The most reliable setter there is. Thank you Azed.
| Across | ||
| 1 | CLAPTRAP | Composer’s wife getting grip of exercises with piano? Rubbish (8) |
| CLARA (Clara Schumann – a composer in her own right, not just the wife of one) contains (getting group of) PT (exercises) with P (piano) | ||
| 7 | ABBA | Camel hair coating successful group (4) |
| double definition | ||
| 11 | HOVA | Dominant Malagasies hard on drifters denied grants (4) |
| H (hard) and O’ (on) then VAgrants (drifters) missing GRANTS | ||
| 12 | HOMINOID | Ape concealed in old raincoat? The opposite (8) |
| O (old) MINO (raincoat) inside (in) HID (concealed) – the opposite concealed in old raincoat | ||
| 13 | LOSTE | Poet’s confused in fancy hotels, one of the taps having come off (5) |
| anagram (fancy) of hOTELS missing H (hot, one of the taps) | ||
| 14 | GOANNA | Lizard from Indian territory, North America (6) |
| GOAN (from Goa, Indian territory) then NA (North America) | ||
| 15 | OFF COLOURED | Food for clue as an anagram, unsatisfactory to jewellers (11) |
| anagram (as an anagram) of FOOD FOR CLUE | ||
| 19 | SHEEPO | NZ farm hand who may be ordered to hose pen endlessly (6) |
| anagram (who, the solution, may be ordered to) HOSE PEn (endlessly) | ||
| 20 | GARCIA | I peak, coming from behind, ahead of a top golfer (6) |
| I CRAG (peak) reversed (coming from behind) then (ahead of) A – Spanish golfer Sergio Garcia | ||
| 21 | MITRAL | Some popular timps backing, high-hat-like? (6) |
| found reversed (backing) inside popuLAR TIMps – ecclesiastical headwear like a high hat | ||
| 23 | LICHEN | Eruption, hot, in Iceland and going of explosively – little new (6) |
| H (hot) inside anagram (explosively) of ICELand missing (going off) AND then N (new, little=abbrev) – an eruption on the skin | ||
| 28 | CHIMAERIDAE | Family of fishes from America hide with camouflage (11) |
| anagram (with camouflage) of AMERICA HIDE | ||
| 29 | FAUTOR | Car protected by French patron (6) |
| AUTO (car) inside (protected by) FR (French) | ||
| 30 | KLIMT | Artist recalled exploit with centre of picture (5) |
| MILK ( |
||
| 31 | ASPHODEL | Flowering plant acquired from shop, deal negotiated (8) |
| anagram (negotiated) of SHOP DEAL | ||
| 32 | LEET | Unconventional writing system fast losing following (4) |
| fLEET (fast) missing F (following) – L33T or 1337 | ||
| 33 | YEST | Barmy stuff formerly essential for dyesters (4) |
| found inside (essential for) dYESTers – barm is yeast | ||
| 34 | RIDEABLE | Get cross about a bed, collapsed, that’s ‘ready to mount’? (8) |
| RILE (cross) contains (about) anagram (collapsed) of A BED | ||
| Down | ||
| 1 | CHLOASMA | Lady’s skin condition: one after opening has look inside (8) |
| A (one) follows CHASM (opening) containing LO (look) | ||
| 2 | LOOFAH | Scrubber prince put up pocketing cash (6) |
| HAL (prince, Harry from Shakespeare) reversed containing OOF (cash) | ||
| 3 | PATCHERY | Knavery in Shakespeare, irregular when the monarch’s involved (8) |
| PATCHY (irregular) containing (when…is involved) ER (monarch) | ||
| 4 | THEOW | Article that’s painful for old slave (5) |
| THE (definite article) has OW (that’s painful) | ||
| 5 | ROLL COLLAR | Neckline feature, dandy buttonhole? (10) |
| ROLL ( a dandy-roll) then COLLAR (buttonhole) | ||
| 6 | PIOUS | ‘Dutiful’, suggesting French ranker? (5) |
| PIOUS (piou plural) suggests piou-piou, a French soldier (ranker) | ||
| 8 | BONEACHE | Almost stranded, on being kept in – arthritic condition? (8) |
| BEACHEd (stranded, almost) contains ON | ||
| 9 | BINDHI | A ——, Asian, modifies appearance of Indian sahiba (6) |
| A BINDHI ASIAN is an anagram (modifies appearance of) INDIAN SAHIBA – definition is &lit | ||
| 10 | ADAW | A dimwit accounting for cow, old (4) |
| A DAW(dimwit) | ||
| 14 | GOGGLE-EYED | Watching too much TV, maybe, turn oddly edgy, filled with joy (10) |
| GO (turn) then anagram (oddly) of EDGY containing GLEE (joy) | ||
| 16 | KETCHUPS | More than one sauce vessel, vulgarly flashy? Tart obscured (8) |
| KETCH (vessel) then UPStart (vulgarly flashy) missing (obscured) TART | ||
| 17 | ORCHILLA | Dyestuff, rich, stirred in jar (8) |
| anagram (stirred) of RICH in OLLA (jar) | ||
| 18 | DANCETTE | Line that’s jagged, irregular etc penned by poet (8) |
| anagram (irregular) of ETC inside (penned by) DANTE (poet) | ||
| 22 | INCASE | Box as a precaution (6) |
| IN CASE (as a precaution) | ||
| 24 | ENAMEL | Surface gloss , well-known in a wing (6) |
| NAME (well known)in EL (a wing, of a building) | ||
| 25 | SMOOR | Accommodation going up in smoke (in Edinburgh?) (5) |
| ROOMS (accomodation) reversed (going up) | ||
| 26 | ARKLE | River entering lake mistaken for a famous bay (5) |
| R (river) inside anagram (mistaken) of LAKE – a famouse racehorse, a bay (brown coat) | ||
| 27 | OFAY | There’s nothing fine, alas, in this offensive label (4) |
| O (nothing) F (fine) AY (alas) | ||
definitions are underlined
I write these posts to help people get started with cryptic crosswords. If there is something here you do not understand ask a question; there are probably others wondering the same thing.
Thanks to PeeDee (as well as Azed) – especially for the informative note on 32ac LEET. But just above, 30ac has a typo in the bracketed elucidation of MILK
Thank you quenbarrow. The typos where I hit a neighbouring key by mistake I understand, but those where I accidentally type a different word leave me mystified. Having typed the wrong word I then can’t see it and only read the word I intended to type. The brain is a strange organ.
PeeDee: since it still seems to be just us so far, I will keep things going. You are so right about the brain and mis-readings. I do part-time proof-reading, and have to make sure to check everything twice over. Recently, an obit mentioned that the dead man’s descendants had settled in his territory a century earlier. How could author and editors have let that through? How could I have let it through on first reading? Such things happen too often for comfort.
Quenbarrow, that example reminds me of the old riddle: “A plane crashes right on the border of Canada and the USA. Where do they bury the survivors?”
At least half the people I’ve told that to answered with something like “depends on the nationality of the passengers” rather than the correct answer, and I have a feeling I fell for it myself when I first heard it. Perhaps our reliance on context to understand to understand language works against us sometimes? No doubt those who read the obituary expected to see “ancestors” so they did see it. I often miss typos, omitted or wrong words when I read through something I’ve written, because I see what I think I wrote rather than what is actually there. Then there are the vagaries of auto-correct, of course…
If any psycholinguists read this forum, they could offer a rather more informed insight.
Conversely, I once saw a review of a TV programme that said it was about a catering company that had been founded by an ancestor of the Earl of Sandwich.
Didn’t have any comments on the puzzle because, as usual, after a week I had no memory of doing it (although I agree with PeeDee’s comments about Clara Schumann).
Ever since Azed sent one of my competition entries back to me with a red ring around a typing error, my enthusiasm to identify points of contention in his puzzles has I suspect been subconsciously honed. However, not only did I find nothing in this puzzle with which to take issue, I felt that it marked a return to top form, containing many excellent clues including the splendid 26dn.
I do think that “Composer’s wife” is a little questionable, but I can see that having decided to bring Clara Schumann into the clue things probably got a little tricky – “Composer’s composer wife” doesn’t sound good. “Schumann perhaps” would surely have been preferable.
Regarding the descendant/ancestor thing, the existence of the word ‘antecedent’ has always seemed to me a wholly unnecessary complication.
Since others mention it, I too was somewhat surprised by how Clara was referred to in 1 across. Perhaps Azed felt that as her works are rarely performed these days, “composer” wouldn’t be quite adequate? But then again, anyone who knows enough about music to know the name of Schumann’s wife would probably know she was a composer in her own right… I would agree with DRC’s suggestion (as I so often do).
I should have mentioned in my previous post that it was nice to return to normal after the DLM, and a very good puzzle this was too. Harder than average, I found.
As it happens, Clara Schumann’s Piano Concerto is being performed in a concert in Cardiff this Friday, broadcast live on the BBC, as part of International Women’s Day.