Times Quick Cryptic No 1422 by Wurm

Author   plusjeremyPosted on Categories Quick Cryptic

Introduction

Perhaps I’m out of practice, or perhaps I’m tired from organizing a one-year-old’s birthday party this weekend, or perhaps I was groggy from the nap I’d just woken up from, but this one gave me a tough time. In the end, I needed to look up some synonyms for ’emperor’ to get a hint on 17 Across (a clue I rather liked, in the end). There was plenty to like here, even though it wasn’t my finest solving effort.

Solutions

Across

8 Loves to involve the two learners [in] play (7)
OTHELLO – OO (loves) around (to involve) THE (the) + LL (two learners)
9 Port initially judged acceptable [as] wine (5)
RIOJA – RIO (port) + first letters of (initally) JUDGED ACCEPTABLE (judged acceptable)
10 Bow-legged British man (5)
BANDY – B (British) + ANDY (man)
Didn’t know this one.
11 Olivia upset by rat’s head [in] food parcels (7)
RAVIOLI – OLIVIA (Olivia) anagrammed (upset) next to (by) RAT’s (rat’s) first letter (head)
A lovely definition!
12 Elite artist [is] complex woman? (7)
ELECTRA – ELECT (elite) + RA (artist)
The definition refers to the psychological complex, named after the character from Greek mythology, in which a girl competes with her mother for her father.
14 Lawyer hiding stuff [creates] tense situation (5)
DRAMA – DA (lawyer) around (hiding) RAM (stuff)
I liked ‘stuff’ = RAM.
15 Candle that a person holds (5)
TAPER – THAT A PERSON (that a person) contains the letters of the answer (holds)
17 Emperor having no time to eat fish (7)
SARDINE – TSAR (emperor) without (having no) T (time) + DINE (to eat)
A lovely, difficult clue.
19 Men out in the East recalling trouble? (7)
AMNESIA – MEN (men) anagrammed (out) in (in) ASIA (the East)
Another nice definition.
20 Busy worker going to church [in] wood (5)
BEECH – BEE (busy worker) + (going to) CH (church)
22 Charles and Mike [showing] wide difference (5)
CHASM – CHAS (Charles) + (and) M (Mike)
The latter is from the NATO phonetic alphabet.
23 Tribe bothered Marie outside public house (7)
EPHRAIM – anagrammed (bothered) MARIE (Marie) around (outside) PH (public house)
One of the lost tribes of Israel.

Down

1 Robert invests million — that’s a huge sum (4)
BOMB – BOB (Robert) around (invests) M (million)
2 Beggar to ask for such / reform? (6)
CHANGE – double definition
3 Topless girl friend (4)
ALLY – remove the first letter of (topless) SALLY (girl)
4 Minor tremors perhaps / unremarkable? (2,5,6)
NO GREAT SHAKES – double definition
A chestnut.
5 Supporter for Verdi, playing (8)
PROVIDER – PRO (for) + VERDI (Verdi) anagrammed (playing)
6 Cigar Eleanor occasionally holds up (6)
CORONA – ELEANOR OCCASIONALLY (Eleanor occasionally) contains the letters of the answer (occasionally holds) reversed (up)
7 One king in shock after another [is] reckless (8)
KAMIKAZE – I (one) + K (king) in (in) AMAZE (shock) after (after) K (another)
Another king, that is.
12 Charm / your way in? (8)
ENTRANCE – double definition
13 Remote is broken — [it’s] annoying (8)
TIRESOME – REMOTE IS (remote is) anagrammed (broken)
16 State [needing] humour injection? (6)
PUNJAB – PUN JAB (humour injection?)
‘Jab’ is an informal way of saying ‘injection’, such as with a hypodermic needle.
18 Frozen corpse [found in] derelict cinema (6)
ICEMAN – anagram of (derelict) CINEMA (cinema)
Liked this definition!
20 Husband in club [in] Thai capital (4)
BAHT – H (husband) in (in) BAT (club)
21 Ambassador and politician [showing] fibre (4)
HEMP – H.E. (ambassador) + (and) M.P. (politician)

29 comments on “Times Quick Cryptic No 1422 by Wurm”

  1. After a Titanic struggle, with 25 minutes elapsed, I lost the will to live and used a word finder to find my LOI, KAMIKAZI. I’d managed to eventually work out the rest, but that totally defeated me. I thought this was tougher than a lot of 15x15s. If I’d have known before I started what I know now, I’d have left it until after a good night’s sleep. Thanks Wurm(I think) and Jeremy.
  2. Fifteen minutes on this Wurm cast puzzle with J. Bloggs groggy! Punt e Mes anyone?

    FOI 8ac OTHELLO

    LOI 7dn KAMIKAZE

    COD 7dn KAMIKAZE

    WOD 23ac EPHRAIM

    If you read all the Down answers it appears there might be a terrorist act against a tiresome ally in the Punjab, backed with Thai money and carried out by stoned Japanese hitmen.

    Shades of ‘The Telegraph’ May 1944

  3. The main puzzle today was tough enough. Perhaps it was the same setter, and we got the leftovers here?
  4. Wurm is often tricky. I got everything bar 7d in about 20 minutes but gave up after 30 minutes as nothing occurred to me for 7d. I thought the parsing was two kings (e.g. IR or IK or AR ) inside a four letter word for Shock.
    So a defeat for me today. David

    Edited at 2019-08-21 06:40 am (UTC)

  5. A rare technical DNF for me. I solved all but 7dn in 11 minutes but when the clock ticked round to 20 minutes I decided enough was enough and resorted to aids. In my view complicated wordplay in a QC clue demands a clear definition, and I’ve always thought of KAMIKAZE as several stages on from merely ‘reckless’, but I see the dictionaries support that meaning.

    Edited at 2019-08-21 07:03 am (UTC)

  6. I started very quickly in the NW corner expecting a good time, but then ground to a halt and was also defeated at the end by Kamikaze. Without that one clue I would have posted 20 minutes – so not a difficult puzzle overall in my opinion, just a handful of harder clues.
  7. Interesting comments. I didn’t have any trouble with KAMIKAZE other than it’s spelling which fortunately was provided by the wordplay. I did however biff SARDINE and parse after submitting. 23a EPHRAIM was unknown to me but the most likely re-sort of the letters and checkers. My last two in were 19a AMNESIA and 16d PUNJAB. 10:53
  8. Yes, one of Wurm’s toughest, I think. Some nice clues but some were slightly outside the usual QC level for me. PUNJAB took a while but I liked ELECTRA, AMNESIA, and EPHRAIM. SCC today but I needed a bit of trawling for my LOI KAMIKAZE which was testing. Thanks to WURM for a clever puzzle and a serious brain stretch and to Jeremy for a good blog and for parsing SARDINE which was my COD (but only with hindsight since I biffed it!). John M.

    Edited at 2019-08-21 09:14 am (UTC)

  9. I was on the website. I had to cheat in lots of ways from looking up synonyms (elite, cigar) and spellings (baht – I put bhat at first) to putting single letters in then checking the word (ephraim). Still took me 42 minutes
    -CHS
  10. ….for a correctly completed QC.

    It had all being going so well. After about 3 minutes I was down to three clues – and then I froze. “The ICEMAN cometh” – well he arrived some 4 minutes later, and only then did I catch a SARDINE.

    It took even longer to nail KAMIKAZE. An excellent puzzle from Wurm, but, if it takes an experienced solver such as myself more than twice their target time, one has to ask if it deserves to be described as “quick”.

    FOI OTHELLO
    LOI KAMIKAZE
    COD AMNESIA
    TIME 11:33

  11. I had a few annoying interuptions during solving and I didn’t seem to be getting anywhere so I gave up with half still to go.
    Reading the answers I don’t think I would have got much further, even on a good day. I don’t normally complain about difficult puzzles as I look on them as a challenge, but I think this one crossed the line.

    Brian

  13. Beaten by KAMIKAZE. Never occurred to me that ‘another’ referred to another King. Otherwise I found it a challenging but fairly steady solve with much to enjoy.
    PlayUpPompey
  14. Well I found this really easy. Mind you, I thought the daily one quite easy too, and I’m no great shakes as a solver.

    There might have been a couple of veiled definitions, but the indication was straight down the line.

    12 down COD. Through this in 10 mins.

  15. I thought this was very tricky in places, but persevered only to come unstuck after 32 mins on loi 7d Kamikaze. I struggled with the cryptic, not realising that another referred to another king, and resorted to alphabet trawls but still couldn’t see the answer. I agree with Jackkt that kamikaze strikes me as a tad more than reckless, but so be it. Apart from that, I thought Wrum gave us some good clues, with 16d Punjab just ahead of 19ac Amnesia for my CoD vote. Invariant
  16. Yes there is some trickery here all right. Anyone else try looking for alternate letters for 6D? Admittedly I changed tack fairly quickly by thinking of cigars. NHO ELECTRA complex, so trusted to the wordplay for that. LOI AMNESIA, but only because I forgot to fill it in. The previous minute or so was spent gazing at the crossers for 7D. Was there a DARE in there at the end. Eventually I realised we had 2 Ks. A good test. Thanks Wurm and Jeremy. 6:35.
  17. Didn’t enjoy that much; not for the first time, Wurm produced a “QC” the wrong side of the Q line. Nothing to add to the comments above, which were more fun than the puzzle. Thanks all, especially Jeremy.

    Templar

  18. We also found this tricky, with help for 7d. The easier 4d which went in immediately was little help due to the unhelpful grid. Finished with the help in 40m, 10 m over target. A bit of a slog, needing perserverence to solve a number of clever clues. Thanks for the workout.
  19. 17dn caused me pause for deja vu reasons because of a clue on Tuesday:
    17. Emperor having no time to eat fish (7)
    3. After the last of chips are almost finished, eat fish (7)
    4dn also feels extremely familiar.

    I was at a loss on elite=elect but the crossers gave the answer and wasn’t too happy that tribe=Ephraim in a QC.

    Then to 7dn which was a fine tussle followed by Punjab which was last in and ended the whole thing (after 17 minutes) with a smile.

  20. I gave up with about half done. I usually manage to finish, even if I need to resort to various aids but couldn’t get near the rest of it.

    Not much to enjoy, I’m afraid.

  21. I was very pleased with Amnesia – the recalling trouble? was an interesting definition that raised a smile. But I struggled to understand Baht as capital – took the surface too literally and spent too much time not writing that in. Gave up after 40 minutes with the NW corner TBA and then wished I persevered with Corona – clever hidden not regular letters and Ravioli. I don’t think that I would have got Kamikaze or Drama.
    Mixed feelings but Punjab and Ephraim dropped in. Good to see Hemp in there. Support the U.K. hemp farms against the government dodgy licensing I say.
    Thanks all
    John George

  23. This was one of my favourite puzzles for a long time, so many great clues, but in particular; PUNJAB, RAVIOLI, AMNESIA, ELECTRA to name but a few. Some tricky stuff especially in the NE where I wasn’t helped by trying include ‘for’ in the anagram fodder for 5d, and I needed an alphabet trawl for LOI 7d. Finished in 14.04
    Thanks to Jeremy and Wurm
  24. Well having seen all the comments, we are pleased that we got there – eventually – after spending supper on the solve so about 45-50 minutes. After several years we – having not attempted a cryptic crossword before – in our late 70s can now nearly always finish the QC. Very satisfying and, hopefully, staving off dementia!
  25. Another DNF! 19A, 7D, 16D. Should have got PUNJAB; AMNESIA was clever but KAMIKAZE was never going to happen. Not on a good trot at the mo.
    Tim (not that Tim).
  27. OO doesn’t ‘equal love’, but love as in tennis is commonly (i.e. VERY commonly) used in puzzles to signify letter O in the sense of ‘zero’.

    So yesterday’s ‘loves’ were O and O going around THE LL (two learners).

    Edited at 2019-08-22 12:09 pm (UTC)

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