Guardian 26,470 – Crucible

by

For some reason I found this a bit of a slog while I was solving it, but looking back I see that there’s a nice variety of clues and lots to admire. There are couple of items of “general knowledge” requited that might puzzle non-UK solvers. Thanks to Crucible.

Early birds might have seen that the main web page originally promised a Tramp: according to a message in the comments a puzzle by him was due to be published today but has been put back to next Thursday – so something to look forward to!

 
 
 
 
 
 
Across
1. BABY-SITS Black, it fills void in minds (4-4)
B + IT in ABYSS
5. USABLE Functional black uniform goes on top (6)
U + SABLE (black)
9. MEAT PIES Bump into noisy old birds making pub grub (4,4)
Homophone of “meet” + PIES (older name of magpies)
10. PATROL Make the rounds every year to lake, crossing river (6)
P[er] A[nnum] + R in TO L
12. EMEER Top man in Dubai backing agreement banks rejected (5)
Reverse of agREEMEnt with the outer pairs of letters (“banks”) removed
13. UPLIFTING Inspirational university place provided passion Henry’s wanting (9)
U + PL+ IF (provided) + T[H]ING
14. CLERK OF WORKS Site manager in city’s protecting wild flower king planted (5,2,5)
R in FLOWER* in CORK’S – a rather old-fashioned (or is it?) name for someone representing the architect or client on a construction site
18. ABBREVIATION Cutting books on the subject of getting into flying (12)
B B + RE (on the subject of) in AVIATION
21. CLEARANCE Clubs find out about a church blessing (9)
C + A in LEARN + CE – blessing as in “I give it my blessing”
23. U-BOLT What secures runner’s autograph? (1-4)
As Usain Bolt might sign his name?
24. MOVIES Films script involving old battle (6)
O VIE in MS
25. GARRISON Guitarist set aside hour for troops (8)
G[eorge] [H]ARRISON – I’m a bit uneasy about the way the abbreviation of George is not indicated
26. NURSES Former railwaymen’s assets regularly omitted tenders (6)
NUR (National Union of Railwaymen, which merged into RMT in 1990) + alternate letters of aSsEtS
27. CLOSETED Key Latin dictionary ready to be loaded in camera (8)
C (key) + L + SET in OED
Down
1. BUMPER Unusually big seat at theatre tipped up (6)
BUM + REP[ertory]<
2. BRAKES What Hollywood does to preserve the King’s discs, perhaps (6)
R in BAKES. The baker here is Paul Hollywood, from the BBC’s Great British Bake Off
3. SUPERGLUE Use plug, crudely inserting ruler and gum (9)
ER in (USE PLUG)* – superglue isn’t really “gum”, but you can use both words as verbs with pretty much the same meaning
6. STAFF Rod‘s beginning to suspect river personnel (5)
S[uspect] + TAFF, and two definitions
7. BARRIERS Advocates avoiding street obstacles (8)
BARRI[ST]ERS
8. EULOGISE Solver said record is English hymn (8)
Homophone of “you” (solver) + LOG IS E
11. FLY ON THE WALL Unnoticed 17 may be wasted by a magazine (3,2,3,4)
I nearly had to give up on explaining this, but then I realised that a fly may be killed (“wasted”) by being hit by a newspaper or magazine
15,4. WHO GUARDS THE GUARDIANS Classic question concerning our security arrangements (3,6,3,9)
Cryptic definition – this “classic question” is perhaps better known (well, to me, anyway) in its Latin form “Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?”, originally from the poet Juvenal, but eternally relevant. This English version allows a play on the word “Guardian”, hence the “our” in the clue
16. WATCHMEN Harrison and Cartier‘s answer to last question? (8)
John Harrison invented the marine chronometer, and Cartier make fancy watches, so they are WATCH MEN, and WATCHMEN could “guard the guardians”
17. OBSERVER Network hub underpins heart of global paper (8)
[gl]OB[al] + SERVER
19. COSSET Nanny state dumps rubbish, cutting loss (6)
STATE less TAT in COST (loss). I was attuned to this word, as it appeared in Nimrod’s puzzle in the Independent yesterday (define there are “baby”).
20. ATONED It’s paid for in agreement with daughter (6)
AT ONE (in agreement) + D.
22. REEVE Magistrate constantly rose to defend earl (5)
E in EVER< – Reeve is the origin of the word Sheriff, who is a “Shire Reeve”. There's also a Reeve in the Canterbury Tales

56 comments on “Guardian 26,470 – Crucible”

  1. Thanks Crucible and Andrew
    I took against this when I had major quibbles about each of the first three I entered. 14a “city” = “Cork” – how loose is that?
    3d SUPERGLUE isn’t “gum”; the latter is thick and sticky, whereas supeglue is quite runny until set. Also “ruler” = “er” is unusual.
    15,4 if the question is “classic”, it should be in the original Latin (which has been mistranslated according to this site: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quis_custodiet_ipsos_custodes%3F )
    I did like U-BOLT, but it’s a bit weak that virtually the same trick is used for GARRISON.

  2. Glad I’m not the only one who found this hard work; I could only complete about a quarter of it. It’s by no means a bad crossword, though.

    It didn’t help that I was convinced that HARPIES had something to do with 9a, and I was trying to fit MOVIES into 2d without realising it was obviously the answer to 24a. And I was sure that 23a was something-SIGN.

    I liked 25a despite the lack of an abbreviation indicator. I thought Paul Hollywood was a bit too obscure, though. Wasn’t to happy with EULOGISE until I checked Chambers to discover that hymn can also be a verb.

  3. Thanks, Andrew.

    Well, I thoroughly enjoyed it – even while I was solving it! It took a bit longer than usual but that’s no cause for complaint.

    Lots of favourite clues [1, 10, 14, 23, and 25 ac and 1, 2 [for the great misdirection] and 17 dn].

    muffin seems uncharacteristically grumpy this morning: what is wrong with Cork as a city [the second largest in Ireland] or the translation of the Juvenal [apart from the tense]? And Crucible has ‘classic’ rather than ‘classical’ so no need for it to be in Latin, I think.

    Anyway, many thanks to Crucible for a most enjoyable workout.

  4. Thanks Andrew. Failed right at the end on U-BOLT. Though there were several I felt uneasy about (got, but was baffled by the Hollywood one) such as 21A and the two definitions in 6D, on the whole I give it a tick, thanks Crucible.

  5. A very enjoyable solve, although trickier in parts than most of the clues this week. I thought 2d was clever – whether one likes it or not, Paul Hollywood has become pretty prominent over the past two or three years, and I don’t think he can now be described as obscure! I also paused over “hymn” as a verb in 8d, but remembered that the Te Deum Laudamus is sometimes translated as “We hymn thee…” rather than “We praise thee…”

    Many thanks to Andrew for the blog.

  6. Thanks Crucible and Andrew

    I only managed to complete this by using crossers and wordplay finding the parsing often beyond me,
    e.g. for UPLIFTING and CLERK OF WORKS. Never heard of Paul Hollywood and felt browned off.

    1d, first put BUCKET but CRAB PIES sounded un-publike.

    Finally, REEVE cheered me up by immediately coming to mind, probably from past feudal history lessons.

  9. Thanks Andrew and Crucible.

    I thought this was terrific. Hard to get into – virtually nothing on the first pass – but gradually yielding and with each individual clue a challenge. Once I got most of the long ‘uns I was left with four isolated and very tough mini puzzles, with the SE hardest of all.

    Tiny typo, Andrew: in 14 it is K inside (FLOWER)* all inside CORK’S. I agree with your reservation at 25.

    Any fans of the graphic novel here? WATCHMEN is one of the most famous examples – it (and the film that is based on it) are supreme examples of the genre. The author, Alan Moore, claimed to not have heard of Juvenal’s original version of the phrase, but the theme of “who watches the watchmen?” runs through it.

  11. Congratulations, Crucible. I am sorry muffin and I were grumpy this morning. Scchua had us roasting ore well into the evening yesterday, then this morning we were faced with smelting it.

  12. Some elegant clues, the Paul Hollywood reference surely ruins it.

    There ought to be some rule surrounding the use of proper names which would render this sort of clue illegitimate (I think The Times crossword only allows names of people no longer living). I have lived in the UK all my life, and I do occasionally watch television, but I have never heard of Paul Hollywood. What hope is there for a non-UK resident/non-English person?

  13. Hi Andrew,

    I thought 25A was just [H]ARRISON, i.e removing the ‘H’ for hour, so no worries about the ‘George’ part.

  16. Really hard work, and couldn’t finish but a great workout. BABY-SITS and ABBREVIATION were favurites. Thanks to Crucible and Andrew.

  17. Thanks Crucible and Andrew.

    I too found this a slog with word searches used to complete it. I’m another TV watcher having never heard of Paul Hollywood. I don’t understand passion=thing, if that is what is meant.

    Of course, Harrison to me means Ford and although I saw the G/H/ARRISON, the clue seems to be incomplete. I was also once told that to mix a dd with word play (STAFF) was a complete no-no [apparently not!]

    So, yes it left me feeling grumpy, although perhaps that is associated with my poor solving skills rather than deficiencies in the clues – glad that Eileen enjoyed it. 🙂

  19. Hi. I am new to this site so please excuse me for butting in. I thought this puzzle was excellent. It certainly kept me intrigued for 3 hours until I finally admitted defeat over 23 across.
    I am Australian and I found some clues challenging as Andrew alluded to. ie 26 across our union is TWU transport workers union rather than NUR. to be honest i got the correct answers for some clues but could not quite explain how I did. ie 8D how does “eulogise = hymn?” one is a verb the other is a noun?

  20. I found this one quite tricky but got there in the end with GARRISON my LOI after ATONED. BRAKES had gone in with a shrug as my best guess from checkers and definition, although I have seen Paul Hollywood in the media so I should probably have made the connection. I am under the impression that ER=ruler is fairly standard crossword fodder.

  22. Thanks Crucible and Andrew

    I enjoyed this one very much, found myself uncharacteristically in tune with Crucible today.

    Robi @ 17: it’s THING as in “having a thing for someone”. Possibly slightly archaic, I guess – 1940s/50s?

  23. Eileen @3

    Thanks for the “uncharacteristically”!

    My point about “city” = “Cork” is that there are so many cities in the world that you couldn’t expect to guess “Cork” and solve this forwards – the only way was to guess the solution, then try to justify it (as I did).

  24. Thanks, Andrew.

    Well, I’m another who enjoyed this puzzle, despite having recourse to wordsearch in a few places: 10a, as I have never encountered this spelling (a bit annoying, as I had spent ages trying to fit ’emir’ in somehow) and 23a, as I am unfamiliar with the device (the clue’s fine, though).

    Too many good clues to enumerate.

    BRAKES took a while, but raised a smile when I eventually got it. As it happens, I am familiar with PH, but I wouldn’t have complained if I hadn’t been. The Guardian is a British newspaper, so UK references are perfectly legitimate, even though there is a global online readership (American crosswords never make any concessions to foreigners, do they!), and I relish a puzzle that contains a nod to both contemporary popular culture (The Great British Bake Off is an extremely popular show) and Juvenal.

    GUARDIAN(s) and OBSERVER form a thematic pair. I was on the look out for some other newspapers, but no dice. Now that IS a mini-theme!

  25. Thanks Simon @22 – I can’t find it in any dictionary or Thesaurus. Perhaps ‘obsession’ could have been used instead. There are, of course, many other more reasonable synonyms for ‘thing.’

  26. I too found this too loose and random for comfort, though the actual constructions pretty much without exception have the potential to be good. Examples? Well the Harrison H, the ‘banks’ (which letters exactly do you mean), Cork, hub, hymn, ‘on top’ in across clue, etc etc. Not comfortable, as I say, even tortuous. And all after such a good start for BABY SITS.

    🙁

  27. Gervase,

    The problem is not that it’s a UK reference, it’s that it’s obscure. Proper names have to be handled carefully by crossword compilers/editors. It is unfair to expect a solver to have heard of, for instance, an actor playing a minor part in a UK soap opera, however popular that show might be. I would argue, too, that it is unfair to expect solvers to know the names of presenters of TV cookery programmes.

  29. I’m sure I didn’t just enter an incorrect captcha, but let’s try again!

    Found this quite challenging in places, mostly in the NW and SE, but entertaining too. Last in and biggest groan was U-BOLT, though the word was unfamiliar. Favourite was BRAKES, also liked GARRISON (and for me that works). Couldn’t see how the TING in UPLIFTING worked so thanks for that

    Thanks to Andrew and Crucible

  30. Contrarian @27

    I would argue that Paul Hollywood is not ‘obscure’; he has a much higher profile on TV and in the media than some ‘actor playing a minor part in a UK soap opera’. I’m sure he is familiar to far more people than the Juvenal quotation, for instance. It’s just slightly unfortunate that you’re so highbrow that such references are completely meaningless!

  31. Gervase @31 – well said! I hardly ever watch TV, but I know who he is. I didn’t find my lack of knowledge of Juvenal (or Mitz’s Watchmen) a handicap this time, but knowing the names of too many runners may have been…

  32. Totally agree with all those accepting the appearance of Mr Hollywood in clueing. Indeed, to my mind it’s the mark of a good crossword when contemporary references are bundled in with (eg) classical quotations and knowledge of the second-largest city in Ireland. Otherwise, we’d just be doing Sudoku and letting the logic work for us in isolation of the world outside. And, for what it’s worth, the Guardian newspaper and website have carried many stories about Bake-Off – if you want a sample, here it is.

    Much the toughest of the week, not that that’s difficult to achieve; indeed without getting 15,4 from the enumeration I’m not sure I would have had any chance of a finish. SE and NW took much longer than the other quarters – I’d twigged which Hollywood might have been meant but that didn’t mean the clue got solved quickly …

  33. Trailman @32
    Cork may indeed be the second largest city in Ireland, but what in the clue indicates that we are looking for an Irish city? (I would withdraw my objection if “Irish” had been indicated; it narrows down the possibilities to a manageable level.)

  36. Sorry, I couldn’t resist that. I had CLERK OF WORKS from the enumeration and a few crossers and worked out the parsing retrospectively. Yes, there are a lot of cities, but nobody bats an eyelid about things like flower being used the same way…

  37. Hi beery hiker
    In a recent Radio Times a “flower” that I had never heard of featured – it turned out to be the seventh longest in the world!

  38. “I’m sure he is familiar to far more people than the Juvenal quotation, for instance. It’s just slightly unfortunate that you’re so highbrow that such references are completely meaningless!”

    🙂 Sadly, I think you’re right.

    I have nothing against ‘lowbrow’ cultural references. I’ve always loved the way Paul (ie JH) manages to smuggle them into his puzzles. But, please, no cookery programmes 😉

  39. [Wikipedia says 7. Ob-Irtysh, and Ob is familiar, though Irtysh would be very obscure. I’ve not heard of any of the three that make up number 5]

  40. [OB was the required answer (to make up part of the solution). I hope we don’t get into trouble for giving it!]

  41. Speaking as a non-UK solver, I did manage to solve the puzzle, but only under a number of misconceptions. I had concluded that Hollywood ‘bakes’ old film as a preservation technique, giving me what is the obvious answer. But now that I think of it, that technique is for old audio tapes, not film.

    Other wrong parsings: P(ATR)O + L, USA(B)LE. Left unparsed: CLERK OF WORKS. FLY ON THE WALL.

    As for ‘George’, we often see GR for ‘king’, so the abbreviation is not entirely unprecedented.

    I thought U-BOLT was fairly amusing, a witty clue that eluded me for a long time.

  42. Setters seem perfectly at ease referencing LA or NY without hinting that they are foreign. Mark you, listening to Radio 4 I’m not sure that they are !

  44. I thought this rather difficult. Probably a result of the easy ride we’ve had this week-it took me about twice as long as yesterday. Still, on reflection, the puzzle is(mostly) pretty good. I loved GARRISON and the quotation. I was really delayed by the NW corner. I didn’t like EMEER, didn’t really think of Paul Hollywood for a long time, and BABYSITS confused me with its hyphen. The penny or pennies finally dropped though.
    Tomorrow is another day!

  45. Thanks Andrew and Crucible
    I completed this after a break. I carelessly put ‘watchman’ in 16d and I failed to parse 11d though the relevant meaning of ‘waste’ did briefly cross my mind.
    I was not really ‘gruntled’ by the puzzle. I felt there were too many uses of single letters to my taste.
    Being aware of the etymology, I also thought clue and answer were too close to each other in 20d.
    I did not particularly take to the gum/superglue linkage either – one rarely seems to stick and the other often overdoes it.
    Of course there was also quite a lot of amusement too including 11d with hindsight.

  46. I enjoyed this. Lots of clever clues and lots of great misdirection.

    It did take me ages though and I’ve probably missed the snooker now!

    I shall see.

    Thanks to Andrew and Crucible

  47. Wonderful to see a do tough crossword with inventive but scrupulous clueing. A real plessure to solve. Some of today’s criticisms are a bit madder than usual, presumably a reflection of the difficulty level.

  48. [Sorry, that was meant to say a GOOD tough crossword. “Plessure” you can probably work out for yourselves – a bizarre prediction indeed by the predictive text!]

  49. Excellent puzzle.

    I find it hard to believe that some of the quibbles (and especially the non-specific ones) on this thread are bona fide – one of course we know never is.

    @muffin #33 – “city” is regularly used to key a city from anywhere in the world (or on the planet, as some now say) – frequently it is combined in a lift-and-separate, such as “English city” where English actually indicates E as part of the wordplay and the city itself is in another country altogether – and of course that country is not indicated.

  50. Loved the elegance of this Crucible and agree with Gervase and others about legitimate use of UK/pop culture references, though hitting myself as a (non-UK) fan of GBBO I still didn’t see the PH reference! Good Grief, people, you’ll be saying you’ve never heard of Mary Berry next! Agree with Trailman that it’s the variety of clues that makes a good crossword and don’t think we should complain if certain clues are opaque to us personally. Sport, for instance, is definitely NOT my “thing” and I didn’t watch any of the Olympics, but would expect, as a generally aware person to have at least heard of Usain Bolt – but would not have complained about the clue’s “obscurity” if I hadn’t.

    Studied some Juvenal in Latin A Level and it doesn’t seem like a mistranslation to me …

    Finally, suffered severe embarassment at not getting 25 straight away, my surname being Harrison and my initial … G!

  51. Malagachica, were you one of those who sat up in class every time the teacher used the word “comparison”?

    I found this a hard start, but the more I did, the steadier it became. It took two sessions though.

    Many thanks all.

  52. @42 those ‘cities’ are Crosswordese, and so pretty front-of-mind for most solvers. So’s EC, of course.

    Some setters like to indicate that they are ‘American’ or ‘US’ locations, even so.

  53. Hi Like others I could only complete 25% of this. I loved U-BOLT but, like others have reservations about Hollywood-being out of UK and not having access to TV it was lost on me. Not at all highbrow-Secondary Modern actually! Reading these threads is a wonderful help though.

  54. 15,4dn is wrong because the correct translation, as normally used in English, is “who will [future tense] guard the guards themselves”.

  55. @crossbencher
    The future can be expressed by the present tense in English (“If I don’t have breakfast tomorrow, who gets the extra egg?”) so it’s an acceptable translation, as well as the only one I’ve ever seen.

  56. Thanks Crucible and Andrew

    Started this on Saturday whilst waiting for a friend – in two hours, it was still only half done. Needed another session to finish it off. What a terrific mix of clue devices as well as subject matter. Had no idea whatsoever as to how BRAKES was derived, although the definition was clear enough – was trying to find a Hollywood process BRAES (opted for K=king) – still a great clue !

    For some reason Usain Bolt jumped straight out as the runner and he was the second or third in! Didn’t get miffed with a similar trick on GARRISON – it probably brought a bigger smile when the penny dropped with it. Finished with COSSET and had to double check that nanny was a verb (the same as for hymn in 8d). Took a little time to parse it as well.

    A real sense of accomplishment to see it all correct.

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