Neat, tidy and satisfying from Mara, as always. I found this at the easier end of the spectrum and it took me 06:35; hope you enjoyed it too.
Definitions underlined in bold.
| Across | |
| 1 | Great composers moving Artemis (7) |
| MAESTRI – anagram [moving] of “Artemis”. | |
| 5 | Cloak with hat back in wardrobe (4) |
| CAPE – CAP [hat] + E [back (i.e. last letter) in wardrobe] | |
| 7 | Route passing through endless treetops (6) |
| STREET – hidden [passing through] in “endless treetops”. I didn’t spot “passing through” as a hidden indicator and needed the two Ts. | |
| 8 | Stuff one person, originally, in lift (6) |
| FILLIP – FILL [stuff] + I [one] + P [person originally]. As in “That give me a real lift/fillip”. I looked up the origin of this and was amazed to find that it’s an onomatopoeic rendition of the faint sound that comes from flicking your finger! | |
| 9 | Word competition’s queen of magic? (8,3) |
| SPELLING BEE – if you were a BEE you might be a “queen” and if you do “magic” you’d cast spells. Put them together [queen of magic] and you get a SPELLING BEE, ho ho! COD from me. | |
| 10 | PC with chief on circuit (6) |
| LAPTOP – LAP [circuit] + TOP [chief]. Fortunately Bletchers reminded us all the other day that for an across clue the convention is “X on Y = X follows Y”. | |
| 12 | Barking deeply, sounded like a dog (6) |
| YELPED – anagram [barking, i.e. mad] of “deeply”. Very good. | |
| 14 | Push by channel, media lacking integrity (6,5) |
| GUTTER PRESS – GUTTER [channel] + PRESS [push]. I’m not aware of any conventions on the use of “by” as a positional indicator. | |
| 17 | Building for animals unlikely to fall down? (6) |
| STABLE – definition with a faintly cryptic hint. | |
| 18 | One who demonstrates device in bathroom (6) |
| SHOWER – someone who “shows” things could whimsically be called a “show-er”, I suppose. | |
| 20 | Creative celebration fails to start (4) |
| ARTY – {p}ARTY. | |
| 21 | Back in forest, ain’t I a smashing fairy queen! (7) |
| TITANIA – I thought for a moment this was a backwards hidden, but no: it’s T [back in forest] + an anagram [smashing] of “ain’t I a”. TITANIA is of course the Queen of the Fairies in Midsummer Night’s Dream; she last popped by on 28 January. | |
| Down | |
| 1 | Floor covering having dull surface (3) |
| MAT – double definition. I thought that the second one was always “matt” but no. | |
| 2 | For example, lead component (7) |
| ELEMENT – cleverly deceptive and my LOI. The setter tempts us to think of “lead” as in “foremost”. In fact it is “lead” as in the dull grey metal which is also an ELEMENT (symbol PB). | |
| 3 | Score, little one, a fifty (5) |
| TOTAL – TOT [little one, i.e. small child] + A [a] + L [fifty, Roman numerals]. | |
| 4 | Youth I have a crush on withholds name (7) |
| INFANCY – I FANCY [I have a crush on] which contains [withholds] N [name]. I took a moment over this because I read “withholds name” as indicating “drop an N”, not “add an an N”. The sense of “withholds” familiar to me is refusing to hand over, which seemed to fit with dropping a letter. But here it is used as meaning “holds back; restrains”. | |
| 5 | Star cluster emitting light, extremely brightly first of all (5) |
| CELEB – the first letters [first of all] of “cluster emitting light, extremely brightly”. | |
| 6 | A scream of incalculable worth (9) |
| PRICELESS – double definition – “She’s a scream/priceless”. | |
| 9 | Killing jokes finally introducing amused reaction (9) |
| SLAUGHTER – S [jokes finally] going in front of [introducing] LAUGHTER [amused reaction]. | |
| 11 | Existing gift (7) |
| PRESENT – double definition. | |
| 13 | Wild one disturbed rest (3,4) |
| LIE DOWN – anagram [disturbed] of “wild one”. | |
| 15 | Label alongside cat (5) |
| TABBY – TAB [label] + BY [alongside]. | |
| 16 | Mail comes round I suppose (5) |
| POSIT – POST [mail] goes around [comes round] I. If you POSIT something you put it forward as an assumption for the purposes of a discussion; you postulate. It comes from the Latin ponere, positum (to place or put). | |
| 19 | Time every second of retrial (3) |
| ERA – alternate letters [every second] of “retrial”. | |
11.32 DNF. Mostly fine but, like several others, I bunged in YELLER at the end thinking of the film. Which I’ve never seen. Thanks Templar and Mara.
07:34
Needed 2 sittings. When I came back to it after work, yelped, fillip, infancy, street, and LOI element came fairly quickly.
COD YELPED
Was able to solve the bottom half rather than the top half of the puzzle, normally find it the other way round. Definitely made some silly mistakes looking through the clues this time.
I do have a question. Funnily for STREET and CELEB I wasn’t able to figure them out, but from what clues I had figured out I realised I hasn’t had any clues where the answer is written out like STREET, or where its the first letters like CELEB. In the puzzles, will there always be at least one type of each clue?
There is absolutely no guarantee that any particular type of clue will appear in a puzzle. Sure, it’s quite likely that there will be one (or more !) anagrams, double definitions etc, but nothing is guaranteed. Indeed, quite a few of us enjoy working out why the answer is correct more than just getting the right answer.
Thanks for the reply, I’ll keep that in mind when I try more. I enjoy finding out how the clues worked for the ones I couldn’t figure out too
Completed in what for me is a very quick time, and only held up by LOI FILLIP.
The more the MARA for me!
23 minutes.
Following the criticism I received yesterday, this is my final post (at least for the foreseeable future). I will continue to read the blog.
Thanks to those of you that have provided advice and support. It was appreciated.
Good luck to all of you who struggle with cryptics. I hope you persevere and are able to improve. I have seen several newcomers progress to a very high standard, so there’s no reason why you can’t too!
FWIW, I came within a hair’s breadth of completing the 15 x 15 today.
Over and out.
It’s your choice, Gary, but I certainly wouldn’t let an ill-judged comment from ANO influence whether or not I posted on this site.
To save anyone looking for it, please note that I have removed the post in question because it contained a personal insult and these are not tolerated at TfTT.
Was cruising comfortably towards a PB until the NW corner got in the way. 34 mins in the end – a respectable time for me 😁
Only for experienced players,not for intermediate beginners like myself.Only managed to solve 7 today🤷♂️