Guardian 25,991 – Pasquale

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Found this tough, though all the cluing was very fair. Favourites were 5dn and 15dn.

Across
1 PLUNDER =”Rob” bLUNDER=”mistake”, with a “misprinting” of the “initial letter”
5 FLUSHED =”looking roseate” FLU=”Illness”, SHED=”got rid of”
9 LOCUM =”Substitute” Sounds like “low”=”inferior” + “come”=”make an appearance”
10 FIREPROOF =”able to stand the heat” F[emale] + I + REPROOF=”reprimand”
11 CHARLES’ LAW A gas law [of volumes] CHAR=”Fish” + LE=”the French” + SLAW=”salad”
12 TIER =”Rank” TI[g]ER Woods =”golfer deemed great”, minus “g[ood]”
14 STOCK IN TRADE &lit (Kit stored can)*
18 THE MOUSETRAP The Agatha Christie play THEM=”those people” + OUSE=”river” + TRAP=”mouth”
21 GOER =”Energetic type” (ergo)*=”therefore”
22 WOMAN-HATER &lit (A harem won’t)*
25 EVAPORATE =”dry up” EVA=”lady” + P[ower] + ORATE=”make speech”
26 PARTY =”Person” P[iano]=”quietly” + ARTY=”pretentious”
27 SMARTLY =”showing quick-wittedness” SLY=”Knowing” about MART=”market”
28 HAYSEED =”Country bumpkin” Spoonerism of SAY=”eg” and HEED=”attention”
Down
1 POLICE =”keep an eye on” PO=”river” + LICE=”insects”
2 UNCIAL [wiki] =”Old letter” UN[so]CIAL=”withdrawn”, ignoring the “so”
3 DEMOLITION =”ruin” DEMOTION=”Relegation”, with L[eft] and I=”one” inside
4 RUFUS William II, known as “Rufus” was killed in the New Forest FUS[s]=”endless to-do” after R[ugby] U[nion]=”game”
5 FORMALIST =”Rulekeeper” Shoppers might be advised to FORM A LIST
6 UMPS =umpires=”who enforce the rules” U=”Superior” + MPS=”politicians”
7 HOOLIGAN =”troublemaker” “This person”=”me”, which is removed from HO[me]. + (in gaol)*
8 DEFERRED double def =”Yielded”; =”put off”
13 STRATHSPEY =”dance” (Pretty sash)*
15 CASSOWARY the flightless bird CO=”firm” + WARY=”cautious”, around ASS=”idiot”
16 STAGGERS double def =”Equine disease”; =”is astonishing”
17 DEMERARA =”Rum” (dream)* around ERA=”time”
19 STERNE , Laurence the writer [wiki] STERN=”hard” + E[nglish]
20 GREYED =”became less colourful” Y[ear] in GREED=”deadly sin”
21 ALEPH ALEPH and Beth are the first two letters in the Hebrew alphabet
24 BOOT double def John Boot, founder of Boots the Chemist; =”something to put on foot”

23 comments on “Guardian 25,991 – Pasquale”

  1. molonglo
    #1 - Thu 4th Jul 13, 11:25

    Thanks manehi. There we some tricky bits, like UNCIAL, but no need for aids given the good clueing. Pity about the “rid off” typo in the online 5A.

  2. Dave Ellison
    #2 - Thu 4th Jul 13, 11:25

    Thanks manehi. I found it quite tough, too.

    I liked 22a WOMAN HATER – very neat.

    In the clue for 5a surely “off” should be “of”?

    I wasn’t happy with the “makes” in 1a – this put me off for ages, thinking 4d began with an S; nor with the tense in 16d “is astonishing” for STAGGERS, but I suppose it might just about work.

    I have enjoyed many a Rufus and Gordius more than this Xword.

  3. tupu
    #3 - Thu 4th Jul 13, 12:14

    Thanks manehi and Pasquale

    A tough one but quite entertaining.

    The NW corner held me up. Uncial was my last in and I ran out of parsing steam having managed to sort everything else.

    !a was unclear till one got 1d. Otherwise the cluing was very good as one has come to expect from this setter. I ticked 10a, 25a, and 4d in particular.

    I toyed for a time with ‘Ruddles Law’ for 11a – it would be about ‘gassy beer’ I suppose.

  4. Gatacre
    #4 - Thu 4th Jul 13, 12:37

    Tough but fair, I think. Took a long time with lots of references to look up. Not entirely happy about UMPS…

    As tupu @3, I had Ruddles, but I followed it with Ale rather than Law – wishful thinking, perhaps – I wondered where the salad was!

  5. Jezza
    #5 - Thu 4th Jul 13, 13:05

    I really enjoyed this one today.

    Many thanks to Pasquale for an enjoyable challenge, and to manehi for the review.

  6. Robi
    #6 - Thu 4th Jul 13, 13:09

    Good crossword with a few new words needing checking in the dictionary.

    Thanks manehi; I particularly liked the STOCK-IN-TRADE and the TI(g)ER.

  7. Sylvia
    #7 - Thu 4th Jul 13, 13:12

    Enjoyed this but beaten by 23d. Thanks to Pasquale and manehi (presume 27a is ‘smartly’ which you didn’t mention).

  8. manehi
    #8 - Thu 4th Jul 13, 13:14

    Thanks Sylvia – I’ve added 27a.

  9. David Mop
    #9 - Thu 4th Jul 13, 13:18

    Did anyone else join me in my first thought, that 21d might be “Eliza” (as in “My Fair Lady”)?

  10. Mark I
    #10 - Thu 4th Jul 13, 13:49

    Dave, I’m fine with 16d:

    It is astonishing

    It staggers

    Both seem to be present tense to me!!

    Mark

  11. muffin
    #11 - Thu 4th Jul 13, 13:49

    Thanks Pasquale and manehi
    In an otherwise entertaining crossword I thought PLUNDER stood out as being rather weak – I’m sure that someone could come up with a better clue.
    Despite misgivings, my favourite was CHARLES LAW (Volume of a gas at constant pressure is proportional to Temperature in Kelvin). The misgiving is that it was described by M. Charles, so should really be Charles’s Law; see:
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_Charles
    It reminded me of Cole’s Law (defined as chopped cabbage in mayonnaise)

  12. michelle
    #12 - Thu 4th Jul 13, 13:54

    I was pleased that I could parse all of the clues, even though it took me a bit longer than is usual with Pasquale.

    I liked 27a, 22a, 15d, 3d, 5d, 21a, 1d, 7d

    New words for me were STRATHSPEY, CHARLES(‘s) LAW & UNCIAL (last in). I also learnt about the RUFUS Stone in the New Forest, and UMPS was also a new abbreviation for me.

    Thanks for the blog, manehi.

  13. Bryan
    #13 - Thu 4th Jul 13, 14:20

    Many thanks Manehi & Pasquale.

    This was tough but enjoyable.

    I was very sorry to hear about RUFUS RIP. No wonder he didn’t make his usual Monday appearance.

    And, yes, David @9, I also wondered about ELIZA Doolittle for 21d.

  14. Derek Lazenby
    #14 - Thu 4th Jul 13, 15:01

    Re 7, it was only last month that the Editor’s blog said jail was prefered house style to gaol! Still he also said other things being equal, hmmm.

  15. nametab
    #15 - Thu 4th Jul 13, 17:58

    Found it quite straightforward.
    A question: how legit are abbreviations (cf UMPS)?
    Misprint in paper copy too at 5a
    Thanks to Manehi

  16. Andy B
    #16 - Thu 4th Jul 13, 18:52

    I needed aids to get UNCIAL because I didn’t see “unsocial”. After reading some of your comments I checked my Chambers and it has CHARLES’S LAW without an alternative.

    At 19d I had STARKE. It fits the wordplay (Chambers even has stark=stern as its first definition), and there are three female authors called STARKE (Ruth, Olivia and Kathryn), so in a competition I would argue that it is a valid alternative.

  17. morphiamonet
    #17 - Thu 4th Jul 13, 20:50

    Bryan @13

    Rufus ‘gag’ – about as unfunny as humanly possible.

  18. Pasquale
    #18 - Thu 4th Jul 13, 21:00

    Thanks for feedback. Apologies for ‘rid off’ (a proof-reading error, mea culpa) but no apologies for Charles’ Law which some dictionaries give as an alternative. The presence or absence of ‘s in such cases is often disputed but it always Jesus’ and not Jesus’s.

  19. Brendan (not that one)
    #19 - Thu 4th Jul 13, 23:07

    Finished this eventually.

    Some nice cluing but on the whole not very entertaining.

    Still don’t see why some setters resort to obscurity rather than ingenuity.

    Aleph!!!! Now fancy me not knowing that Beth was the second letter of the Hebrew alphabet! What an ignoremus!! And uncial? How often that must come up in a conversation?

    Surely it’s obvious that if your using an esoteric word for the answer the wordplay should be that little bit more direct. As not many solvers are going to come up with uncial and work backwards the leap from withdrawn to unsocial is in my opinion too difficult.

    Thanks to Manehi and Pasquale who at least kept me busy this evening
    😉

  20. JollySwagman
    #20 - Fri 5th Jul 13, 01:56

    @AB #16 same here. Also OED gives CHARLES’S as a specific example:

    With personal names that end in -s: add an apostrophe plus s when you would naturally pronounce an extra s if you said the word out loud:

    He joined Charles’s army in 1642.
    Dickens’s novels provide a wonderful insight into Victorian England.
    Thomas’s brother was injured in the accident.

    and Fowler (modern editions at least)

    It was formerly customary, when a word ended in -s, to write its possessive with an apostrophe but no additional s…. but we now usually add the s – always when the word is monosyllabic and preferably when it is longer.

    I always took the other approach to have come from sloppy journalese.

    It would have been interesting to see what the G enumeration policy for CHARLES’S LAW would have been for that. Conventionally (8,3), which always makes things tricky to spot, but we saw a (7’1,3) approach in one clue a while back – don’t recall the exact answer but seem to remember it was aspecial case so not fair to draw the conclusion that the normal apostrophe enumeration convention was under question.

  21. Pelham Barton
    #21 - Sat 6th Jul 13, 08:10

    nametab@15; Chambers 2011 gives “ump (inf) n short for umpire“. So UMP is a word in its own right, not a mere abbreviation.

  22. nametab
    #22 - Sun 7th Jul 13, 19:01

    PB @21: good point:)

  23. spade
    #23 - Wed 10th Jul 13, 08:58

    25a Why ‘See’? Couldn’t this be omitted?

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