Times Quick Cryptic 1967 by Izetti

Author   william_j_sPosted on Categories Quick Cryptic
A fairly difficult puzzle that pushed me comfortably over my target time. I couldn’t see the setter’s name when I solved it (on my phone), and wouldn’t have guessed – it seemed to lack his usual sparkle. Perhaps I’m just grumpy at being beaten…

Definitions underlined.

Across
1 Most desperate little daughter, one needing repose (6)
DIREST – D (abbreviation for (little) daughter), I (one), and REST (repose).
4 Jumped up seconds before accident (6)
SPRANG – S (seconds) before PRANG (accident).
8 One fighting hard, someone at crease collecting half-century (7)
BATTLER – BATTER (someone at crease) containing (collecting) L (fifty, half-century).
10 Short extract from writer’s exposition (5)
TERSE – hidden in (extract from) wriTER’S Exposition.
11 As famous mother-in-law, I grumble the wrong way (5)
NAOMI – I MOAN (I grumble) reversed (the wrong way). I didn’t know this biblical reference, so waited until I had all the checkers before putting in the obvious (from wordplay) answer. Book of Ruth.
12 Clutched dog’s tail, having got irritated (7)
GRASPED – last letter of (..’s tail) doG, with (having got) RASPED (irritated). Not the first synonym to come to mind, so this one held me up too.
13 Unwelcome guests maybe when gate-crashing different parties (9)
PARASITES – AS (when) contained by (gatecrashing) an anagram of (different) PARTIES. Pick of the bunch, for me – COD.
17 Financial protector of home having less doubt (7)
INSURER – IN (home) and SURER (having less doubt).
19 Help a troubled character abroad (5)
ALEPH – anagram of (troubled) HELP A. I actually put ‘alpha’ in first, because I can’t (be bothered to) read sometimes. First letter of the Phonoecian alphabet, amongst others.
20 Support trendy person with mental ability (5)
BRAIN – BRA (support) and IN (trendy).
21 Rake gathering money in practice (7)
ROUTINE – ROUÉ (rake)containing (gathering) TIN (money).
22 News cut by half editor repeatedly called for (6)
NEEDED – first half of (cut by half) NEws, then ED (editor) and ED again (repeatedly).
23 Controlled what monarch did, reportedly (6)
REINED – sounds like (reportedly) “reigned” (what monarch did).

Down
1 Expose girl coming out to meet headless macho man (6)
DEBUNK – DEB (debutante, girl coming out) and all-but-the-first letter from (headless) hUNK (macho man).
2 Greasiest fop about to hold a significant birthday ceremony? (4,2,7)
RITE OF PASSAGE – anagram of (about) GREASIEST FOP, containing (to hold) A. Great anagram, great srface, nice clue.
3 Tommy betrayed? That is right (7)
SOLDIER – SOLD (betrayed), IE (that is), and R (right). As in sold out?
5 Favourite artist in historic city (5)
PETRA – PET (favourite) and RA (Royal Academician, artist).
6 Relaxing OAP is ponderer thinking of nothing in particular (1,6,2,4)
À PROPOS DE RIEN – anagram of (relaxing) OAP IS PONDERER. I did not know this French phrase, but luckily had heard the recurring Stewart Lee / Richard Herring exclamation, “apropos of nothing”. I had thought it came from Latin. Still don’t really get the joke…
7 Wanting to eat grass? Empty Guernsey would eat it (6)
GREEDY – REED (grass) contained by the first and last letters of (empty) GuernseY.
9 Official getting entire gist: rarely only partially (9)
REGISTRAR – hidden in (only partially) entiRE GIST RARely.
14 Speak unfavourably about traffic outside fronts of university colleges (7)
TRADUCE – TRADE (traffic) containing (outside) first letters (fronts) from University and Colleges.
15 Ape a famous historian (6)
GIBBON – double definition. Another I didn’t know. Edward, 18th century MP and historian.
16 Train of thought in the advertisement ensnaring customer finally (6)
THREAD – THE and AD (advertisement) containing (ensnaring) the last letter of (finally) customeR.
18 Compass for the mountains? (5)
RANGE – double definition. Yet another I had to guess at, or more accurately, just use one of the definitions. ‘Compass’ is the range of pitch achievable by an instrument.

66 comments on “Times Quick Cryptic 1967 by Izetti”

  1. Even knowing most of the GK …
    … such as Gibbon, Naomi, Aleph and Petra (which I have been to — it is genuinely as good as the hype), this was a challenge, which took me 15 minutes to complete. I find Izetti’s puzzles usually take time and careful attention, but this felt a bit more of a tough nut than most.

    Surprised to a genuine French expression in a Times crossword, though having got À Propos, the “de rien” bit followed easily enough.

    LOI 1D Debunk — even with DEB-N- i puzzled over it for some time. For a long time the only word that came was Debone, and I was fairly sure that wasn’t right.

    Many thanks to William for the blog
    Cedric

  2. NHO the Phoenician character, but got ALEPH.
    NHO the (famous?) historian, but got GIBBON.
    NHO the biblical mother-in-law, but got NAOMI.
    NHO the historic city, but got PETRA.
    So, now only my carefully constructed Latin phrase (A PROPOS RE DIEN) to verify for a very hard-earned successful completion in 43 minutes. But, hang on, what do I see? The wretched phrase is French, not Latin, so the whole effort has to go down in my records as a lame DNF. I’m gutted!

    Mrs Random, of course, speaks French and finished in 32 minutes. As usual, that’s 3-0 to her so far this week. It’s looking bleak for me.

    Many thanks to Izetti and William.

    1. You have some very strict rules for what constitutes a DNF, Mr Randomchap. That was a genuinely tough puzzle and the fact that you completed it at all is a good effort as far as I’m concerned. It would certainly have been way beyond me when I was at a similar stage of my QC ‘career’.
  3. I came to this after 5 o’clock and it was a disaster. I did most of it without any big issues (just the odd raised eyebrow) but came to grief in the NE. I worked out that it was the fault of an error with 10ac. I bunged in ‘tract’ since it is a shortened (ex)tract and seemed to fit the definition of tract as a ‘writer’s exposition’. Obviously this made 6d and 7d completely impossible.
    I didn’t think that my error was so bad (even though the hidden should have been obvious). I worked out A PROPOS DE RIEN, removed ‘tract’ and finished. I can’t blame Izetti for my performance but I did think this was beyond acceptable for a supposed QC. Just too clever in parts for a ‘quickie’. Thanks to William for doing a good job. John M.
  4. I solved this after golf, not that quickly.
    FOI GIBBON; LOI A PROPOS DE RIEN.
    A high quality, difficult QC. Every so often Don teaches us some new words and phrases and I think the best advice is to learn them for when they come up again.
    David
  5. General Knowledge is rather important in the QC, as it is often at a slightly higher percentage than in the 15×15. Today one sixth of the clues required GK. 11ac, 19ac, 5dn & 15dn. That’s 16.67% – 20% is often reached.

    Never stop reading – anything! You will progress. I often do the Monday GK for a warm-up. COD ALEPH.

  6. I did this earlier today, and have to say it came within a whisker of being a DNF. Not only did I bung in Alpha, which messed up the SE corner before I spotted my mistake, but I spent ages on loi 21ac, Routine. As usual when I really struggle with a clue it was a wrong end issue. The towel was speeding towards the ring before a massive pdm prompted Routine for practice. About 30mins in all, most of them jolly, with a smile at 6d. Stiff but fair, as ever with Don. Invariant
  7. Missed out on debunk and gibbon but even getting that far took me over 30 minutes. At least I figured out a propos de rein.
  8. Not a happy bunny today. I was going great guns at first and got all the way to 21a before getting my FONI. The last two acrosses also went in straight away and I thought I was on for a great time. I didn’t get DEBUNK straight off admittedly, but it went in when I came back to it and somehow even TRADUCE came to mind immediately, perhaps because I remembered being completely stumped by the unknown word very early in my crossword career a few years ago. Basically, by 13 minutes, I had everything apart from 21a and 6d. ROUTINE went in in short order since I’ve seen roue = rake a couple of times recently and that just left 6d. I assumed it was a Latin phrase I hadn’t heard of, but somehow to find it is French is even more frustrating. I thought these crosswords were supposed to be in English. I did almost work out the correct answer after 25 minutes (I forgot to count my Es and Os and put PREPOS instead of PROPOS) but it was a guess. If you’re going to put an obscure foreign phrase in a crossword, why clue it with an anagram? I’m sure Izetti could easily have come up with an inventive clue involving an oversize supporter with the queen and I in a hole, or something. Thanks anyway Izetti and, of course, William.
  10. Did it, finished it, can’t say I loved it — and, despite the tricksy nature of his puzzles, I usually love an Izetti. I had a very similar experience to Cedric, even down to the debone / DEBUNK options, but took a minute longer. In fact, I spent four minutes on POI and what I thought was my LOI — 12a and 6d. Then I discovered that I hadn’t solved 1d — what a performance! I knew A PROPOS but didn’t remember the second part of the phrase. As I finally filled it in, I thought there are going to be some comments about this one 😅 No probs with the rest of the GK.
    FOI Direst
    LOI Debunk
    COD Parasites
    Thanks Izetti and William
  11. But still DNF today — exceedingly tricky! I do know french so kicking myself that I didn’t work out A PROPOS DE RIEN. I just wasn’t expecting a french phrase — I won’t make that mistake again! Other clues unanswered included GIBBON and GRASPED. Took a long time over DEBUNK but this was nonetheless my COD. I did enjoy the process despite being rather stumped by some of the clues. More practice clearly required. Many thanks Izetti and William.

  12. DNF for me today. I had the letters for Aleph but didn’t know the word. Learned something.

    Never heard of ‘roue’ for a rake meaning person of immoral character. It’s a dated French word – does it really belong in a crossword.

    ‘Hunk’ clued as ‘macho man’? ‘Rasped’ clued as ‘irritated’? I have to say I didn’t enjoy this one which I don’t remember ever thinking about a QC before even when I haven’t finished them. There was just something odd about it all.

    Hey ho, thanks anyway to Izetti as I do appreciate how long this must have taken to produce, and thanks for the blog as always.

  14. Slow time – but all correct. I tackled this at the start of the day but cannot recall what was FOI and LOI. Although disappointed with the time on completion, It was only the A PROPOS DE RIEN that caused the delay. Thank you to william-j-s and Izetti.

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