Times Cryptic No 27300 – Saturday, 16 March 2019. Let bliss and joy abound.

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Joy and bliss for me – another Saturday that I could finish without tearing of hair or beating of breast, without spending too much time in a state of 15ac. The NE corner was the last to go in. I thought 7ac was delightful. Thanks to the setter for a very enjoyable puzzle, with a delightful flavour of whimsy and irony.

Clues are in blue, with definitions underlined. Answers are in BOLD CAPS, then wordplay. (ABC*) means ‘anagram of ABC’. Deletions are in [square brackets].

Across
1 I’m a threat to all, promiscuous cleric said (5,6)
LOOSE CANNON: LOOSE=promiscuous, CANNON sounds like (“said”) CANON=cleric.

7 Member of Parliament‘s a dish: bachelor knocked out (3)
OWL: [b]OWL. I normally don’t have much time for contrived collective nouns, but “a Parliament of owls” is well enough known to make this definition delicious.

9 Act foolishly, hurling most abuse (4,5)
MESS ABOUT: anagram (“hurling”) of (MOST ABUSE*).

10 Wife visiting North American railway town (5)
CREWE: a CREE is a North American. Insert W for wife. I didn’t know Crewe is/was a railway town, but the wordplay convinced me.

11 Director of further education in damaging U-turn (7)
FELLINI: F.E. for further education, LLINI is IN ILL backwards (“U-turn”).

12 Pointless filibuster I leadenly can deliver (7)
STERILE: hidden answer (“delivered”).

13 Originally Ottoman fort half seen on numerous occasions (5)
OFTEN: fiddly parsing: O[ttoman] (“originally”), FT (fort), [se]EN (“half”).

15 Blissful state? Teacher doesn’t like it (9)
IGNORANCE: double definition, the second cryptic and a bit whimsical.

17 Passing Sian frolicking in river (9)
TRANSIENT: anagram of (SIAN*) “frolicking” in TRENT.

19 Bungling writer’s back, overcome by drink (5)
INEPT: NEP is PEN backwards, inside IT, an old-fashioned drink.

20 Say again: educated Liberal must go (7)
ITERATE: [l]ITERATE without the L[iberal].

22 If nurse is sick, one makes tea (7)
INFUSER: anagram of “sick” (IF NURSE*).

24 A Dickensian quirk? (5)
TWIST: double definition, the first being Oliver of course.

25 Somehow lure a girl, a freedom fighter? (9)
GUERRILLA: an anagram, “somehow”, of (LURE A GIRL*).

27 Retired academic gives signal of assent (3)
NOD: DON “retiring”.

28 One contemptuous of bards, and where they lie at rest? (5,6)
POETS’ CORNER: or, split differently, a POET SCORNER? It (but of course, not he) is in Westminster Abbey.

Down
1 Scottish smoker depressed, having to give up golf (3)
LUM: g[LUM] being depressed, without G[olf].

2 Resort to stuffing oddly oily bird (5)
OUSEL: USE in O-L-, the odd letters of OiLy.

3 Joy’s story recalled home full of love (7)
ELATION: ELAT is TALE “recalled”, then put O (love) in IN (home).

4 Australian with roots in Lincoln? (9)
ABORIGINE: ORIGIN in ABE.

5 Lines of attack rejected (5)
NOTES: the “rejected” attack is SET ON, backwards. “Lines” might be notes, as in “I dropped them a line”.

6 Kind of family that’s equivocal, putting university back (7)
NUCLEAR: equivocal is UNCLEAR. Move U for university as instructed.

7 Old piece of furniture niece destroyed, following instructions (9)
OBEDIENCE: O for old, BED is furniture, then IENCE is an anagram of (NIECE*) “destroyed”.

8 Interrogator may use this … or let deceit run riot? (3,8)
LIE DETECTOR: an anagram “running riot” of (OR LET DECEIT*).

11 Suffering from cold, TV interviewer attacked by dog (11)
FROSTBITTEN: David FROST was the interviewer, perhaps BITTEN by a dog.

14 Dealing with gas and ship’s propeller? (5,4)
TRADE WIND: TRADE=dealing, WIND=gas. The propellor of 19th century square-riggers bound to the Antipodes.

16 Crazy quality of Brazil, perhaps (9)
NUTTINESS: at first glance this looks like a double definition, but since CRAZY doesn’t seem to be the same part of speech as NUTTINESS, perhaps it’s just a cryptic definition.

18 Celebrated lamb producer in new venture (5-2)
START-UP: STAR=celebrated, TUP=bearer of lambs.

19 Conclude nothing can get to grips with northern hell (7)
INFERNO: INFER=conclude, O=nothing, all gripping N=northern.

21 Dog beginning to bound away, a born hunter (5)
EAGLE: the dog is a [b]EAGLE.

23 Sage quickly engulfing lake (5)
SOLON: SOON=quickly, L=lake. I knew SOLON by name, but no more. Turns out he was one of the “seven wise men of Ancient Greece”.

26 Make known dictator’s successor (3)
AIR: sounds like HEIR. (On edit: might sound like “heir” when listening to dictation.)

15 comments on “Times Cryptic No 27300 – Saturday, 16 March 2019. Let bliss and joy abound.”

  1. Can somebody please explain the parsing for 26 down. I don’t follow what indicates the answer should sound like HEIR.
    1. As Bruce says make known is AIR(one’s views) and if this is dictated/spoken it sounds like HEIR.

      Edited at 2019-03-23 01:05 am (UTC)

    2. It’s a good question. Thanks John for explaining! I’ll make the blog clearer too. BTW: it may be helpful to reflect that every part of the clue should be there for a reason. In this case, the dictator isthe producer of the spoken word.

      Edited at 2019-03-23 01:32 am (UTC)

  2. I think this is a PB for me, for a Times 15×15, at 12:50. Gob smacked I am! From the Scottish chimney to the bards’ resting place, I had the GK required. Even SOLON wasn’t a “Who?” moment. An enjoyable romp. Thanks setter and Bruce.
  3. I imagine this is a PB for me, too, or as near as dammit. (ON EDIT: I just checked the club leaderboard, and my time got me 189th place, with John at 190. Verlaine, at 5:31, is 92d. Saturday is Show Your Typing Skills Day at the club.)
    I did have a ? at INFERNO; since coming to grips with something is not gripping something, this seemed a bit loose as an inclusion indicator. I knew SOLON was a lawgiver, although I didn’t know of the 7 Sages; but I treated it as a common noun meaning ‘sage’–evidently this is a US usage only, and more specifically relating to legislators. As you can imagine, it’s not often used. If I recall correctly, the Sacramento baseball team in the Pacific Coast League back in the day was the Solons. I think they’re now the Mudlarks (that, by the way, is where Kevin Gregg the pitcher got his start).

    Edited at 2019-03-23 03:28 am (UTC)

  4. 12 minutes, while I was in a Saturday frame of mind and cruising. I think I could have broken 10 if I hadn’t wandered off down a few by-ways. I particularly liked LOOSE CANNON, TRADE WIND, FROSTBITTEN, and COD POETS CORNER. Short but sweet. Thank you Bruce and setter.
  5. 27 minutes. NHO SOLON, but apart from that it was all pretty plain sailing, I think.

    My only question mark was “lines” for NOTES, but now Bruce has pointed it out, I find “a short letter or note” for “line” in Chambers, and it all makes sense. I’m not sure I’ve ever really thought about the actual meaning of dropping someone a line!

  6. ….is a Scottish wish for someone’s continued long life (“long may there be smoke from your chimney” literally).

    A neat puzzle, with nothing contentious and no hold-ups.

    FOI MESS ABOUT
    LOI OBEDIENCE
    COD EAGLE
    TIME 9:16

  7. Like boltonwanderer I dawdled at first before I realised how easy it was. All good fun and it gave me more time to address the somewhat harder Jumbo. LOI CREWE, COD START-UP. 10:00.
  8. I was not as quick as the experienced solvers but I proceeded steadily after getting LUM straightaway. I knew SOLON but not OUSEL. I was confident such a bird could exist. LOI was TRADE WIND. Very enjoyable puzzle. David
  9. Bruce, it’s a major railway junction in Cheshire similar to Clapham outside London. There was an old music hall song my mother used to sing which went:

    Oh Mr. porter what shall I do
    I wanted to go to Birmingham
    But you’ve taken me on to Crewe….

    I believe it was full of doubles entendres which were well above my head at the time.

    Yes, this was a very nice one. That OWL thing always fools me. 14.18 including a lengthy sneezing fit and it’s not even pollen season yet.

    1. In the mid/late fifties, my pals and I would ride our bikes over to Skew Bridge on the West Coast main line just south of Preston to do our trainspotting. Just once, we all caught a train the 50 miles or so down the line to Crewe where, as well as the West Coast line, the Manchester, Liverpool and North Wales lines went through to the north, with a similar number of options to the south. It was trainspotters’ heaven. We even ‘bunked’ round the sheds as well. Of course, the girls in our gang weren’t daft enough to be trainspotters, so the journey to Crewe wasn’t going too far.
  10. 17:51. An easy one but still lots of fun. I liked the loose canon and the poet scorner.

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