Guardian 26,291 – Imogen

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A enjoyable puzzle from Imogen, where spotting the theme early on helped a lot.

Although there seem to be quite a few sporting references dotted around the clues, the “nine other answers” referred to in 24 are all WRITERs (highighted thus below), mostly defined by their first names (or in one case initials),and all of them I think pretty well known. Thanks to Imogen

 
 
 
 
 
 
Across
1. ANTIDOTE Relief, but not for love (8)
ANTI (not for) + DOTE (love)
5. BUCHAN John‘s tea involved in such a fight? (6)
CHA (tea) in BUN (as in a bun-fight)> John Buchan is probably most famous for The Thirty-Nine Steps
9. TERAFLOP Calculating at this rate, say, fear to fail (8)
Homophone of “terror” + FLOP. Teraflops (prefix tera- for trillions plus flop for “floating-point operation” [per second])
10. IMAGES One takes so long making pictures (6)
I’M AGES = “one takes so long”
12. FINGERPRINT Personal impression gathered by the police (11)
Cryptic definition
15. REEDS Most of the snooker balls cover end of table in plants (5)
[tabl]E in REDS (15 of the 22 balls in snooker)
17. WODEHOUSE PG Tips found on wino due home (9)
Outer letters of W[in]O D[u]E + HOUSE, with a nicely concealed definition
18. COLERIDGE Samuel, free to enter university, left out (9)
RID (free) in COLLEGE less one L
19. DRIED About to be dumped, Irish girl coming back was lost for words (5)
Reverse of DEIRDRE with RE (about) “dumped”
20. NEW YEAR’S EVE Ease very possibly suggested by opportunity for party (3,5,3)
A “reverse anagram” – a NEW version of YEAR’S EVE is EASE VERY
24. WRITER Sounding more appropriate, like nine other answers (6)
Homophone of “righter”
25. FIELDING Henry in the covers? (8)
Double definition – Henry Fielding, writer of Tom Jones etc, and as in cricket, where the covers are fielders
26. NESBIT Edith and Ben sit out (6)
(BEN SIT)* – author of The Railway Children, published as E Nesbit
27. SWEEPNET One impressing wingers to do defensive duties beside goal (8)
SWEEP (as a sweeper in footbal would do) + NET (goal). A sweepnet is used to collect flying insects (“wingers”)
Down
1. ACT OF GRACE Pardon WG’s performance (3,2,5)
Double definition, referring to the cricketer W G Grace
2. TARANTELLA Steps aren’t at all problematic (10)
(AREN’T AT ALL)* – the tarantella is a quick dance, once said to be caused by, or a cure for, a tarantula’s bite
3. DEFOE Daniel‘s unquestionably colloquial Old English (5)
DEF (slang “definitely”) + OE
4. TWO-UP TWO-DOWN Modest accommodation of League and Conference arrangements? (3-2,3-4)
Double definition, referring to the system whereby two teams move up or down a league at the end of the season
6. UNMATCHED To be given a bye is best of all (9)
If you’re given a bye in a sporting competiton then you’re “UN-MATCHED”
7. HUGO Victor is over to undergo embrace (4)
O[ver] “undergoes”, i.e. goes under, HUG
8. NOSH Noisy meal? (4)
NO + SH
11. BIRD’S-EYE VIEW A general impression of frozen veg? (5-3,4)
Definition + hint, referring to Birdseye frozen foods
13. LUCIFERIAN Devilish clue in fair construction (10)
(CLUE IN FAIR)*
14. DEADWEIGHT Insensitive to delay in hearing being heavy burden (10)
DEAD (insensitive) + homophone of “wait” (delay)
16. SERENGETI National Park, green site for development (9)
(GREEN SITE)*
21. RILKE In pique finally sack German linesman (5)
[sac]K in RILE. [sac]K in RILE. The “linesman” is Rainer Maria Rilke, who wrote in German, but was born in Prague, which was part of Austria-Hungary at the time.
22. OWEN Old, not old — that’s up to Wilfred (4)
O + reverse of NEW. Wilfrid Owen, poet of the First World War
23. NIBS Important chap, preceded by his 24’s materials (4)
“His nibs” is name for an important person

26 comments on “Guardian 26,291 – Imogen”

  1. Thanks Andrew. Needed an assist for 9a but finally scored – looks like a World Cup technical term. Scooted over the rest of it, raising an eyebrow at DRIED=lost for words as well as the one-word claim for 27a. NOSH was nice.

  4. Imogen, I really enjoyed this and thank you Andrew for helping me understand some of the parsing: 8d for instance. When I wrote in FINGERPRINT I feared it might be a bit easy, but far from it, with 9a and 27a both new words to me. My favourite was 23d with ‘his’ nestled there unobtrusively but helpfully. Knowing all the writers assisted the solving process; a good 1a to the blues brought on by last night’s football result!!

  5. Thanks, Andrew.

    I wasn’t doing well on first pass, so getting 24a was a great help. After that it mostly went well. My last in were TERAFLOP (after all these years I still sometimes miss homophones that require a non-rhotic accent) and SWEEPNET (I didn’t know the word, or have a clue about football terms).

    [I have, once or twice, DRIED on stage. It is a horrible experience.]

  6. I generally grumble so I’ll say now that I enjoyed this one. However (to get in a little grumble!) I’ll join molonglo @1 in wondering what dictionary has 27a as one word.

  7. I’m with David Mop here. Searching the web for sweepnet indicates “Sweepnet” as a registered mark, “Sweep-net” as various organisations, “sweep net” as the insect catcher. I couldn’t be bothered to look past the first two pages though as I had already wasted considerable time trying a host of on-line dictionaries to no avail.

  8. Good puzzle, luckily I got 24a fairly early on.

    Thanks Andrew; I’m another one who can find no support for SWEEP NET (or SWEEP-NET) as one word.

    I thought LUCIFERIAN was nicely misleading, using ‘clue.’ NOSH was my LOI and caused a chuckle when I got it. I was also impressed by WODEHOUSE.

    I thought 5a might have been Bunyan as ‘yan’ is apparently a Russian word for tea. HUGO put paid to that!

  10. I also enjoyed this one. How did our overseas solvers fare? I suspect most of the writers were known well enough for them to cope (as they always seem to do).

  12. Quite a jolly little crossword I thought. I was half way through the writers by the time I got to 24a so that only served to confirm what I had suspected. The answer to 27a was new to me so whether it was one word or two made no difference to slotting it in.

    Just back from Tesco, which helped with 11d – the basket behind me was full of the stuff.

  13. Found this easier than any of Imogen’s previous ones, but just as enjoyable nonetheless. Last in was TERAFLOP (after SWEEPNET which was unfamiliar but had to be right from the wordplay and the crossers). Got the theme straight away because NESBIT was my first answer. Liked BIRDS EYE VIEW and DEFOE.

    Thanks to Andrew and Imogen

  16. Thanks Imogen and Andrew
    I really enjoyed this. Lots of good clues, but I must pick NO SH as my favourite.
    The comments on “isn’t it two words” I thought were referring to DEAD WEIGHT, which I don’t think I have seen as one word. “SWEEPNET” I was indifferent to, as I had to work out the word from the clue anyway, not having heard it.
    (btw when I refer to a clue I generally give the clued word, and prefer others to do that, so that I don’t need to look back at the crossword. However I note that many other contributors prefer just to give the clue number. Is this the “house style”?)

  17. Thanks, Imogen, for an enjoyable puzzle and Andrew, of course.

    I enjoyed the theme and WODEHOUSE, in particular.I’m with Muffin @ 16 and usually highlight the word referred to for the same reason. DEADWEIGHT surprised me, too but it couldn’t have been anything else.

    Giovanna x

  18. Good puzzle.Quite staightforward although SWEEPNET was new to me and it took some time to get DRIED and LUCIFERIAN despite it being an anagram.
    Thanks Imogen

  19. @muffin – I prefer to give the word, but if you also contribute to the comments under the actual puzzle in the Guardian, then spoilers are absolutely taboo and verboten, so probably people get into the habit of never typing the answer and continue it here.

  20. I finished this one with web help for 9a and 27a, so I expected the usual comments in these cases that it was too easy. Not so; only one. Am I getting better, or are the complainers getting fed up?

  21. Thanks Andrew, a lot easier, ok I could do this one, than last week’s Imogen. The list of writers wasn’t obscure and wordplay decidedly easier.
    liked Nosh, but sweepnet was close to unfair.

  22. DEADWEIGHT is given as one word in Collins as: ‘(billiards) relating to a shot that leaves the other balls in the ideal position’

  23. An enjoyable puzzle IMHO. Like others I didn’t find this as difficult as Imogen’s previous puzzles because the themed answers were all very fairly clued and were well-known, to me at least. TERAFLOP was my LOI.

    I don’t remember having come across SWEEPNET in any of its forms before and solved it from the wordplay. In light of the comments above I did my own searches. None of the online dictionaries that are accessed by OneLook show it as one word, and my Chambers has it hyphenated. I accessed the online OED via my library and it also shows it hyphenated with no alternative, although the very first example of its usage, from 1605, has it as one word and capitalised. Having said that, spelling was extremely hit-and-miss 400 years ago so that probably doesn’t mean a lot.

  24. Thanks all
    Last time out this compiler beat me, this time I managed it and 24ac came early enough to be of assistance. Enjoyable.

  25. Slowly getting better. Again extremely difficult for me, not being an English speaker, have not read 8 of the 9. Heard of them through crosswords only. Some of them for the first time. And homonyms never work in Indian accent:-) But I have read all the works of PG Wodehouse. Despite that I somehow managed to hack through this, But today’s London Times has typical member of Drones Club and I missed that. Go figure. Thanks for helping me with the parsings post facto.

  26. Thanks Imogen and Andrew

    Another very good week in Guardian crossword land … and this was a good ‘un to finish up on. I found it easier than her previous puzzles as well, but no worse for that. The only character I wasn’t across was the German RILKE.

    Numerous good clues but 4d, 8d and 23d were probably my favourites. Like others, I spent a lot if time trying to validate my last one in, SWEEPNET – was finally convinced of it, whether as one word or two.

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