Times Quick Cryptic 1977 by Breadman

Author   william_j_sPosted on Categories Quick Cryptic
I reckon your experience of today’s puzzle will depend on whether you solved the four longest answers quickly, or not. I’m in the latter camp, with 1ac my LOI.

Overall, this is a pretty grown up QC, but with nothing really obscure or difficult.

Definitions underlined.

Across
1 Notable Elizabethan coin is found finally with garden tool (7,5)
FRANCIS DRAKE – FRANC (coin), IS, last letter of (finally) founD, and RAKE (garden tool).
8 Dance clubs no good in outskirts of Omaha (5)
CONGA – C (clubs), then N (no) and G (good) inside the first and last letters from (outskirts of) OmahA.
9 Filling morning with a large magazine to go over (7)
AMALGAM – AM (morning), A, L (large), and a reversal of (to go over) MAG (magazine).
10 Mark and Dorothy (3)
DOT – double definition.
11 Peers corrected worker initially over language (9)
ESPERANTO – anagram of (corrected) PEERS, ANT (worker) and the first letter of (initially) Over.
13 Wow female, upper-class, somewhere in Greece (5)
CORFU – COR (wow), F (female), and U (upper-class).
14 Relations love fair in New York (5)
NOOKY – O(love) and OK (fair) inside NY (New York).
16 Poet sadly edgier after depression (9)
COLERIDGE – anagram of (sadly) EDGIER, after COL (depression).
17 Four years establishing climbing plant (3)
IVY – IV (four) and Y (years).
19 Fruit counter in centre on right (7)
RHUBARB – BAR (counter) inside HUB (centre), next to (on) R (Right). Or vegetable?
21 See the registrar holding anaesthetic (5)
ETHER – hidden in (…holding) seE THE Registrar.
22 Rubbish trifle has glutinous quality (12)
FIDDLESTICKS – FIDDLE (trifle) and STICKS (has glutinous quality). Trifle is the verb, meaning to amuse oneself with something.

Down
1 Confronted US agent restraining Bill (5)
FACED – FED (US agent) containing (restraining) AC (account, bill).
2 Tune Laura composed in the buff (2,7)
AU NATUREL – anagram of (composed) TUNE LAURA.
3 Beneath French castle, munched rib and steak (13)
CHATEAUBRIAND – after (beneath) CHATEAU (French castle), is an anagram of (munched) RIB, then AND.
4 Quick, like a crocodile? (6)
SNAPPY – definition and cryptic hint.
5 New organisation on Scottish isle get to recruit guys (13)
REARRANGEMENT – RE (regarding, on), ARRAN (Scottish isle), then GET containing (to recruit) MEN.
6 Cask from King’s Head, for example (3)
KEG – first letter of (…’s head) King, then EG (for example).
7 Represent doctor on duty primarily in case of emergency (6)
EMBODY – MB (doctor), first letters of (primarily) On Duty, all inside the first and last letters (case) of EmergencY.
12 From a bygone age, nasty one fired bumpkin slightly lacking (9)
NEOLITHIC – anagrm of (nasty) ONE, then LIT (fired), and all-but-the-last leter from (slightly lacking) HICk (bumpkin).
13 Military leader and Roman emperor beheaded Roman orator (6)
CICERO – CIC (Commander in Chief, military leader), and all-but-the-first letter of (beheaded) nERO (Roman emperor).
15 Wait, lifting half of leaf suitable for eating (6)
EDIBLE – BIDE (wait) reversed (lifting) then half of the letters from LEaf.
18 World War I battle certainly captivates pair (5)
YPRES – YES (certainly) containing (captivating) PR (pair).
20 Quentin regularly avoided academic institution (3)
UNI – every other letter from (regularly avoided) qUeNtIn.

56 comments on “Times Quick Cryptic 1977 by Breadman”

  1. Found this slow going but we were pleased to get there in the end, some not parsed eg neolithic, enjoyed 14a, nooky.
  2. … as I not only found this tough, but also found rather too many of the clues leaving me with question marks. I am clearly in the minority over 14A Nooky, as everyone else seems to think it a brilliant clue, but I struggled to see Relations = Nooky, and took far too long to see OK = fair. With doubts over both meaning and wordplay, but no other word I could think of to fit N-O-Y, that one was my LOI and went in with a considerable shoulder shrug. 15D Edible and 19A Rhubarb also biffed but not parsed, didn’t connect Fiddle with trifle, didn’t think of Col as a depression (more of a saddle to me, and interestingly in meteorology it usually means a region of slightly elevated pressure). And so on.

    Definitely not on Breadman’s wavelength then. But you cannot win them all and tomorrow is another day.

    Many thanks to William for the blog
    Cedric

  3. At least 1/3 of clues unanswered, found this quite hard to get to grips with.

    Happy with myself for seeing the wordplay in AMALGAM and NOOKY before the definition.

    Gave up after 35 minutes.

  4. … but I got there, in 34 minutes.

    I found three of the four long clues (FRANCIS DRAKE, REARRANGEMENT and FIDDLESTICKS) very hard to crack, which gave me precious few checkers elsewhere. I particularly liked EMBODY, and CICERO was my LOI (I didn’t know what he was famous for — shows the paucity of my GK).

    Mrs R and I are each visiting our own parents today, so I will have to report on how she will have smashed my time in due course.

    Many thanks to Breadman and William.

    Edited at 2021-10-06 04:23 pm (UTC)

    1. I knew Cicero was a Roman statesman and orator. However, rather than coming from some learned knowledge of ancient Roman history, I picked it up from the Robert Harris novel Dictator.
        1. That genuinely made me laugh as I hadn’t noticed it in the glossary before. The mere fact it is there means I can’t be the only bluffer then 😀 (unless the original quote was being ironic of course)

          Edited at 2021-10-06 05:51 pm (UTC)

  5. Came to this late in the day after a few hours work digging tree roots out at my daughter’s house. My reward was a decent enough time (16mins), and in both cases the satisfaction of a job well done. I didn’t think it would turn out that way when I read the clue for 1ac, but 1d Faced gave me enough of a hint to see what was going on. After that, a fairly steady solve, with a few biff then parse solutions (Rearrangement, Coleridge, Rhubarb) to get me over some tricky spots. Loi was 22ac, Fiddlesticks, via a mercifully quick pdm. CoD to 14ac, Nooky, even if I couldn’t quite believe it the first couple of times I looked at it. Invariant
  6. A lightning solve (by my meagre standards), at half the target time. Once a few checkers were in there was lots of biffing with fiddlesticks the last to fall.
  7. Where I come from nooky is synonymous with shagging or screwing which I wouldn’t expect to see in a Times crossword!
    1. Dear Mr. Anthony Mouse – Believe it or not – it’s how we all got herein the first place! Smelling Salts!?
  8. Hardly a moment to see CHATEAUBRIAND 😉 but FACED and the much referenced FIDDLESTICKS were altogether a different story. Several visits to the grid during the day in between work and walk, so no definite time but I would not take issue with an hour overall.
    Definitely more difficult than yesterday, Biff and hope and away we go.
    Thanks William and Breadman
  9. I was sharing the answer to 13d with my classicist daughter who pointed out that as well as referring to [N]ERO, “beheaded” also refers to “Roman orator”, since Cicero was beheaded (and had his head impaled on a stake, whereupon Fulvia stuck hairpins in his tongue).

    Otherwise, I’m afraid I didn’t complete this one, and had to have help with 14a, 22a, 7d and 12d. Pleased with myself for biffing Chateaubriand since I’d only ever heard of the French writer (1768-1848) rather than the steak.

    1. Dear William Morris It far is better if one puts the actual words in, as most of us can’t be fagged to scroll back to find out what 13d 14a, 22a, 7d and 12d are! You’ll have to get out a bit more to discover the joys of the other Chateaubriand (for two).

      19ac, 19ac, 19ac! Kind regards Meldrew

    1. Hi Anon,

      It stands for Medicinae Baccalaureus, or Bachelor of Medicine.

      ‘Doctor’ in a clue sometimes indicates: DR, MB, MO, MD, GP, DD, or rearrangement (anagram).

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