The puzzle may be found at https://www.theguardian.com/crosswords/cryptic/27553.
As always, I am happy to find that the blog allocated to me is an Arachne: not too difficult, but so satisfying. The anniversary signalled itself directly, which was a good start.
| Across | ||
| 1, 5, 9 | NATIONAL HEALTH SERVICE | Corrupt “haves” all at once inherit our greatest public asset (8,6,7) |
| An anagram (‘corrupt’) of ‘haves all at once inherit’ gives the anniversary, introduced by Aneurin Bevan on 5th July 1948. | ||
| 5 | See 1 | |
| 9 | See 1 | |
| 10 | JURYMEN | People in court to condemn Jeremy Hunt neglecting the sick (7) |
| An anagram (‘to condemn’) of ‘jer[e]my [h]un[t]’ minus (‘neglecting’) an anagram (‘sick’) of ‘the’. | ||
| 11 | OBAMA | First to admire Mr Aneurin Bevan, our revolutionary 5 reformer? (5) |
| Initial letters (‘first to’) of ‘Admire Mr Aneurin Bevan Our’ reversed (‘revolutionary’), for the US President who championed what is now known as Obamacare, and which the Republicans are hell-bent to counter. | ||
| 12 | DISSECTOR | Be rude about ’Arry, chap with scalpel (9) |
| A charade of DISS (‘be rude about’) plus ‘ECTOR (”Arry’, if my standard notation does not confuse matters too much). | ||
| 13 | LIVERISHNESS | Rebellious 1 5 9 donning uniforms with singular irritability (12) |
| An envelope (‘donning’) of SHN, an anagram (‘rebellious’) of NHS (National Health Service, ‘1 5 9’) in LIVERIES (‘uniforms’) plus S (‘singular’). | ||
| 17 | CALENDARISED | Allocated by month: care reduced, deadlines trashed (12) |
| An anagram (‘trashed’) of ‘car[e]’ minus its last letter (‘reduced’) plus ‘deadlines’. | ||
| 20 | NEURALGIA | Pain of north European country losing monarch (9) |
| A charade of N (‘north’) plus EUR (‘European’) plus ALG[er]IA (‘country’) minus ER (‘losing monarch’). | ||
| 22 | OPERA | Theatre cancelling 50% of surgical procedures (5) |
| The first half (‘50%’) of OPERA[tions] (‘surgical procedures’). | ||
| 23 | IMAGERS | Current wife describing time in MRI machines? (7) |
| An envelope (‘describing’) of AGE (‘time’) in I (physics symbol, ‘current’) plus MRS. (‘wife’). | ||
| 24 | INTONED | “Skint!”, one dental nurse said monotonously (7) |
| A hidden answer (‘nurse’ – that raises an eyebrow. Can it be justified as a noun, meaning something like “the thing which is nursed”?) in ‘skINT ONE Dental’. | ||
| 25 | NEEDLE | Require extremely large hypodermic? (6) |
| A charade of NEED (‘require’) plus LE (‘extremely LargE‘). | ||
| 26 | ON STREAM | Available drug seized by frantic matrons (2,6) |
| An envelope (‘seized’) of E (‘drug’) in ONSTRAM, an anagram (‘frantic’) of ‘matrons’. | ||
| Down | ||
| 1 | NESTOR | Regularly sneers at poor old counsellor (6) |
| Alternate letters (‘regularly’) of ‘sNeErS aT pOoR‘, for the character in Homer. | ||
| 2 | THREAD | Hospital study following Bert’s last suture (6) |
| A charade of T (‘BerT‘s last’) plus H (‘hospital’) plus READ (‘study’). | ||
| 3 | OXIDATION | Rusting, lidless box hid a can containing nothing (9) |
| A charade of ‘[b]ox [h]id’ minus their first letters (‘lidless’) plus ‘a’ plus TION, an envelope (‘containing’) of O (‘nothing’) in TIN (‘can’). | ||
| 4 | ABERDEEN ANGUS | Ensure bandage moved lower (8,5) |
| An anagram (‘moved’) of ‘ensure bandage’, for the breed of cattle. | ||
| 6 | EERIE | Superior neighbour sounded weird (5) |
| A homophone (‘sounded’) of ERIE (Great Lake, ‘Superior neighbour’). | ||
| 7 | LIME TREE | Are still taking pulse, for example of Flora (4,4) |
| An envelope (‘taking’) of METRE (‘pulse’, of a poem or song) in LIE (‘are still’). | ||
| 8 | HUNTRESS | Barbarians entertaining very French lady after game (8) |
| An envelope (‘entertaining’) of TRES (‘very French’) in HUNS (‘barbarians’). | ||
| 10 | JUSTIFICATION | Right now I fib about blood group, for good reason (13) |
| A charade of JUST (‘right now’ as in “I have right now received a crushing blow”) plus ‘I’ plus FICATION, an envelope (‘about’) of A (‘blood group’) in FICTION (‘fib’, noun). | ||
| 14 | HAEMOSTAT | Sat at home twirling surgical instrument (9) |
| An anagram (‘twirling’) of ‘sat at home’. | ||
| 15 | SCANSION | 10 new non-invasive procedures advanced the study of feet (8) |
| A charade of SCANS (‘non-invasive procedures’) plus IO (’10’) plus N (‘new’), with ‘advanced’ indicating the order of the particles. Like the ‘pulse’ in 7D, the feet are in a poem. | ||
| 16 | ILL-USAGE | American stops small community rejecting very bad treatment (3-5) |
| An envelope (‘stops’) of US (‘American’) in [v]ILLAGE (‘small community’) minus the V (‘rejecting very’). | ||
| 18 | SEANCE | Attempt to raise spirits of Irishman with case of champagne (6) |
| A charade of SEAN (‘Irishman’) plus CE (‘case of ChampagnE‘). | ||
| 19 | TANDEM | One behind the other in Accident & Emergency (6) |
| With emendation of AND for ‘&’, a hidden answer in ‘AccidenT AND EMergency’. TANDEM is a wordpaly on the Latin, meaning “at length”. | ||
| 21 | AREAL | Local London football team spurned by Poles (5) |
| A subtraction: AR[s]E[n]AL (‘London football team’) minus (‘spurned by’) SN (‘poles’). | ||
Thanks Arachne and PeterO.
Yes the NHS was immediate, as I am sure it will be for many solvers.
I found this on the very easy side for an Arachne.
So confident was I that 6d was ELDER, that I was surprised, and annoyed with myself, when I used the REVEAL
I don’t get lower as a breed of cattle
“The cattle are lowing, the baby awakes…”
Regarding 6d. The shortest distance between Lakes Erie and Superior is over 300 miles, or about the same as London to Edinburgh. Even by American standards, not quite a neighbour, or even a neighbor.
Stee@2 – a bit of a crossword chestnut – the sound that cows make is ‘lowing’.
I loved it. An important anniversary.6d doesnt bother me as they are two of the five great lakes.
Yes, a gentle canter cf yesterday’s Philharmonic. That said, I had to verify several dnks: haemostat, the adjective areal and scansion which I vaguely remembered; all clearly gettable though. And though I knew Bevan was a reformer I was antipodeanly ignorant of his role in the NHS. Hey ho.
Thanks Arachne and PeterO.
Gentle it may have been but equally nothing to induce 13a
Thanks to Arachne for the celebratory crossword and to PeterO for the explanations
Thanks Arachne and PetrO
Very clever, but not as much fun as usual with Arachne. The Special Instructions made 1 etc. a gift, so it was a rapid solve (though I didn’t parse LIVERISHNESS).
Favourite was JURYMEN.
Thank you PeterO.
This is one of my top 3 setters but, I have to say, I prefer her offerings unbound by a theme.
Having said that SCANSION was a sublime misdirect and CALENDARISED has a lovely surface.
Struggled a but to equate ‘right now’ with ‘just’ in JUSTIFICATION but our blogger’s example is just about OK for me.
All over rather too quickly, sadly, but enjoyable nonetheless.
Nice day, all.
Thanks Arachne and PeterO. A rapid solve for me too but I enjoyed it immensely. Arachne’s clues seduce with the surface, then use subtle deviousness to veil her meaning before dissolving to reveal the impeccably clued answer. And typically marshals those answers and clues into a social message. Masterly.
I justified ‘nurse’ in 24ac from considering the cryptic grammar as “3 words nurse (hidden answer which means) …”
It seems this was one time that not being a UK resident helped. The special instructions and Mr AB hint were no help to me and I had to solve 1,5,9 as an anagram, with a bit of backwards help from 11ac. So that was a pleasant PDM for me rather than the giveaway for commenters here and on the Guardian site.
Excellent! Only marred for me by LIVERISHNESS and SCANSION which were a bit too difficult.
Ingenious uses of the theme.
Actually KLColin just beat me to it to give a better summary in the first sentence than I could hope to verbalise.
I made a mess of EERIE (couldn’t get the lakes link, nor see how an eyrie fitted in), but a very enjoyable Arachne as always. Loved IMAGERS, ABERDEEN ANGUS and SEANCE. Many thanks to A and P.
Thanks, PeterO.
Like copmus, I loved it [and I’m with him re EERIE]. When Arachne has a theme, there’s always some serious point to it and there were some great points made here, with plenty of the customary wit in the surfaces – 10, 12, 22, 26ac and 10, 14and 19dn, for instance. I loved the ‘study of feet’ and ‘attempt to raise spirits’.
[I took a phone call in the middle of writing this and, like pex, now see that KLColin has said it all so well. And I read ‘nurse’ in 24ac as he did, too.]
Stee @2 – as geof @5 says, lower in that sense is a classic: just last week, Vlad gave us ‘Lower rent after Ray’s moved (8)’ for AYRSHIRE.
Many thanks, as ever, to Arachne – lovely puzzle.
Enjoyable puzzle, as Arachne’s tend to be, but I did think the special instructions were a bit of a spoiler: I got the first three clues from them and the letter count alone, which in turn made the top half a bit of a write-in (and I place myself very much towards the novice end of the spectrum of solvers on this site).
Thanks to blogger and setter!
Same as Hack@16. Many thanks A and P.
Agree with Hack @16.
A disappointingly easy puzzle.
Thanks to A and P all the same.
Thanks both,
Some lovely surfaces, especially 16d.
Thanks for the blog. In 13a I don’t think that it is an anagram of NHS, just a reversal of the letters. I didn’t twig the parsing of eerie or scansion.
Tyngewick@19, but does 16d warrant a hyphen? Ill-used yes, but…?
Like others, I got 1,5,9 without having to think much about the clue because the special instruction was there! But what a super clue nevertheless, and an equally super one to follow it (JURYMEN).
The only blemish was ‘Superior neighbour’ in the clue for EERIE, as first pointed out by Dr Whatson @4.
The toughest clues were for CALENDARISED and AREAL, neither of which I have come across (to the best of my knowledge).
I too could have tried to write something lyrical about both the craftmanship of the clues in this crossword and the way the theme was woven into it and added interest to it. But despite coming here much earlier than usual I find that it’s all been said! I thought yesterday’s Philistine would be a hard act to follow, but Arachne has done it.
Thanks to Arachne and PeterO.
The usual great surfaces and clues from the spiderwoman.
I can understand the query about ‘neighbour’ in 6; would ‘partner’ or some such have been better? I think the rider was unnecessary as it did make NHS rather a write-in. ILL-USAGE is hyphenated in Chambers, so that seems to be kosher.
Good clue and anagram for ABERDEEN ANGUS, and I particularly liked SCANSION and the well-hidden INTONED.
Thanks to Arachne and PeterO.
Thanks to Arachne and PeterO. Sounds like I found this a bit more difficult than most. I thought at first it was going to be easy, with lots going in on the first few passes. However lime tree held my up (not on the solving but the parsing) and then got stuck in the SW. Last ones in were scansion, imagers and areal. It was just a case of getting one and then working on the crossers. I actually liked liverishness along with dissector, and thanks again to Arachne and PeterO.
Easy but fun and a tour de force with so many medical mentions in both clues and solutions. Thanks Arachne.
A very enjoyable puzzle! I echo everything stated by KLColin @11 in his first, second, and especially third paragraphs.
Many thanks to Arachne and PeterO and the other commenters.
Thank you Arachne and PeterO.
A lovely puzzle, only regret is that the term ‘Matron’ has been replaced by ‘Senior Nursing Officer’, why couldn’t the male equivalent have been called ‘Patron’, at least on the wards ?
Because of the new layout in my print-off of the cryptics, I failed to read the Special Instructions which were at the side and not at the top. This proved to be a major oversight. I had to come here to realise that it was not just a medically-themed puzzle but much more than that. I wondered who Mr Aneurin Bevan might be in 11a, so the significance of the surface of that clue eluded me even though I got OBAMA from the first letters and could see it was linked to Obamacare.
I also had an unparsed EYRIE at 8d so really this was a DNF for me, but now I can see that one was a very clever clue.
My favourite was 13a LIVERISHNESS, which reminded me of what my dear old Dad used say if one of the children in the family woke up grumpy: “What’s wrong, have you got “S.O.L.?”. I didn’t understand that abbreviation until I was much older!
Thanks to Arachne for a great puzzle (even though I missed the point), and to PererO for the elucidation. An interesting blog too, so thanks to contributors.
Sorry PeTerO!
A tour de force of brilliant setting. JURYMEN was my favourite, and I learned a new word in AREAL. I am not convinced the special instruction added anything, though I suppose it might have persuaded a few more occasional solvers to have a go.
Thanks to Arachne and PeterO
Thanks to Arachne and PeterO. Great fun, as usual from this setter. Here in the US the opening NHS clue was not a write-in but still gettable and made a good start. The AE in HAEMOSTAT gave me trouble, I needed help parsing LIME TREE, and ABERDEEN ANGUS was my LOI (I needed all the crossers).
My “neighbourly” comment about 6d earlier met with mixed responses, but on thinking about it further I have a bit more to say. Firstly, maybe there is no perfect substitute. I cannot think of any common word that means “belonging to the same set”, certainly not “belonging to the same geographic set”. Furthermore, would you say that Sussex and Yorkshire are neighbours because they are both English counties? Probably not … but an American might! What I’m suggesting here, and this is pure conjecture, is that where the speaker is located makes a difference. I’m living in the States right now and one of those two lakes is within a day’s drive, the other isn’t, so they clearly don’t FEEL like neighbours. For someone living in the UK or Australia, say, any map with a large enough scale to show both their home and the Great Lakes might give the impression that Superior and Erie were right next door to each other.
Dr. Whatson @32, there is a significant difference between the terms ‘next-door neighbour’ and ‘neighbour’.
PS, one of Lake Superior’s next-door neighbours is Lake Huron, but Lake Erie is also a neighbour.
Dr. Whatson @32 et al., I also initially wondered about the word “neighbour” when referring to Lakes Superior and Erie, at the time of solving 6d … but once I considered what the setter’s options were, I was OK with it. It would not be a very satisfying cryptic clue if it were “Huron neighbour sounded weird” or “Ontario neighbour…”!
Dr Whatson @32 and other commenters
I would just like to make the point in this mini-debate that we are talking about a series of interconnected freshwater lakes that we see on a map (and of course from space). They might as well be states in the USA (for example). But they are not houses in a street. When we talk about neighbouring states we mean those states that are touching (on a map) the one referred to, not those that are one removed from those neighbouring states. The Great Lakes are not ‘next to’ each other in the same way, of course, but on a map it is reasonable – more than whimsical – to say, for example, that Lake Superior, Lake Huron and Lake Michigan neighbour each other, or are ‘neighbours’. Lake Superior and Lake Erie are not neighbours.
That was what I had in mind when I commented on this clue earlier. One commenter said it didn’t ‘bother’ him. Well, it didn’t bother me either, but I still thought the clue was at fault in quite a minor way.
Good puzzle with the theme adding to the enjoyment. Maybe crossword chestnuts, but I still liked ‘lower’ in 4d and ‘the study of feet’ in 15d.
I understand from Chambers that it’s an accounting term, but I still think CALENDARISED is a very unappealing word.
As a bonus, I’ve learnt something about the geography of the Great Lakes.
Thanks to Arachne and PeterO.
Enjoyed today’s puzzle despite knowing nothing about the theme.NHS was easily got but struggled with Aberdeen Angus and Scansion.
Thanks Arachne and PeterO
Alan B @36, the lakes are all in the same neighbourhood, that of the Great Lakes …
Most of this was rather easy but I got stuck in the SW- story of my life really, as I live in Devon- with CALENDARISED and AREAL. SCANSION took a while as well,I’m ashamed to say. Still,a very nice puzzle and a worthy theme. Let’s hope the current government don’t vandalize it further.
Thanks Arachne.
Cookie @39
First, thank you for your brief comment challenging my conclusion – I do like the resourceful way in which you stick up for the setter, and you make a good point.
Are the Great Lakes really a ‘neighbourhood’? If so, I concede.
A thoroughly appropriate tribute to the NHS and the great service it provides under extreme pressure and underfunding. Also a great tribute to my fellow countryman the great Aneurin Bevan. Thanks Arachne and Peter O
Good stuff as always from this setter and although the 1,5,9 start was a gimme for UK solvers, there was plenty of meat to be found elsewhere.
HAEMOSTAT, SCANSION & AREAL were new additions to my vocabulary and it took me quite a while to satisfactorily parse all the elements of LIVERISHNESS.
Top three for me were IMAGERS, NEEDLES and SEANCE.
Many thanks to Arachne and to PeterO for the blog.
Alan B @41, from “The Girl’s Reading-book in Prose and Poetry : For Schools”, by Lydia Howard Sigourney.
The eider duck is found in great numbers, amid the perpetual snow and ice of Greenland, Iceland and Norway. Sometimes they are seen in the neighbourhood of our great lakes and in the Northern parts of the United States.
hmmm
Read the comments here with interest. As a Canadian (now living in the States) in elementary school we were given a mnemonic HOMES to remember the names of the great lakes. Of course, that meant that Erie was always listed immediately next to Superior. For those of you interested in their geography, you cannot do better than read or watch Paddle to the Sea. My COTD of Séance, which I thought terrific. I’m used to OHIP instead of the NHS, but it was gettable. Thanks to Arachne and PeterO.
DNF but got a decent chunk and all very enjoyable…but if ‘calendarise’ is really now a proper word I’m tempted to give up English and learn a sensible language!
I didn’t much enjoy this.
As has been said the “Special Instructions” made the first clue an immediate write in. The rest of the clues were almost all as easy. (In fact some were even easier)
The only slight surprise was that Arachne allowed a sexist word such as JURYMEN to appear in one of her crosswords. 😉
It would appear that either my PC or the Guardian website agreed with this and tried to introduce some level of difficulty. The “Anagram Helper” wasn’t working as it entered blank squares for any letter in the word already entered in the puzzle. This of course made it useless. However coping without this useful tool was no problem with this facile puzzle.
Very disappointing.
lurkio @ 47
Why is JURYMEN sexist? A jury is composed of jurymen and jurywomen, and the clue just said ‘people in court’, which would include judges/magistrates, clerks, lawyers, witnesses, the public and more. Are you suggesting that any term which also has an other-gender variant is inadmissible in crosswords? That would be ridiculous.
Cookie @44
There’s more to neighbours and neighbourhoods than I ever thought possible!
Surely when you say ‘in the neighbourhood of our great lakes’ you mean in the neighbourhood of each of those lakes. In my last comment I asked “Are the Great Lakes really a neighbourhood?”, and my honest answer is “No.” But if you think otherwise, and you think the quote from Lydia Howard Sigourney supports that, please say. (I’m quite happy if we have different views on this minor but interesting point.)
Alan B @49, did you notice the spelling of ‘neighbourhood’ not the nowadays American one – the reader was published in 1841 – however, I agree with her description since the land surrounding the lakes has many small lakes, rivers etc. in it.
Cookie @50
[Perhaps the US spelling reforms inspired or dictated by Noah Webster took effect later.]
Ha, despite solving on the newspaper, I completely missed the introductory comment. That possibly made unraveling the puzzle all the more fun. A lovely tribute with some pithy commentary in the surfaces.
A what a brilliantly put together puzzle it is. All cross clues themed and most of the down ones.
i had equated just=right and didn’t see where now came from, so thanks PeterO.
And many thanks Arachne
Simon S @48 – not ridiculous; Guardian policy.
The Guardian Style Guide says the following, in reference to the use of “actor”:
“Use for both male and female actors; do not use actress except when in name of award, eg Oscar for best actress. The Guardian’s view is that actress comes into the same category as authoress, comedienne, manageress, “lady doctor”, “male nurse” and similar obsolete terms that date from a time when professions were largely the preserve of one sex (usually men). As Whoopi Goldberg put it in an interview with the paper: “An actress can only play a woman. I’m an actor – I can play anything.”
“There is normally no need to differentiate between the sexes – and if there is, the words male and female are perfectly adequate: Lady Gaga won a Brit in 2010 for best international female artist, not artiste, chanteuse, or songstress.”
The Readers’ Editor has kindly confirmed that the Style Guide and the Editorial Code apply to the crossword as to any other content of the Guardian newspaper and website.
Excellent puzzle,just like the NHS for all the people not just the elite!
VW @ 53
You hoist yourself with your own petard. “There is normally no need to differentiate between the sexes…” In tis case Arachne needed to do it, so it’s justified. It’s also in dictionaries, so fair game.
VW @53: the word “actress” appears quite frequently in the Guardian crossword. The most memorable example recently (for me) was in Paul’s brilliant clue for DREW BARRYMORE (27,523, 31 May) where it was part of the clue. (And we had HUNTRESS today.)
So it doesn’t seem that the style guide is applied very rigidly to the crossword.
Simon S @55 – why did Arachne need to do it? Because MALE JURORS wouldn’t fit the grid? In any case, I was arguing about your general point on ridiculousness, rather than the specific case of JURYMEN.
Lord Jim @56 – just because the policies are applied laxly does not mean they do not exist. Following complaints, there has been a notable decline in recent years in the use of anagram indicators based on mental and physical incapacity. Sexism presumably is next on the list. Personally I find it curious (rather than tragic) that Arachne in particular should be cluing HUNTRESS and referring to “lady” instead of “woman”.
In the US we generally refer to the Great Lakes Region. I’d guess that’d be a neighborhood on a larger scale.
For 6d I had EYRIE, a lofty nest or any high habitation, hence “superior”. Eyrie is a homonym for EERIE or weird, the second, subsidiary part of the clue. Not a lake in sight.
Not sure if anyone is still around, but I was just wondering why ‘describing’ in 23ac and ‘stops’ in 16d are indicators of envelopes?
vikingson @60
I think ‘stops’ is fine, the sense being “to plug” (so that AB stops CD would result in CABD). ‘describing’ is a little more dubious: I had thought of a meaning like encompass, but cannot find much support for it – the nearest being ‘”to trace the outline” of a geometric figure (so that AB describing CD would give ACDB).
PeterO @60
Thank you so much; especially for also including the two ABCD examples. I will try and use that technique if I get stuck on similar envelopes.