Guardian Cryptic 27,389 by Picaroon

by

The puzzle may be found at https://www.theguardian.com/crosswords/cryptic/27389.

There is some tricky parsing here, particularly 20A BAPTISMAL, but I managed to finish it after finishing off a sumptuous Christmas dinner involving numerous Philippine dishes, so it cannot have been too difficult – and I am still in time to wish everyone a happy Christmas. 16A BISMILLAH led me to look up the lyrics to Bohemian Rhapsody, but that does not seem to be a theme, nor can I see any other.

Across
1 NO GREAT SHAKES Harry Kane’s rage, shot being unremarkable (2,5,6)
An anagram (‘harry’) of ‘kanes rage shot’. Harry Kane is a soccer player.
10 UPTIGHT Defaced drinking vessel, smashed on edge (7)
A charade of [c]UP (‘drinking vessel’) plus TIGHT (‘smashed’ – that is, drunk).
11 RAT RACE Artist to sketch undesirable existence (3,4)
A charade of RA (‘artist’) plus TRACE (‘sketch’).
12 EXILE Ban text title out of Times (5)
‘[t]EX[t] [t]I[t]LE’ without the Ts (‘out of Times’).
13 CARNIVORA Order soldiers to stop endless festivity (9)
An envelope (‘to stop’) of OR (other ranks, ‘soldiers’) in CARNIVA[l] (‘festivity’) minus its last letter (‘endless’).
14 NOTED Famous number by ’50s rocker (5)
A charade of NO (‘number’) plus TED (Teddy Boy, ‘ ’50s rocker’).
16 BISMILLAH Error probed by philosopher, a blessing perhaps (9)
An envelope (‘probed by’) of MILL (John Stuart, or others) plus ‘a’ in BISH (archaic slang, ‘error’), for the Arabic invocation, which may be used as a blessing.
18 TYRANNOUS Cruel newbie setters overwhelming girl (9)
An envelope (‘overwhelming’) of ANN (‘girl’) in TYRO (‘newbie’) US (‘setters’).
19 NEXUS Short, unsexy jockeys bond (5)
An anagram (‘jockeys’) of ‘unsex[y]’ minus its last letter (‘short’).
20 BAPTISMAL Roll back the Spanish writing: it’s a sort of font (9)
A charade of BAP (bread ‘roll’) plus TISMAL, a reversal (‘back’) of LA (‘the Spanish’, feminine for a change) plus MS (manuscript, ‘writing’) plus ‘it’.
23 PANIC Alarm call all ignored: I sleep, turning over (5)
A reversal (‘turning over’) of ‘C[alll]’ minus ALL (‘all ignored’) plus ‘I’ plus NAP (‘sleep’).
24 EARMARK Set aside weapon stocked by English vessel (7)
An envelope (‘stocked by’) of ARM (‘weapon’) in E (‘English’) plus ARK (‘vessel’).
25 CROATIA Spies gathering nothing in desert country (7)
A double envelope (‘gathering’ and ‘in’) of O (‘nothing’) in RAT (‘desert’) in CIA (‘spies’).
26 VICE-PRESIDENT Politician failing to offer wrapping papers (4-9)
A charade of VICE (‘failing’) plus PRESIDENT, an envelope (‘wrapping’) of ID (identity ‘papers’) in PRESENT (‘offer’).
Down
2 OUTFITTER Not in closet, sexier clothes come from here (9)
A charade of OUT (‘not in closet’) plus FITTER (‘sexier’. I raised an eyebrow at this, but among its definitions of fit, Chambers gives “highly attractive, sexually desirable (inf)”).
3 ROGUE Bad sort of accent British dropped (5)
[b]ROGUE (‘accent’) minus the B (‘British dropped’).
4 ATTIC Greek has an idiosyncrasy when stammering? (5)
A T-TIC (‘an idiosyncrasy when stammering’).
5 SURPRISES Society rebels about Republican’s bombshells (9)
An envelope (‘about’) of R (‘Republican’) in S (‘society’) plus UPRISES (‘rebels’).
6 ATTRITION Grinding rock into art with this, oddly (9)
An anagram (‘rock’) of ‘into art’ plus TI (‘ThIs oddly’)’
7 ERATO Elevated books exist as a source of inspiration (5)
A reversal (‘elevated’ in a down light) of OT (Old Testament, ‘books’) plus ARE (‘exist’), for the muse of lyric poetry.
8 AUGEAN STABLES Awfully at sea, as bungle is a mess for Labour (6,7)
An anagram (‘awfully’) of ‘at sea as bungle’. The definition refers to one of Herakles’ labours, the cleaning of the Augean Stables.
9 METAPHYSICIAN He’s concerned with being satisfied by a doctor (13)
A charade of MET (‘satisfied’) plus ‘a’ plus PHYSICIAN (‘doctor’).
15 DUNSINANE Demands to settle on silly Scottish hill (9)
A charade of DUNS (‘demands to settle’ money owed) plus INANE (‘silly’), for the landmark featured in Macbeth.
16 BOOKMAKER Might one interest better  author? (9)
Double definition.
17 LEXINGTON Showing muscle, topless fashion in American battle scene (9)
A charade of [f]LEXING (‘showing muscle’) minus its first letter (‘topless’, appropriate for a down light) plus TON (‘fashion’). The battle scene might be in Massachusetts, for the opening battle of the Revolutionary War, or in Missouri, for either of two engagements in the Civil War.
21 PARSI Knock over Sikh, half-cut Indian believer (5)
A charade of PAR, a reversal (‘over’) of RAP (‘knock’), plus ‘SI[kh]’ minus its second half (‘half-cut’).
22 LOCUS Back away from crazy American place (5)
A charade of LOC[o] (‘crazy’) minus its last letter (‘back away’) plus US (‘American’).
23 PROUD Dig around radioactive metal that’s sticking out (5)
An envelope (‘around’) of U (chemical symbol, uranium, ‘radioactive metal’) in PROD (‘dig’).
completed grid

23 comments on “Guardian Cryptic 27,389 by Picaroon”

  1. After filling in BISMILLAH, I was hoping to see SCARAMOUCHE or BEELZEBUB among the other entries, but no such luck.

    Thanks Picaroon and PeterO!

  3. Another excellent puzzle from Picaroon. I hope everyone had a very good Christmas Day and continue to enjoy the rest of the festive season.

  4. An entertaining mixture – some gentle and some pretty tricky, particularly to parse, but all as well crafted as ever.

    Thanks to Picaroon and PeterO

  5. Thanks Picaroon and PeterO

    RAT RACE was my only across entry on first pass; fortunately the downs were easier, though the RHS took some time. I had to use a wordsearch for BISMILLAH, a word I was unfamiliar with. OK crossword, but not as much fun as Picaroon usually is for me.

  6. Thanks to Picaroon and PeterO. Lots of fun, though I had some bumps along the road. BISMILLAH gave me trouble, not just because the word was new to me but also because I did not know BISH = error.  With CARNIVORA I started out looking for a “festivity,” not an “order” and initially I did not see “jockey” as an anagrind for NEXUS. LOI was AUGEAN STABLES where I needed all the crossers – and much enjoyed the messy result.

  7. Thanks to Picaroon and PeterO for clarifying some of the parsing which failed me. Got there in the end but required some guessing and dictionary checking to complete, particularly with 8d and 16a which were unfamiliar. As ACD spent too long focussing on festivity for 13a, until the penny finally dropped. Overall an enjoyable and quite challenging solve. Enjoy the rest of the festivities all.

  8. OUTFITTER fell into place straightaway, since OUT made me think of gay slang, in which FIT means ‘sexy’ — see the gay personals  in Craigslist, for example.

  9. Quite liked this although I had a lot of trouble with the parsing of several on offer here. CARNIVORA almost defeated me and was LOI. I liked NOTED and BAPTISMAL. VICE PRESIDENT raised a smile and I was glad of the two long anagrams.
    Thanks Picaroon.

    Ps. A belated Merry Christmas to you all.

  10. I liked this a lot, as is usual with Picaroon, but was stumped by the parsing of BAPTISMAL – thanks to PeterO. Favourites were CARNIVORA, EARMARK, SURPRISES and AUGEAN STABLES. Seasons greetings to all!

  12. John Wells @8

    Your explanation of “fit” amused me.

    Here “up in t’north” fit means attractive whatever the sex of the beholder or the beheld (hetero or homo).

    This was common usage when I was a lad in the 60s/70s so the “gays” have nicked it from us. (Cheek)

    Nice puzzle by the way.

  13. A toughie – but got there in the end!  Failed to parse OUTFITTER and LEXINGTON.  I was thinking of OUT as simple antonym of IN, so “closet” baffled me – and like Peter, I’m dubious about FITTER = “sexier”.  Not in my experience!  As to LEXINGTON – it was my LOI (after I got NEXUS it was obvious!) – and I was just too tired to figure out the parsing.

    Some pretty fiendish definitions.  I should have remembered “Labour” (of Herakles) and “Order” (of animals) but today isn’t the best day for the old grey-matter!

    Oh and could we please have a moratorium on “OR” for “men” or “soldiers”.  It’s come up so many times, surely the outdated abbreviation only ever occurs in Grauniad crosswords nowadays!

    Is there a theme?  Can’t see one.

    Thanks to Picars and Peter.

  14. Sadly for you FD “OR” does appear in the dictionary.

    There is no indication of it being “arhaic” or “out of use” so perhaps your personal dislike of this abreviation won’t persuade the rest of the crossowrd community to ignore it. :-).

    We shall see.

  17. lurkio@14,15: lots of other people on 15² have moaned about OR in the past – it’s not just me!

    My point is – it’s so predictable that whenever I see “men” or “soldiers” or similar, in the clue, my mind now goes into autopilot: it whirrs on totally outside my control, looking to see if OR is somewhere in the word.  As indeed it was, in this case!

    After it’s happened so many times before, this gets boring.  If a setter wants to clue the letters OR, there are so many other ways to do it!  What I’m griping about is that this device is no longer entertaining.  At least, not to me.  I want to see something new!

    But it’s the only blemish, to my mind, in what is otherwise a superb puzzle.

  18. But aren’t you missing something FD?

    There are hundreds of similar conventional inicators/charades which the experienced solvers are very familiar with. Often they have a multitude of meanings as “men” could lead to “OR” or be used to indicate a chess piece (“one of the men”) just as an example. It is this familiarity that setters use to mislead us when they are used perhaps purely as normal fodder but in a way to lead us up the garden path.

    So surely this framework of familiarity is very inportant.

  20. Frankie@19 – it comes from the French word ton – meaning, amongst other things, ‘tone’ or ‘style’, hence ‘fashion’.  The word has some usage in English.

  22. Frankie the cat @ 19

    ‘Ton’ means fasion – from the French. It is one of the definitions in Collins online dictionary. It’s worth remembering as it comes up fairly frequently in crosswords.

Comments are closed.