Alfie is an occasional setter who invariably gives us a puzzle on an Alfie-betical theme, and this is true here as well. Themed crosswords can appear contrived, and annoy some solvers who might find them clunky. However, I always enjoy their cleverness and craft, so count me as a fan.
I’ll describe what I have found at the end of the blog, to give you all a chance to find it for yourselves. Also, sorry for my radio silence on this blog this week. I started the week with a 72 hour golf trip to Wiltshire, and yesterday did a round trip from Surrey to Scotland for a very sad family funeral. However, that is all behind us, and we can now move on. I have completed all of the QCs this week with times between 10 and 13 minutes (except for this one!), which may be related to exhaution. However, I have had neither the time nor opportunity to comment here until now.
Across
1 Sale that sounds weird to some? (6)
BAZAAR – Sounds a little like BIZARRE (weird). One of those homophone clues that doesn’t quite work in my opinion. The first syllable is definitely not the same sound in the two words.
5 Told stories added by brief, regularly recalled (6)
FIBBED – Alternate letters (regularly), reversed (recalled) in aDdEd By BrIeF.
8 Reports Athletic Club matters (8)
ACCOUNTS – A{thletic} C{lub} and COUNTS (matters).
9 Fish a healthy red colour, tailless (4)
RUDD – RUDD{y} (healthy red colour), tailless = drop the last letter.
10 Measure of length of payment time (4)
FEET – FEE (payment) and T{ime}.
11 Widespread agitating I’d suffer endlessly (7)
DIFFUSE – Anagram (agitating) of [I’D SUFFE[r}] (endlessly).
12 Returning favour to Ms Darling perhaps, as compensation (6,5)
SAVING GRACE – This is where I struggled with the parsing. Ms Darling is Grace Darling, a lighthouse keeper’s daughter whose participation in the sea rescue of a handful of survivors from the shipwrecked Forfarshire in 1838 brought her to the attention of society, and made her a heroine. A SAVING GRACE is a compensation, or compensating virtue or quality, so answer and definition fit. However, how does the wordplay work? The best I could arrive at is this: Grace Darling undoubtedly saved lives in her heroic rescue, If one were to save Grace, one would be returning the favour. Can anyone do better than that?
15 Arrogant school bowler, perhaps (4,3)
HIGH HAT – HIGH (school, as in HIGH school) and HAT (bowler is an example of a type of HAT). To HIGH HAT is to adopt a superior attitude towards, or to ignore socially, or to be arrogant.
16 Pilgrimage starts off hopeful and joyful journey (4)
HAJJ – First letters from (starts off) H{opeful} A{nd} J{oyful} J{ourney}. The HAJJ is the name of the annual Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca.
17 A couple of lines penned by each girl (4)
ELLA – A couple or pair of L{ines} to give LL, which is inside EA{ch}.
18 Back in Paris, I annoy local French citizen (8)
LYONNAIS – Reverse hidden (back in) in {pari}S, I ANNOY L{ocal}. LYONNAISe (usually written with the final E) is a cooking term meaning cooked or served with onions, but comes from ‘a la Lyonnais’, of or made in Lyon or the Lyonnais region, which can equally apply to a citizen of the region.
20 Lincoln’s assassin, by front of stage, stalls (6)
BOOTHS – BOOTH (John Wilkes, assassin of Abe Lincoln in Ford’s Theatre) and S{tage} (front of stage).
21 Stylish clothes, ultimately, dyer’s transformed (6)
DRESSY – Anagram (transformed) of [DYER’S] and S ({clothe}S ultimately).
Down
2 Family on radio taking their bow? (7)
ARCHERS – A cryptic hint to give the name of British Radio’s most famous family, the ARCHERS, broadcast since 1951 (a good year, that!).
3 Sailor not at home? That’s concerning (5)
ABOUT – AB (sailor) and OUT (not at home).
4 Manage to flee (3)
RUN – Double definition.
5 Female at first rubbished this gift, causing a punch-up (9)
FISTFIGHT – Anagram (rubbished) of [THIS GIFT] with F{emale} (at first).
6 Live with artist, accepting vilification, in Caribbean location (7)
BERMUDA – BE (live) with RA (artist) containing MUD (vilification).
7 Fellow spun around endlessly (5)
EDDIE – EDDIE{d} (spun around) endlessly = drop the last letter.
11 Foul places knight visits heaving dull sigh (9)
DUNGHILLS – Anagram (heaving) of [DULL SIGH] with N (Knight, N, chess notation) ‘visiting’.
13 Wandering around Virginia, on allowance (7)
VAGRANT – VA (Virginia, standard abbreviation) on GRANT (allowance).
14 Exhorts, in French, to marry son (7)
ENJOINS – EN (‘in’ in the French language), JOIN (to marry) and S{on}.
15 A greeting the chap is going to love (5)
HELLO – HE’LL (he will, the chap is going to) and O (love).
16 Joint that’s nothing exceptional inside (5)
HINGE – Hidden (inside) in {not}HING E{xceptional}.
19 Elderly Cockney’s influence (3)
OLD – HOLD equals influence. If said by a cockney, he’d probably say ‘OLD and drop the aitch.
Back to Alfie’s theme. Answers to all of the across clues contain double letters, starting with AA in 1a, BB in 5a, CC in 8a, etc, working through the alphabet in order, but missing occasional letters. We continue with DD, EE, FF, GG, HH, JJ, LL, NN, OO and finally SS in 21a. A couple of the down answers also feature double letters, 11d and 15d. In addition, all but seven of the twenty-five clues, across and down, feature double letters.
Alfie also sets under the name Noel, usually at Christmas. Famously, in one of his Xmas puzzles a few years ago, Alfie / Noel included a grid that was one letter short of a pangram (called a Lipogram). The missing letter? It was L that was missing – No El! Today, the only clue that does not contain a letter L is 14d.
Please let me know if you spot anything else.
I was not familiar with high hat, which is more often part of a drummer’s kit, and I had to pull the Archers out of my memory bank of UKisms. I just biffed saving grace, which saved a lot of trouble.
I do think the SCC may be in a bit of trouble with this one.
The Bahamas and the Turks and Caicos Islands are sometimes considered to be a part of the Caribbean, even though they are neither within the Caribbean Sea nor on its border. However, the Bahamas is a full member state of the Caribbean Community and the Turks and Caicos Islands are an associate member.
Edited at 2021-06-10 07:04 am (UTC)
Rotter, you found more Alfie/Noel tricks than I did. I noticed only the double letters in the Across clues and a couple in the Downs.
I had the same parsing at 12ac as you did.
I quite enjoyed the dodgy homophone at 2dn which at least was acknowledged by a question mark.
My knowledge of Darlings doesn’t go much beyond Blackadder so SAVING GRACE went in on the definition and checkers.
Lots to enjoy but my COD goes to ARCHERS for the homophone misdirection.
Finished in 13.28, oblivious to the theme despite a brief looked based on Alfie’s history.
Thanks to Rotter
FOI 4dn RUN
LOI 1ac BAZAAR
COD 12ac SAVING GRACE – M5r. Rotter NB ‘perhaps’
WOD 16ac HAJJ
Time: just short of 8 mins.
Edited at 2021-06-10 07:04 am (UTC)
Great puzzle and mostly fair if you count help from Google for Lincoln’s assassin and RNLI Victorian lighthouse heroine… Didn’t spot the Nina so thanks Rotter and Setter. Lots of partial anagrams and construction clues which were fun. Just squeezed in under 20 with help so technical DNF
Thanks for the erudite parsing of the clues.
controversyoutright error over 6D Bermuda (it is categorically not in the Caribbean), I was not sure about 1A Bazaar, which does not really mean sale in my book, being more the marketplace or souq than the activity going on there, and I confess I have never heard the expression 15A High hat (though this clue is eventually forgiven for avoiding the temptation to automatically have Eton as the meaning of school!). On the other hand, a hat-tip to 16A Hajj, possibly the first time I have ever seen a double-J in a Times crossword.I parsed 12A Saving Grace exactly as Rotter did (eventually — I did also like Kevin start by wondering about Wendy). I don’t think there is any need to “do better than that” — I think it is a very clever clue as it is, requiring a pleasing amount of mental gymnastics, and it is certainly my COD.
Many thanks to Rotter for the very full blog, on both the clues and the NINA.
Cedric
Cardorojo
LOI was ACCOUNTS – I also had an unparsed BARBUDA, but then spotted that MUD could be vilification and that BE RA was the rest of the clue, and gave no more thought to the location of said jurisdiction!
I liked SAVING GRACE and DUNGHILLS
8:58, so a third missed target this week.
Actually, Cedric, one does talk about eg a church bazaar meaning charity sale, so not bizarre to me.
Kept trying to think of a homonym for family and then the penny dropped for LOI ARCHERS.
Agree BERMUDA not Caribbean.
Failed to see Nina as usual.
Thanks so much, TheRotter. I am sorry you have had a difficult time lately.
I think you’re right, Rotter, that newer members might find this more challenging – there were some quite tricksy clues and a diverse range of GK is probably necessary.
I never did quite get what was going on at 12a SAVING GRACE so thanks for the explanation. Like Kevin, the first Darling I thought of was Wendy from Peter Pan, but ‘something Wendy’ definitely wasn’t going to work! HIGH HAT caused me to SMS (nice one!) as I was only really aware of the phrase high handed in that context.
FOI Bazaar
LOI Hinge
COD About, although Fistfight made me laugh
Many thanks to Alfie for the fun and to Rotter for the full and clear blog, plus all the extra work looking through Alfie’s bag of tricks! Many commiserations and best wishes to you too.
To Alfie – clever and great fun giving me 13+ minutes of intrigue.
Last, and very least, to me for managing to grind through the anagram for DUNGHILLS and then, eventually, managing to fill in LOI BOOTHS – as I dnk the assassin.
Edited at 2021-06-10 09:27 am (UTC)
FOI ACCOUNTS
LOI HINGE (lovely concealment !)
COD SAVING GRACE (definitely a 15×15 clue however)
TIME 4:28
DNK Lincoln’s assassin, the only Booth(s) I know being the local supermarket up here in the North West. Nearly put “Hard Hat” for 15ac, but couldn’t parse it and 12ac “Saving Grace” was also an educated guess.
Whilst there were a few clues that were genuinely problematic (never a fan where specific GK is required for part of the clue) — the main issues for me were the cleverly constructed surfaces that meant nearly each clue could have been looked at in numerous ways.
FOI — 4dn “Run”
LOI — dnf
COD — 2dn “Archers”
Thanks as usual!
Edited at 2021-06-10 10:38 am (UTC)
Edited at 2021-06-10 06:42 pm (UTC)
My first thought for 2 dn was to look for a homophone but then realised it was just an everyday story of countryfolk.
COD was probably 12 ac “saving grace” — very cleverly put together.
I’m another of those people who seem to miss the Ninas and pangrams, so thanks to Rotter for a fascinating and comprehensive blog and to Alfie. So at least now I know “what it’s all about” !!
I too wondered about BERMUDA but the parsing was clear.
Late in were BAZAAR and ARCHERS. LOI should have been BOOTHS. I spent several minutes trying to remember who dun it; I did in the end.
Some good difficult stuff here. COD to BOOTHS.
David
Impressed with the Nina — well done Alfie and Mr Rotter for the great blog
Thought it was tough today but managed to keep going by jumping around
Grew up in Newcastle so v familiar with Grace Darling
FOI FIBBED, LOI ARCHERS, COD LYONNAIS, time 12:38 for 1.8K and a Tough day.
Many thanks Rotter and Alfie.
Templar
I just did not look for a hidden with misdirection all over the place: “annoy” as an anagrind for local, “in Paris” = “en”, then that backwards etc, trying to think of the French for back as in “Back in Paris”…
COD BERMUDA which I assembled from the parts, and was expecting a more Caribbean ANTIGUA, JAMAICA, or TORTUGA
Edited at 2021-06-10 06:04 pm (UTC)
Edited at 2021-06-10 02:24 pm (UTC)
Edited at 2021-06-10 04:17 pm (UTC)
Edited at 2021-06-10 04:58 pm (UTC)
I am absolutely delighted to have finished, all correct and fully parsed in 34 minutes (a good time for me). The clueing was precise and I made progress each time I thought I was
grinding to a halt. DNK Lincoln’s assassin or the pelling of HAJJ. Also, initially thought ENJOINS was CAJOLES, but saw my error in time.
Many thanks to Alfie and therotter.
Great blog today.. we did not spot the nino either.
Seems to depend which computer I am one as to what name I get when I log in
There fore MarkDavis = Toxshot!!