Guardian Cryptic 27,097 by Qaos

by

The puzzle may be found at https://www.theguardian.com/crosswords/cryptic/27097.

I found this quite a struggle, not helped by a few doubtful constructions, mentioned below. For that, not, I think, Qaos in top form.

Across
7 SUBATOMIC Very small vehicle reversing by a cat, I see (9)
A charade of SUB, a reversal (‘reversing’) of BUS (‘vehicle’) plus ‘a’ plus TOM (‘cat’) plus ‘I’ plus C (‘see’).
8 MOSES One getting some orders around the summit of Sinai? (5)
An envelope (‘around’) of S (‘summit of Sinai’ – is the first letter the summit? At least the intent is clear) in MOES, an anagram (‘orders’) of ‘some’, with an extended definition.
9 ODD ONE OUT They don’t fit plywood, done outside or inside (3,3,3)
A hidden answer (‘inside’) in ‘plywoOD DONE OUTside’. Plural definition, very singular answer.
10 FLOUT Show contempt for loud hooligan (5)
A charade of F (forte, ‘loud’) plus LOUT (‘hooligan’).
12 ANGELS England’s in trouble, wanting Norway and Germany as financial backers (6)
An anagram (‘in trouble’) of ‘E[n]glan[d]’s’ minus N and D (‘wanting Norway and Germany’).
13 ELATEDLY Close to dive 50, T Daley dances with joy (8)
An anagram (‘dances’) of E (‘close to divE‘) plus L (Roman numeral, ’50’) plus ‘T Daley’. Tom Daley is a British diver and Olympic medallist.
14 ABANDON Might this show you’re married to Chuck? (7)
A BAND ON (‘might this show you’re married’).
17 IMPEACH Incriminate every individual backing Independence politician (7)
A charade of I (‘independence’) plus MP (‘politician’) plus EACH (‘every individual’), with ‘backing’ indicating the order of the particles.
20 SNOWBALL Drink with little chance of being found in Hell? (8)
Double definition. The drink is a mixture of advocaat and lemonade, with perhaps a squeeze of lime,and the second “definition” is allusive.
22 MUTUAL Common umlaut design (6)
An anagram (‘design’) of ‘umlaut’. Following on from yesterday, MUTUAL as in “Our mutual friend”.
24 MAJOR A great prime minister? (5)
Cryptic definition. I’m not sure that ‘great’ is a good description of MAJOR (with or without the John).
25 OVERTRAIN Exercise too much? It’s evident — need shower (9)
A charade of OVERT (‘evident’) plus RAIN (‘shower’).
26 HIPPY Lover of the ’60s, Carpenter gives up crown (5)
A subtraction: [c]HIPPY (‘carpenter’) minus its first letter (‘gives up crown’). Both often spelled [c]HIPPIE.
27 ORWELLIAN Gold — good and fashionable when worn by adult, 1984-style­ (9)
An envelope (‘when worn by’) of A (‘adult’) in OR (‘gold’) plus WELL (‘good’) plus IN (‘fashionable’).
Down
1   See 5
2 NAPOLEON European working under North American general (8)
A charade of N A (‘North American’) plus POLE (‘European’) plus ON (‘working’).
3 BOXERS They conceal privates and fighters (6)
Double definition.
4 FIGURED Understood 1d? (7)
Nothing to do with SUGDEN: a charade of FIGURE (‘1’, indication by example, with the question mark as justification) plus ‘d’.
5, 1 MOLLIE SUGDEN Was she busy modelling Sue in Are You Being Served? (6,6)
An anagram (‘busy’) of ‘modelling Sue’.
6 REPUBLIC Local resident in antique country (8)
An envelope (‘resident in’) of PUB (‘local’) in RELIC (‘antique’).
11 FARM Building weapon unleashes anger (4)
A subtraction: F[ire]ARM (‘weapon’) minus IRE (‘unleashes anger’). ‘Building’ is not the first thing that comes to my mind for FARM, but the latter can mean a farmhouse.
15 BENJAMIN Mountain in Germany, yes? I’m climbing with new boy (8)
A charade of BEN (‘mountain’) plus JA (‘in Germany, yes’) plus MI (‘I’m climbing’ in a down light) plus N (‘new’).
16 OPAL Could be expensive round — drink up … (4)
A charade of O (’round’) plus PAL, a reversal (‘up’ in a down light) of  LAP (‘drink’).
18 ENTIRELY … only ten pound, I count (8)
A charade of ENT, an anagram (‘pound’; questionable syntax) of ‘ten’ plus ‘I’ plus RELY (‘count’).
19 CLOVERS Wild plants caught by Romeo and Juliet? (7)
A charade of C (‘caught’) plus LOVERS (‘Romeo and Juliet’).
21 WHOOPS Doctor works and cries at mistake (6)
A charade of WHO (‘Doctor’; as has been pointed out in this blog before, the character is simply the Doctor, in the series Doctor Who) plus OPS (‘works’).
22 MURIEL Spoon bender hugged by little girl, then another (6)
An envelope (‘hugged by’) of URI (Geller, ‘spoon bender’) in MEL (‘little girl’). The definition is ‘another’ – i.e. another girl.
23 ANIMAL A game, a lake, a creature (6)
A charade of ‘a’ plus NIM (‘game‘. Am I the only one to whom L’année dernière à Marienbad springs to mind?) plus ‘a’ plus L (‘lake’).
completed grid

45 comments on “Guardian Cryptic 27,097 by Qaos”

  1. Some pleasurable moments with this solve, but some parts were a bit clunky and, to me, several clues were forced.

    The surface of 13a for instance, “Close to dive 50, T Daley dances with joy” had me scratching my head. May have been that I had never heard of Tom Daley, the diver, though.

    “MEL” as a “little girl” in 22d MURIEL also didn’t appeal to me. I share the objection of other forum participants (as previously discussed) when a clue includes a boy’s or girl’s name – always so many possibilities – and even more if abbreviated? I am known variously as “Jule” and “Jules”, for example, and have known various Melissas and Melanies as “MEL”, as was the answer here, then Emmas and Emilys as “Em” and “Emm” etc etc…

    In the end my grid included quite a few guesses without seeing why.

    Thanks to PeterO for explanations, as well as to Qaos.

  2. PS Just looked back to my grid and saw blanks in 4d. So not even a complete solve. Disappointing. I can recall going back through the other characters in “Are You Being Served?” to try to solve it, but then gave it away and moved on.

  3. There’s an Animal Farm theme going on here. I read it way back in high school, so Snowball and Napoleon were the only characters I remembered. But there’s also Moses, (Old) Major, Benjamin, Boxer, Clover, Muriel, and Mollie, with 27 and 23,11 tying it all together.

  4. Thanks PeterO and Qaos

    I totally missed the theme, even with the word ORWELLIAN as one of the solutions. Thanks for that Steve B. @ 3

    New words for me were NIM and I had never heard of MOLLIE SUGDEN – probably because I never watched that TV show, but I confirmed her existence via google

    I was unable to parse 11d.

  5. Thanks for the blog, PeterO.

    I loved the Animal Farm theme, having recently been reacquainted with it in a podcast. I also put question marks beside FARM, “building” doesn’t work for me as a definition and I also missed the F(ire)ARM parsing. Thankfully the theme enabled me to enter the correct answer.

    My favourite clue today was MURIEL for the memory of living in the U.K. in the late 80s and watching Uri Gellar on a TV chat show – Parkinson perhaps – and being amazed by his “powers”.

    Many thanks to Qaos for a brilliant puzzle.

  6. Cap in hand. Totally missed the theme! How embarrassing when I have taught “Animal Farm” to many 15 year olds over the years. Again that thing about getting so caught up in the detail. Now that I can see how clever the puzzle is, all is forgiven. Thanks to Qaos for the interesting inter-interconnections.

  8. Though Julie in Oz may be a close second, I remain the world champion of missing the theme. Thanks for catching that, Steve B. Some puzzles seem to be better after I slam my forehead into the desk.

  9. Apologies. Too many “inters” in my last post.

    [Thanks for your humility, slipstream@8, but I feel like I was really Number 1 Klutz for obtuseness, having corrected misspellings of “Mollie” in many student essays and done endless comparative charts on the whiteboard about historical figures like Stalin, Goebbels et al when discussing the characters of Napoleon and Snowball, in exploring totalitarianism, propaganda, class warfare and so on with my students.

    Groan! Mortifying when I consider that one of my main motivations for doing cryptics is to discern patterns and connections.

    Think I need to order some tea trays as per Extremophile’s and baerchen’s posts on Monday’s Rufus blog – at least now I really do understand the concept of the tea tray moment.]

  10. I made the mistake of trying to solve this in the wee small hours after returning from a night out with Dutch, who is visiting Freiburg. After solving BENJAMIN and SNOWBALL I became convinced we were looking for film characters with the rank “private”. This idea then became modified with MAJOR and NAPOLEON…
    Quite a clang when the penny eventually dropped.
    Thanks to Q and PeterO
    (forgive the plug but I’m in the FT today if anyone fancies a look)

  11. I too missed the theme. I last read Animal Farm in about 1962 but that’s no excuse, especially with 27a. I too found a couple of clues clunky and ‘could be expensive’ in 16d didn’t exactly narrow down the options. Couldn’t parse 4d. But enjoyed most of it. Thanks Qaos and thanks PeterO.

  12. Commiserations to slipstream @ 8, but I’m sure I have a stronger claim to the prize of greatest theme-misser! “No theme unmissed” is my motto.

    I really liked this, and thought it was a bit easier than some of Qaos’s offerings. Yes, the clue for FARM was a bit iffy, but I loved ABANDON, HIPPY, REPUBLIC, BENJAMIN and WHOOPS. Many thanks to Qaos and PeterO.

  13. My mother loved a snowball, prepared by mixing Babycham (‘genuine champagne perry’) with advocaat and served in a champagne coupe – very daring and sophisticated.

    I thought that ‘whoops’ might also include ‘oops’as a cry uttered when making an error.

  14. Thanks for the blog, PeterO.

    The theme wasn’t quite so ghostly as Qaos’ often are, once ORWELLIAN and NAPOLEON were in but I thought it was pretty impressive to include so many allusions and I enjoyed tracking them down.

    Apart from the odd 9ac, there were some great clues – favourites today were MOSES, ELATEDLY and FIGURED [lovely pdm!].

    Many thanks to Qaos for a great puzzle.

    [baerchen @10 – plug forgiven, puzzle warmly recommended.]

  15. In response to previous commenters, no, no, no … I am, and will remain, the record holder for being rubbish at spotting themes. I did realise when I eventually finished this that there must be something going on and did finally see it. I said to myself: ‘for goodness’ sake’. Or something like that with the middle word substituted.

    Very good puzzle. Well done to Qaos and thanks to Peter for blogging.

  16. I confess to being another solver to miss the theme, but I’m far too humble to make any counterclaims to general superiority in this regard! I agree” that some of the clues were a little iffy and I’m not sure about the definition of WHOOPS. I’ve always regarded “whoops” as being cries of excitement with “oops” being “cries at mistake”. Nevertheless a good puzzle and my thanks are due to both Qaos and Peter O

  17. Thank you Qaos and PeterO.

    I did not spot the theme until the last clue when 1984 opened my eyes, good fun afterwards trying to find the ANIMAL FARM characters – no other references to 1984 as far as I can see.

    At 8a I first took N to be the summit of Sinai, but the answer had to be MOSES. The clue for FIGURED was great.

  18. As should be obvious from the blog, I am another who missed the theme, Somehow I have never read Animal Farm, but one way or another I have absorbed enough of it to kick myself when Steve B @4 pointed it out.
    Curious: I would take the verb whoop as meaning cry in excitement, but the interjection whoops as a variant of oops; Chambers agrees with me. Many years ago in Washington State the Washington Public Power Supply System (WPPSS, commonly known as Whoops) went spectacularly bankrupt. I felt that the response should be “Dam, there goes a billion-kilowatt Whoops”. So thanks to Frank Sinatra for the corroboration.

  19. I completed this while being distracted by other things, and I name that as my excuse for missing the theme. I nearly always do miss crossword themes, unless they are telegraphed, but having read a great deal of George Orwell, including Animal Farm, I really should have spotted what was going on here: it would have helped me to solve 20a SNOWBALL, which I eventually got given the N, W and L.

    I thought a few of the clues were barely adequate today, so I agree with you Pater that this is not Qaos at his best. As well as SNOWBALL (which had a weak secondary definition), I thought 14a ABANDON would have been better with the word ‘having’ added (“Might having this show you’re married to Chuck?”), and “They don’t fit” in 9a ODD ONE OUT looks like a mistake (“It doesn’t fit …” would work).

    The grid was unhelpful, with 12 out of 28 answers having fewer than half of their letters crossed by others, but 10 of these 12 had good, accessible clues – the other two being ABANDON and ODD ONE OUT.

    Thanks to Qaos and PeterO.

  20. Me @19
    Sorry Peter – I honestly had no reason to refer to you as Pater in the middle paragraph of my comment above!

  22. Just to confirm Chambers, the COED gives for WHOOPS “colloq. expressing surprise or apology, esp. on making an obvious mistake. [variant of OOPS]”

  23. I found this very entertaining and not too difficult. The theme was obvious as soon as I had SNOWBALL and NAPOLEON, and definitely helped, though several of the characters were at best distantly familiar. ENTIRELY was last in

    Thanks to Qaos and PeterO

  24. “A snowball’s chance in Hell” and “whoops a daisy” both trip easily from the tongue – or am I just generationally challenged?

  25. Thanks Qaos and PeterO

    I missed the theme of course – a pity, as it would have made me feel more positive about an iffy offering from one of my favourite compilers. Some unusually loose definitions, I thought – FARM has been mentioned, IMPEACH isn’t the same is “incriminate”, “could be expensive” for OPAL is very lax.

    The “wearing” in 27a doesn’t work for me, however I try – “adult” is wearing “in”, not “worn by”.

    I did like ABANDON (in contrast to some), REPUBLIC and WHOOPS (despite the “Who” problem).

  26. Thanks to Qaos and PeterO. I did not know MOLLIE SUGDEN (and needed a Google search) or Nim as a game for ANIMAL and took a while dredging up Uri Geller for MURIEL but did remember Chippy = carpenter from previous puzzles. Tough going for me here.

  27. This one kept us thinking long after lunch had gone. Moses was last in and even then we thought it was just a straight definition of the guy who got some orders at the top of that particular mountain. Thanks for the explanation. And thanks to Qaos. Nice one.

  28. Yes, missed the theme. Too busy working on what I thought was a fiendish and brilliant puzzle to notice. Couldn’t get a toe in for ages but started in SE gradually filled in lower half and moved up to the NE. Wonderful. But was trounced in the end for missing the obvious. Well done Qaos. And that petero for the blog.

  30. muffin @25

    I think you are getting confused: “A coat was worn by me” is the passive of “I was wearing a coat”; either way yours truly (or in the clue, ‘adult’) is on the inside.

  32. I missed the theme too- second puzzle in a row- even though it seems obvious now. Had I spotted it, I wouldn’t have puzzled so long over FARM- I still think the clue is a bit weak though.
    Some nice cluing however- SUBATOMIC,ELATEDLY,ABANDON,OVERTRAIN and ORWELLIAN.
    I fared much better than yesterday, but this doesn’t seem to be one of my best weeks.
    Thanks Qaos.

  33. I think that I tend to miss themes because I forget the answers I’ve already written – when they are solved, they are done with. Today this was even more likely, as I did this in two sittings, interrupted by a round of golf!

  34. Thanks both,

    The last few clues were a struggle. Re 27ac, I’m trying to think of any sentences in which ‘well’ can be substituted for ‘good’, disallowing, of course, any adverbial use of ‘good’.

  35. Thanks Qaos and PeterO

    Tyngewick @ 34: how about resonses to the question “How are you?”. There’s the traditional “I’m well” and the more modern “I’m good”. Not condoning the latter, but there’sno denying the usage.

  36. I would defend the use of, the often expedient, “they” when a gender-specific pronoun needs to be avoided.
    Michael Swan, in Practical English Usage, says ” … it has been common in educated speech for centuries. ‘God send everyone their heart’s
    desire.’ (Shakespeare)”

    Thank you Qaos and Peter. You are not alone in associating nim with Last Year in Marienbad. It is a film I love and find has a strangely
    cathartic effect. I always refer to it as the Marienbad game and use it to teach conditionals and modal auxiliaries to my Sardinian students.
    It is also a handy way of winning a beer or two, when short of cash!

  37. Curiously, I was watching L’année dernière à Marienbad yesterday, for the first time in 40 years, I suppose. I had no idea the game had a name – or that ‘nim’ was the name of anything. Very eerie sensation, when I looked it up.

    I too missed the theme, even after being told there was one, but then I found this terribly hard. This word ‘clunky’ barely begins to describe the intractability. I had to cheat like mad to finish (13, 17, 5+1, 15, 18, 23…) and after that work hard to understand why on earth those were the answers.

  38. [It’s a film that had a lasting effect on me too. Francophones – I think it makes a difference if you put the “derniere” before or after the noun – one is just “last”, the other “the last” – i.e. the final one in a sequence? Is this right, and if so, which is which?]

  39. I’m not sure what part of speech “whoops”, as in “whoops-a-daisy” is, but it’s certainly not a plural of “whoop”, which is a cry of joy, so “cries at mistake” makes no sense.

  42. Qaos (almost?) always has a theme, so I was alert and found it after three or four entries. This helped quite a lot in the solving and consequently I was one who found this an entertaining puzzle, with one exception, of course.

    I had —/O–/— and was looking for a hidden YWO/ODD/ONE! Never did see the correct hidden version; doh! though I had toyed with ODD ONE OUT earlier but dismissed it because of the singular/plural thing.

    Thanks Peter and Qaos

  43. Doh! Missed the theme. LOI ENTIRELY and I still don’t entirely see the equivalence with ‘only’. Suggested sentences where it doesn’t mean ‘completely’, anyone?
    Thanks both.

  45. My mother often ordered a snowball during evenings out with my father. The pub made it by shaking Babycham (‘genuine champagne perry’), not lemonade (which made it doubly daring), with advocaat, and serving it in a wide-mouthed champagne glass .
    I thought the answer ‘whoops’ might also includes ‘oops!’ as a cry uttered when making an error.

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