Guardian Prize 27,920 / Picaroon

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It’s always a delight to find Picaroon’s name on a puzzle and even more so when it’s a Prize and I’m down to blog it.

I thought this was a practically perfect puzzle, which kept me absorbed and entertained from start to finish, with answers referring to a range of interesting personalities – a British politician*, an American composer, a former spy, a Hardy heroine, a Russian novelist, an American boxer, a Roman poet and a mythological Greek First Lady, all of whom were totally familiar – but the name of the last of these, annoyingly, proved impossible for me to parse but Gaufrid gallantly rode to the rescue. [*Another appeared outrageously misleadingly in two of the clues: I couldn’t possibly comment but they [along with 25ac] were my favourites].

My thanks, as always, to Picaroon for a brilliant puzzle.

Definitions are underlined in the clues.

[By the time this blog is published, I shall be on a walking holiday in Menorca, so I hope there are no careless typographical errors. I’ve tried to give dictionary verification where I thought it might be necessary. I’m confident that you’ll be able to sort out any other queries amongst yourselves. 😉

Across

1 Able to restore compliance at first in central banks (9)
MEDICINAL
C[ompliance] IN in MEDIAL [central] – ‘banks’ is the containment indicator

6 House fixed in advance (3-2)
PUT-UP
Double definition, the second as in ‘a put-up job’

9 Leading Brexiteer Boris ending, unfortunately, ruling people (9,6)
GOVERNING BODIES
[Michael] GOVE [leading Brexiteer] + an anagram [unfortunately] of BORIS ENDING

10, 21 Bet everything Spain makes a mark in football (4,4)
GOAL LINE
GO ALL IN [bet everything] + E [Spain – International Vehicle Registration]

11 Amend E sharp bum note covers (8)
REPHRASE
RE [note] round [covers] an anagram [bum] of E SHARP

14 Drunkenly outspoken, narcissistic creature in the main (9)
SHELLFISH
Sounds like [outspoken] ‘shelfish’ – as ‘selfish’ [narcissistic] might be drunkenly pronounced

15 Retire, having left new regional capital (5)
TURIN
TUR[n] IN [retire, minus n – ‘having left new’] – Turin is the regional capital of Piedmont

16 Use a description of cider? (5)
APPLY
Cider could be described as apple-y – tasting of / made from apples: Chambers and Collins both give ‘apply = [put to] use’

18 Transparent ornaments, say, in some minimalist American music? (9)
GLASSWORK
Referring to the work of Philip Glass, the American minimalist composer

20 Maybe scratch both sides of Hindustani hat (8)
HANDICAP
H AND I [both sides of H[industan]I + CAP [hat] – a golf term

25 For yours truly, where Trump is certain to create tragedy (10,5)
PROMETHEUS BOUND
PRO [for] ME [yours truly] + THE US [where Trump is] + BOUND [certain] – to create Aeschylus’ tragedy 

26 Desire what’s finally in butterfly net (5)
YEARN
[butterfl]Y + EARN [net]

27 Spy once noting criminal on edge (9)
RIMINGTON
An anagram [criminal] of NOTING after RIM [edge] – for the former Director General of MI5

 

Down

1 Frenchman excited in ungodly place (5)
MAGOG
M [Frenchman] + AGOG [excited]

2 Climbing, setter’s cutting palm tree branch off (7)
DEVIATE
A reversal [climbing] of I’VE [setter’s] in DATE [palm tree]

3 Caught group in army base (4)
CORE
My last one in – and it still took a minute or two to parse: I was fixated on C = caught + OR [group in army] but then where did the E come from? Of course, it’s a homophone [‘caught’] of ‘corps’ [group in army]

4 Slowcoach shaking off top cop (4)
NAIL
[s]NAIL [slowcoach] – nail and cop are both slang for ‘arrest’

5 Feller tricked about European turtle (10)
LOGGERHEAD
LOGGER [feller] + HAD [tricked] round E [European]

6 Diviner Wessex girl mounted by forward man (10)
PROPHETESS
PROP [forward, in Rugby] + HE [man] + TESS [of the Durbevilles – Wessex girl]

7 Cryptic hint on vent into which one disappears (4,3)
THIN AIR
An anagram [cryptic] of HINT + AIR [vent]

8 Boris: leader of party, awful sneak and rat (9)
PASTERNAK
P[arty] + an anagram [awful] of SNEAK and RAT – it’s this Boris, of course

12 Ali G follows foreign character, one foolish target (4,6)
CLAY PIGEON
[Cassius] CLAY [original name of Muhammad Ali ] + PI [foreign character] + G + an anagram [foolish] of ONE

13 His sentences add up to life (10)
BIOGRAPHER
Cryptic definition

14 Careless friends lifted very soft grass skirts (4-5)
SLAP-HAPPY]
A reversal [lifted] of PALS [friends] + HAY [grass] round [skirts] PP [very soft]

17 Greek First Lady‘s assistant straddling two gates (7)
PANDORA
PA [Personal Assistant] round [straddling] AND OR [two {logic} gates]
– many thanks to Gaufrid for this parsing, which was way beyond the limits of my knowledge! See here for Pandora – another ‘first lady’ who brought evil into the world …

19 Poet cut capers in the tube (7)
OVIDUCT
OVID [Roman poet] + an anagram [capers] of CUT

22 Turned around in cockney’s area of London (3,2)
END ON
[h]ENDON [area of London, as a cockney might say it]

23 Stick around American island (4)
GUAM
GUM [stick] round A [American]

24 About to welcome group flying in port (4)
OBAN
ON [about] round BA [British Airways – group flying [or not, at the time of writing]

35 comments on “Guardian Prize 27,920 / Picaroon”

  1. Thanks Eileen. I don’t think I have ever completed a grid with so many unexplained answers. Some yielded to further reflection but I just ran out of patience in trying to decipher 12d and 17d so thanks for putting my mind at rest. It spoiled for me the satisfaction of solving, sometimes with the help of Google, a good number of very clever clues.

  2. Thanks to Picaroon and Eileen. I’m another who struggled with parsing. I did piece out PANDORA and managed to remember RIMINGTON but I guessed CORE but could not explain it, took a long time figuring out HENDON (obviously I don’t know the areas of London as well as I thought), and had never come across slowcoach (as opposed to the US slowpoke).

  3. At last! I got on Picaroon’s wavelength and really enjoyed being there. Great puzzle with much delightful clueing. I couldn’t quite finish it – I’d never heard of Rimington and was far from confident about Oban so I entered neither. But hey – still huge fun. My only quibble is that I don’t get caught as a homophone of core – how does the T fit in? So it was the third one I didn’t enter. But thank you P and thank you Eileen.

  4. Nice puzzle, I thought. Used to live a few miles from Hendon, so that wasn’t a problem, and used to build logic circuits, so PANDORA, though slow to come, seemed the cleverest.

    To Jaydee @3: caught isn’t the homophone, it’s the indicator of the homophone.

  5. Well, I got all of this except CORE. I had CORK, which I think parses, as Cork is an army base in Ireland, and there is a rock group called ORK (c = caught, of course). Brilliant puzzle, though, full of humor. Enjoyed it immensely!

  6. Thanks Eileen.  Some jolly and clever clues targeting Boris and Trump.  Ticks for 6D and 12D.  All went in nicely until failure on the army base (3D).

  7. [Sil – I’ve replied to yours as (very) late posts on Thursday’s Philestine. Sorry to intrude, Eileen, off to bed now but will read your blog later – I’ll mention now that I ticked BIOGRAPHER though wondered whether it was original thinking; SHELLFISH a bit sheshtnutty?…..Another easy prize!]

  8. I’m not sure about 18A: Philip Glass wrote a suite called Glassworks, but the movements have their own titles: there is no singular “glassswork.” As a general term meaning “a work by (Philip) Glass,” wouldn’t it have to be two words?

  10. Yep pretty cruisy prize, except I bunged in glassrock at 18, dumb! And can’t quite make a normal sentence substituting def and solution in 1ac, but I’m probably being dim again. Took a while to get the Clay bit of 12d, a tea tray clue, and PA straddling the gates was clever. Thanks both.

  11. I enjoyed this puzzle, even though I failed to solve 3d CORE.

    My favourites were SLAP-HAPPY, APPLY, MAGOG, PROMETHEUS UNBOUND, GOVERNING BODIES, LOGGERHEAD.

    I could not parse CLAYPIGEON.

    New for me was Stella RIMINGTON. I found her via google and might want to read her fiction in the future.

    Thanks Picaroon and Eileen.

  12. Thanks Eileen and Picaroon. I was puzzled over 14d because it only contained a single definition but the clue contained the word ‘to’ twice. So I thought there was another part to the clue

  14. An enjoyable puzzle, and well summed-up by Eileen, (thanks for comments), drawing as it did on wide GK and ranging from the classical, and classic, through to contemporary affairs and IT.

    Especially liked 14a fruit d’mer, and Wessex girl to complete 6d.

    Thanks Picaroon.

  15. I thought this was an enjoyable puzzle.  Absolutely bursting with well-constructed clues, and at the same time managing to accomplish mainly good surfaces.

    Lots of favourites, including 6ac, and 2,3,6,7, and 12 dn.  It hardly seems fair to add that 8 and 13 dn were perhaps rather less inspired, though perfectly acceptable clues.

    And unusually for me, I was able to parse all the answers.

    Great fun.

    A pity that it was all over too quickly.

    Many thanks to Picaroon and to Eileen.

  16. Thanks for the blog and intro Eileen – you said what I thought about this puzzle. I didn’t parse CLAY PIGEON (Cassius didn’t occur to me at all due to the very clever way the clue was written) and I didn’t fully parse MEDICINAL and REPHRASE. BIOGRAPHER was loi. I was sure there was a similar clue a while ago that also taxed me for a long time – maybe I’ll remember it now. Lots of ticks throughout.
    I did think about SET UP muffin, but 6d ruled it out although it took me a while to parse all of PUT UP.
    All in all an excellent puzzle which kept us entertained on and off throughout Saturday – many thanks to Picaroon.

  17. We thought this one was excellent, and – unusually – we parsed all correctly. LOI was CORE where for ages we were trying to find army units abbreviated as ORE – already having the C from MEDICINAL – until the penny dropped that caught was the homophone indicator, not the cricket abbreviation. A fiendish little trap! Many thanks to Picaroon and Eileen.

  18. Many thanks Picaroon for an excellent pizzle and to Eileen for equally excellent blog.

    Enjoyed this, and somewhat surprised myself by completing in reasonable time, with all bar the CLAY PIGEON being parsed as well.

    I did think we were in ‘PAUL-ine’ territory with the PROPHETESS – neat clue though.

    Not normally a big fan of homophones — my Irish ear seems to hear things differently from English ears (I imagine those from further afield must have even more of an issue with this.). But CORE for ‘corps’ wasn’t an issue. Clever little puzzle where the ‘C’ crosser leads you down the garden path of ‘C’ = ‘Caught’…

     

    Thanks again Picaroon, Eileen and all learned contributors.

  20. Thoroughly enjoyed this although it seem like a while ago now.  I entered CORE without any real conviction and I did not get the homophone scenario.  Can anyone please explain why caught is a homophone indicator.  Many thanks to Picaroon and Eileen for the explanation of at least a half dozen parses of which I was uncertain.

  21. SPanza @ 20

    If you can’t quite hear what someone has said, you might well say “I didn’t catch that”.

  22. Thanks Simon S @2  I’m not sure I would ever have thought of that so I must keep it in mind for future reference.

  24. A rarity for me – a Saturday Prize that I finished on a Saturday. 17d. I knew PA and worked out that and/or might be some form of entry check but didn’t recognise the term of art. Apart from that I even had the GK for the rest.
    An enjoyable puzzle. Thanks to Picaroon and Eileen.

  25. I found this mostly very enjoyable and managed to parse all the clues. However, I didn’t fill in my supposed CORE for 3d as I can’t see how it means ‘base’. I also started by thinking ‘caught’ was for the initial C, but decided it was a homophone of ‘corps’ probably. No-one else has expressed any doubts about this definition but I would like to see a sentence where core and base are interchangeable.

  27. To paraphrase the preamble: “It’s always a delight to find Picaroon’s name on a puzzle and even more so when it’s a Prize and Eileen is down to blog it”.

    I liked this puzzle but it sure wasn’t easy! Favourites were 25a PROMETHEUS BOUND (mentioned by several others) and 17d PANDORA (though for the latter clue, while I knew the much-maligned Greek “lady”, I hadn’t heard of AND and OR being referred to as “gates” – I just thought it was a clever term Picaroon had made up for what I used to explain in grammar lessons as “connectors”).

    Confession: I also had to use Google to confirm RIMINGTON at 27a for the unfamiliar (to me) spy which I only got via the wordplay.)

    [As William F P has mentioned @7, this puzzle was referenced in the Philistine 15² forum (a puzzle I came to well after the event, and the blog even later). The blog turned very political, but I will leave it to anyone who might catch this very late post to read it and form their own opinions). But just to say that personally I appreciate puzzles that contain themes of clues based on politics, religion and sex. (For the latter subject matter, cf. that hilarious clue here for PROPHETESS.). I smiled broadly at Picaroon’s two Boris clues (9a and 8d), because political satire always tickles my funny bone, and I have been watching with interest the whole Brexit story unfold from afar. And Trump is certainly fair game IMHO.

    Many thanks to Picaroon, Eileen and other commenters.

  29. Simon @26

    Not very persuasive.

    Base of an argument? Basis maybe.ie the facts it’s based on. The core of an argument would be the most important logical step though, wouldn’t it?

    “Core of an argument” gets some hits in a Google search, but “base of an argument” mostly gets hits for a puzzle clue.

    By definition, the core is at the centre and the base is at the bottom, so it shouldn’t be that easy to find even metaphorical equivalents.

    In fact, ‘a base’ can be ‘a centre’, as in operational base/centre, but I don’t think you would describe such a place as ‘an operational core’.

  30. BlogginTheBlog@19

    Iparsed CORE in the same way, but I think it’s a better explanation than Eileen’s

    GREAT PUZZLE

  31. Blog now read; I disagree slightly with your explanation of PUT UP which I saw as a simple charade; PUT for “fixed” (a little wobbly – the only example in this delightfully constructed puzzle) and UP for “advance”. I didn’t quite understand your reference to ‘put-up job’ I’m afraid.
    I also enjoyed PANDORA and thought SLAP-HAPPY a wonderful example of elegant, efficient clueing. And with one of Eileen’s “story-telling surfaces” – and a fun one to boot.
    A great crossword.
    Many thanks to Picaroon and Eileen (I hope you had a fulfilling time in Menorca though I haven’t received your postcard yet!)

  32. I too baulked at core = base and still do. Try OED for each and see if there is a single entry in which the other word could be used.

     

  33. My wife Soozi and I have a backlog of Saturday Guardian newspapers since we live abroad and have them sent out in packages each month.

    We started this Picaroon marvel yesterday morning on 2nd of November. We finished it this morning oon the 3rd. We also parsed Core using ‘o’ as a blood group.

    A ‘bloody’ good Frankenstein of a puzzle, if you ask me.

    Thanks to Picaroon, Eileen and my brother Kevin for introducing me to The Guardian when I was new teen, back in 1969. I’ve been over the moon ever since.

  35. Very satisfying. Prometheus Bound was favourite. Belated thanks to setter and Eileen for parsing of Core. Knew the logic gates but thrown by biblical Magog as I only remembered the giant(s).
    A friend used to quip “give us one of your prawn sandwiches…don’t be shellfish”.

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