Guardian 27,964 / Brummie

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A fairly straightforward puzzle from Brummie, with some interesting and witty clues. I enjoyed solving it.

Brummie’s puzzles more often than not have a theme. His most recent one, which I blogged, didn’t and so I was even more on the alert to find one today. It wasn’t difficult: I counted nine birds, animals and insects in the grid.

Thanks, Brummie, for the fun.

Definitions are underlined in the clues

Across

1 Players putting Irish broadcaster in a spot, according to some (7)
QUARTET
RTE [Raidió Teilifís Éireann – Irish broadcaster] in QUAT [spot] – I think ‘according to some’ is there because Chambers says that QUAT [= pimple] is ‘now dialect’

5 Southern peninsula, a massive area (7)
SIBERIA
S [Southern] + IBERIA [peninsula]

9, 19 Enthusiast gets to live, say, east of East Span River (5,6)
EAGER BEAVER
BE [live] + AVER [say] after [East of, in an across clue] E [east] + AGE [span] + R [river]

10 Obnoxious person was in the van, refusing to bend (9)
PIGHEADED
PIG [obnoxious person] + HEADED [was in the van[guard] – in the lead]

11 Boxing Day fare that might be imposed on trippers? (4,6)
COLD TURKEY
Double / cryptic definition – referring to the trip of one experiencing the hallucinatory effects of LSD or similar drug

12, 24 No socialiser should be left with a womaniser (4,4)
LONE WOLF
L [left] + ONE [a] + WOLF [womaniser]

14 Ceremonial dancing: it curtails stifling independence (11)
RITUALISTIC
An anagram [dancing] of IT CURTAILS round I [independence]

18  Nark about rifles and stuff, taking a long time (5-6)
STOOL-PIGEON
A reversal [about] of LOOTS [rifles] + PIG [stuff – both as verbs] + EON [a long time] – nark is a slang term for a police informer

21, 6 Industrious sorts in active communal working parties (4,4)
BUSY BEES
BUSY [active] + BEES [communal working parties]

22 Reprobate Dolly pursues Sooty (5,5)
BLACK SHEEP
SHEEP [Dolly – this one] after BLACK [sooty]

25 In vacuous orgy, male smeared sun oil with menace (9)
OMINOUSLY
An anagram [smeared?] of M [male] and SUN OIL in O[rg]Y

26 Block an uncompleted foul (5)
ANVIL
AN + VIL[e] [foul]

27 Antisemitic affair victim (‘Y’) Freud treated with very little success (7)
DREYFUS
An anagram [treated] of Y FREUD + S[uccess] – for the ‘affair’, see here

28 Beset by depression, make mistake of only half being a clown (7)
PIERROT
PIT [depression] round ERR [make mistake] + O [half of Of]

Down

1 Heartless monarch has church put out (6)
QUENCH
QU[e]EN + CH [church]

2 Strange Lancastrian housing name (6)
ANGELA
Contained in strANGE LAncastrian

3 Act the soup-maker and keel over (4,6)
TURN TURTLE
TURN [act] + TURTLE [from which soup may be made]

4 One who records spill (5)
TAPER
Double definition

5 Don’t join ‘Easter Egg’ movement (9)
SEGREGATE
An anagram [movement] of EASTER EGG

7 Old soldiers flushed out a Scot (8)
REDCOATS
RED [flushed] + an anagram [out] of A SCOT

8 Induce rehabilitation in hospital department for TV watchers? (8)
AUDIENCE
An anagram [rehabilitation] of INDUCE in A & E [hospital department] – TV watchers are only one example of an audience, hence the question mark

13 Main part of the rugby team has moved on (5,5)
LION’S SHARE
LIONS [British and Irish rugby team] + an anagram [moved] of HAS + RE [on]

15 Indian river ignored by powerful businessmen who hope to become major players (9)
TRIALISTS
[indus]TRIALISTS [powerful businessmen] minus Indus [Indian river] – one meaning of TRIALIST is ‘a competitor or player under consideration for a place in a major team’

16 Hair colour like Henry James, perhaps, cut by Latin? (3,5)
ASH BLOND
AS [like] + H [Henry – SI unit] + L [Latin] in [cutting] BOND [James, perhaps] – more usually seen in the feminine [blonde]

17 An unhappy existence of stick-retrieval etc? (4,4)
DOG’S LIFE
Cryptic definition – this made me smile: I’ve always wondered how dogs feel about endlessly retrieving a stick, only to have it chucked away again

20 Cooker put on time program? (6)
APPLET
APPLE [cooker] + T [time] – the question mark indicates definition by example: an apple could also be an eater

23 Praise miniature railway in container (3,2)
CRY UP
RY [abbreviation – miniature – of railway] in CUP [container] – I don’t think I’d heard of this expression but I suppose it’s the opposite of ‘cry down’ – obvious, really

40 comments on “Guardian 27,964 / Brummie”

  2. Hmm, not so much to my taste. I felt the theme rather spoiled things as a number of answers were write-ins from the definition once the idea of expressions using animals was in place. The parsing was often then tortuous. I didn’t like “east” for “after” given the clue is across and down, not the additional “a” in s+iberia + a + massive area. I know “a” is part of the definition here but crossword clues don’t usually include articles unless they are wordplay or necessary so this seemed a bit off.

    “cry up” was new to me too. I thought “busy bees” a bit weak – almost just a double definition with neither particularly cryptic. There were some fun clues too, but it would’ve been better to be less forced I thought.

    Thanks Eileen for the blog.

  3. Couldn’t parse EAGER BEAVER, STOOL PIGEON, LION’S SHARE, or TRIALISTS, and did not know QUAT in 1ac. But the answers had to be what they were. So thanks, Eileen, for the explanations, and Brummie for the puzzle.

  4. I thought this was a tremendous puzzle –  great clues. Also hadn’t heard of QUAT. Favourites included OMINOUSLY, ASH BLOND and APPLET. Got waylaid by 10a for a time, trying to shoehorn in something about intransigent and ‘in transit’ (in the van)! Many thanks to Brummie and Eileen.

  5. Had no idea re parsing 1ac, too lazy to work on parsing eager beaver, and ditto trialists (cute!). So, grid filled, quite enjoyably, but more of a ‘dnf’ than a ‘f’. Held up a bit thinking 10ac would end in ‘led’, and by the unfamiliarity of ‘cry up’, as Eileen said. Opioids engender cold turkey, hallucinogens (trips) don’t. Spill for taper is cw-familiar, but it’s been a while. Reverse loots plus pig plus eon was clever, tho the surface was a bit ‘que?’, and ditto the vacuous orgy. Quench was neat. Overall, not bad. Thanks both.

  6. Thanks Brummie and Eileen

    Quick up to the last two, ANVIL and APPLET, though I took some time to parse TRIALIST (a favourite) and STOOL PIGEON, and never did parse EAGER BEAVER.

    ASH BLOND was another favourite.

    (Eileen, I’m sorry, you have used one of my most hated expressions – “birds and animals”, adding “insects” this time. The BBC Music magazine had “animals, birds and fish” this month. I felt like writing to say it was like saying “humans and magazine editors”!)

  7. Definitely at the easier end of Brummie’s range, but an enjoyable crossword.

    Thanks to Brummie and Eileen

  8. I’m with TheZed@2 in finding the bitty parsing tedious – and with ginf@5 in not being bothered to work them all out. I didn’t see the theme – although with hindsight it must be the most obvious one ever!
    Muffin – you must spend your life being constantly irritated by other’s (mis)use of words!
    Thanks to Brummie and Eileen.

  9. I thought this was great. Surprised by some of the reactions. Btw TheZed, the relevant part of that clue is across not down. Would have been worth it for 16 ac alone but of goodies.

  11. I enjoyed this.  Some clever surfaces.  I particularly liked the exhortation to stay away from the Easter Egg movement at 5d and Henry James’s hair colour at 16d.

    (Muffin @6: the other day I was given a coupon at my local supermarket for money off “fresh fruit and bananas”.  I thought bananas were fruit.  However since learning that humans are fish – see my comment @56 of last week’s Arachne – I’m not sure of anything any more.)

    Many thanks Brummie and Eileen.

  12. An enjoyable puzzle that unfolded steadily. I completed the top left corner quite quickly and so spotted the theme early (very rare for me) and that helped. Quat was a guess and a google – I’ve not heard that before. I agree with TheZed @2 that BUSY BEES was a little weak. I needed the blog to fully parse EAGER BEAVER, though it was easy to get with the crossers and the theme.

    Thanks to Brummie and Eileen.

  13. I didn’t enjoy this as much as some others, although I smiled at DOGS LIFE and thought TRIALISTS was quite clever. Xjpotter@9, I don’t think the across part of 9, 19 is “the relevant part of the clue.” The clue implies that BEAVER is east of EAGER, but it is actually southeast. I was also annoyed at the clue for STOOL in 18a. “Rifles about” would work, but imo “about rifles” does not. I think Sil van der Hoek commented on a similar use of “about” recently.

    Maybe I’m just grumpy today. Anyway, thanks to Brummie and Eileen.

  14. Xjpotter@9 My reading of 9ac 19dn is “to live say” = “be aver” east of (ie to the right of) “east span river” = “e age r” but no part of “beaver” is in an across clue so the instruction is wrong. It is to the east of it in the grid but that is pretty weak.

  15. Enjoyed this partly as I spotted the theme which I usually don’t. I spied ten animals or eleven if you include TAPIR, a bit of a stretch for a homophone of TAPER. Come to think of it they’re pronounced differently; I’ll get me coat.

  16. A DNF for me but largely my own fault. Convinced myself that the James in 16d was James Brown, therefore unthinkingly put in ash brown. This of course made Dreyfus virtually impossible. As I say the clue is fair enough, so merely down to me. Enjoyed the rest of it and thanks to Brummie for the challenge and Eileen for the blog.

  17. Eileen and gratinfreo@5. Cold turkey isn’t the effect of the [usually opioid] drug but the effect of its sudden withdrawal.

  18. An enjoyable coffee-time challenge. Witty and not as forced as some of the Grauniad regulars. Thanks Brummie &Eileen.

  19. TheZed @ 2 is, I think, the only one who has pointed out that the theme isn’t just animals, birds, etc. It is words or phrases which include them.

  22. DREYFUS was FOI and a bit obvious I thought. Not as obvious as the animals but I still didn’t notice there was a theme! I ‘ve never heard of CRY UP but, after eliminating every other possibility, I looked it up. and lo . ASH BLOND was a bit convoluted but not hard to get.
    Quite enjoyable.
    Thanks Brummie.

  23. I really do need to start looking for themes. Lions share was last but one, not helped by not being able to get fronts=part of rugby team out of my head. 5ac didn’t seem fair due to loose definitions in both wordplay and definition. Nice crossword otherwise.

  24. Not too dfficult, but I enjoyed it. I didn’t get all the parsing so many thanks to Brummie.

    1 across: I didn’t know RTE or QUAT so it was a toss-up between QUINTET and QUARTET until ANGELA came to the rescue.

    20 down: “Program” instead of “programme” in a UK crossword is a dead giveaway for a computer related answer.

    21 across: I feel I’m missing something – why “bees” particularly for “communal working parties”?

    I make it ten animal metaphors: eager beaver, pigheaded, cold turkey, lone wolf, stool pigeon, busy bees, black sheep, dog’s life, turn turtle, lion’s share. (I think redcoats are birds as well.)

  25. Dagenham @24

    “Bees” is a term for several people getting together to perform the same sort of task (“sewing bees”, for example). I suspect that it’s transatlantic!

  26. I’ve been out since just after posting the blog. Thanks for the comments and apologies for the confusion re 9ac, which I didn’t understand at first. I stayed up until midnight to get the puzzle, solved it online, copied and pasted the clues and filled in the solutions, then filled in the explanations when I got up this morning. Since I was working from a list, I didn’t notice /had forgotten that 9,19 was an ‘across and down’ clue, as TheZed points out @2  and so BE AVER was not to the east of the rest of the clue in the grid. [I hope that make sense.]

    grantinfreo @5 and Blaise @17 – I didn’t intend my comment on the blog to mean what either of you implies: my understanding was that COLD TURKEY might be imposed [as in the clue] on someone who had been on a trip. [Both Collins and Chambers give COLD TURKEY as both the sudden withdrawal of a drug and the symptoms which result from it.]

    Dagenham @24  I did get ten animals [sic] – I just miscounted my ticks! Re BEE: this crops up fairly often in crosswords, so it’s worth filing away – see Chambers: ‘a gathering of persons to unite their labour for the benefit of one individual or family, or for some joint amusement, exercise or competition, as in quilting bee, spelling bee‘.

    [Thank you, muffin – I’ve refreshed twice since starting this post and found another comment to reply to each time.]

     

  27. The Indus flows through the whole of Pakistan and has its origin in the disputed region of Ladakh. Hardly an “Indian river”.

  29. Not many ipad users here, I guess, or there would be some comment about the new format. With the exception of the anagram tool (which itself is not perfect) it’s a big step backwards. To quote Charlie Higson on Down the Line: why can’t they just leave things alone?

  30. Lloydus @29 “For everything to stay the same, everything must change” (Lampedusa, The Leopard)

    Muffin @28 seconded – I knew the bloggers here put in time and a half to get their blog up in time for us all to discuss the puzzle, but I am even more impressed now! Thank you again Eileen.

  31. Lloyd us the old version never worked well on my iPad Pro, so thought this one an improvement. However I couldn’t find the compilers name anywhere in the app.

  33. Yeah I really struggled with this! might need to do a few more quiptics before attempting these bad boys… Thanks for your help everyone.

  34. Late starting this, therefore late to finish. It was good fun and well worth staying up for. I enjoyed all the clever little misdirections and original (or unusual) bits of wordplay in several of the clues, and I can understand also why some of these would not suit some solvers.
    I enjoyed the theme too, and, like others, found that it helped me to solve a few of the last answers to go in.
    Many thanks to Brummie and Eileen.

  35. thanks Eileen for your blog- I’m with cryptic sue in agreeing with your comment. I did not manage to parse a number so thanks for that. Thanks to Brummie for the fun

  36. Too late to be part of the conversation, but on the animals bird and insects question, I find I do equate animals with mammals, whilst would see them all as creatures. I found this hard and needed to come here for the parsing . Thanks all!

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