Times Cryptic No 27960 – Saturday, 24 April 2021. In dire straits?

Posted on Categories Weekend Cryptic
This was fun. About standard weight for a Saturday puzzle, with lots to enjoy.

I confess that once I saw the helpers for 14dn, I decided I had no interest in trying to guess where the B, D and N went, so I looked it up! Everything else is gettable, even 18ac where the wordplay gave the spelling. I didn’t quite understand 28ac, although the answer is obvious. Dire Straits? Cue Mark Knopfler!

Thanks to the setter for a very enjoyable puzzle. How did you all get on? Here we go.
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Notes for newcomers: The Times offers prizes for Saturday Cryptic Crosswords. This blog is posted a week later, after the competition closes. So, please don’t comment here on the current Saturday Cryptic.

Clues are blue, with definitions underlined. Deletions are struck through.

Across
1 Have operation slightly less dangerous than Damocles? (2,5,3,5)
GO UNDER THE KNIFE – better than under a sword, I agree.
9 I indicate we are to leave miserable cell (4,5)
BLUE PETER – the Blue Peter was originally a blue maritime signal flag meaning “P” or “outward bound”, flown to warn a ship’s crew in port of an imminent sailing. Take BLUE for miserable, and add PETER which we now discover can mean prison cell.
10 Engrave plaque initially unwanted by playwright (5)
INTERPINTER is the playwright. This meaning of the answer is in Chambers as obsolete.
11 Drunk, though a round behind (6)
LAPPED – double definition. The milk is drunk, or the track racer is lapped.
12 Like Elizabeth, popular online, full of spirit (8)
VIRGINAL – GIN in VIRAL. One of my last.
13 Make pet harmless, the rule at Christmas? (6)
DECLAW – or DEC LAW: is the law in December any different from other months?
15 Spotting row containing fruit, mostly good (8)
DAPPLING – APPLE in DIN, followed by G for good.
18 Repetitive disease spares one small shrub (8)
BERBERIS – BERI-BERI is the disease. Take out (spare) an I, add S for small. Generous wordplay.
19 Grotesque figure runs into battle (6)
FRIGHT – R in FRIGHT.
21 Stingy type is irrational, love held in contempt (8)
SCORPION – PI is an irrational number. 0 is love in tennis. Put them both in SCORN. You need to read the definition with a hard G.
23 Affected elegant greeting (3-3)
CHI-CHI – CHIC is elegant, HI is the greeting.
26 Old character returning in Sky feature (5)
DRACO – O for old, CARD for character. Turn it all round. The sky feature is a northern constellation.
27 End of fighting in Crimea: it’s ruined (9)
ARMISTICE – anagram (ruined) of CRIMEA ITS.
28 In dire straits after reputation collapsed, a first for relatively wealthy area (11,4)
STOCKBROKER BELT – I’m not sure I quite understand this clue, so if anyone can help, please comment!

I think STOCK = reputation, BROKE = collapsed. With less confidence, BELT = in dire strait(s), although I’m not quite sure how that last bit fits. Chambers does say ‘belt’ can mean ‘strait’, or vice versa, but I don’t know why ‘straits’ plural would become ‘belt’ singular.

Anyway, insert R from Relatively, and voila!

Down
1 Ate so fast, mouth appeared injured (7)
GOBBLED – his GOB BLED!
2 Our faction in revolt about king — who did this? (5)
USURP – US + UP around R. A clue where it’s hard to pin down how much is the definition!
3 Protest against fall in value — I missed out (9)
DEPRECATE – take an I out of DEPRECIATE.
4 Wrap is sexy, shortened at both ends (4)
ROTI – take the ends off EROTIC. I think of a roti as just the bread, not a wrap, but I can see it could be used for that.
5 Hard rain disturbed shrew (8)
HARRIDAN – anagram (disturbed) of HARD RAIN.
6 Flooring put round in one of the clubs, perhaps (5)
KOING – put a round O in the KING of clubs. The answer is flooring as in K.O.-ing.
7 Meaning one attached to how the Book of Revelation may be seen? (9)
INTENDING – I for one, then the book in question is the N.T. ENDING, since it’s the very last book of the Bible.
8 It is put in the canal to limit waves (7)
EARPLUG – cryptic definition.
14 Can do boar stew or beef stew (9)
CARBONADO – anagram (stew) of CAN DO BOAR. The answer is in Chambers, but to me it’s still basically a foreign word, unhelpfully clued as an anagram.
16 Ship’s officer drinking tea he buys (9)
PURCHASER – PURSER drinking CHA.
17 Monster (“bully”) youngster clutches almost tight (8)
MINOTAUR – MINOR clutches TAUT. “Bully” because the minotaur had the head of a bull.
18 Places for well-mannered doctor, having a day out too (7)
BESIDES – take a D out of the doctor’s BEDSIDES, where he/she displays that bedside manner. Very clever.
20 Divide up equally to sample sparkling wine, say (7)
TRISECT – try secs Sekt, do you hear? Sec Sekt is German sparkling wine.
22 Board given nothing to replace a cheap bottle (5)
PLONK – take a PLANK and change an A to an O.
24 For recitation, get up this poetic tract (5)
CLIME – sounds like CLIMB.
25 Rooms known to be reduced in snowy city (4)
OMSK – hidden answer.

23 comments on “Times Cryptic No 27960 – Saturday, 24 April 2021. In dire straits?”

  1. ….and thought it rather unsatisfactory. I had trouble parsing BERBERIS, and had to delete “bedside” at 18D when I realised my error.

    FOI GO UNDER THE KNIFE
    LOI CLIME
    COD EARPLUG
    TIME 14:41

  2. Off the wavelength and gave up early, after being unable to parse some simple ones, which I was hoping to have explained here. In 20 I see try sec, but what about the final T which is certainly pronounced? In 28 I thought broke might be in dire straits… just looked up Chambers and one meaning of belt is strait. Still no help. Failed also on the (I thought) less-than-generous wordplay for the unknown plant. Did know the carbonado, and scorpion was excellent.
    1. ‘Sekt’ is German sparkling wine and it’s part of the homophone.

      On ROTI, Collins has it under American English as a soft, round flat bread of India, often served wrapped around a filling as of curried meat.

      NHO PETER as ‘cell’.

      Edited at 2021-05-01 04:52 am (UTC)

        1. I never heard it pronounced that way but even if it is so in German it has become Anglicised amongst English wine drinkers and dealers. We also say, for instance, Liebfraumilk.

          Edited at 2021-05-01 05:27 am (UTC)

          1. I was just nit-picking, and would have assumed (I’ve never come across the word, certainly never heard it) that it was pronounced [sekt] in English (just as we say ‘Saltsburg’ not ‘Zaltsburk’, etc.). It definitely is [zekt] in German; and ODE gives it that pronunciation.
      1. Thank-you. Never heard of it before, even in crosswords. I was convinced I had either/both 20dn or 28ac wrong, as neither parsed.
      2. Lexico has it as Aus & NZ usage. It was certainly new to me. At the time I thought the setter had rather oddly called a safe a cell, as in a walk-in one in a bank.
        Andyf
  3. Sorry, can’t really help with 28a. Like isla3, I did wonder about BROKE = ‘In dire straits’, but couldn’t make that work. I’ve now just looked it up and see that LT is listed as an abbreviation for “life-threatening”, so BELT = BE LT = ‘be life-threatening’ = ‘in dire straits’? Convinced? No, I’m not either.

    Apart from this, everything came together well, though I had to enter the unknown DRACO and BERBERIS from the wordplay and I agree about that unexplained final T in TRISECT. Still, it made a change from ‘asti’ for ‘sparkling wine’.

    Favourites were GO UNDER THE KNIFE, and OMSK for the Tom Lehrer reminder.

    Thanks to setter and blogger

  4. Never got ROTI. Same problem as everyone else with 28ac, which I biffed, fortunately having remembered it from a recent cryptic. And the same question about the final T. (Shouldn’t ‘equally’ be underlined?)
  5. STOCK = reputation + BROKE = collapsed add R for relatively + geographically straits form a belt – as per the Great Belt formed by three Danish Straits (Fyn, Sjælland and Lolland). Dire!

    FOI 28ac STOCKBROKER BELT

    LOI 18dn BESIDES

    COD 4dn ROTI

    WOD 22d PLONK – Rodney!

    Time Immemorial

    1. Belt = strait OK, but belt does not equate with “in dire straits”? What’s the “In dire” doing? You can’t pluralise straits but not belt? Chambers (12ed) distinctly defines belt = A strait, not Straits.

      Edited at 2021-05-01 02:55 am (UTC)

  6. 40 minutes with nothing to add to the STOCKBROKER BELT possibilities, none of which are convincing. The clue seems to have defined STOCKBROKER BROKE. Otherwise, I liked BESIDES and GO UNDER THE KNIFE and had to assume that a PETER must be a cell. Thank you B and setter.
  7. Same confusion as others over STOCKBROKER BELT. Didn’t know PETER as a cell. ROTI was LOI after an alphabet trawl. Had to look up BERBERIS. Liked GO UNDER THE KNIFE. 45:40. Thanks setter and Bruce.
  8. I am sure that PB will be along later to explain BELT and ‘In dire straits’.
    1. Let’s hope so, but it’s not one of his puzzles – those are on Sundays. Richard Rogan or David Parfitt perhaps.
      1. Thanks jackkt. As you can see retirement is having the effect of rendering every day the same.
  9. I never did get ROTI and have never seen it. I thought of pretty for sexy and so had RETT which I thought may be a variant spelling of RET.
    Otherwise I hesitated over KOING; guessed DRACO; biffed STOCKBROKER BELT as close enough; and guessed the NHO CARBONADO.
    MY favourite was DECLAW.
    Berberis is in the garden and so is one of the few plants I know; it’s very sharp.
    David
  10. 32:31. I was stuck for ages at the end with BLUE PETER and ROTI. I didn’t know what the flag was used for, or that PETER can mean cell (as opposed to safe), or that ROTI can be a wrap as well as the type of bread it’s made from (which I did know). I had to get BLUE PETER just from the checkers, and without the T, which proved tricky.
    Most dictionaries define CARBONADO as a type of grilled meat. The setter may have confused it with ‘carbonade’, which is a beef stew, although Chambers does give this meaning for CARBONADO.
    The wine in TRISECT is clearly sekt. The dictionaries say it’s pronounced zekt as Kevin says, but on the rare occasions I’ve heard the word it’s been anglicised to ‘sect’.
    No idea about STOCKBROKER BELT. I’d like to hear from the setter or editor.
    I almost came unstuck bunging in what was clearly the only word that could possibly fit those checkers, AMOK.
    When I was a kid we had a dog whose pedigree name was Jade de Berberis. She was known as Snodger.
    1. …I see, about 28. But I didn’t know a strait is a BELT, and suspect now that the setter was being a bit too cute with “dire” and the plural, but I would sure like a definite answer.
      CARBON in that meat dish’s name was some help with the anagram, but it seems, as you say, that this spelling is rare for this definition.
      (I didn’t mean this to be a personal reply, but what’s the difference…)

      Edited at 2021-05-01 11:14 pm (UTC)

  11. Just received this in the Club forum. Still don’t know what the clue should have been, and it doesn’t appear to have been changed in the on-line archive.
    jackkt

    From Richard Rogan
    STAFF

    Yes there was an error in the clue, which was drawn to my attention when a confused colleague had difficulty parsing it. He always has difficulty parsing certain clues, mind you, but on this occasion he was right. I think as it was a prize puzzle, and in fact we received as far as I know not a single email about it other than the one just mentioned, it probably got forgotten about, but has been corrected should it appear in a future book.

    Edited at 2021-06-03 09:20 am (UTC)

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