Times Quick Cryptic No 1068 by Izetti

Author   rolytolyPosted on Categories Quick Cryptic
A touch on the harder side today from Izetti, which is to say probably average for Izetti, and there was indeed some typical tricksiness going on. Some nicely unusual wording as well – If I’d seen a couple of the answers cold, I couldn’t have told you remotely what 18d was, and I would have given a different definition for 20ac. I was also left staring at 16d for a couple of minutes at the end, which pushed me correspondingly over my target. Eight-or-so anagrams might have helped provide a decent entry if some of the clueing elsewhere was on the harder side (although 10d was my 2nd last one in), so all in all, a well-balanced puzzle – many thanks to Izetti!

Across
1 Former lover having requests cries (8)
EXCLAIMS – EX (former lover) CLAIMS (requests)
5 Stylish little bird with tail hidden (4)
CHIC – CHICK (little bird) with tail letter hidden.
8 Trips made by drunkard rolling over outside old city (5)
TOURS – TOS (SOT/drunkard, rolling over/reversing) outside UR (old city – a cryptic crossword staple).
9 Loner in sports ground, learner needing exercise (7)
RECLUSE – REC (Sports ground – another staple) L(earner) needing USE (exercise)
11 Supports politicians giving accounts of what happened earlier (11)
BACKSTORIES – BACKS (supports) TORIES (politicians)
13 Musical dramas are so fantastic when piano is included (6)
OPERAS – Anagram (fantastic) of ARE SO with P(iano) included
14 A day given opening — now on calendar? (6)
ADVENT – A D(ay) given VENT (opening) – with reference to advent calendar opening.
17 Temporary pavilion so unstable, sheltering Rex (11)
PROVISIONAL – anagram (unstable) of PAVILION SO, sheltering/covering R(ex)
20 Hospital official who could give Ron meal (7)
ALMONER – anagram (could give) of RON MEAL. If pushed, I would have said this was a giver of alms, but it now more commonly refers to a hospital aftercare worker, originally being someone who also organised payment of the medical bill.
21 Candle that a person gets hold of (5)
TAPER – hidden: “thaT A PERson” gets hold of the answer. Interesting etymology – same as paper: a corruption of the Latin “papyrus”, a very versatile plant whose pith could make both paper and the wicks for candles, with the root providing a fuel and all manner of tableware.
22 Fiddler supposedly with refusal to entertain the Queen (4)
NERO – NO (refusal) to entertain ER (the Queen)
23 Most exciting preliminary contest involving fantastic side (8)
HEADIEST – HEAT (preliminary contest) involving an anagram (fantastic) of SIDE.
Down
1 Poet denied king food (4)
EATS – KEATS (poet) denied K. The singular “eat” exists but is rarer.
2 Fall apart, having cold and noise in stomach? (7)
CRUMBLE – C(old) and RUmBLE (noise in stomach)
3 Group of coots in Asia flying (11)
ASSOCIATION – anagram (flying) of COOTS IN ASIA
4 Confused situation with nothing right in church service (6)
MORASS – O (nothing) R(ight) in MASS (church service) – same idea as “marsh”.
6 Sixty minutes with one beautiful female (5)
HOURI – HOURI (60 min) with I (one). A bird of paradise, so to speak, last appearing in a QC on the 16th March. johninterred, who blogged the puzzle, provided a useful link to here.
7 Oily liquid ruining eco-store (8)
CREOSOTE – anagram (ruining) of ECOSTORE
10 Odd creation modified and harmonised (11)
COORDINATED – Anagram (modified) of ODD CREATION. This held me up for a bit, as I failed to consider O going between C_O.
12 Arrive shortly on flat territory and grumble (8)
COMPLAIN – COME (arrive), shortly = dock the tail; PLAIN (flat territory)
15 Pill, see, could be this shape (7)
ELLIPSE – anagram (could be this) of PILL SEE, with pills often being elliptical.
16 Go through church under mass of stonework? (6)
PIERCE – CE (Church of England) under PIER (mass of stonework).
18 Shell of yellow hue on French sea (5)
ORMER – OR (yellow hue – as in golden) on MER (French sea) – abalone/sea snail, the creature and/or shell.
19 Exclamation of annoyance when daughter meets rodent (4)
DRAT – D(aughter) RAT (rodent).

20 comments on “Times Quick Cryptic No 1068 by Izetti”

  1. Slowed down by the long anagrams, and by not knowing BACKSTORIES. I knew ORMER only because of cryptics; never met one. I wasn’t sure what ‘now on calendar’ was supposed to mean, but it didn’t matter. 6:33.
    1. Hesitant to suggest an alternative to our accomplished blogger, but I read the answer as advent with a small “a”, and hence as the event was shortly arriving, it was now on the calendar. The fact that there is an “Advent Calendar” is just coincidence/misdirection.
  2. 9 minutes here, but I thought some of this would probably be very hard for inexperienced solvers, PIER clued as ‘mass of stonework’, ORMER and HOURI being among the trickier points.

    Like Kevin above I wondered about’now on calendar’. Advent calendars have been around all my long lifetime, so there nothing ‘now’ about them and ‘on calendar’ would have done the job just as well in my view. Or perhaps Izetti compiled the puzzle expecting it to be published during the run-up to Christmas and it was a seasonal clue that’s now out of time.

    Edited at 2018-04-12 03:57 am (UTC)

  3. DNF as DNK ORMER. Reasonably thought “shell of yellow hue” was clue for ONMER. Then tried “shell of yellow” : OH=hue for OHMER.

    Also thought HOURI very obscure, never heard of it apart from previous QC.

    COD 11a

  4. 15 minutes but with onmer at 18d.

    Quite a few unknowns, houri, ormer, taper for candle.

    COD operas or crumble.

  5. A steady solve today, completed in 17.38. I was held up at the end by 16d which I needed before I could figure out the unknown 20a. 18d also went in with fingers crossed.
  6. Trickier than usual, with the unknown ORMER my LOI. I also wondered about now on calendar, but the wordplay was clear. 11:45. Thanks Izetti and Roly.
  7. NOW is surely being used in the sense of the time referred to ( that is, in the answer — that time being ADVENT), not in the sense of the present time in which the puzzle is being solved. The answer demands a temporal definition of some sort.
  8. Just under 20 minutes for me. I was struggling to get 1d at the end and had to think hard about the clue to get Keats. I had one wrong: Onmer at 18d. I knew it could be wrong and thought that the yellow hue was part of the definition. No complaints. There are lots of words I don’t know and I’ll know it next time. Would have struggled to get Or from “of yellow hue”.
    COD to 11a. David
  9. Found this tough, but then Izetti usually is. never heard of BACKSTORIES, but the cluing was fair enough. Is it a press term I wonder? Never heard of ORMER or even of OR for a yellowish hue (although could see a possible association), so that was a total guess. A PIER can of course be wood, and often is, so found that a bit iffy as well. COORDINATED took a while. COO is not the first thing you think of to start a word.
    All in all, quite a challenge.
    PlayUpPompey
    1. A novelist uses backstory as a term for what happened in a character’s life prior to the novel’s beginning…so I got that one straight away! Unlike ORMER/ALMONER, both of which I had to google to check they were correct. A DNF, really, seeing as I just couldn’t see Keats minus the K 🙁
      Classic Izetti! And thanks for the blog explaining 1d, Roly.
  11. Worked steadily through till was left looking at O-M-R. MER was a given so then did an alphabet trawl to fill in the blank. This told me I had no idea what the answer was, so I came on here to be educated.

    Like PlayUpPompey not only had I never heard of the ORMER (an alternative name for the abalone, I have discovered, and regularly collected and eaten in Guernsey!) but I had never come across OR as meaning yellow (my heraldic usage, which is what my OED says it is, is a little rusty I must confess).

    Anyway, having seen the answer I don’t think it was at the right level for a QC.

    Good puzzle otherwise and thanks for the blog

    Templar

    1. OR= either gold/yellow (from the heraldic use of the word) or e.g. ‘men’ (other ranks); definitely need to be kept in mind. ORMER, on the other hand, …
  12. Couple of obscure words today, particularly if you weren’t born in the 19th Century.
  13. 15 minutes today, so just inside my old target time, but failing miserably on the new one. Like others, struggled to understand what ‘now on’ was doing, but wondered if it was something to do with the advent (i.e. start or arrival) of something, like the advent of television. I also considered Jacckt’s timing reason, but didn’t dwell too much on it, as I wasn’t blogging.

    Also struggled with ORMER and required an alphabet trawl to remind me of the heraldic meaning of OR, which pointed to the answer.

    thanks setter / blogger.

  14. 40 mins today, which I’m happy to say I thought was a bit slow – how perceptions change! I would have been quite a bit quicker had I known any of Houri, Almoner and Ormer, but all three had to be worked out from the cryptics. Like others, the stray ‘now’ in 14ac was puzzling, but the answer was obvious enough. 16d was my loi, taking a few minutes to get the right stonework. Invariant
  15. The cryptic for 14a is very simple, as others have commented on, i.e. A (A) + D (day) + VENT (opening). I read ‘now’ as referencing the time when a day is given an opening on the calendar, i.e. advent, thereby providing the definition. The whole works as a form of &lit.
    I think.
  16. Only ever heard this used by Dick Dasterdly but as a big Wacky Races fan was no problem. Can one of you clever people think up a clue for double-drat?
    DNQF today but happy as a toughie. Thx to all. John.

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