Times Quick Cryptic 131 by Izetti

Author   jackktPosted on Categories Quick Cryptic
This took me 22 minutes.  I was very slow to get things flowing and spent ages dotting answers in around the grid. And then, having completed most of it, I had a mental block and was stuck for far too long with 1dn and 7ac outstanding. I’m inclined to think this must have been at the harder end of the Quickie spectrum but I have been wrong on such matters before and I await comments of of others with interest.

Definitions are underlined and curly brackets indicate deletions.

P.S. SNAFU Central are on the march and have now moved on to buggering up Sudoku (regular and Killer) which has not been updated since Friday. This has never gone wrong before but they’ve repositioned the puzzle in the newspaper and for some reason that seems to have affected on-line access. Edit 10:30 Now sorted.

Across
7 Poet conveying the sound of running water (6)
BROOKE – Sounds like BROOK (running water). With reference to the Great War poet, Rupert Brooke 1887-1915.
8 Fuss socialist loved (6)
ADORED – ADO (fuss), RED (socialist)
9 Drinks imbibed by female sometimes (4)
ALES – Hidden in [imbibed by] ‘femALE Sometimes’
10 Officer ecstatic about new gear (8)
SERGEANT – Anagram [new] of GEAR inside SENT (ecstatic)
11 Abstains from supporting rude people (8)
FORBEARS – FOR (supporting), BEARS (rude people)
13 Not bad, thus can be repeated (2-2)
SO-SO – SO (thus) x 2 [repeated]
15 Report of outcome in outdoor event (4)
FETE – Sounds like [report of] FATE (outcome)
16 One politician shown to be damaged (8)
IMPAIRED – I (one), MP (politician), AIRED (shown)
18 Withdraw, having returned to humbler position? (4,4)
BACK DOWN – Two meanings, but principally ‘withdraw’
20 Northern Queen meets old emperor (4)
NERO – N (Northern), ER (Queen), O (old)
21 City girl returning after six (6)
VIENNA – VI (six), ANNE (girl) reversed [returning]
22 Soldier, one buried in site of battle (6)
MARINE – I (one) inside [buried in] MARNE (site of battle). Two battles were fought near this French river during the Great War.

Down
1 Loose woman beginning to exasperate novelist (8)
TROLLOPE – TROLLOP (loose woman) E{xasperate}. With reference to the author Anthony Trollope 1815-1882
2 Illegal entrance for demolition of building (13)
HOUSEBREAKING – Two meanings but principally ‘illegal entrance’
3 Old country prospers, I assume, with several outsiders banished (6)
PERSIA – {pros}PERS I A{ssume} The former name of Iran.
4 Bull inflicted lacerations on us, we’d say (6)
TAURUS – Sounds like [we’d say] TORE US (inflicted lacerations on us}
5 What schemes will be profitable? Maybe we toss a coin! (5-8)
MONEY-SPINNERS – Two meanings one straight, one more tongue-in-cheek
6 Little boy eats a vegetable (4)
BEAN – BEN (little boy) encloses [eats] A
12 Farm animal in river in the morning (3)
RAM – R (river), AM (in the morning)
14 Son listening to pianist George (8)
SHEARING – S (son), HEARING (listening to).  George Shearing was a British jazz pianist and song writer who went on to live and work in America. I’m not sure how widely known he is now but he deserves to be remembered. He died as recently as 2011 which rather surprised me as I’d not heard of him for years and assumed he had been dead for much longer.
16 One of many keeping close together when there’s a gale? (6)
ISOBAR – Cryptic definition. If they are close together on a weather chart they indicate strong winds.
17 Criticise a mother’s summer hat (6)
PANAMA – PAN (criticise), A, MA (mother). These hats actually originated in Ecuador.
19 Perched and damaged tail (4)
ALIT – Anagram [damaged] of TAIL. This makes use of the rare past tense of “alight” which is more usually “alighted”.

13 comments on “Times Quick Cryptic 131 by Izetti”

  1. Definitely in the graduation-to-main-puzzle category. SHEARING is a case in point. I’d never heard of him, but it’s the kind of clue one can expect in the main puzzle, and HEARING clued as ‘listening to’ is as helpful as it gets. I also finished with BROOKE, a very nice clue.

    Thanks to Jack and Don.

  2. Started off quickly with the first 4 across clues going straight in. Most of the rest went in ok but there were 3 answers I could not get, 1d, 2d and 11a. Favourite clue 16d.
  3. I join the ranks of strugglers today getting held up in NE. Took ages to equate bears with rude people – rather than cautious investors and ‘outsiders banished’ meaning ‘look inside’. Didn’t record a time as interrupted but it must have been up with jackkt’s.
  4. Didn’t find this too tricky, almost a write-in as soon as the Trollope penny dropped; at first I had MONEY-SPINNING which messed up the crossing clue but not for long; 12 minutes, and commiserations to ulaca, having so far missed the oeuvre of George Shearing – smooth as silk.

    Edited at 2014-09-08 07:16 am (UTC)

  5. 4 mins. I thought this was the easiest of the Don’s QCs, but it could just have been that I had most of the necessary GK for some write-ins (starting with BROOKE as soon as a saw it), and even the one I didn’t know, SHEARING, was very helpfully clued. ISOBARS was my LOI after VIENNA.
  6. My experience was pretty much identical to Jack’s, including a time of about 23 mins. I found nearly all the clues harder than some of the easier ones in today’s main-paper Cryptic.
  7. It just goes to show that you just have to be on the wavelength of the setter. At 6:36 it was one of my quickest yet! As Andy says, having the necessary GK certainly helped.

    BTW, it’s the centenary of the Battle of the Marne at the moment.
    BTW2, apart from being a writer, Anthony Trollope also invented the pillar box.

  8. Didn’t get on well with this at all, some jumps in vocabulary just totally escaping me. Some seem tenuous (Bears for rude people) some I had never come across (alit for perched) and some I still don’t understand (sent for ecstatic?). The GK of people and places wasn’t a problem though. Since Monday is supposed to be an easier day for the main cryptic, maybe I’ll give that a try this evening.
    1. I agree with the last comment. Bears might have been boors. I am too young to use the word alit and too old to know of Shearing. Trollope and Brooke were fair but challenging. I did not finish until this afternoon.
      1. Good heavens, Silverwaver, “too old to know of Shearing” born in 1919 and world famous for decades from 1947 onwards! I’m all in favour of “never ‘eard of ‘im” (I had to ask who Freddie Mercury was on the day his death was all over the news) but I don’t think you can plead excess of years on this occasion 🙂

        Edited at 2014-09-08 04:25 pm (UTC)

    2. All of these definitions are in Chambers. I understand that this might not be a satisfactory answer but, since everyone has their own ideas about what certain words mean, the only possible way of determining what’s acceptable and what isn’t is via one or more reference works. Chambers says for send: “(orig of jazz) to rouse (someone) to ecstasy”. I can’t say I would I use either bear or sent in these senses in “real life” but that’s true of many words encountered in Crosswordland. Sent is worth remembering as it crops up in the main cryptic on occasion.

      The main cryptic is definitely worth a try today, as it is fairly gentle but still interesting.

      1. Sam Cooke’s 1957 classic (hope you’re not too old to remember that one!) ‘You Send Me’ has the word in precisely this meaning.
  9. It’s a funny old game, saint, as Jimmy Greaves used to say to Ian St John. I found this OK for the most part, but struggled with a few clues. In particular, I just couldn’t see HOUSEBREAKING for ages; end result, 11 minutes, my longest ever for a quickie. By contrast, I found the main crossword a relative write in, and completed in an identical time. Go figure!

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