Guardian Cryptic 27,762 by Qaos

by

The puzzle may be found at https://www.theguardian.com/crosswords/cryptic/27762.

I was short of time, which perhaps colours my view of this puzzle – I did not like it greatly. Qaos here seems determined to be awkward in his choice of borderline acceptable devices – some I liked, some I did not. On the whole, the upper half went in fairly quickly, but the lower half took longer. It’s Qaos, but I cannot see a theme.

Across
1 PISTOL Gun that’s very good with many rounds (6)
A charade of PI (‘very good’) plus STOL, a reversal (’rounds’) of LOTS (‘many’).
4 JESTER Judge’s terse order? He must be joking! (6)
A charade of J (‘ludge’) plus ESTER, an anagram (‘order’) of ‘terse’.
9 FREE Frank Zappa and Elvis overtures dropped from set (4)
A subtraction: FREE[ze] (‘set’) minus Z and E (‘Zappa and Elvis overtures dropped’).
10 GRAND-NIECE Family member needing car fixed (5-5)
An anagram (‘fixed’) of ‘needing car’.
11 HITMAN Hired individual to maybe assassinate national leaders? (6)
Initial letters (‘leaders’) of ‘Hired Individual To Maybe Assassinate National”, &lit.
12 LINESMEN Assistant referees can be poets (8)
Double definition.
13 GLASS CHIN Close to wedding, girl’s mate ignores a weakness in the ring (5,4)
A charade of G (‘close to weddinG‘) plus LASS (‘girl’) plus CHIN[a] (‘mate’) minus the A (‘ignores a’). A boxing term.
15 URNS Vessels go south after bow has been removed (4)
A charade of [t]URN (‘go’) plus S (‘south’) minus the first letter (‘after bow has been removed’).
16 DALI Artist‘s face, one shifting to one side (4)
DIAL (‘face’) with the I moved to the end (‘one shifting to one side’).
17 WHIRLWIND WW1’s new day welcomes greeting by both sides in turmoil (9)
An envelope (‘welcomes’) of HI (‘greeting’) plus RL (right and left, ‘both sides’) in WWI (‘WW1’) plus N (‘new’) plus D (‘day’).
21 MAGICIAN Expert speller? (8)
Cryptic definition.
22 SLEIGH Bob‘s actress (6)
A charade of S (after the apostrophe) LEIGH (Vivien or other ‘actress’).
24 HURRICANES WW2 planes owned by English captain, it’s rumoured? (10)
Sounds something like (‘it’s rumoured?’) HARRY KANE’S (‘owned by English captain’, soccer)
25 AGES Portion of cabbage soup may last a while (4)
A hidden answer (‘portion of’) in ‘cabbAGE Soup’. The definition does not seem very satisfactory to me; ‘a while’ would be better, but leaves ‘may last’ with nothing in particular to do.
26 APNOEA Issue of sleeping adults involving open chops (6)
An envelope (‘involving’) of PNOE, an anagram (‘chops’) of ‘open’ in AA (‘adults’). A possible attempt at an extended definition.
27 ANGLES In the past, Germans who overcame England‘s corners (6)
Double definition.
Down
1 PARTIAL Dad’s on trial unfairly? Just a bit (7)
A charade of PA (‘dad’) plus RTIAL, an anagram (‘unfairly’) of ‘trial’.
2 STEAM Cook eats roast mutton for starter (5)
A charade of STEA, an anagram (‘roast’) of ‘eats’ plus M (‘Mutton for starter’).
3 ORGANIC Natural produce I can grow, for the most part (7)
An anagram (‘produce’) of ‘i can gro[w]’ minus the last letter (‘for the most part’).
5 ENDING Conclusion of election: extrem­ists’ date in government (6)
A charade of EN (‘ElectioN extremists’ – at a guess, a device not to everyone’s taste) plus D (‘date’) plus ‘in’ plus G (‘government’).
6 TWIN-SCREW Type of ship used by the Krays’ gang? (4-5)
TWINS’ CREW (‘Krays’ gang’).
7 ROCKETS They get fired up to score wildly, nothing less over the weekend (7)
An envelope (‘over’) of K (‘weeKend’) in ROCETS, an anagram (‘wildly’) of ‘t[o] score’ minus an O (‘nothing less’).
8 BALL LIGHTNING Dance illumination incorporates new atmospheric effect (4,9)
An envelope (‘incorporates’) of N (‘new’) in BALL (‘dance’) plus LIGHTING (‘illumination’).
14 SOLDIER ON Persevere? I’d sooner go crazy drinking lager top (7,2)
An envelope (‘drinking’) of L (‘Lager top’) in SODIERON, an anagram (‘go crazy’) of ‘I’d sooner’.
16 DRACULA Student union card revoked by a monster (7)
A charade of DRACUL, a reversal (‘revoked’) of L (‘student’) plus U (‘union’) plus ‘card’; plus ‘a’.
18 RESTS ON Leans Against King by the Rolling Stones (5,2)
A charade of R (rex, ‘king’) plus ESTSON, an anagram (‘rolling’) of ‘stones’.
19 NUGGETS Returning piece earns pieces of gold (7)
A charade of NUG, a reversal (‘returning’) of GUN (‘piece’) plus GETS (‘earns’).
20 MISCUE Caught daughter of Bond’s colleague in a slip (6)
I think that this must be a sound-alike (‘caught’) of Miss (or Ms.) Q.
23 EMAIL Communication with naked ladies, say (5)
If i read this aright, I do not like it. The answer sounds like (‘say’) EMALE, which is [f]EMALE[s] (‘ladies’) shedding their coverings (‘naked’).
completed grid

68 comments on “Guardian Cryptic 27,762 by Qaos”

  1. I failed to solve 26a, and 20d which I see as caught = heard (homophone of MISCUE) Miss Q (daughter of Bond’s colleague, Q).

    I could not parse 23d, but the blog makes sense.

    New for me were BALL LIGHTNING + GLASS CHIN.

    My favourites were TWINSCREW + SLEIGH.

    Thanks Peter and Qaos.

  2. Think there’s a theme of snooker nicknames, including HURRICANE, WHIRLWIND, JESTER, DRACULA, HITMAN, PISTOL, MAGICIAN and maybe others, (and maybe hinted at by MISCUE?). That last was one of my favourites, and I parsed it as michelle did. I also liked the Krays’ ship. Lots of fun to be had throughout, though, I thought.

    Thanks to Qaos and PeterO

  3. Michelle @1

    Just to explain what is going on, I came up with the same explanation of 20D as you did, but after first publishing the blog (the original entry for 20D just asked for help). I revised the blog about the same time as you posted your comment.

  4. Too loosey-goosey for me. In most other puzzles, when the penny finally drops I smile; in this one I did a lot of sighing. I eventually interpreted 20d the same as Michelle, after a lot of going round in circles trying to incorporate “M”. My sympathies, PeterO.

  5. Chameleon @2

    Well now, evidently I am not up in the snooker world. Wikipedia has a whole list of them: a quick scan adds ANGLES to your list.

  6. Saw Dr No as a teenager, nothing since, and forgot to remember caught as homophone cue, so failed on Miss Q. NW held up a bit by bunging teaser at 4…stupid! Liked whirlwind, which needed all crossers, the second W sorting the Krays’ gang and then jester. Otherwise pretty smooth. No, not quite, put sledge at 22 (yes there was an actress of that name, tho obscure). Hey ho. Report card: could do better.

  7. …and no idea of theme, or how Hurricanes works (text disappearing to the right, whichever way I turn screen). Thanks PeterO and Qaos.

  11. Off topic

    @Eileen (if you visit here) I think two more words need to be highlighted as theme words in yesterday’s Guardian blog.

  12. [Hi Rishi – coincidentally, I was just about to comment here! I’ll respond to yours on yesterday’s blog.]

    I enjoyed solving this Qaos puzzle, as always, but was totally stumped as to the theme – I knew there must be one – so I ended up feeling rather grumpy when I found out what it was. [I’m comforted that PeterO didn’t get it, either.]

    Many thanks, though, Qaos, for the puzzle – it isn’t your fault 😉 – and thanks to PeterO for the blog.

  13. As others have said, a mixed bag. Did not get the theme but less cross with myself about that than I was yesterday. However, the theme makes it a very clever puzzle.
    Liked working out GLASS CHIN ‘though hadn’t heard of it. Less keen on MISCUE and EMAIL.

  14. Thanks Qaos and PeterO

    Several not parsed, including HURRICANES, which, having seen PeterO’s parsing, is simply awful. Another I didn’t like was ORGANIC – “natural” is nonsense as the definition. I would accept “natural produce”, but then “produce is doing double duty.

    The rest was fine, though no particular favourites.

  15. Very average puzzle . I got too many answers with a ‘well i suppose that works’ approach. Which for me means poor clueing.

  16. Agree with muffin @14 that 24ac HURRICANES, one of three sound-alikes, is about as unacceptable as you can get for that kind of clue (hurry/harry?) Cleverly assembled theme, though likewise at the far end of accessibility: what % of solvers would know more than a few of the players’ nicknames? – though it all works OK irrespective of that. It looked at first if there might be a fierce-weather theme (17 and 24ac, 8d), but of course the first two attach to (fiercely competitive) players.

  17. I quite liked this puzzle.

    GLASS CHIN was my LOI and also my favourite – a totally new expression but one which can be worked out from the wordplay.  Good, I thought.

    Didn’t know the actress or the football captain, but again, these answers were given by the wordplay.

    My only real quibble is the oddness of some of the surfaces.  I’m thinking of 26 ac in particular.  What on earth is that supposed to mean?

    Thanks to Qaos and PeterO.

  18. Thanks both. I suppose that HURRICANES for Harry Kane’s just about works in, say, a Manchester accent.

  19. Hurry Kane must be a cockney – we up north don’t know him. Another SNL (sounds-nothing-like) clue. Otherwise some nice clues.

  20. Thanks to Qaos, PeterO, Chameleon and others – I appreciated the puzzle more when the theme was pointed out. I found this an ok solve but it a bit lacklustre with few ticks. I liked HITMAN and didn’t see anything wrong with EMAIL – unlike HURRICANES. Loi was URNS which didn’t come to me from the definition – although it’s common enough in crosswords – and so I plodded through the alphabet before doh-ing at U.

  21. At first I thought I’d stumbled on the quiptic as answers flew in quickly on the first pass, but also with more of a grunt than a smile. The clues seemed laboured and like others I was unimpressed by several. “Hurricanes” totally perplexed me – I got the answer from the definition and was working around the homophone “hurrs” for “her’s” but got nowhere. It turns out to be because the answer is not a homophone at all but something that sounds utterly unlike Harry Kane – it might as well be Joe Root (or Eoin Morgan) to my mind!

    “Rounds” in 1ac I suppose just sneaks in as a verb (“lots” rounds ie turns on itself) – questionable though.I’d not heard “glass chin” but had come across “glass jaw”. Why “girl’s mate” when the construction requires “girl mate”? In this case I can’t see it as “girl is mate” which is the usual excuse for a random apostrophe-s. “Sleigh” I thought wasted a good device – the “s” eliding into the answer was clever but “leigh” for actress was so vague it needed all the crossers for me. Also isn’t Guardian style “actor” these days? Also thought “ball lightning” rather weak with so much of the answer given by one word from the clue.

    I liked some of the short ones – “Dali”, “free”, “rests on” and “apnoea” were fun. “Miscue” I got eventually and read as “Miss Q”. I too was thinking “M” but that is Bond’s boss not colleague so fair’s fair. And “email” I finally also saw as a homophone of “[f]emale[s]” ie naked ladies. Not sure about “with” as a connector though – Ximenes might not approve and “from” would work just as well for the surface.

    Missed the Qaos of old – this lacked many of his inventive and fun devices which make you struggle and then smile.

  22. Yes it was towards the groanworthy end of the spectrum but enjoyable nonetheless. Missed the theme despite playing the game in a misspent youth.

    Agree with Anna that the surface to 26a was unnecessarily clumsy. Favourite was the clever and well-constructed TWIN SCREW.

    It’s high time we had a word for an iffy homophone + parlophone maybe.

    Thanks to both.

  23. Anna@17, chops is old slang for jaws (Say that again and you’ll get a smack in the chops), and jaws are open, trying to breathe, when you have sleep apnoea…? Well, it’s a thought.

  24. To grantinfreo @23

    Thanks for pointing that out.  I hadn’t thought of chops meaning jaws.  I still think it’s very unwieldy.

    To thezed@21

    Isn’t the apostrophe s standing for ‘has’ here?

  25. For 20 I had Bond’s colleague as M and his daughter as ISSUE with C included-to be kind to Qaos ISSUE could be ISUE (hom).

    less convinced about harry but overall I enjoyed this. I knew it wasnt about weather or Hammer Films, but I have little knowledge of Snooker.

    Thanks all.

  26. I suppose the eventually discovered theme of snooker players makes this a cleverer puzzle on reflection. Thought Whirlwind a rather laboriously put together clue. LOI was 9 ac but needed Peter O’s explanation of the cluing. And strangely, even though I have heard the work spoken often, had never seen Apnoea written down before. Quite a rare occurrence, that.

  27. I enjoyed this, perhaps more than others, although the homophone at 24A was dreadful (@shirl: this mancs man certainly didn’t pronounce Harry and hurri the same – i was wondering if it worked in a SE accent! 🙂 )

  28. Missed the theme which is good with hindsight but obscure for non snooker fans. Harry and Hurri……terrible. Former England football captain Lineker was a fine snooker player, not that that helps!

  29. Totally missed the snooker theme too although the puzzle is littered with references and I watch a bit of snooker. Whirlwind, hurricanes and ball lightning had me sniffing around for more extreme weather phenomena. No’p!! Weird solve this, lurching from worryingly simple, eg 25ac and 1dn to downright fiendish, particularly 20 dn. Much more fun with hindsight than in mid-solve. Thanks Qaos and Peter O.

  30. Thanks PeterO and Qaos. I’m only repeating what others have said above, but I too found it an odd mix of the ridiculously easy and the almost impossible. No reason why all clues should be of a similar level of difficulty of course. Indeed I welcome a few easier ones as a way in. But to have such a wide disparity makes for an unsatisfactory overall experience.

  31. Thanks to Qaos and PeterO. I am another who enjoyed this puzzle more the others seem to have done. Yes some were a bit on the easy side and some others were a bit of a stretch of the imagination (maybe sometimes inevitable when trying to fit in a theme), but for me that is part of the joy of solving, and I even spotted the theme (my mother in law who is in her late eighties never misses snooker on the television). Last two were miscue and sleigh which seemed to take forever. I am another fan of hitman and twin-screw and thanks again to Qaos and PeterO.

  32. I hadn’t heard of GLASS CHIN, though I had of “glass jaw.”

    This has to be the most obscure theme ever.  Most of us don’t know anything about snooker, much less the nicknames of players!

    Thanks, Qaos, and thanks and sympathy to PeterO.

  33. Found this a little tougher than Qaos often is despite seeing the theme pretty early. Enjoyed the challenge. I don’t understand the complaints about the ghost theme – as always with Qaos, no knowledge of the theme whatsoever is required to solve the puzzle, and there have been plenty I that have not known enough to spot. And those of you that think this theme was obscure should check out the brilliant 26157 (the one with Russell’s teapot, Flying Spaghetti Monster and Invisible Pink Unicorn)!

    Thanks to Qaos and PeterO

  34. Thanks both,

    My last ones were miscue, sleigh and apnoea, all of which, I thought, were quite clever.

    Neither OED nor Chambers online has ‘bob’ as a noun meaning a sleigh, but they have ‘bob’ and ‘sleigh’ as verbs meaning to ride on a (bob-)sleigh.

     

  35. Tyngewick @34

    Verbs are fine, but dead tree Chambers does give ‘bob’ as a noun, short for bobsleigh; likewise the OED supplement.

  36. Missed the unmissable theme, had a few niggles about the clueing like others, but generally enjoyed it. Many thanks to Qaos and PeterO.

  38. Showing my age now – 24a, does anyone else remember the WW2 character in the Valiant comic who would singlehandedly wreak havoc on an opposing army when he flew into a “Raging Fury”, watched by his trusty Batman, Maggot? No? Oh well. He was an English Commando, name of Captain Hurricane.
    So dare I suggest that he might just be the “English Captain” referenced in 24a? Which raises the question if that was the intention (no, I don’t believe it either) – would that be better or worse than Harry Kane?

    Thanks Qaos and PeterO

  39. Thanks to PeterO and Qaos

    It sometimes feels as if some setters throw in an iffy one just to see how much of stir can generate.

    Nevertheless I can’t resist.

    BlueCanary@22

    How about hmmmophone?

  40. Thanks to Qaos and PeterO. Nothing to add to the mix, though the spelling of APNOEA slowed me down. I agree with Valentine @32.

  42. Well, despite most of the above, I enjoyed this one. So thanks to setter and blogger.

    Any crossword featuring the magnificent Francis Vincent Zappa has to be marked as special. Any setters fancy a Zappa themed puzzle? That would be a challenge. Zoot Allures!

  43. Valentine @32 and ACD @40:  Yup.  Not a theme designed to engage Americans–or half of Britain, it seems, either.   On that note, when I was about halfway through–about when I have learned to start looking for themes in a Qaos puzzle–I saw Rockets and Nuggets on the right, and was wondering what crazy Brit would make a puzzle themed around American basketball teams (Houston and Denver, respectively).  But of course there weren’t any others, which even at that point was enough to reject that idea.

  44. I also enjoyed this one, but maybe because I was mostly on the right wavelength even without spotting the theme. Couple of ‘questions from the inexperiejced’
    1A why does Pi = very good?
    23D am I right in thinking indirect anagrams are frowned on, but this kind of synonym then strip letters away is seen as ok? Seems a bit ‘one step removed’ to me.
    A DNF for me in the bottom right (22A and 23D, and 27A which in retrospect is ‘Beverley Knight’ (shoulda / woulda/ coulda) …

    Thanks Qaos and PeterO

  45. Stuart @44

    PI is a perennial – salt it away for future reference. It is short for pious, particularly in the sense of ostentatiously or annoyingly good. I agree with you that I did not find 23D acceptable, yet alone normal. That is one of the places that I think Qaos overstepped the boundary.

  46. Probably pointless to speculate, but I see similarities between Qaos’s style here and the style of the new Everyman, at least over the past couple of weeks. Anyone else see it too?

  47. Of course I didn’t get the theme. Now that I know it I’m no wiser. I’ve never heard any of the terms in a snooker context but I know nothing about snooker. I used to play billiards in my youth but that’s as far as I got. Anyway, as others have said, this was a mixed bag. Mostly easy to get but not necessarily to parse.The exceptions were MISCUE and APNOEA which took almost as long as the rest of the puzzle. Like Valentine, I’ve heard of GLASS JAW but GLASS CHIN was new to me. I suspect the former is American and I’ve picked it up from old gangster films.
    Thanks Qaos.

  48. Thanks PeterO

    Other thing I was going to mention /forgot about/ ‘factoid’ …

    My heart always sinks very slightly when I see a clue like 9A…apparently ‘set’ is the word in the English language with the most different definitions

  49. Thanks to PeterO and Qaos, although just barely in the latter’s case ! Harry Kane = Hurricane ??? Leave it out, Muvver ! After finishing the puzzle I sat for a good ten minutes searching for a theme before I gave up and came here. I had started to think that Qaos and Nutmeg had actually swapped bylines over the last two days. Having now been told what the theme is I’m none the wiser, but anyone who can produce a crossword with a theme of Deep Purple deserves to be cut a bit of slack so no worries !

  51. If ‘Magician’ is a straight cryptic then a better answer would be ‘sorcerer’, surely? Magicians don’t really use spells.

  52. Re ‘bob’ and, a couple of days ago, ‘carbine’. I think it’s a valid topic of discussion to compare authorities and usage. There are some, for whom this seems not to be the case – the ‘if it’s in Chambers/Collins/OED then it’s valid and there is nothing to discuss’ school of thought. I find this rather sterile since it rather takes away from the elegance of a good crossword if the interplay between cryptic definition and wordplay is lost. It’s also the case that dictionaries can be wrong (eg the recent discussion on octopi where it seems Chambers has implicitly got the origin of the word wrong.) OED, at least, aims to be descriptive of current and historical usage so that, to me, renders comments here about how individuals use a word are relevant. For example, for some gun people carbines are not rifles and rifles are not carbines, whereas to the broad mass of ordinary working people, carbines (if they know what they are) are considered to be a subset of rifles.

    Setting crosswords is hard work and poorly paid (even if it is indoor work with no heavy lifting). We shouldn’t require setters to research each answer in depth, but, because of that, it doesn’t harm to broaden discussion a bit beyond, ‘It’s in Chambers, end of’.

  53. Tyngewick @52

    That was my objection to “natural” = “organic”. Virtually everything we can see in the universe isn’t organic!

  54. Hammer @42 — Some themes are set and some themes are retrofitted (see comments 63 and 64 for Guardan Cryptic 27,730).

  55. thezed@21 makes a good point with the question ‘isn’t Guardian style “actor” these days?’

    Even if the crossword editor overlooked it, the person at the desk must have thought over it. But I am not sure if he or she would do anything more than place the text in the allotted text box with all the necessary formatting in place. However, ‘actor’ would have made the clue even more obscure and hard to solve.

    Moviegoers of a certain age like myself (here in Chennai) would remember Vivian Leigh.

    The new devices used in some of the clues have provoked a good debate. It is just that some like them, some not. I think the setter may continue with the experimentation.

  56. Tyngewick@52
    The “it’s in Chambers so it’s OK” concept dates from the time when the crosswords appeared with a note recommending Chambers, followed in later years by a warning when a word (excluding proper nouns and phrases in common use which were always fair game) wasn’t in Chambers. Chambers may not always be right but I find it useful to have a single point of reference so that if it isn’t there I’ve got the answer wrong. We shouldn’t have to own more than one dictionary or need to use the internet.

  57. I am comforted that even if I did know more snooker nicknames, I doubt if I would have spotted the theme.  Thanks for the parsing of 20d which I had worked the same as Copmus@25 – far more satisfactory as a homophone.  Thought 24a was amusing but struggled a little (as many others) with 23d.  Good fun overall.  Thanks Qaos and PeterO.

  58. Muffin @53. I quite agree with you about ‘natural’ and ‘organic’, neither is contained within the other.

    Pino @56 AIUI there isn’t an authoritative dictionary for Guardian cryptics. I’ve got several dictionaries of different sizes, just not Collins or Chambers, and like you, I don’t want to buy another. My preferred dictionary is OED online, which is accessible to most members of UK public libraries simply by putting one’s library card number in. (For non-uk readers there are some UK public libraries you can join online without being a resident of the town – try Manchester?)

  59. For the first time, I actually remembered when solving the puzzle: “It’s Qaos, so there must be a theme.” But then the theme was something I had no hope of spotting. C’est la vie.

    Couldn’t we chop or mince the mutton instead of roasting it? I can’t see how “roast” suggests an anagram. This is a particular quirk of mine: just as some people are bothered by loose homophones, I get irritated by setters who seem to think that just about any word can be an anagrind.

     

     

  60. Tyngewick@58
    I don’t know when Chambers ceased to be the authoritative dictionary for Guardian cryptics but for my part I think it’s a pity that it did. Solving a crossword is a pleasant relaxation.I’m not going to look at more than one source to check an answer.

  61. Pino @60

    I agree that people are limited as to sources they can check. It’s annoying when you’ve got down to the last few clues to be stymied by a word that isn’t in your available resource, but on the whole I like the freedom to adapt to changing needs and topics. Some words are quite new or short lived: it would be a shame to deprive us the fun of, say, ‘Brexit’ as a potential answer, just because it hadn’t made into the print version of a particular dictionary.

    Part of the fascination of crosswords is that setters are giving us an insight into the way they think, however weird that may be.

     

  62. Rishi

    Even if the crossword editor overlooked it, the person at the desk must have thought over it.

    That’s the funniest thing I’ve read on here in ages!

    Nobody actually believes that either of these processes actually happen, except in the most cursory manner, at the Guardian now. (i.e. checking by editor or sub-editor). This has been quite obvious for about a year now as demonstrated by the general lack of rigour in most of the setters’puzzles. (naturally there are a few notable exceptions)

  65. Tyngewick@61
    I think that we’ll have to agree to differ but I would just add that I wouldn’t object to Brexit, a proper noun and in common use, even if it hasn’t reached a dictionary. Not so sure about “woke” though, if it turned up now in its recent and hopefully short-lived meaning.

  67. Cant see how you got cats stevo.

    Cumbrian @38: for what its worth I started looking for a comic theme as I thought it was that Captain Hurricane. Interesting to look back at his outbursts and descriptions of the enemy that would cause such a furore these days – and probably prison for the author.

     

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