT and IO.

17 Men with lowered energy in the East recall trouble (7)
AMNESIA: ASIA is in the East. Inside it is MEN with the E moved to the end. Another nice definition.

19 Genuine fish pigment (7)
REALGAR: REAL / GAR. And another vocabulary gap.

20 Attendant always protecting Colonel Lawrence? (7)
ACOLYTE: AY around COL, then a mention of T.E. Lawrence, who contrary to my misreading of Wikipedia apparently did also end up a colonel.

22 Sweetener your drink contains (5)
SYRUP: YR (your) inside SUP (drink).

24 Volunteers time to make knotted lace (3)
TAT: TA (the usual volunteers), then T (time).

37 comments on “Times Cryptic No 27042 – Saturday, 19 May 2018. Woman’s Work.”

  1. ….since SILD is one of the oily fish recommended to help me win the war against cholesterol.

    A 12:45 relative cruise, without a biff in sight. I did waste time trying to fit the ubiquitous OR for “men” into 17D though.

    FOI AUSTIN
    LOI ALLEVIATES (just not seen when it should have been obvious)
    COD VERNACULAR – I don’t recall Lord Lucan appearing here before, and he hasn’t officially been dead for long anyway. I also liked VENUS DE MILO, and the juxtaposition of INSOMNIA with the consequently improbable STUPOR.

  2. 22:59, but with NO PLUS ULTRA, where I didn’t know the expression and failed to diagnose the clue properly.
  3. which puts me at 172 on the leaderboard; Saturday really brings out the neutrinos. DNK AUSTIN, POGO, REPEATER, or SILD, ‘knew’ REALGAR but didn’t know it was a pigment. I probably typed in NO at 12d, but the U suggested a foreign phrase. My COD.
  4. I enjoyed this puzzle to the extent that I made notes in order to be able to comment a week later.
    I did enjoy Lord Lucan surfacing in VERNACULAR. He’s officially dead now, so we may see him again.
    Other clues that amused me were ACOLYTE and “Present Suppliers” for MAGI. Incidentally, brnchn, Wikipedia lists T E Lawrence as a Colonel so I think it was clever work by our setter to put us off the scent a little.
    Didn’t know REALGAR or AUSTIN and, even though, I like art, I had never heard of Etty
    1. I did know Etty, and could only have known him from a Times cryptic. And hasn’t Lord Lucan appeared here before?
      1. I don’t know about Lucan but maybe one of our number who keeps a track of this sort of thing might enlighten us.
  5. 26 minutes counts as a major success for me, especially on a Saturday. A few things were on the edge of my GK but there was nothing that totally mystified me. But for close attention to wordplay I’d probably have misspelt SOLENOID with two I’s.

    Edited at 2018-05-26 04:49 am (UTC)

  6. … registration BUN 120 was our first family car, acquired in 1957. It wasn’t the best advert for pre-war British engineering. As it was too, I was a bit slower than my usual comparators at 31 minutes, but with all correct, and parsed once I’d assumed a fish called sild. LOI AMNESIA, a contender for COD along with SITTING PRETTY and MAGI, which has to go to the magnificent MANSFIELD PARK. Very enjoyable. Thank you B and setter.
  7. Very nice indeed, delicious solve of around 30m for me, this felt fresh and original.

    Full of lovely tricks and tropes, here I particularly liked NE PLUS ULTRA, but rather a lot of good ones to choose from.

    Thank you setter, and a great blog too.

  8. My notes say “31 mins. Fun!”. Apparently: FOI 2d IMMORAL LOI 17d AMNESIA, where I liked the definition. That was closely preceded by my COD 18a VERNACULAR, with a nicely-hidden def and some nice steps to find it. Also enjoyed 6a AUSTIN for an engineer I didn’t think I’d heard of until about three seconds passed, at which point the penny dropped…

    WOD POGO. Thanks to setter, and to Bruce for helping me out with sild, Etty and a couple of other points I hadn’t quite figured out…

  9. 17 min 40 with one wrong. I omitted to change No to Ne in Ne Plus Ultra despite getting Ne from the wordplay.

    I’ve read that police have been advised to be aware of Aston Villa fans bringing flares to Wembley for the Play Off finals. Apparently that’s what they wore last time they were there.

    2. Were they still wearing flares in 2000 when I know you were in the semi-final there? Flares reached Lancashire in the mid-sixties with The Hollies, so I think the would have got to Birmingham in about 2000. Dean Holdsworth had one laid on a plate for him by Eidur with five minutes to go. He missed and you lot won the penalty shoot-out. Good luck sgainst Fulham.
      1. Thanks BW.

        A brummie goes for a job interview wearing a polyester shirt, bright flares and cowboy boots. The interviewer says: “All you need now is a kipper tie.”
        The brummie replies: “That would be luvloy, two sugars please.”

        1. Bad luck. Still, the tie and the poys are better in the Championship.
    3. I certainly wore them to Villa’s League Cup Final against Spurs in 1971 !
  10. 15:26. Very similar to previous week’s in difficulty. I didn’t quite get the wordplay for 12d although I spotted it was an anagram of LATE RUN with PLUS. Thanks for unravelling that. Very clever. SYRUP my favourite.
  11. 17 minutes, but a disgraceful quantity of not parsing, specifically NE PLUS ULTRA (pity, that was clever) and Milo O’Shea’s VENUS (disarmingly beautiful was a giveaway, and the relevant letters were mostly there to the casual glance).

    Probably just coincidence, but there were a lot of apposite pairings for those of us who look for such things:
    VENUS DE MILO TAT from the Louvre gift shop
    INKLING ACOLYTE presumably C S lewis
    IMMORAL AMNESIA a politician’s I have no recollection…
    REFER INVENTION: Report the above to parliamentary standards
    SILVERED AUSTIN an improbable blinged up Allegro
    SPA NE PLUS ULTRA Bath? Leamington? Gellert Budapest?
    INSOMNIA STUPOR indeed.
    ANDALUSIA SYRUP
    Could be just coincidence, but I’d like to thinknot.
    And the juxtaposition of AUSTIN and MANSFIELD PARK is kind enough to let us feel smug about knowing it’s not spelt that way.

  12. 8:07, so I seem to have found this one easy. I didn’t think I knew who AUSTIN was, but of course I did, sort of. And Etty rings a vague bell now but I just biffed that one.
      2. Hi denisovan. Apologies for the silly jargon. It’s actually a bit more specific than brnchn suggests: it is derived from BIFD, ‘bunged in from definition’.
            1. Anyone seen him around here lately? I met him in our office in Cambridge a couple of months ago, but I don’t remember seeing any comments from him for ages.
              1. Well, bless Grestyman wherever he is. I’m very grateful for the info about biffing.

                I’d like to tell you that due to the rainstorm we’ve had around these parts tonight, persons in certain public houses were kept in after time ‘as it’s still raining’. Hence later post. Hic.

  13. Well, there you go. I had always assumed that BIF stood for “…But It Fits!”, which is my regular weekly plea in mitigation to myself.
    1. I’m glad to hear you say that! This week I encountered the verb “biff” for the first time, and my immediate guess was also “But It Fits!”

      Which I much prefer to “Bunged In From definition”.

      1. It’s pretty much my slogan for life, but certainly for Times Crosswords. Glad that it struck a chord! – Peter
  14. 18:38 which is quick for me for for a Saturday. Surprising too since whilst solving I had the sense that I was dawdling and really ought to have been going much faster. Nice puzzle. Half knew Etty, the lace and the pigment. But for the clear anagrist and checkers I think I would be inclined to spell 6dn with a ‘c’ not an ‘s’. Didn’t know Stone Cold Herbert Austin but guessed 6ac was something to do with the motors.
  15. The elusive lord appeared in Sunday Times 4707. The Roman poet Lucan was in Times 26535.
  16. This was another enjoyable Saturday puzzle which I pretty much solved on the day.
    I now go on to the Sunday puzzle if I haven’t finished this.
    FOI was Stupor. LOI was Silvered which I had as a best guess and then supposed that Sild was one of the many fish in our crossword seas.
    Realgar was a guess but I think it might have come up before as it seemed vaguely familiar.
    It took me a while to get 9a. The Park part came first and then I travelled around all the likely football grounds only to end up at a racecourse -Lingfield Park. Ultimately it failed the parsing test but it did make 2d harder than it should have been. David

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