The Observer crossword from Aug 5, 2018
I went pretty slow through this fine crossword. That was probably because my head was still filled with music after my stay at ….
…. the Cambridge Folk Festival [more or less in my back garden] that weekend. What I learnt was that the word ‘Folk’ has quite a few meanings, apparently.
Local band Morganway and First Aid Kit were absolutely wonderful, but Folk?
Anyway, it took me quite some time to properly stare at puzzles again in the beginning of the week that lies behind us.
Conclusion? I’m not the right person to ask whether this was an easy, an average or a hard Everyman crossword.
But, as ever, many thanks to the setter!
Definitions are underlined wherever possible and/or appropriate.
| Across | ||
| 1 | RELISH | Love from scoundrel is hollow (6) |
| Hidden answer [from]: scoundrel is hollow | ||
| 4 | ASSEMBLE | Disorder in retreat contained by skilful marshal (8) |
| Reversal [in retreat] of MESS (disorder), going inside ABLE (skilful) | ||
| 9 | HUMDRUM | Pal discarding clubs and diamonds? Odd routine (7) |
| CHUM (pal) minus the C (clubs) at the start, followed by D (diamonds) + RUM (odd) | ||
| 11 | OFFHAND | Casual worker, bad at first (7) |
| HAND (worker), preceded by OFF (bad) | ||
| 12 | ANNAPURNA | Pavlova, say, almost immaculate, not available as part of range (9) |
| ANNA (Pavlova, for example) + PUR[e] (immaculate, almost) + N/A (not available) A bit of GK here. Anna Pavlova (1881-1931) was perhaps the most famous ballerina of her generation. More about her here . And the answer, Annapurna, which actually did ring a bell with me, is a (very high) massif in the Himalayas. |
||
| 13 | CLEAN | Fair copy initially accompanied by spare (5) |
| C[opy] + LEAN (spare) | ||
| 14 | FRED FLINTSTONE | Cartoon character‘s not left friends in trouble (4,10) |
| Anagram [in trouble] of NOT LEFT FRIENDS Yabba dabba doo! |
||
| 17 | COPPER-BOTTOMED | Reliable element beginning to beat excessive protest back (6-8) |
| COPPER (element, Cu) + B[eat] + OTT (excessive, over the top) + a reversal [back] of DEMO (protest) | ||
| 21 | TUDOR | Member of dynasty bringing defeat about, seizing day (5) |
| Reversal [bringing … about] of ROUT (defeat), going around D (day) | ||
| 23 | ORIGINATE | Found spirit with answer during old ceremony (9) |
| GIN (spirit) + A (answer), together inside O (old) RITE (ceremony) | ||
| 24 | TSARIST | Adherent of emperor in dire straits (7) |
| Anagram [dire] of STRAITS But certainly not in Dire Straits! |
||
| 25 | GLOWING | Tips in general due to be favourable (7) |
| G[enera]L + OWING (due) | ||
| 26 | CONTRARY | Deception by artist in attempt to be perverse (8) |
| CON (deception) + {RA (artist) inside TRY (attempt)} | ||
| 27 | SONNET | Poem shown in text at regular intervals (6) |
| Regular letter selection taken from: shown in text | ||
| Down | ||
| 1 | REHEAT | Area in ether unusually warm again (6) |
| A (area) inside an anagram [unusually] of ETHER | ||
| 2 | LEMON DROP | Decline to support useless person? Sweet (5,4) |
| LEMON (useless person), followed by DROP (decline) | ||
| 3 | SCRAPED | Grazed in fight before end, losing heart (7) |
| SCRAP (fight) + E[n]D | ||
| 5 | STOP AT NOTHING | Hint on past got broadcast? Be ruthless (4,2,7) |
| Anagram [broadcast] of HINT ON PAST GOT | ||
| 6 | EFFECTS | Carries out belongings (7) |
| Double definition | ||
| 7 | BRAKE | Restraint from cook about right (5) |
| BAKE (cook) around R (right) | ||
| 8 | ENDANGER | Put at risk, destroy bug (8) |
| END (destroy) + ANGER (bug, as a verb, I guess) | ||
| 10 | MORALE BOOSTER | Good robot, see, working? It raises confidence (6,7) |
| MORAL (good) + an anagram [working] of ROBOT SEE | ||
| 15 | OPERATION | Running exercises covered by speech (9) |
| PE (exercises, physical education) going inside ORATION (speech) | ||
| 16 | ECSTATIC | Rapturous quote coming up about new cast (8) |
| Reversal [coming up] of CITE (quote), going around an anagram [new] of CAST | ||
| 18 | EARLIER | Former king after attention with story (7) |
| EAR (attention) + LIE (story), followed by R (king, Rex) | ||
| 19 | ORINOCO | Hunter mostly bearing north above Colorado river (7) |
| ORION (hunter) minus the N at the end, going around N (north), then: + CO (Colorado) Seeing the name Orinoco always makes me think of that (in)famous Enya song. Everyman made quite an effort to move the N one place forward, didn’t he? |
||
| 20 | WEIGHT | In hearing, stand by bias (6) |
| Homophone [in hearing] of WAIT (stand by) | ||
| 22 | DRAWN | Tense, like match going to penalties? (5) |
| Double definition For the non-sporting types: when a game is a draw, then no-one wins and (often) in the end a decision will be forced through a penalty shootout. We’re talking about football, of course. We’re not talking cricket. |
||
Lucky you Sil, being so near to the Cambridge Folk Festival. I bet Cropredy isn’t too far away either.
Anyway, I made very slow progress with this puzzle and even put a wrong one in : I put OPERATING instead of OPERATION as it seemed to fit better. I should have left off the last two letters until I was sure of the answer but being cavalier to the end, I just wrote it in without thinking. So, I was left with three answers that I nearly gave up on. However,persistence rules the day and I finished it finally. The last one was EARLIER which it took ages to get.
Thanks to Sil and Everyman.
Thank you Everyman for a pleasant puzzle and Sil for the blog – hope you enjoyed the music.
I was fooled by 4a for a while trying to think of a famous, or infamous, marshal, only Pétain would come to mind, and, like Davy @1, I was tempted to enter OPERATING at 15d, but it had to be SONNET at 27a.
Again some good anagrams, those for FRED FLINTSTONE and STOP AT NOTHING.
Many thanks to both for an entertaining wee while. Everything went in fine although I had to check ANNAPURNA afterwards as it was a hazy memory from somewhere.
Um, Sil, you might like to correct the little typo in your answer to 26a.
The cartoon character took me ages until I had most of the crossers and that then brought a laugh as I used to watch the programme when younger. 10d also took some time to work out and it was one I parsed after, but it had to be that.
No idea where that P was coming from.
Done now! 🙂
Back into it after 3 weeks touring Cambodia & Vietnam. I printed off the 3 Everymans from the Guardian site before I left but couldn’t manage to finish them. Interested to know if others found the last few weeks’ harder than this one, or was it just my brain not working so well in a foreign environment?
Thanks for an enjoyable puzzle. Strangely I didn’t get earlier or Tudor before I decided I’d had enough.
Paul@5 I found the last few weeks have been a mixed bag, but I am getting better at parsing them now so must be getting used to this setter.
My favourite this week was Copper Bottomed and was my first one in.
LOI
4Ac
i always thought a Lemon was a useless thing like a dud machine, not necessarily a useless person. But there you go
Beautiful puzzle! And they say the Everyman is easy. I did a Chifonie during the week and it was A LOT easier than this one.
Enjoyed earlier, Orinoco, drawn, Tudor … actually there were several excellent clues.
@Vanessa, I’ve often used “lemon” to describe someone who was performing below par e.g. he’s a bit of a lemon.
Undone by Annapurna having heard of neither the ballerina nor the mountain. Couldn’t think beyond the rather sickly disgusting dessert actually. Eventually Googled it in.
Dire straits anag was nice. Earlier was LOI after exactly one hour.
Thanks Sil (unusual name, Dutch?) and Everyman