70 minutes. A puzzle like this, I feel compelled to finish no matter how long it takes — and, well, this one took some time. I fell asleep slightly in the middle, but I don’t think staying awake would have made the puzzle go any quicker.
| Across | |
|---|---|
| 1 | Delicate shot dealing with service when returning (8) |
| GOSSAMER – GO (shot) + RE (dealing with) MASS (service) reversed | |
| 6 | Show contempt for playwright copying Psmith? (5) |
| PSHAW – Psmith → PSHAW | |
| 10 | Former South American king provided for driver (2-3) |
| IN-CAR – INCA (former South American) R (king) | |
| 11 | Bad spirit more or less reflected a lack of claret (9) |
| CACODEMON – CA (more or less) + reversal of NO (a lack of) MEDOC (claret)
I eventually got this from the wordplay, but for a long time I had C _ _ _ DERON (NO RED reversed). |
|
| 12 | Mistake during dive, leaving five engineers behind (8) |
| DERRIERE – ERR (mistake) in DIVE – V (five) + RE (engineers) | |
| 13 | Daughter first mentioned unopened window (6) |
| DORMER – D (daughter) + FORMER (first mentioned) without the first letter | |
| 15 | Frankly weird present heralded by hearts on card (7,7) |
| WITHOUT RESERVE – OUTRÉ (weird) SERVE (present) preceded by H (hearts) next to WIT (card) | |
| 17 | Silly wet males not for Germaine Greer, say (5,2,7) |
| WOMAN OF LETTERS – anagram of WET MALES NOT FOR | |
| 22 | Work over there has Hebe in the middle (6) |
| REHASH – hidden (in the middle) in THERE HAS HEBE | |
| 23 | Presume Spooner’s cook specially shaped dish? (4,4) |
| MAKE BOLD – switch first letters of BAKE (cook) MOLD (specially shaped dish?) | |
| 26 | Learning lover’s posh but heartless, fancy him a lot (9) |
| PHILOMATH – P{os}H + anagram of HIM A LOT
A lover of learning. |
|
| 27 | Very hearty sandwiches to cut into triangles? (5) |
| HALVE – HALE (hearty) around (sandwiches) V (very) | |
| 28 | Assigned to classes, letting name go on a list (5) |
| RAKED – RANKED (assigned to classes) – N (name)
I thought the meaning here was ‘angled’, but perhaps I’m wrong. |
|
| 29 | One man’s retreat out of Moscow, primarily the stuff of history (8) |
| HERITAGE – HERMITAGE (one man’s retreat) – M (Moscow, primarily) | |
| Down | |
|---|---|
| 2 | If heard, a dog can be found (5) |
| OCCUR – homophone of A CUR
The problem I have here is that ‘occur’ is synonymous with ‘be found’, no? |
|
| 3 | Mute used by violinist, otherwise racket pierces terribly (7) |
| SORDINO – OR (otherwise) DIN (racket) in SO (terribly) | |
| 4 | Soaking allotment opened by official staff (10) |
| MACERATION – RATION after MACE (official staff) | |
| 5 | Toss / sticks at the seaside (4) |
| ROCK – double definition
Chambers informs me this is a type of hard candy sold in sticks. |
|
| 6 | Innkeeper’s yearly drink cut by doctor (7) |
| PADRONE – PA (yearly, per annum) ONE (drink) around DR (doctor)
As in, for instance, ‘a quick one’. |
|
| 7 | Note struggle behind house, result of shooting there? (4,5) |
| HOME MOVIE – MEMO (note) VIE (struggle) after HO (house) | |
| 8 | Unfriendly judge goes after successful outcome (6) |
| WINTRY – TRY (judge) after WIN | |
| 9 | Undesirable growth of plant factory justified in report (6) |
| MILDEW – homophone of MILL (factory) DUE (justified) | |
| 14 | Ring sailor in race that’s lost time — he’ll protest (10) |
| BELLYACHER – BELL (ring) YACHTER (sailor in race) – T (time)
My last one in. |
|
| 16 | Thin cleaner not thin enough to fit around piano (9) |
| TOOTHPICK – TOO THICK (not thin enough) around P (piano)
I liked this one. |
|
| 18 | Prisoner with muscles died gripping that bunk (7) |
| ABSCOND – ABS (muscles) D (died) around (gripping) CON (prisoner) | |
| 19 | Number one hit, of course? (3,4) |
| TEE SHOT – cryptic definition
The first hit on a golf course, that is. |
|
| 20 | Hasty dairy supplier not quite filling tin (6) |
| SUDDEN – UDDE{r} in SN (tin) | |
| 21 | Real man using lasso under pressure (6) |
| PROPER – ROPER (man using lasso) after P (proper) | |
| 24 | Prison officers were kept in by delay (5) |
| OFLAG – OF (by) LAG (delay)
This one was mean. I knew it couldn’t be GULAG, but this was quite hard to see. |
|
| 25 | Something for the offertory when in church? (4) |
| CASH – AS (when) in CH (church) | |
I think you’re right with angled for raked. A ship’s mast might be ‘raked’ towards the stern or ‘leaning to the rear’ (listing).
Didn’t have much luck with this, too many words I’ve never heard of and the wordplay wasn’t helping. Managed about half before moving on to more constructive tasks. Well done PJ for sticking with it.
Seeing 70 minutes in Jeremy’s blog has cheered me up as I no longer feel so bad about my own 70 minutes, although that marked the point at which I gave up and used aids to resolve the last two missing answers. One of these was CACODEMON where I needed only the first two unchecked letters. I didn’t know the word which has appeared here only once before 16 years ago on a day when I didn’t comment. The other was BELLYACHER, for which I would have needed assistance from wordplay and although I had considered ring = BELL I would never have thought of sailor = YACHTER in a million years. Is it one of those ugly words like ‘batter’ in cricket that’s been given currency in order to avoid referring to the gender of the participant? Checking the TfTT archive reveals that BELLYACHER has appeared only twice before, both times in Saturday prize puzzles (January and April 2022) and both using the wordplay BELL, YACH{t}ER.
We’ve now had three consecutive very hard puzzles consisting largely of wordy clues. I am getting a bit fed up with this as I get it at The Guardian most days and rely on The Times for more variety and style.
Agree raked like Quadrophenia and +J. I guessed occur in the sense of “is native to”. Cacti occur in the desert? Cacti can be found in the desert.
Otherwise it was dejavu all over again, as Jack says. Wordy and difficult clues. A few absolute NHOs: philomath easily constructed, but sordino, cacodemon and LOI make bold in on trust. Slight MERs at triangles in the halve clue presumably referring back to the sandwiches, and the yachter. We’d only ever say yachtie 😉
Much preferred it to yesterday’s, for reasons I can’t explain. COD toothpick.
97 minutes. Finally got there after a struggle. Who knew there was such a thing as a CACODEMON and there were a couple of other unknowns/forgottens in PHILOMATH and SORDINO. Finished in the SE with the Spoonerism after having to change my original TOP to TEE SHOT. I thought the def for OCCUR was ‘be found’ as Jeremy suggests. I agree YACHTER isn’t much of a word; the informal YACHTIE sounds better and is also gender neutral.
My favourite bit was the surface for the ‘Germaine Greer’ clue.
Thanks to Jeremy and setter
Another very tricky Friday, which took me over the half-hour – but again I really enjoyed the tussle. I was only nervous about my LOI, MAKE BOLD. The Spoonerism fitted, but it didn’t feel like the only option, and while I could link the phrase to the definition through ‘presumptuous’, I didn’t know it.
The other NHOs for me – SORDINO and CACODEMON – were very well-clued. No problem with YACHTER, although it took me ages. There might be more appealing words for a ‘sailor in race’, but yachter is certainly one of the options.
Thanks to setter and blogger.
Many left after my 30 minutes. SORDINO? CACODEMON? Sadly in the wrong crossword. Thanks jeremy
I was very proud to get most of this, but: make bold? padrone? oflag??? what are we doing here.
Worthy of a Friday, I thought .. though perhaps one or two more unknowns than I wanted. Nho SORDINO or PHILOMATH, and CACODEMON and PADRONE rang only vague bells. So fingers were crossed, but all correct, in the event .. much better clues than yesterday, though.
As someone who has been doing the Times Crossword now for the better part of 60 years, I have to say that I am getting very tired of these Friday crosswords. I appreciate that perhaps the top solvers appreciate the challenge but honestly, when I see the like of PlusJeremy and Jackkt taking 70 minutes to do a crossword, I know that it is not even worth me looking it. And frankly, looking at the blog today, this feels more like a Mephisto to me than a regular Times crossword.
I have always known that I have my limits, which is why I don’t do the Mephisto on Sundays, but I used to be able to reckon on putting up a good show in 30-60 minutes for most of the daily crosswords. I recognise that, during the annual competition season, there is going to be a few really difficult puzzles, but recently it seems that I have to accept that Fridays are increasingly FOF and that I need to find something else to do at lunchtime. I find that sad.
I share your pain.
I do sympathise.. I’ve been doing them for about as long.. since the mid 1960s .. and I don’t remember them being this hard on such a regular basis. Though average difficulty has varied greatly in that time.
The FT, the Guardian and the Independent all do worthwhile cryptics that can be accessed free, so you could always try one of those for a bit of a change. Or you could do what I do, just do what you can and then put it aside for a while and come back later. Amazing how much that can help!
Agree
I started in 1954 (I know I should have finished by now) but I am finding recent puzzles much less enjoyable.
Happy Birthday!
Totally agree…no fun in being stumped day after day!
I have posted a request on the Times Club Forum encouraging the puzzles and crossword editor to read all of the TfTT comments on recent Fridays. While some people are happy, I am not sure that they are fully aware of the discontent among loyal solvers and buyers of the newspaper.
The editor and/or the setter pop on here occasionally to explain or apologise. Aside from a brief period a couple of years ago when I think the crossword team was reorganised, they were almost invisible on the official forum. I don’t know if that’s improved, but it was hardly the way to treat their subscribers.
Spot on. I cannot get rid of the feeling that someone is showing off.
It is akin to a top class sportsman showing up in the local park, not to encourage the locals but to make sure they know their place.
Hear hear.
I agree with you to the extent that I am left feeling that I will be doing fewer of these in the future which is a shame as I can’t find the correct level for my ability and the amount of fun normally provided elsewhere
You can always pretend it is a Mephisto, and dictionary use is allowed.
I think you are missing the point!
Agree- did one pass and only got one answer, then looked up the snitch score and thought ‘nah’…
The top solvers solve the standard offering in under 10 mins. This one probably took them less than fifteen. So not a massive difference and certainly not worth upsetting mere mortals by offering it.
The place for this type of crossword is the Saturday prize offering. Normal solvers are catered for by the cryptic jumbo.
Gave up after an hour with six unsolved.
Some of the word splits were Frankly weird – WITH/OUTRE/SERVE, HO/MEMO/VIE, BELL/YACH(T)ER?
No fun.
After some poor performances recently, I was determined to make a go of this today. I eventually did, having struggled with the cacky one, muted the bloody fiddler and finally baked the mold. Many other clues had to be beaten into submission, including ROCK, which came from George Formby’s little stick from Blackpool. But perseverance paid off, even if I do need to go back to bed now. Thank you Jeremy and setter.
Too hard for me, stopped after 25′. The Hermitage museum is in St Petersburg.
Thanks jeremy and setter.
But the Hermitage in St Petersburg was indeed one man’s (the Tsar’s) retreat out of (not in) Moscow. The clue is cleverer than a geographical mistake.
I read it as just hermitage = a retreat for a hermit and Moscow was just misdirection.
More of a gave up than a DNF. This week has been a trial. Summed up today by revealing cacodemon after trying a cocktail of second and fourth letters.
Congratulations to those who finished- however long it took!
Not a single clue filled in after 30 mins. Gave up in despair.
22:40. I mostly enjoyed this one, presumably because I appear to have been on the wavelength for it, judging by the leaderboard. It helps if you happen to know the funny words, and I happened to know CACODEMON and PADRONE, while the unknown PHILOMATH is an assembly of familiar Greek parts. I had to construct SORDINO from wordplay.
I say ‘mostly’ because there were quite a few ‘guess a definition and then reverse-engineer the wordplay’ clues. However there were also some very good construct-from-wordplay ones, which I like more. The two long across ones in the middle, for instance.
As isla3 says, the definition in 2dn is ‘can be found’.
I must say I agree with the general sentiment that we’re getting rather too many of these at the moment. This week has been brutal.
“A man’s gotta know his limitations”, said Dirty Harry; having had to reveal the last handful of impenetrable clues after an hour’s struggle I now have a clearer idea where mine are. Getting CACODEMON without aids was some consolation.
Thanks Jeremy and congratulations setter and finishers.
57 mins and pleased with it. Very inaccessible at first but built up a head of steam. Only the 2nd all correct this week.
I also tried No Red and indeed No Merlot for the NHO demon.
SORDINO another NHO of course but at least it wasn’t a theme.
OFLAG only known from previous appearances. Some thought it GK then but then some will complain about Sn for tin. Can’t please everyone.
Enjoyable and rewarding. COD TOOTHPICK. Thanks setter and Jeremy.
Of course a DNF but I got about halve of the clues before cheating. I’m amazed no one else seems to have put a mistaken ‘the best’ as an answer for 19D (TEE SHOT), though it doesn’t work with the ‘of course’ part of the clue. Despite this, either this or 27A (HALVE) is probably COD IMO.
33.36 with my daily (almost) typo. Quicker than yesterday by more than 15 minutes, though having to check the date to make sure it wasn’t the first of the month, given the Special words. I usually quite like Spooner clues, but this was my last in and hell ward.
The trouble with puzzles like this, which clearly many here don’t enjoy, is the lack of laughs and obscurity for its own sake. It tends to invite quibbles, so here’s one from me: our setter has obviously never ordered a tray of sandwiches from M&S – they’re triangles, sure, but always cut into quarters.
DNF. Needed aids for BELLYACHER and HOME MOVIE to get my last 5 finished, and annoyed now not to spot MEMO rather than just ME for the note and YACHTER for the “sailor in race”. A proper Friday workout. Thank-you Jeremy and setter.
My thanks to plusjeremy and setter.
DNF. Not easy. I have a couple of queries.
11a NHO Cacodemon, used aids.
15a Without reserve, not a chance of getting or parsing that one especially as I had W—E-T instead of W—O-T.
17a Woman of letters. HHO Germaine Greer as an academic and feminist, but of writings only the Female Eunuch came to mind – never read it. Had forgotten about Rose Blight in Private Eye.
26a NHO Philomath, added to Cheating Machine. Wiktionary says it is archaic.
3d NHO SordinE, error, I took it as din in sore, it is a valid spelling but it mangled 15a. CM offered sordino but I spurned it, and added sordine to C.M. on the evidence of Wiktionary when I went there about sordino which I CNP.
5d Rock. Rock=toss? Not for me. Even the phrase “storm tossed” doesn’t imply rocking to me.
16d COD Toothpick. I have a puerile sense of humour, PSOH.
DNF again.
I agree with so many of the comments above. I know I could definitely have completed this puzzle, but I am simply too bored with this type of thing to spend time unravelling clunky, wordy and wilfully convoluted clues to reveal obscurities. Once in a while would be fine, but most days? Nah. This trend has been developing for a while now, and it’s alienating that tranche of solvers who enjoy a challenge and set aside about an hour in their day to relax with the crossword and a cup of coffee. As I said yesterday, give me Dean every time. He understands the brief, and his puzzles are showpieces of wit, concision and inventiveness, and even if you don’t finish one of them, you feel as though you’ve had an entertaining and fair challenge rather than a bleak sojourn through a joyless landscape.
Thanks, pj.
Well said
23:49
Well I really enjoyed this one, in particular piecing together unknowns like CACODEMON, PHILOMATH and SORDINO.
My LOI was the Spoonerism which went in with fingers crossed but my STLOI was the blooming hidden.
I had a bit of a beef on Wednesday about the puzzle being dry with one clue “too clever by half” but I thought today’s was tough but fun with the cleverness at the right level.
All that said, I tend to agree that we get too many hard puzzles with unnecessary complexity.
Around the hour mark may have just tipped over. This proved tough.
LOI in BELLYACHE which proved quite the bellyache.
NHO SORDINO or CACODEMON. The first constructed easily the second not so much.
COD HALVE
Thanks blogger and setter
Gave up at the 50ish minute mark after a second use of the check button, and seeing I had an incorrect BELLWETHER, for no good reason other than it fitted (it was far from unique in that regard). Still had three or four to go, but would never have got that Spooner horror show even with the correct checker. Liberal use of the dictionary up to that point. I generally like the challenge of a Friday toughie, but these last two have felt particularly brutal. Thanks (ish) to setter, and to Jeremy for the unravelling.
I also had an incorrect ‘bellwether’
Just another one that takes the fun out of it. Enough to make me give up my subscription.
DNF, beaten by BELLYACHER – I got the ‘bell’ part, but then I ran through the various options for ‘sailor’, trying to fit that inside a word meaning ‘race’ with the T removed.
– Had to trust the wordplay to get CACODEMON and SORDINO
– Didn’t know that a PADRONE is an innkeeper
– Took a long time to accept that 24d wasn’t GULAG and remember OFLAG
Agree with some of the commenters above about the Mephisto-ish feel to some of this, but I don’t mind that (and I’m definitely not a top solver!). My yardstick is: if the answer is a word I’m not familiar with, can I figure it out from wordplay? And that applies to CACODEMON and SORDINO. I hope we continue to get puzzles of this difficulty level at least some of the time.
Thanks Jeremy and setter.
COD Tee shot
62:47
Never felt like I couldn’t finish this, and with some perseverance, finally crossed the line. Main hold-ups towards the end were CACODEMON which, having seen the reversed NO MEDOC, I pencilled in. MACERATION and ROCK gave me GOSSAMER and the first letter of 3d, for which I’d already pencilled in OR DIN. That left four – MILDEW gave the first letter and final checker required for 15a, which soon went in. Finally thought of SUDDEN (I had S___EN for most of the puzzle), and a more confident MAKE BOLD (had until then thought MAKE/TAKE would be first word, and that the second would begin with B).
Thanks PJ and setter
I knew cacodemon from the old computer game DOOM. Didn’t have much luck with this at all, tbh
That’s probably where I know it from: I once spent two consecutive weekends playing the game more or less non-stop at a friend’s house in Tooting!
Cacodemon is literally the exact classical Greek translation of ‘bad spirit’.
Yeah – I thought it might be ‘poo demon’, but it’s not. Though the Greek does connect the ideas poop and bad, apparently.
Did discover that my handwriting can be described as cacography, though, so that’s something.
DNF on the hour
Almost. Struggled for a long time but then sped up nicely after cracking PADRONE with no checkers. Failed at the end with another unparsed BELLWETHER which made the Spoonerism impossible even though BAKE and MOLD were hovering there or thereabouts.
I like these toughies (helped by not having the inconvenience of work) but I think what appears to be the consensus view does need some attention. We certainly shouldn’t be getting more than one beast a week.
Anyway, thank goodness I don’t blog Fridays 🙂 Well done Jeremy and thanks setter.
After three sessions totalling 51 mins I gave up with BELLYACHER unsolved. There were a lot of very good clues, but I didn’t like 2D, as to my mind OCCUR is not a homonym of ‘a cur’. The generally excellent wordplay got me safely through CACODEMON and PHILOMATH. My favourite four clues were to WOMAN OF LETTERS (on a par with the brilliant clue to THE VIRGIN QUEEN yesterday), PHILOMATH (made me laugh), TOOTHPICK (very clever) and TEE SHOT. A fine puzzle. Thank you to Setter and Blogger.
Not sure how you would pronounce the two but as I do it they are perfect homophones. The initial vowel is a schwa in both cases.
I really wanted to finish, and only had bellyacher left at 70 minutes. I just needed one more mental breakthrough that I could just not achieve.
I did like padrone, sordino, philomath, and cacodemon. Being able to conjure up obscure words from the cryptic is the true key to solving difficult puzzles.
You’ve summarised my similar experience rather better than I did!
1:07 Enjoyably difficult today. The top half went over my head with a whoosh for the first few minutes but the bottom half proved to be a more fruitful line of attack. Really liked BELLYACHER. Thanks blogger and setter!
Gave up after more than an hour,, defeated by two: CACODEMON and BELLYACHER. I now think I should have seen the second, but I would never have seen the first. I’m still pleased to have got all the rest, even though I’m now a bit punch-drunk like so many others
DNF, with a similar experience and viewpoint to most of the contributors here. My personal gripe about OCCUR being a homophone of “a cur” was the least of my worries….
I’ve been getting a “too many requests” error quite often when trying to access tftt. Primarily on my phone, but sometimes on my laptop. Are others getting this problem, and is there any solution. Many thanks Allan
We’re all getting it. At the moment the only solution is to wait, it seems to resolve itself on an hourly basis.
At last! Most people have now realised that these are not crosswords with clever clues, but
merely very abstruse, indeed plainly wrong, clues to a ridiculous amount of extremely rare
words. If there still is an editor checking through the compilers’ work, it is time for some of
them to be replaced. For goodness’ sake, let’s get The Times cryptic crossword back to its
heyday as simply the best challenge around.
After 15 or so minutes with 5 or 6 clues solved, I lost patience and saved for later, not sure whether I’d come back to it or not. I usually do the puzzles before breakfast and something which needs this amount of time and effort is not what I want. Once in a while is ok but not the regular beasts we seem to be enduring at the moment. Anyway I came back to it later this afternoon once my chores were done and managed to finish in 73:22 albeit having checked PHILOMATH and CACODEMON after construction. Despite having one for my viola, I didn’t know what the violinist’s mute was called, but the wordplay was clear enough for me to put it in without checking. First 2 in were PSHAW and PADRONE. Last 2 in were PROPER and REHASH. Thanks Jeremy.
SORDINO is not specific to the violin, it’s just the Italian for a mute. The musical directions con sordino / senza sordino (with / without mute) often appear in classical scores.
Thanks Jack.
I hope that the Crossword Editor will offer some sort of acknowledgement and reflection in response to so many complaints – and even, perhaps, an amendment of ways.
I much prefer a hard puzzle to one that is too easy.
There’s no sense of satisfaction when completing the latter….
Agree with the above. I’ve been thinking that at 73 maybe my powers are waning, but if they’re getting harder then that’s a bit of a relief!
In order to complete this, I had to have several delves into my scrabble app, which I find the most help. It can get a bit tedious…
I had all but six done in the SE corner in 45 mins when I threw in the towel. HALVE, BELLYACHER, MAKE BOLD, TEE SHOT, SUDDEN and OFLAG. But I thought all the answers were fairly clued and the surfaces were mostly smooth.
I mainly like these tough ones as long as the answers are gettable from the wordplay. Good practice for those of us who vaingloriously compete in the Championship puzzles each year, while knowing in our hearts that the task in hand is well above our pay grade.
COD: OFLAG
Beaten with about 6 left- was never going to get cacodemon or make bold or oflag. Make bold I find an incredibly poor clue.
Thanks to the blogger for his efforts
this was hard! did not get a number of clues, tho I found answers that were incorrect, for instance, that there must be a Nicodemon, (no medoc in), of course I put Gulag, thinking that GU must be Guards Union, and I put Bellwether, can’t even remember my justification now, but it hurts my ego! good to be brought back down to earth! thanks all, cx
I really enjoyed this. Usually a 30 to 45 minute solver but this took about 2 hours over 2 sessions. Several words learnt thanks to fair clues. If I wanted easy puzzles I wouldn’t be buying The Times.
If this really is Mephisto level perhaps I’ll give those a go.
Well I do take some comfort from throwing in the towel with six complete. One more than last Friday
Done on Sunday in 48’38”. BELLYACHER at the end took 10 minutes. Talking of which, there is obviously some dissension in the ranks. My view is that as long as there’s a mix, these toughies are part of what makes it fun. And if you don’t know the word, well you’ve learned it for next time.