Solving time: 12:09
A fitting puzzle for April Fool’s Day. In my experience, Asp is the toughest of the regular QC setters.
While I’d completed most of this in just over eight minutes, three answers pushed my time out by another 50%.
In retrospect, two of these were fairly straightforward, and in my humble opinion, the trickiest to parse without checkers, was a three-letter answer…
Did Asp make a fool of you, too?
Definitions are underlined in bold italics, {deletions and substitutions are in curly brackets} and [directions in square ones]. The caret ^ indicates an insertion point in containment clues.
| Across | |
|---|---|
| 1 | Prevent completion of work on street (4) |
| STOP – ST (street) OP (work i.e. short for ‘opus’ – a musical work) | |
| 4 | Second act precedes retreat (4,4) |
| TURN BACK – TURN (act) precedes BACK (Second)
Surprisingly, this was one of those I found tricky. I wrote in BACK very early on, but just didn’t think of TURN = act, nor the whole answer given the probable definition. |
|
| 8 | Nastiest corrupt individual of immense strength (8) |
| TITANESS – Anagram [corrupt] of NASTIEST | |
| 9 | Develop good part of grid (4) |
| GROW – G (good) ROW (part of grid) | |
| 10 | Offshore part of UK broadcaster close to collapse (4) |
| SKYE – SKY (broadcaster) then last letter [close to] of {collaps}E The answer refers, of course, to the Isle of SKYE. | |
| 11 | Meetings concerning groups supporting workers (8) |
| REUNIONS – RE (concerning) UNIONS (groups supporting workers) | |
| 12 | Minor disturbance in this small vessel? (6) |
| TEACUP – The cryptic refers to the phrase ‘storm in a TEACUP’ which means a big fuss over a trivial matter | |
| 14 | Wicked people right to be dropped by US sitcom (6) |
| FIENDS – The US sitcom is F |
|
| 16 | Sit astride bicycle seat holding traveller’s coat (8) |
| STRADDLE – S^ADDLE (bicycle seat) containing [holding] end letters [coat] of T{ravelle}R | |
| 18 | Band like to enter in silence (4) |
| SASH – AS (like) entered into S^H (silence) | |
| 19 | What was used during war to protect post? (4) |
| MAIL – Double definition – the first (seven words) being barely cryptic, the second (single word) being straightforward | |
| 20 | Strengthened new deal backing former monarch (8) |
| ANNEALED – Anagram [new] of DEAL following [backing] ANNE (former monarch)
Strengthened here, in particular to do with the heating and cooling of materials, such as glass or metals, to toughen them. From the Old English onælan “to set on fire, kindle; inspire, incite.” |
|
| 22 | What may accommodate men bound by principle? (8) |
| TENEMENT – MEN inserted [bound by] into TENE^T (principle) | |
| 23 | Team playing final stage of game (4) |
| MATE – Anagram [playing] of TEAM
The definition refers to the final stage of a game of chess. |
|
| Down | |
|---|---|
| 2 | Drip fled naked after fool (7) |
| TRICKLE – TRICK (fool), then |
|
| 3 | Fool primarily expected to talk foolishly (5) |
| PRATE – PRAT (Fool) then first letter [primarily] of E{xpected}
PRAT is from the Old English præt meaning “trick, prank, craft, art, wile.” In the 16th century, it was a slang term for a buttock or a person’s bottom. In more recent times, a fool or contemptible person. |
|
| 4 | Seconds to stop fool revealing part of body (3) |
| TOE – Second letters of [Seconds to] {s}T{op} {f}O{ol} {r}E{vealing}
If you managed to solve 4a early (which I didn’t!), you probably managed to get this quickly as well. |
|
| 5 | Shake up loud vacuous fool stopping us here unexpectedly (9) |
| RESHUFFLE – F (loud i.e. abbreviation for ‘forte’ in musical notation) and F |
|
| 6 | Fool recited great passage (7) |
| BEGUILE – Homophone [recited] of BIG (great) AISLE (passage)
‘Fool’ as a verb… |
|
| 7 | Monarchy replacing Republican with Liberal fool (5) |
| CLOWN – C ‘fool’ as a noun. |
|
| 11 | Deny judge accepts one fool returning (9) |
| REPUDIATE – R^ATE (judge) containing [accepts] I (one) DUPE (fool) both reversed [returning] | |
| 13 | Fool cleaning woman with untrue story (7) |
| CHARLIE – CHAR (cleaning woman) and LIE (untrue story) | |
| 15 | Abandon broadcast for fool? (7) |
| DESSERT – Homophone [broadcast] of DESERT (Abandon)
Oh, that kind of fool. My third last in….. eventually! |
|
| 17 | Fool contributing to waste, as expected (5) |
| TEASE – Hidden [contributing to] in wasTE AS Expected | |
| 18 | Attack fool filling manuscript up (5) |
| SPASM – SAP (fool) inserted [filling] into M^S (manuscript) all reversed [up] | |
| 21 | Fool regularly forgetting anxiety (3) |
| NIT – every other letter ignored [regularly forgetting] of aNxIeTy
Short for NITWIT, as is TWIT. NITWIT is probably from German nix, a dialectal variant of nichts meaning “nothing,” and WIT “mental capacity.” In other words, no mental capacity… |
|
Events disrupted me so I have no solving time to report, which is probably just as well as I ended up stuck on two clues for what seemed like ever. SPASM and ANNEALED were the culprits and both required extensive alpha-trawling. I did however finish eventually without using aids, which I take as a few crumbs of comfort on a bad attempt.
I did not find this too bad. I noticed the theme, but I did not think of April Fool’s Day, because it is still March 31 over here. As an experienced solver, I do know a lot of short words meaning fool. I also managed not to get stuck on anything obvious, which helps.
Time: 8:30
LHS nice and fast, RHS mega tough. Really bored with the word fool by the end – which took a long time to come. All green in 19.47.
What Mendeset said, but an agonising 31.04.
Thanks Mike for parsing of beguile, I’m guessing there will be eyebrows raised on that pronunciation. We did like straddle, great surface, thanks Asp
I didn’t twig that it as 1st April whilst solving this and became rather bored of thinking of synonyms of fool. A very clever display of the setters art, but not one for me.
Started with GROW and finished with MAIL, which I’d made harder for myself by biffing ‘charade’ at 13d, in 11.25.
Thanks to Mike and Asp
SPASM beat me. I went with ‘swarm’, hoping that a ‘raw’ was (unknown to me) some kind of fool in military slang. Well, it made sense to me at the time, anyway. So a DNF. Glad that’s over.
Many will enjoy the extreme ingenuity of this puzzle, but it’s not for the likes of me. Managed nearly half, hence nicely exposed as a fool. NHO ANNEALED or any US sitcom. Thanks for much instruction, Mike.
Somewhere between 10 and 20😂 mistakenly started in crossword club (where the format was weird with letters not fitting the grid properly and the clues were too small to read easily) Saw the problem and swapped back to regular QC format after 13 minutes with 2/3 completed. What with the write-ins and the format easier, finished in 9:47.
Quickly cottoned on to April 1st theme. Bunged in charade at first (what a Charlie) Also nearly didn’t get my just desserts. Had a slight spasm with mail. Well done Asp; these foolish things will remind me of you.
TaMAA
I would advise anybody to just do the 15×15 today, which is far more accessible. I pretty much finished that in about the same time it took me to do less than half of this. Even if the 15×15 is easier than average, this needs a steward’s enquiry. Easily the worst on a weekday this year.
I was thinking the joke on us was that the editor had effectively switched the two around today. I’ll have a go at the 15×15 later. I only managed two in my allotted 20 minutes, titaness and mail…
And the menu button wasn’t responding either…so no login
Worked on revisiting it. This was definitely a hard one judging by the other comments.
I totally disagree about the 15×15 being easier than this one. It took me around 4 times as long to do, and though there was only one unknown word, there were 3 long anagrams. If you like long anagrams you might be quicker than I was, but I can’t see why it would be regarded as more accessible than this. But by all means give it a try.
Disappointingly, Asp has aimed this puzzle at the experts. DNF. Not in the least enjoyable, as far as I am concerned.
Have not read the blog or comments yet in the faint hope I may solve more clues later, but thanks all.
While it felt like every clue was on the ‘fool’ theme in fact it’s only the down clues. Too hard, frustrating and I didn’t enjoy. Revealed a few letters and a couple of answers after 30minutes.
DNF. Gave up after 25 minutes, having failed to see TURN BACK, TOE or DESERT.
An enjoyable puzzle nevertheless.
Thanks Asp for fooling me so well, and thanks Mike for the blog
I enjoyed this ingenious puzzle. Held up parsing SPASM (hadn’t immediately noticed the ‘up’ in the clue) and LOI MAIL. Biffed TOE – thanks Mike for explanation.
Very clever, but annoying in the end. Took a very long 35:01 to work it all out, especially the NHO ANNEALED.
I finished after half an hour but wondered why I had persevered. All very clever but not a QC and I went beyond the point of admiring the ingenuity and failed to enjoy it. Thanks to Mike for help with a couple of parsings.
40:44 for slowest puzzle of the year. Seeing Asp’s name appearing on April 1st, I called it before I started that there could be a theme. I genuinely appreciate the intent to provide something different today even if it was hard work.
Last eight mins of that alphatrawling all the possibilities of MAIL and not understanding the answer. despite it being my first thought. Didn’t understand TOE and NHO ANNEALED. CHARLIE made me laugh. Liked MATE All a bit too complicated for my brain today.
Thanks to Mike and Asp
PS #5 in cryptic quintagram seems to have a mistake to the definition
I thought that too about the Quintagram. A clear mistake.
Thanks Cedric – for what it’s worth it’s now been changed.
So I see. But the extraordinary thing is that in the printed version of the paper, the wording was “Curry, with extra to follow …” etc all along. I wonder where the app got its erroneous version from.
I like Asp’s puzzles, and this didn’t disappoint, though there was a nervous moment as I stared at my LOI, which turned out to be the fairly straightforward MAIL, disguised as something profound and convoluted! Particularly liked BEGUILE and SPASM, which kept me guessing for a while – oh, that sort of attack! Given that the Quick crossword is supposed to be an introduction to the 15, I really think that the odd unknown word like ANNEALED (which is easily parseable) has a valid place in the trickier ones, otherwise there is no progression and no stepping stone between the easier 15s and the harder quickies.
Not all of us aspire to move up to the 15×15. I suspect many like me are content to roll along in the SCC and just enjoy the ride.
I do know what ANNEALED means, by the way, but was trying to fit in ER.
29.54 Happy to be amongst friends. Cannot say we enjoyed this. It was a slog.
NHO ANNEALED (though could parse it so in it went).
4D TOE Needed the welcome blog (knew it had to be EYE/TOE, couldn’t parse either, in the end only TOE worked).
21D NIT Query construction. Can see direction ‘regularly’ > aNxIeTy, however, do you simply ignore/leap frog ‘forgetting’ in order to carry out the direction? Is definition fool – or fool forgetting? Fooled me in any event.
LOI BEGUILE
Skill to create this applauded, however, not quite our thing.
Thanks to Asp and to Mike Harper for providing much needed clarity.
You apply the whole instruction “forgetting regularly” to ANXIETY, which would either give you AXEY, which makes no sense and is too many letters, or NIT, which works.
ah…the whole instruction.. we wondered that, though in our world, a NIT is one who forgets… so we kept that with the fool. Clearly not required. Thank you for the clarification! Signed, Nit : )
An odd challenge today, justified by April 1 I suppose. I’m afraid the April Fool bit passed me by as I solved.
20 minutes in the end held up by TOE and TURN BACK. SPASM also very hard I thought.
I did have a feeling of satisfaction when I finished and the ingenuity of the setter has to be admired.
David
We’re stout yeomen here, who like our crosswording fare plain and decent, with none of that fancy trickery.
I liked it, yes it was a little bit difficult, but it made me think a bit, and surely that’s the idea of these things. I don’t think there’s anything inaccessible here if you have some experience, and I liked the topical theme – I don’t think I’ve seen anything like that in a QC before.
Thumbs up from me. Last two in for me were BEGUILE and then GROW.
9:20
I couldn’t agree more, but it seems that we’re in the minority. Today’s splendid crossword took me 10 minutes, so very much a QC for me, given that my 15×15 solves rarely beat 30 mins. I’m simply not sure quite what the “this isn’t a QC” people want from a QC, but hey. Perhaps we’ll learn something from the debate that Jason’s started today.
Thanks Mike, and Asp – terrific stuff!
This was a tough QC, and I felt I was on form to finish only a little outside target time at 10.38. I would have made it in time if I hadn’t spent the best part of a minute on my LOI DESSERT. Didn’t know there was such a thing as a TITANESS, but I assumed that if an ‘ogress’ is often used there must be such a thing. A clever puzzle by Asp that I enjoyed, although I suspect there may be some who find it too tricky.
So far the thumbs down considerably outnumber the thumbs up for this undoubtedly clever puzzle, and I regret to say I join the majority. I did complete the puzzle, in a tortuous 17:10, but I did not enjoy it and it is in my view a classic example of “NINAs seldom make good puzzles” – I know many people really like them and there is obvious skill in constructing them, but too often the compromises and contortions needed to fit the theme lead to unbalanced puzzles and strained wordplay. And, in this case, a certain ennui with the word fool.
On the clues themselves, I was surprised at the extra words in 1a (why “Prevent completion of” when just “Prevent” would work?), unsure whether TITANESS was an actual word, amused by TEACUP when I finally got it, shrugged a bit at Crown being a synonym for Monarchy in the wordplay for CLOWN, and biffed TOE without being able to parse it. So a tough day. At least the SNITCH agrees with me.
Many thanks Mike for the blog.
For those that don’t already know, I am Asp and the editor of the Times Crossword. I thought it would be fun to do something different for 1 April. Apologies to those who weren’t keen on the theme.
What I am interested in, and why I’m writing this comment, is why many solvers found this particular puzzle difficult and regard it as one for the expert solver. Very few clues have more than two wordplay elements to them, certainly no more than puzzles that appeared earlier in the week. I deliberately keep my clues simple in structure for the Quick Cryptic, and encourage other setters to do the same.
If you did find this puzzle difficult, could I encourage you to look at the clue explanations on TftT for puzzles from Monday and Tuesday, compare them with today’s puzzle, and let me know why you feel this puzzle is different and/or harder.
I would genuinely be interested to hear from you as it will help me understand what it is that solvers of the Quick Cryptic find difficult. (My suspicion is that I tend to write clues with very little punctuation, which may make it harder to pick out the boundary between wordplay and definition.)
I thought this was delightful, but definitely a tough one. I usually solve the quick in 10-15 minutes but this one took me 23:34. BEGUILE doesn’t quite work as a homophone in my accent (or maybe I’m just pronouncing it wrong) but I’ll forgive that given just how many words for fool you needed to construct it.
I think it was hard only because it require one to think of so many different ways to interpret just one word, and a word that is so often used as a clue for the letter combination ASS at that. I don’t think any of the clues were all that out there.
Generally I found the clues had too much going on in them and therefore presented more things to consider rather than being able to get straight to the answer. For example, Cedric makes the point above that “Prevent completion of” is harder than “Prevent” – it took me 15 secs to get past trying to do something with a K (“completion of worK”). The MATE clue seems like another example. REUNIONS also took longer because it was wordy and I thought I was looking to shove three synonyms into the answer.
The QC puzzles I fly through are almost biffable. Or certainly the answer becomes obvious with one piece of the wordplay. Today on my first readthrough of the clues which took well over five minutes because there is more processing going on in my brain, I only had seven answers (STOP, SKYE, FIENDS, TENEMENT, TRICKLE, CHARLIE, TEASE) and only the rate=judge and MS=manuscript pencilled in to help out elsewhere.
Checking letters are massive to quick solves and I had almost none in the NE which was what took me out past 20mins because I couldn’t find the synonyms for act=turn, back=support, crown=monarchy, big aisle and I don’t recall seeing the “seconds” trick for TOE in the QC. Wasn’t helped by wondering if “rung” might be the part of a grid.
Anyway as I said above, I appreciate the intent to do something interesting on April 1st. And as I said a few days ago, I feel your efforts at encouraging the setters to make the QC clueing uncomplicated have generally been rewarded this year, so thank-you.
Thanks for dropping in, Jason. Personally, I like anagrams nowadays, as they give me something to hang on to, an answer I’m confident about. If the grid permits, longer words or phrases help. Though my GK is fairly extensive, apart from as regards maths, science, business, IT and pop music after 1970, (rather a lot of blanks, I admit), I find synonyms don’t spring to mind as readily as they used to.
But I often guess the answer before I parse. This was hard today. Answers that are half anagram and half synonym, plus reversals, are more difficult. And, as others have said, a theme or NINA often makes the puzzle seem contorted. But punctuation doesn’t make much difference, imo.
I approve of the varying difficulty as I feel the QC would become less enjoyable if it was either consistently easy or consistently difficult. I feel the same about the 15 x 15.
Hard to say why I find some setters more challenging than others (I’m including you at the challenging end of the spectrum) but I wouldn’t be put off attempting a puzzle just because the setter is one of those that I struggle with.
I’ve often wondered if the same compilers are used for both cryptic crosswords or do some of them specialize in one or the other?
There is a large overlap between the sets of compilers for the Quicks and 15x15s. But there are indeed specialists: very few of the setters of Friday’s 15x15s have appeared in the Quick Cryptic slot, for example.
I think the reason that I found today’s puzzle tricky is that I found it difficult to keep thinking up different synonyms of ‘fool’ and that became my focus rather than looking at the clue as a whole.
Having said that I appreciate a variety of difficulties but as a rule I find puzzles easier when the definition is really clear and vice versa. Wordy clues (and spoonerisms) are my bete noir whilst a good smattering of anagrams provide plenty of useful checkers.
I imagine that it must very difficult to assess the difficulty of a puzzle as we’re all different but one thing I’ve been wondering about is having puzzles getting progressively more difficult as the week goes on and thereby help manage people’s expectations i.e. have Trelawney on Mondays and old school Izetti on Saturdays.
I use my solving times for submissions as a gauge of difficulty, and do try to schedule progressively more difficult puzzles later in the week. This is easier to do for the 15x15s as the mean and variation of my solving times is greater for those (as the SNITCH for both sets of puzzles will confirm). Solving time is not an entirely accurate metric either, as any edits I make may affect the difficulty, and this may affect the Quicks more than the 15x15s.
Dear Jason
Firstly may I thank you for initiating this debate. I am well aware that setters, yourself obviously included, are trying to offer us something we would enjoy, and it must be disappointing when your efforts are not met with gratitude. I do try to keep my comments polite and I apologise if they come across wrong.
Secondly, gauging the difficulty of a puzzle is clearly very far from easy – even the SNITCH (which you don’t of course have in advance of publishing a puzzle) is only a rough guide. We your solvers often cannot explain why we take abnormally long on a given puzzle; hence the references to “not on wavelength” and the like, in the absence of anything more obvious to attribute it to.
But a couple of thoughts – and these are clearly very personal observations: firstly, delving deep into the bottom recesses of Collins’ list of meanings to come up with an obscure or archaic meaning which is almost never seen in real life might by “according to the rules” (it is after all in Collins), but takes the QC dangerously close to the Scrabble approach of artificial lists not real words with real-life usage, and secondly, if a definition is too loose or tenuous, one can end up guessing the answer and then working out why and how it fits the definition. Which some solvers like I am sure, but others might query whether that is the objective.
But in general, we are extremely well served … and the puzzle that satisfies absolutely everyone is probably unattainable!
Thanks for responding, Jason. Personally, I enjoy the variety that the QC setters offer – some generally easier and some harder, with many more in between. I also enjoy learning new tricks – the clue for TOE being one that stretched me today. While the answer was guessable, the wordplay (which many enjoy resolving) used a clever trick not seen often/at all at the QC level.
It’s always in mind that the QC should be an introduction to cryptic crosswords, which over time and with some confidence, may lead the newer solver towards having a go at the 15×15 where the range of solve-ability is considerably greater. Not every solver chooses to do so, but your efforts to ensure that some will gain enough confidence and skill to make the step up, is always appreciated.
As I said in my original post, I think the structure of the clues in a Quick Cryptic should be relatively simply and not have too many wordplay elements. But that doesn’t mean that setters should avoid unusual gimmicks and indicators, such as “seconds” for the second letters of a sequence of words.
Richard Rogan did want the Quick to be a stepping stone to the 15×15 puzzle, so I think it is worthwhile introducing variety, both in terms of novelty and difficulty.
Hi Jason. Thanks for the puzzle and I enjoyed the theme. Ask and ye shall receive … here’s my clue-by-clue attempt at understanding why it was that I found this significantly harder than usual (11:03 against my average of 07:30). Probably TMI but I was really interested by your question!
1a – no problem.
4a – hard. Suspected “back” for “second” immediately but didn’t think of “turn” for “act” and was confused by the Yoda-speak of “Second act precedes” (we get less Yoda-speak in the QC).
8a – no problem understanding the clue, but an obscure word and needed all the checkers.
9a, 10a, 11a, 12a, 14a, 18a, 19a – no problem.
20a – half a problem; I saw how it worked and had the A already so got Anne. But ANNEALED is another rather obscure word and I wasn’t sure what it meant (even though we’ve had it before). So I dithered a bit then put it in thinking I could come back to check it later (forgot to).
22a – no problem once I decided men meant men and not OR.
23a – completely fooled me, I didn’t spot “playing” as an anagram indicator (durr) and it was LOI! Excellent deception/stupid solver, take your pick; I prefer the excellent deception theory.
2d – quite hard but only because I fixed on fool being a noun here; I could see how the clue worked. Didn’t delay too long.
3d – no problem.
4d – I hadn’t seen the “seconds to” device before and so paused for a bit before twigging.
5d – I found that hard but I think that’s because it was a long clue with several moving parts; I found it difficult to break down and didn’t see F for loud. So I moved on and ultimately biffed it once I had checkers.
6d – this was a massive hold up. First, once I had the B and the G I assumed it was going to start “bigg” for the “great” homophone. Second, and more fundamentally, I pronounce it BER-GUILE, not BIG-AISLE. So that took an age.
7d – no problem.
11d – hard, partly because it was a more complex clue and partly because I got stuck on thinking “ref” for “judge”. Biffed it once I had checkers and immediately saw “rate” and then how it worked.
13d – no problem.
15d – took a long time, I think because I was running out of synonyms for fool by this point! Super clue.
17d – no problem.
18d – took a long time, I think because of the slightly tenuous definition, plus “sap” is a bit old school.
21d – no problem.
So the problems for me were: a few clues with slightly more complex construction, a couple of slightly more obscure words, my brain getting tired by hunting for “fools” and a homophone that wasn’t. Nothing to do with punctuation!
Many thanks for the detailed feedback! AFFLUENT and BEGUILE are certainly tricky.
Thx for showing your solving – as a less experienced contributor it was very interesting to see your workings.
I am a QC regular but rarely feel inclined to tackle the 15×15. And often struggle if I do although when someone mentions it is an easier one, I’ll have a stab if have time.
You are definitely one of the hardest setters for me but I enjoy the challenges and usually finish, or get within a couple.
Liked the Fool motif today although it started to feel a bit overwhelming eventually? Perhaps 33% spread across and down rather than the big Down block of them – but a minor, personal view.
I very rarely have any issues with the “fairness” your clues: once the light dawns they are, like Izetti, very neatly done. I find yours a little harder than Izetti but can’t quite define why. As best as I can frame it, I find it a little harder to break through the surfaces to tackle the parsing? The definition seems better obscured? Which is the fun of the challenge, and from my rare forays into the Biggie, very much par for the course most of the time there.
I enjoyed the challenge today, thank you. And going to the other form of Fool for the dessert was neat but infuriating!
Thanks Jason for asking.
I have been solving the QCs for about 10 years now and have moved on to the 15×15 which I finish most days in the evening. This progress has been down to this blog and the QC springboard.
There were quite a few clues in today’s puzzle which I would consider 15×15 level, especially SPASM.
Others have analysed in detail above.
If you look at the comments on say Trelawney’s easier puzzles you will see that we generally like something “easy” but many want to learn new words and devices (like Seconds in 4d today). TITANESS could not really be anything else but I did wonder like Cedric.
Meant to add, COD to MATE today.
Hi Jason, thanks for this. I was impressed by the device, and not outraged by the difficulty as some here are, but I threw in the towel at 30 minutes with a much blanker board than I’ve had in a long while.
Looking through, I don’t see anything that seems entitely out of QC parameters, just a number of clues that feel like they would normally be one of the harder clues of the week. RESHUFFLE was great, but not something I’d be able to spot without a lot of crosses. ANNEAL I have seen in (I think) a QC, but nowhere else and had not chance at then. I am obviously used taking the first or last letter of a string of words, but had only seen that applied to some other nth letter as in TOE once or twice.
So, again, nothing unprecedented, just a density of very tricky (for here) clues that made it difficult to have enough crosses to tackle them.
What is interesting is that it wasn’t just the SCC. This puzzle has stretched top solvers like Jason James, Matthew Marcus, and Andrew Fisher. I solved it in my average time, but my average time isn’t that fast and I had enough room to think a bit. Perhaps I am more used to different styles from doing Mephisto and the Guardian.
I’m a novice solver so my thoughts might not be that useful, but what makes this crossword tricky
1) a double synonym homophone is an order of magnitude more tricky than a single (Beguile Big Aisle)
2) Obscure words (Annealed) – many solvers NHO
3) Once charades get up to 3 pieces with part reversal, it does create so many more possibilities. (Repudiate)
Yes, REPUDIATE is another difficult one – one of the few clues containing three wordplay elements.
I knew that ANNEALED would not be known to some solvers, which is why I tried to make the wordplay straightforward.
Whilst for me the theme started to grow a little ‘stale’ towards the end, I do appreciate the effort which must have gone into setting this.
I’m hoping my QC journey will eventually allow me to regularly complete the 15×15 (more than just the one solved to date).
So, I’d like to convey a very big thank you for another learning day.
By way of background, I’ve been doing QCs for about three years and have recently started to tackle the 15×15 when I have time, with mixed results. The things I found tricky in individual clues were:
1a: The use of “Completion” derailed me a bit because it didn’t seem necessary and I wondered if I’d missed something.
4a: “Second act precedes” is confusing in two directions at once. First, we’re used to “second” being abbreviated to “s”. Second, I think the ordering of the words is uncommon for a QC and I might not have got this one at all if I hadn’t started attempting the 15×15. Combining both of these in one clue makes it doubly hard.
22a: Terrifying checking letters!
4d: I’m kicking myself for this one, but while my brain is familiar with “Starts to…” it’s not familiar with “Seconds to…”. Took me ages and I only parsed it after the fact.
11d: “Repudiate” isn’t obscure but it’s not really an everyday sort of word either, “pud” wasn’t an obvious synonym of “fool” (for me), and generally there’s a lot going on in the clue. All doable in isolation but stacked together it’s quite hard.
On top of that, the difficulty of 4a deprived me of what would have been a lot of useful starting letters, and column one is useless in that respect. Overall: several of the clues are individually tricky and the layout of the grid removes a useful crutch, all of which adds up to a challenge.
I remember that you posted here some time ago, mentioning that skilled solvers find it hard to gauge how difficult a puzzle will be for less experienced solvers – apologies if I’m paraphrasing you incorrectly. One of my fellow commenters suggested that you recruit a small panel of test subjects and I still think that’s an excellent idea.
I will just make a couple of comments about 4 across.
Compilers will routinely use familiar indicators, such as “second”, in unfamiliar or unexpected ways in the 15×15 puzzle. It is part of the compiler’s art (and solving cryptic crosswords is all about finding the right way to read a clue). I wouldn’t want to stop compilers doing it in the QC.
Secondly, “yoda-speak” is a well-established idiom in cryptic crosswords. One has to read the instruction as “second [that] act precedes”, which is not unreasonable – we commonly omit “that” in spoken English (as in “the book [that] he buys is …”, for example). Again, I wouldn’t want to stop compilers using it in the QC, although I would discourage excessive use of it.
Thanks for your reply, and I don’t disagree with you on either count! I suppose my main thrust is that both devices are entirely reasonable to use and serve to keep us on our toes, but using both of them in a single clue makes it particularly hard. And then when that particularly hard clue is the gateway to a bunch of starting letters, the whole puzzle becomes quite a lot harder.
I think that NCT summed up my own thoughts well in an earlier reply: “nothing unprecedented, just a density of very tricky (for here) clues that made it difficult to have enough crosses to tackle them”.
A resounding DNF. ‘Fool’ fatigue played a very large part in this. Possibly I was anticipating the hard work needed. But I also think the theme made for some extra contortions – as they often do – eg 6d. 18d. They also led to some uneven cluing – from pretty damn obvious to pretty damn opaque – so it was hard to get on any wavelength. I’ve been gently solving for a number of years and have no aspirations to join the 15×15 brigade unless tipped that the snitch indicates a really straightforward puzzle. I really enjoy an Izetti for the clarity and economy of the clues. Today was just too overwhelming to enjoy and just for once I didn’t persevere.
I liked the puzzle – I aim for 10 minutes and this took me 18. I agree there was some misdirection, not sure whether this was due to lack of punctuation or clever clues. Some setters become predictable after a while and easy to see where the clues are going – but there wasn’t much of that here
I think, as someone said, seeing fool repeatedly somehow made it harder – but found it quite amusing. Overall I found it harder but not sure why… Took about 50pc longer than usual.
I thought this puzzle had a higher than normal ratio of tougher clues (especially IKEA type) to easy ones (simple anagrams/double defs).
Generally I find having a smattering of easy ones to quickly fill in parts of the grid then helps with working out the tougher ones, but with fewer easy clues today that meant things just went a bit slower and needed a bit more brain power to get going.
Compared to some puzzles, however, there was no single clue/lack of GK that held me up for too long.
TURN BACK/ TOE / BEGUILE took me the longest, and for the same reasons as others have already mentioned. TOE, in particular, took me a minute to parse due to the less common wordplay.
I do enjoy the range of difficulty currently shown in the QC. As a relative beginner it is confidence boosting to solve a puzzle quickly, but I feel I learn more from puzzles like this one.
Tough. Failed on 18d. I had SWARM. Doesn’t parse now that I look closely. Still took a while to see SPASM when I saw the pink squares. Drat! Around thirteen and a half minutes. Thanks Asp and Mike.
A good try, Asp, but it wore a bit thin by the end. Also, just too hard (again) for a QC (IMHO). 50 minutes for me, which means I have spent twice as long as usual on the first three QCs this week.
STOP got me started (weirdly) and I reached the halfway point in 15 minutes or thereabouts. All good so far, but the second half proved a real grind. Several clues had to go in unparsed (incl. TURN BACK, TOE and REPUDIATE) and I just about made it across the line with BEGUILE and SPASM, both also only partly parsed.
Many thanks to Mike and Asp.
Finally struggled through with all but spasm done. Fortunately I had to sit around for an hour not doing much today or I would have given up a lot earlier. I am not keen on themed crosswords, where adherence to the theme seems to overwhealm all else. None of the clues would rank as hardest ever on their own, but so many toughies lightened by so few easier ones is not to my taste. Thanks to Asp and Mike.
Annealed is a GCSE STEM word, fairly common for all except those that love STEM the way that vampires love sunshine.
Oops – log ins and pictures not working? Site is acknowledging that I am logged in (and showing picture) but not getting through to comments.
Regards Ham
Not for me. Gave up at 20 mins with Many left at the end. Appreciated Jason stopping by, just hard to put my finger on why I found it less enjoyable than usual.
COD MAIL
The trick would be tedious, but forgivable, as so appropriate to the day – like music with “ too many notes” – it’s clever, but not necessarily entertaining.
To my amusement, went for MEAT as “final stage of game”, thinking of game in the animal sense. Held me up as it made the crosser 15D end with A.
I also agree that the varying difficulty, and varying clueing styles, both in the QC and 15*15 add greatly to the enjoyment. Long may it last ( but please if possible avoid obscure vocabulary and GK)
Managed to finish before noon thank goodness. All perfectly fair AFAICS. Thanks to both.
Solved over coffee between pistes. Really liked the theme once I’d stopped wondering why the word “fool” kept appearing 😂.
I found it hard (11:03, which is about 150% of my average) but since I’m typing on my phone and about to get back on the slopes I’ll try to work out why (in answer to Jason’s very open question) later today.
COD to TEACUP, which I loved, but LOI MATE ran it close because of the skill involved in hiding a 4 letter anagram!!
Many thanks Asp and Mike.
Feeling rather jealous re your solving between pistes.
This took me quite a while, but that isn’t ever an issue for me as it just means the fun lasts longer and I generally learn something along the way. We are all so different; some like to complete a puzzle within a certain time to feel satisfied or recognise progress, others just enjoy the process. Puzzles can’t be tailor-made for individuals, so to JC I would just say, you can’t please all of the people all of the time, but you’re doing a pretty good job! I’m happy to attempt whatever is provided, whether I finish or not. I did finish this one but couldn’t parse TOE (many thanks Mike). COD BEGUILE (made me smile).
You make very fair points, Fabian. I switch off the timer, because I’m not interested in racing, completion is a moment of quiet satisfaction.
Like you, I’m pleased that the QC is provided for us and I attempt them all, nearly always enjoying the experience.
19.56 I was just about to enter the SCC when BEGUILE popped into my head. I’d spent a while wondering if BIGGILE was a word. TURN BACK and TOE had also been very slow. Thanks Mike and Asp.
Gave up after solving 3 clues in fifteen mins. In answer to Asp’s question, there is a correlation for between difficulty and clue word-length! It just means there’s more associations with words to be found. I believe this crossword has more than the average number of words per clue!
Agree, clue word count definitely makes a difference especially if you’re having to insert bits of words inside bits of words. Russian dolls spring to mind.
13:50. Cor that was tricky – loved the theme. honestly got half way through solving before I twigged!
Only marginally under todays 15×15 time and I would still have snuck onto the leaderboard had I submitted. Can’t explain why it was so hard, LOIs TOE/TURN BACK, neither themed. I never find the QC that quick though, often finishing miles behind regular peers on the biggie.
Quite enjoyed the theme once I spotted it. Thanks to Mike and Asp.
DNF
Quit with the clock just about to reach the half hour with three unsolved:
TURN BACK – had BACK and may have eventually have got TURN if I’d persevered.
TOE – I was thinking ‘eye’ or ‘toe’ so if I’d gotten TURN I’d have totally biffed TOE.
BEGUILE – glad I quit – would never have got this.
Didn’t relate ‘fool’ to today’s date and whilst I appreciate the effort made by Jason (thanks for commenting) and his rationale I’m afraid it grew a bit stale over time for me also – sorry Jason!
FOI: STOP
LOI: DNF
COD: TEA CUP
Thanks to Asp/Jason and Mike
30 mins. Really enjoyed that – not easy but an excellent brain stetch. I was expecting a test when I saw all the fool refs in the downs, so knew there would be a lot of different angles to try. Some great clues with clever wordplay. Decided to post first, then read blog and comments, as I expect there will be rumblings.
FOI Fiends
LOI Beguile
COD Teacup
Thanks Asp and Mike
Well done, Asp!
I took a long time, 22:25, possibly shooting myself in the foot from the start. Because immediately it was clear that “fool” was going to be all over the downs, and I thought “oh dear, the British have so many weird slang words for fool that I’m going to have a hard time.” I might have done better to forget my anxiety, stick to the acrosses on my first pass, and let the downs come from checkers.
It wasn’t as hard as I expected, but the northeast had me very stuck. I’m embarrassed to admit I didn’t understand TOE or TURN BACK until afterwards. I was very distracted by the repetition of “second(s)” on top of the fool theme and started hunting for firsts and thirds and fourths and so on. COD to NASTIEST. Thanks to Asp (and thanks for visiting us!) and Mike.
Well we were a bit slower than average (13:31) but clearly didn’t find this as difficult as many. We couldn’t parse our LOI TOE so thanks to Mike for that. Aside from that I don’t think there was anything that caused especial difficulties. I’m a little surprised that ANNEALED seems to have been so little known, maybe it helps that we’re both ‘scientists’. We did get a little tired of mentally hearing ‘fool’ but we’d have been a lot more understanding had we remembered the day! A very inventive grid anyway so thank you for that Asp / Jason and for taking the time to drop by.
20:46 and no errors, pleasingly.
First time I’ve been 3rd in the rankings, but only because I happened to look at midnight as it appeared! Even then I was 3rd out of 4.
Dnf…
Three dnf’s in a row – the worst run in a while. Saying that, this was very tricky and I had a good five or six not completed. Whilst I can appreciate the “Fool” element of the down clues – I couldn’t help but think it was a little gimmicky, especially if you were struggling for synonyms of the key word – but I probably would say that as I didn’t finish it 😀
FOI – 1ac “Stop”
LOI – Dnf
COD – 10ac “Skye” – hopefully not a premonition.
Thanks as usual!
18:00, which is well over my average, but I did find this pretty tricky in places. It felt a bit like the setter was nudging towards a theme but I have no idea what it might have been.
Thank you for the blog!
16:49. I got all the way to the end without ever making the connection to today’s date. D’oh! Perhaps I’ll hold off on mailing that Mensa membership application.
COD to BEGUILE.
Thanks to Asp and Mike.
I threw in the towel at 30 minutes with 6 clues outstanding and 1 wrong. Obviously I found it difficult and I agree with those who have said they found the repetition of ‘fool’ a bit tedious. This doesn’t invalidate the puzzle in any way as you can’t construct a puzzle which suits everyone and I recognise the skill which went into it.
44 minute DNF.
Put SWARM for SPASM. Another day to forget. I knew it wouldn’t be correct, but I was so ground down by the rest of the puzzle that my brain had stopped functioning.
I didn’t like the repeated use of ‘fool’ in the clues. I found it tedious and unnecessary. It’s bad enough when the Quintagram has some kind of theme, but I really don’t think we need it in the QC.
The puzzle overall was very hard and was clearly one for the brain box brigade, of which I will never be a member. It was like a 15 x 15.
I am already at almost 90 minutes for this week and that includes a 9 minute solve on Monday, so I’m feeling thoroughly disenchanted and in no mood to try (and doubtless fail) the 15 x 15.
11:08 which is 5 seconds slower than Templar and 17 seconds faster than Plett. I am thus rating this as tough. I can’t say I particularly enjoyed the solve as I was struggling to come up with enough synonyms for fool. I didn’t parse TOE and was slow to see BEGUILE and my LOI SPASM. Thanks Mike
Gosh I found this tricky, and finished in 30 minutes, about the same time as yesterday’s 15×15. It wasn’t so much that the clues were hard, in fact I found most of the clueing to be very fair, it was more a concentration issue for me with my mind going into free fall for a good ten minutes when faced with all those ‘fools’. So more to do with me than the puzzle. Once I’d retrieved my wits from the floor I was able to calm down and resume the task. Yes, a bit harder than in recent days but not unduly so.
Thanks both.
I’m off to attempt today’s biggie now, wish me luck.
This took me 1h 5m over two sessions but I appreciated the challenge and admired the setter’s skill in including fool in all the down clues.
However I did need help to check that TOE was correct and also initially had SWARM instead of SPASM so it was a DNF.
It’s good of Jason to ask for feedback. The clues always look straight forward in retrospect but others have provided more detailed explanations.
Thanks ASP and Mike.
I’ll try the 15×15 then, as I got no where with this
Well I think it’s amazing to have all the Down’s clued with a Fool, but as a measure of my dimness today I didn’t see ‘April Fool’! I must have answered 13 clues because I couldn’t answer the other 13, if this is 50% successful I have done better – almost as far back as I can remember. Even ANNEALED which I do know I didn’t put in, I couldn’t see why. We had Raspberry the other day, was today the Gooseberry (Fool). To be pedantic, April Fool finishes at midday, I don’t usually start till 4pm, do I get a pass!
90 minutes spent on 15 x 15 today and Snitch just 75.
That’s well over 2 hours for the day on cryptic crosswords. How am I supposed to derive one iota of pleasure or satisfaction from that? Rhetorical question – I’m not in the right frame of mind for advice.