What a delight to find Orlando’s name on the puzzle this morning, after such a long time! It’s also a relief: I blogged his last puzzle, well over a year ago, on the theme of ‘Goodbye’, which had some of us worried.
It’s all here: a good variety of clue types, elegantly and wittily clued, with the lightness of touch which is characteristic of Orlando and with lovely surfaces throughout.
Many thanks to Orlando – and welcome back! Please don’t stay away so long again. 😉
[I was just about to post this blog when I saw Gaufrid’s reminder of today’s anniversary. I’m so glad Orlando turned up for the party: my first blog [nine years ago – blimey!] was one of his puzzles.]
Definitions are underlined in the clues.
Across
1 Supple mountaineer ignoring cold at first (6)
LIMBER
[c]LIMBER [mountaineer] – this immediately reminded me of one of my all-time favourite clues, from Orlando’s alter ego Cincinnus in the FT: A climber of rocks in Devon (10)
4 Police in rigged state trial that’s crucial (4,4)
ACID TEST
CID [police] in an anagram [rigged] of STATE
9 Self-serving forfeit? (6)
FOREGO
FOR EGO [self-serving]
10 Studio broadcast about backing long shot (8)
OUTSIDER
Anagram [broadcast] of STUDIO + a reversal [backing] of RE [about]
11 Ethics I worried about in book about childhood (5,4,5)
CIDER WITH ROSIE
Anagram [about] of ETHICS I WORRIED – I remember Anax saying what a useful word ‘about’ is for setters: see previous clue – and it can also be a containment or reversal indicator
13 Original sound with early vocal music (10)
ROUNDELAYS
Anagram [original] of SOUND and EARLY
14 Young Simpson has change of heart ?- horrid kid! (4)
BRAT
BART [young Simpson] with the middle letters – heart – transposed
16 Notice either side of estate agent (4)
ESPY
E [first and last letters – either side – of EstatE] + SPY [agent]
18 Lawgiver is left in flowing river (10)
LEGISLATOR
IS L [is left] in LEGATO [flowing – musical direction] + R [river]
21 Grr! Damn sheep he rounded up? (6,8)
GERMAN SHEPHERD
Anagram [rounded up] of GRR DAMNED SHEEP – &littish
23 Breeding stock? Wilder game? (4,4)
GENE POOL
GENE [Wilder] + POOL [game]
24 Country man with an acre (6)
GUYANA
GUY [man + AN A [an acre]
25 Plants from central Asia in stores (8)
DEPOSITS
[a]SI[a] in DEPOTS [stores]
26 Niche for Time Out? (6)
RECESS
Double definition
Down
1 Storage area full of tuna sandwiches (4)
LOFT
Hidden in [sandwiches] fulL OF Tuna
2 Framing paintings, say, without short composer (7)
MARTINU
MINU[s] [without, short] round [framing] ART [paintings, say]
3 Boffins say good boss succeeded (8)
EGGHEADS
EG [say] + G [good] + HEAD [boss] + S [succeeded]
5 “Here is a noble railway” ? sentence from a glossy magazine (7,4)
COUNTRY LIFE
COUNT [noble] + RY [railway] + LIFE [sentence]
6 Win over military leader after shocking raids (6)
DISARM
M[ilitary] after an anagram [shocking] of RAIDS
7 Ultimate recipient of object? American leading lady (3-4)
END-USER
END [object] + US [American] + ER [the Queen – leading lady]
8 Troll chaps found in Twin Peaks (9)
TORMENTOR
MEN [chaps] in TOR TOR [twin peaks]
12 Writer close to Glasgow converts semi-detached cottages (6,5)
WALTER SCOTT
[glasgo]W + ALTERS [converts] COTT[ages] – lovely!
13 No opening for fruit? Large number taken back (2-7)
RE-ENGAGED
[g]REENGAGE [fruit] + D [500 – large number]
15 He turned up to stop a bounder in the pub (8)
ALEHOUSE
A reversal [turned up] of HE in [to stop] A LOUSE [a bounder]
17 Root for base rate cut (7)
PARSNIP
PAR [base rate] + SNIP [cut]
19 Houses joined in competition after they’re oddly selected (7)
TERRACE
RACE [competition] after odd letters of T[h]E[y]R[e]
20 “The Place of Education” ? bit of propaganda penned by French author (6)
CAMPUS
P[ropaganda] in [penned by] [Albert] CAMUS [French author]
22 To succeed in exam, don’t answer question (4)
PASS
Double definition
As Eileen said about the clues which also had variety in the level of difficulty – for me at least. 1a and 1d went straight in but others took longer – including FOREGO which I kept rejecting because I didn’t see FOR EGO (thanks Mrs W) and didn’t like the idea of FOR being in the definition and solution – but it’s a lovely clue once the parsing is seen.
I’d never heard of MARTINU but the clueing is fair. My favourites today are LEGISLATOR and PARSNIP for their surfaces and RE-ENGAGED because greengages are delicious and it reminded me to get some out of the freezer for tomorrow’s breakfast.
Thanks to Orlando – come back soon – and to Eileen – don’t go away.
A lovely crossword, couldn’t agree more with your comments, Eileen.
I particularly liked the misdirection of ‘flowing river’ in 18a, and it’s good to see something other than ‘cad’ as a synonym for ‘bounder’ (15d). My only quibble is the use of ‘bit of’ to indicate the first letter of ‘propaganda’ in 20d.
Many thanks Orlando and Eileen.
ps. Ilfracombe has 10 letters!
Just thought “Self-serving sacrifice” would be an alternative for 9a which would have got round my FOR blockage.
Oops! Thanks, Greensward @2 – trust me to mess it up. 🙁
I assumed in 9 that the setter had confused FOREGO and FORGO, but apparently some people spell the latter as the former. I learn something every day.
Thanks to setter and blogger.
Greensward @2 – sorted now: I forgot to say it’s because I counted ‘climber of rocks’ on my fingers.
I meant ‘climber of’ of course! I’d better get my coat.
Happy anniversary to fifteensquared!
Thanks to Orlando for a super puzzle and to Eileen for a great blog.
Made a big boo boo early with 4a – filled in TEST CASE instead of ACID TEST. After I stopped going up that dry gully, my solve became a little smoother.
I really liked the GERMAN SHEPHERD at 21a, but then I am a dog tragic. I also enjoyed the reminder about that Laurie Lee book, which was so evocative of a different era and growing up in England after WWI, 11a CIDER WITH ROSIE.
I loved this puzzle, and echo the sentiment of wanting to see more of this setter. I had the same reservations about the E in FOREGO mentioned by Ian SW3 @5, but I enjoyed the clue so much, once the penny dropped, that I assumed (and do assume, since I haven’t looked it up) that there would be dictionary support for forego being used for “go without” and not strictly for “go before”. MARTINU and CIDER WITH ROSIE were both unknown to me, but fairly clued and gettable from the crossers. I got a laugh seeing WALTER SCOTT pop up a day after his name unexpectedly came up in the blog comments for yesterday’s Pasquale puzzle — but even without that extra bit of fun, this was one of my favorites today, along with the aforementioned FOREGO, LOFT, GENE POOL, ACID TEST and GERMAN SHEPHERD. Many thanks to Orlando and Eileen.
Thanks to Orlando and Eileen. Lots of fun. I too did not know MARTINU and CIDER WITH ROSIE and took a while getting PARSNIP. In going through the archives, I look forward (or backward) to finding Orlando’s puzzles – always a delight.
Thanks Orlando and Eileen.
I have a special place in my heart for Cider With Rosie – one of the better set books at English Lit. GCE O Level that got me into sixth form and beyond.
I’m struggling slightly with ‘original’ being an anagrind. Is it perhaps being used in the sense of original= eccentric? ie ‘He was a bit of a one-off, an original’? Other than in that rather obcure sense, I fail to see how ‘original’ points to a re-arrangement of letters.
Hi dantheman @11 – Collins’ second definition of ‘original’ is ‘fresh and unusual; novel’, which is how I read it, without thinking about it at the time. Chambers has similar definitions.
Orlando is the Mozart of cryptics-please come back soon.
(Not sure if Nimrod is Wagner or Stravinsky- I love them all)
Orlando is one of my absolutely favourite setters, and like Eileen I was delighted by his return after a long absence.
I knew Martinu, but a trouble with being a hobbyist early musician is that I also knew of a Baroque composer Martini (and there was a 19th centry composer of the same surname, too). As MARTINI (ART in MINI) was my 2nd one in after 1Ac I was slightly held up until the U in roundelays (another early music answer) reset my thinking to 20th century rather than 18th century musicians.
Just right. Orlando one of the best.
Thank you Eileen @12.
The way you put it makes perfect sense. I’m guilty of over analysis!
Thanks Orlando; good crossword.
Thanks Eileen; I spent ages in looking for reversals with ‘taken back’ in 13d.
I especially liked the ‘semi-detached cottages’ – brilliant clue!
Thanks to Orlando and Eileen. I share others’ pleasure in having Orlando back.
Not too taxing – like Goujeers @14 Martini went in first, but was quickly corrected via roundelay. And my last one in was also forego, as I was unfamiliar with that spelling.
Lovely stuff with references from Camus and Laurie Lee to Gene Wilder and The Simpsons, via a composer I had never heard of, but whose name was clued fairly. (There are plenty of composers I have never heard of, I have to confess.)
TORMENTOR was my favourite.
PASS, embarrassingly, was last in
I did mean to say how much, as a former teacher, I loved PASS. How many times have I said, ‘Read / answer the question!’?
Wonderful and elegant, many thanks both.
copmus @13 Love your idea…I have a firm favourite for Stockhausen, but I’ll keep it to myself.
Just because some people don’t know the difference between FORGO and FOREGO, does this mean the rest of us have to accept it?
William@21 – Paul? The notion of setters and their composer doppelgängers set me off thinking – are there any well known female composers to match with Arachne and Nutmeg? I’m not a classical music buff but my GK is ok and I can’t think of one off hand.
An excellent puzzle, with a rare bonus SNAP! for those of us who do both the Codeword and the Cryptic.
Far too long an absence! I suppose I’m still trying to ponder the circumstances in which a railway can be ‘noble’, but enough of griping. He’s far too good to leave us waiting another year.
One for the estate agents (cf 16a) on fifteensquared, should there be any: I live in an end house of a short terrace of three houses. Is my home, therefore, semi-detached (12d) or a terrace (19d)?
What a lovely surprise. Orlando showed us just what we have been missing since his last appearance – beautifully crafted and fairly accessible.
Thanks to Orlando and Eileen
Hi Trailman @25 – Yes. 😉
Trailman @25 – both, so whichever suits the setter
Having read Eileen’s preamble, I guess this is probably my first go at an Orlando – and most welcome! Not the hardest, but a nice mix of clues – and no call to dive into Wikipedia, not this time!
Perhaps LEGISLATOR is the best of the bunch. Parsing left me guessing for a long time, and I could kick myself – especially in my lapsed pianist hat – for not spotting LEGATO sooner!
Thanks Orlando and Eileen.
May I go off at a tangent over GERMAN SHEPHERD? Not because of the clue, which is fine – but because of the dreadful mutilation and disfigurement of the breed under the auspices of the Kennel club and their so-called ‘breed standards’. I reckon a modern GSD bred to this standard, with its sloping back and waddling gait, couldn’t “round up” a pair of tortoises, let alone a flock of sheep.
I prefer the term ‘Alsatian’ anyway – but only when referring to older, un-mutilated versions of the animal!
Lovely to see you back Orlando, thank you very much for the puzzle, and thank you Eileen for the blog.
MARTINU was new to me – its clue mentioning paintings made me wonder if there was a railway artist named Noble which might satisfy Trailman @25, and sure enough there is, David Noble GRA; COUNTRY LIFE used to advertise paintings for sale, it probably still does.
PS, just checked Country Life and was surprised to find the edition of November 1, 2017, has a railway painting on the cover!
Trailman @ 25: I live in the end house of a terrace of five. I know from working in the insurance industry that this is a terrace. If you lived in an elegant Regency Terrace (perhaps you do?) I imagine that you wouldn’t refer to a Regency semi-detached …
Trailman @ 25 – Since both end houses are only ‘attached’ on one side, I think they could justifiably (to an estate agent) be termed ‘semis’, with just the middle one being terraced!
I grew up in an end house of a four house terrace. I used to think of it as semi-semi-detached.
Eileen @20
Haha! Your comment reminded me of my father, a talented ice hockey player in his day (who, now in his early 80s, can still skate rings around me and most of his other children and grandchildren), who has often remarked that a good pair of hockey defensemen, working together, must “adopt the code of the high school chemistry teacher: ‘You will not pass!'”
And that, of course, reminded me of this brief clip (one of many similar ones that I believe is available online): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZf0Q-v3u-k
Me @34
Pardon my typo: *are* available online
Happy 11th to 225.
Nice puzzle from Orlando, who is a dab hand.
I’d concur with the point about ‘original’ as anagrind, however, as it is either a noun or an adjective, but, y’know. The dog clue is fun and should not really be challenged in a serious way, but I think the similarity between shepherd and sheep kind of hamstrings it.
Favourite device: detached cottages!
Thanks for the multiple replies to semis and noble railways. Next year, for reasons that are clearer to Mrs Trailman than to me, our house is likely to be on the market; I rather expect that it will be a semi to the estate agent and a terrace to the buyer (it’s certainly no Regency gem though, Marienkaefer @32). Cookie @30, especial thanks for the David Noble link. Such nostalgia!
Do let us know when the time comes, Trailman. 😉
Thanks Orlando and Eileen
Mainly a pleasure, but I had a slightly doubtful FORAGE for 9a as I did know the difference between “forgo” and FOREGO, and held up in the SE by a perfectly reasonable RUSSIA (RUSS I A) for 24a – only changed this when word wizards couldn’t find anything to fit TER?S?E!
muffin @39 et al
I expected some reaction to FOREGO but decided not to comment myself. I did look it up and all three of my dictionaries [Collins, Chambers and SOED] give it as a variant spelling of ‘forgo’, so, like it or not, Orlando is in the clear. [He probably doesn’t like it, either. 😉 ]
muffin @39
I also first thought of RUSSIA for 24a, but could not buy into it because of the same problem with TER?S?E. When the lightbulb came on for TERRACE, I finally saw GUYANA (my LOI).
There was nothing wrong with this puzzle but I wouldn’t have said it was anything special. I’m rather surprised by the general enthusiasm by, well, everybody really. Still, someone likened this setter to Mozart and as I don’t care much for his music, I suppose that might explain my feelings.
Thanks Orlando.
Eileen @40
Yes, I Googled FOREGO and the very first hit was “variant spelling of forgo”!
Excellent puzzle. Loved FOREGO, GERMAN SHEPHERD, tuna sandwiches, TORMENTOR, CAMPUS, PASS.
Missed the author.
Very enjoyable clueing, accessible yet fresh.
And to me semi-detached means connected to one other property only, directly or indirectly, so the non-misleading term for an end-of-terrace is exactly that. Of course, there are some beautiful end-of-terrace dwellings.
Many thanks Orlando and Eileen
Only people who can’t spell correctly. A schoolboy howler. And please don’t anyone say that it’s in Chambers – not a dictionary but a compendium of errors.
Crossbencher @45
As Eileen has said @40, the alternative spelling is given in Collins and the COED (and I have confirmed that it is also in the ODE) as well as in Chambers so are these publications a “compendium of errors” as well? I think not.
Crossbencher @ 45
Forgo/forego are listed as synonymous entries in my 1976 SOED. Dictionaries document usage. You may not like the usage, but that doesn’t make it wrong. In the same way, the evolution of language, grammar and syntax is determined by how people use words, not how prescriptive knowbetters would like them to use them.
Gaufrid @ 46
Sorry we crossed, I’m a slow typist (and needed to check a couple of references).
[Rehashing an old argument: yes, dictionaries are descriptive, but they could be more ready to add “incorrect” (as in the FLACK from last week’s Prize)]
muffin @ 49
Or “evolved”. If people use and understand a particular usage, who is to stand in their way?
Argue while you can – it won’t B long before the standard spelling of both words will B 4go.
Many thanks to both. I enjoy Eileen’s blogs and Orlando’s puzzles.
Um, the GERMAN SHEPHERD is an anagram off GRR DAMN SHEEP HE. Somehow an “ED” turned up in the blog.
Simon S @50
I’ve said this before, but more to BNTO than you, I think. I’ve no objection to words evolving new meanings. What I abhor is two words with different meanings coming to mean the same (as in forgo and forego – I could go on…)
muffin @ 53
Without wishing to prolong unduly, if it’s in a >40yo dictionary I think the convergence has to be accepted. We may not like it (and I haven’t stated my position, but academically I was a linguist, including a paper in linguistics), but it’s (become) reality.
Re the FORGO/FOREGO debate (which I missed entirely when I was doing the puzzle)….
Am I right in thinking that the version with E in it actually defines what no man has done, whereas the Starship Enterprise boldly does it?
Mmm Simon
I would have thought, as a linguist, you would have been against language being degraded. “Aggravate” for “irritate”, for example, has been around for even longer, but it still aggravates (sorry, irritates) me 🙂
muffin @56 and passim
We pedants know we’re fighting an apparently losing battle in many respects but, as Simon S says, for the purposes of crosswords, what is found in the leading dictionaries has to be regarded as acceptable, whether we [and, as I suggested above, the setters themselves – Orlando being a most meticulous example] like it or not, or where do we go from here?
Hi Mystogre @52
Quite right – how come no one else spotted that? [That’s what comes of the delay between solving in bed and then writing the blog during breakfast. 😉
Eileen @57
I must agree, but why, oh why, can’t the dictionaries indicate misuse?
muffin @ 56
As I said, I wasn’t stating my position, and don’t intend to, as that’s opinion. I was simply stating the reality of the situation, which is fact.
What a perfect description for him, copmus. Who would Paul be, I wonder?
Julie aka giulina.
Regarding discussion of forgo/forego, it struck me that “a compendium of errors” is an excellent description of the English language.
WhiteKing @ 23. I would have suggested Judith Weir, the Master of the Queen’s Music, as the musical equivalent of Arachne or Nutmeg but David Mellor’s description of her music as “pretty impenetrable and when penetrable unrewarding” describes the work of another setter to my mind who I suspect is William@13″s contender for Stockhausen. Beecham, when asked if he ever conducted any Stockhausen, is alleged to have replied, “No, but I may have trodden in some”.
Thanks both,
I had lots of favourites, but ‘legislator’ was the best. Does anybody actually use ‘forego’ (as opposed to ‘foregone’ or ‘foregoing’) in its original sense?
Pino@63 – thanks for engaging in a conversation. Your (Mellor’s) description Judith Weir’s music doesn’t sound (ha ha) like how I’d describe Arachne’s (always rewarding) or Nutmeg’s (rarely impenetrable) crossword styles. Are most classical composers male simply because of the time they lived in? And in today’s (arguably) more equal society are there lots more Judith Weirs who will be tomorrow’s Mozarts (or Stockhausens)?
Tea @62 – well said – best comment of this debate by far!
WhiteKing@65
I don’t suppose that you’ll read this as I always post late. I haven’t even loooked at today’s Nutmeg yet. I think that you are right that most well-known composers of the classical period were male by convention. Who knows how Fanny Mendelssohn would have developed if she had been male or if there were a lot of other potential greats held back because they were female and didn’t even have a famous brother to draw attention to them? As for today I don’t have sufficient knowledge. We have to remember that in classical times there were only one or two per generation who are now well known. 1685 was the famous exception being the birth year of J S Bach, Handel, and Domenico Scarlatti.
Apologies for digressing from the crossword and for forgetting to thank Orlando and Eileen.