It’s Monday, it’s a Quixote puzzle … you know what to expect.
A pleasing, accessible crossword which is often a quickish solve for more experienced crossworders, but a fine learning device for those newer to the black arts. I enjoyed solving and blogging this one.
Abbreviations
cd cryptic definition
dd double definition
(xxxx)* anagram
anagrind = anagram indicator
[x] letter(s) removed
definitions are underlined
Across
1 Acerbity of a female bird?!
BITTERNESS
Well, the question and exclamation marks give you a hint that it’s a bit whimsical. Quixote is suggesting (I think) that – along the lines of words like GODDESS, MURDERESS and POETESS – a female BITTERN might be a BITTERNESS. Anyway, it gives me a chance to give you a link to a picture of this beautiful, elusive and sadly threatened bird with its booming call.
10 Being easy-going? That is forbidden ultimately in period before Easter
LENIENT
An insertion of IE and N for the last letter of forbiddeN in LENT, the 40-day Christian fasting period that begins the day after Shrove Tuesday and finishes on Easter Sunday.
11 Food on plate looking messy
POLENTA
(ON PLATE)* with ‘looking messy’ as the anagrind.
12 Stronghold? Rebel Jack’s left defending it
CITADEL
An insertion of IT in CADE L. Referring to Jack CADE’s rebellion of 1450 against Henry VI.
13 Where a number of characters may be found briefly
IN A WORD
A dd.
14 Support advocate of proper punctuation
TRUSS
Another dd. Referring to Lynne Truss, the author of the best-selling book Eats, Shoots & Leaves, a guide to proper punctuation. I want to have Lynne Truss’s babies.
16 Is maiden embraced by boy rolling around in sack?
DISMISSAL
An insertion of IS and MISS in a reversal (‘rolling around’) of LAD.
17 Escape by Henry in semi-darkness
HALF-LIGHT
A charade of HAL for ‘Henry’ and FLIGHT.
20 Journalist in tabloid set about providing page-three features?
NUDES
A reversal of SEDUN, which is an insertion of ED in SUN, the tabloid paper which still insists on putting naked women on Page Three.
22 Spring test for local official
MAYORAL
A charade of MAY, one of the months of spring, and ORAL.
23 Terrified possibly if booted out, no longer working
RETIRED
The setter’s asking you to take ‘if’ out of ‘terrified’ and then make an anagram.
25 There’s nothing in it for a mathematician
NULL SET
A cd. A NULL SET is ‘a class or set having no members’ (SOED). It’s a long time since I did any serious maths, but someone will no doubt explain more.
26 Being ‘low‘ somehow, lacking the first sign of worthiness
IGNOBLE
Another removal and anagram: take W for the first letter of ‘worthiness’ out of (BEING LO[W])* with ‘somehow’ as the anagrind. I won’t say it’s semi&lit, otherwise Paul B will send me to the naughty corner.
27 Perhaps Don’s abandoned jumper by the seaside?
SAND HOPPER
Well, I hope Quixote is able to retrieve it. (PERHAPS DON)* with ‘abandoned’ as the anagrind for the little critter that lives in the littoral sand and jumps a lot at night.
Down
2 Saintly fellow making use of Italian guy’s loo
IGNATIUS LOYOLA
Despite it being an obvious anagram, (ITALIAN GUYS LOO)* it was my last in. I eventually saw IGNATIUS, but then to see how the three vowels fitted into the second name, I had to resort to that well-known technique of guess and google.
3 Walk a short time, then study
TREAD
A charade of T and READ.
4 Disconcerted PM once stopped short in road
RATTLED
An insertion of ATTLE[E] in RD. Clement ATTLEE, Labour Prime Minister from 1945-1951.
5 European politicians keeping restriction – they’ve nothing to offer
EMPTIES
An insertion of TIE in E MPS. Referring to empty drinks containers, I guess.
6 So valiant, suffering to bring deliverance
SALVATION
(SO VALIANT)*
7 To bring about hate, ultimately legal?
ELICIT
A charade of E for the last letter of ‘hate’ and LICIT.
8 Sir, a nice blonde can turn out to be petty
INCONSIDERABLE
(SIR A NICE BLONDE)* It’s ‘petty’ in the ‘petty cash’ definition rather than the ‘small-minded’ meaning.
9 Sound control for this music-maker
HANDEL
A homophone (‘sound’) of ‘handle’
15 Person gets up, we hear, and gets exposed to the sun’s rays
SOLARISES
Another homophone (‘we hear’) of SOUL ARISES.
17 Kind character giving fellow protection
HUMANE
An insertion of MAN in HUE.
18 Little egg a member served up – something gluey
GELATIN
A reversal of NIT A LEG. NIT is the ‘little (louse) egg’ that the nit nurse used to deal with, and LEG is a ‘member’.
19 Surface of table needs gloss after removal of a very small stain
TARNISH
Another first letter indication, this time of ‘table’. If you remove the V (very, small) from VARNISH and replace it with T you arrive at the solution.
21 Snake is under bottom of leaves, further down
SADDER
The last letter of leaveS followed by ADDER gives you a word meaning ‘more down’. I have bored you with this before, but in Middle English AN ADDER used to be A NADDER, which is why in French it’s still un nadre.
24 In crossword terms it’s not very fast
TON-UP
A tricky first clue and a tricky last one. This is how a setter might clue ‘not’ (in a down clue): TON reversed, or UP, is NOT. TON-UP is a familiar expression for reaching 100mph.
Many thanks to the Don for the start to the Indy crossword week.
This was a great way to start the week. In this puzzle by Quixote, I especially enjoyed 12a, 20a, 22a, 5d, 19d & 21d and my favourites were TON-UP, IN A WORD, BITTERNESS, DISMISSAL & IGNATIUS LOYOLA.
I needed help to parse 14a & 15d.
Thanks for the blog, Pierre.
A nice one from the Don, completed in just under 20 minutes, perfect for Monday morning. 1ac was a bit tricky till I had a few crossing letters, but not 24dn. And (showing off my general knowledge) once I got ‘Ignatius’, ‘Loyola’ was no problem; btw you can find out about him at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignatius_of_Loyola.
The clue to 5dn sounds like a bleat from UKIP.
CoD was TRUSS, with IN A WORD and MAYORAL close contenders.
Thanks, Quixote and Pierre
Nice solve with a few smiles. Thanks both.
I’m living to forget all the maths I once fried my brain with but I think both setter and blogger are exactly on target with NULL SET – it’s the same as the empty set in most if not all formalisations of set theory – ie it is a set – but it doesn’t contain anything.
At 14ac it took me a few minutes to remember Lynne Truss, and I should really have solved the clue much faster from the definition, although in my defence I hadn’t solved 15dn at that point so I was looking at T_U__. Another good Quixote puzzle.
NIce puzzle and blog – thanks for both. In my ignorance I thought Jack Cade was probably a rebellious character in a TV series (coming soon?), and once I had Ignatius L I looked at the remaining letters and hit Google in a hurry. Favourites were 1ac and 24dn; the only one that grated a bit was the use of May to mean Spring, especially as we’ve been having hail this morning.
Lynne Truss is also one of my heroine’s, and its always good to see her get a mention.
Oh dear, Cumbrian @5. I hope Lynne T doesn’t read this.
One of your heroine’s what? 🙂
NULL SET weak, but oters good, so enjoye this mOnday specoal from The Don!!
Cheers
Eowly.
Cumbrian, I take it that you’re comment about the heroine who’s book we mutually admire was tongue-in-cheek …
Pierre@8
Your spot on. All hail the queen of apostrophe’s! Its time we made a stand against offending grocer’s’. (Possible infringement of copyright, T Pratchett)
Pierre & Cumbrian
If you haven’t already seen it, you might be interested in the following article on the BBC’s website:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-22403731
Gaufrid – thnx 4 tht
Hi cumbrian
I wish I hadn’t posted the link now. I was nicely mellow after a few whiskies but now I am totally wound up. I hate txt spk! 😉
Gaufrid – there’s no text speak equivalent of “mellow”, so there is still hope for us all. Have another whisky (or whiskey if that’s your preference!)
LOL @ Gaufrid u no I can’t do text speak sorry, Truss was quite a nice clue, the Ignatius whatever was next to impossible if you didn’t know it on the train without access to the internet. Thanks Pierre, pity you can’t make it to London
It’s too late to think of another witty riposte about grammar and apostrophes!
Anyway, a good start to the week but there did seem to be more anagrams than usual. The surfaces were excellent as always. Thanks Quixote.
Loved the blog Pierre – amusing as always.
Merci et bon nuit!
After following the link from comment 5, my reaction was “I’m more likely to be in the ‘pedant’ category”, but I was then left wondering it that’s actually a correct grammatical sentence anyway. (“More likely than what?”)
All good fun, and plenty of mental exercise.