Guardian Cryptic 28,232 by Vulcan

79 comments on “Guardian Cryptic 28,232 by Vulcan”

1. Excellent puzzle, Vulcan, bravo! Vaguely remembered oflag, no idea from where; liked ‘for a pound’ as indicator, as well as ‘for a crash’, both surface-coherent. 21d is a clever clue (anyone doing this to a book was deemed beyond plate sarty by Mrs Ginf). Enjoyable, and far from a write-in, thanks both.

2. A good little challenge today from Vulcan. I really liked 1a MEAN BUSINESS, 24a PERFORM, 17a USER-FRIENDLY, 16d AUTHORITY, 17d BORROWED, 21d DOG-EAR and 23d SINUS (a clever hidden), coinciding with manehi on a couple of those. 9a OFLAG was unfamiliar but guessed from the crossers. Also, I hadn’t encountered that meaning of TICKLER at 12a before but worked out the clue nevertheless.

   Thanks to Vulcan and manehi.

   [gif@1 – what does “beyond plate sarty” mean? Great phrase but I have never heard of it!]

3. Not a fan of Vulcan’s puzzles and this was no exception. Not a fan of for a pound and get transferred as anagrinds and cosmos means universe not world.

4. That was a challenge though looking back I am not sure why as (except for me at least TAILENDER) the parsing was all very clear. I had not met ‘for a pound’ as an anagrind before, but soon realised it must be. OFLAG = Offizierslager = officers’ camp. I had not realised that it is used in English, though I see from google that it is. Thank you to Vulcan and Manehi, and have a good Monday everyone.

5. Not easy but quite enjoyable.

   Liked AUTHORITY, TAIL-ENDER, MAD KEEN

   New CUMBER = burden; OFLAG

   Did not understand why TICKLER = poacher in river

   Thank you to Vulcan and Manehi

6. Best one yet from Vulcan in my book.  Sorry Desmodeus, but I really liked CLOUDLESS – both for the anagrind, and for the image that the surface evoked, suggestive of grubby backstreet deals between down-on-their-luck crossword setters.  Who knew such a world existed?

   ginf @1, you might have remembered the Offizierslager (thanks Beobachterin) from Oflag IV-C, otherwise known as Colditz?

   [JinA @2: I puzzled over ginf’s plate sarty with my homophone hunter hat on, and grinned when it finally dawned on me: polite society.  I’m just trying to imagine the outcry on 15² if a setter tried to get away with that one! 😉 ]

7. Sorry, forgot to say thanks to Vulcan, and the ever-helpful manehi.

8. I’m with grantinfreo, JinA and essexboy on this one: I think I’ve tackled all of Vulcan’s offerings to date and this one certainly feels like the best.  Certainly it’s nothing like the ‘usual Monday fare’.  Some excellent clues, using a variety of devices and, as everybody probably knows by now, my preference is for smooth and sensible surfaces and there were plenty.

   Ticks for too many to list so selecting a few for particular note: OSPREY (delightful and relevant surface), CLOUDLESS (neat definition and I liked ‘for a pound’), SMOKESTACK (again for the relevance of the surface), DEFACE and SINUS were both cleverly hidden, the whole concept of the BORROWED clue appealed, AUTHORITY was nicely broken down in a way I haven’t seen before.  DOG-EAR could possibly have been tightened even more (‘Fold party clothes’?) but it’s lovely and simple and WAIVE is just splendid.

   michelle @5: trout tickling is a slightly bizarre but genuine method for catching fish and, yes, it involves stroking or ‘tickling’ them to a point – presumably of relaxation or semi-hypnosis – where they can be grasped with the hand.  Given the minimum of equipment required, an easy way for someone to poach.

   Three cheers and more to VULCAN who has either been holding something back or is developing rapidly as a setter.  Thanks also to manehi who had an enjoyable task this morning.

9. Thanks Vulcan and manehi

   Certainly harder than the usual Vulcan. I liked FAST ONE and DOG EAR.

   TAIL ENDER is odd, as it seems to be the same definition twice, with the second one being rather loose.

   What is “is in” doing in 24d? It makes no sense to either definition, and surely could have been just omitted?

10. Like most others I thought it was really good, particularly CLOUDLESS, TICKLER and OSPREY. Lots of fun, if a bit challenging for a Monday. Many thanks to V & m.

11. Thanks both. Seem to remember tickling trout being described in a book by Arthur Ransome, but have never tried!

12. Thanks, Vulcan and manehi.

    [grantinfreo @1

    like JinA, I was intrigued by your ‘beyond plate sarty’ so googled it – and found your comment on the first page! Thanks for the translation, essexboy. 😉 ]

13. I found this very tricky, for a Monday especially, but it fell in slowly but surely. BORROWED was my favourite of many already mentioned by Mark@8 and although cricket is not my forte, I thought TAIL ENDER was neat. Best Vulcan so far and thanks to manehi.

14. Well that was great, thanks and congrats Vulcan. My CotD goes to MAD KEEN. Good to see some more up to date language and, being the last thing I look for, those “the answer is the clue is the answer” types always provide a smile when the penny drops.

    Assumed I was looking for some kind of eider duck so revealed 14d. Thanks for the full parsing Manehi.

15. Just the right balance and difficulty for a Monday, I thought. Some very nice clues included. Last two in had a distinctly riverine theme, TICKLER followed by OSPREY. Thanks Vulcan and Manehi…

16. 11a MAD KEEN ,  I thought “desperately”  (on it’s own) was the clue.

    Anxious provided MAD and KNEE was on a plate for us.

    I’m getting back into crosswords after many decades and I find some of practices very weird nowadays.

    They may have always existed which would explain why I failed to complete more than I solved :O)

     

    If manehi is right on 17d then I might go back to sudoko.

     

    I got Borrowed but could not see how the cryptic clue helped.

    “OR (other ranks, military “men”) after B (bachelor);”   is pure madness if correct.

    “men supporting” to military men and “other ranks”  makes a little sense with hindsight, but needs a huge stretch!

    And to then move on to OR from there? All from “men supporting”?

     

     

    I got 14d by fluke!   I guessed EIDER for duck and did “check this” which made it somewhat simpler.

    I ‘revealed’ 7d  and 26a which I am disappointed I did not get.

    S for Society is my other pet hate, B for Bachelor would normally be forgiveable but with OR not so much.

    I got all the intersecting letters before revealing.

     

    I was lucky with my guessing i.e. EIDER ,  Y from Tay (was Spey) , and LAG from Stalag and doing “check this”  or I might have revealed a few more.

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

17. [Slightly off topic, though with pertinence to Vulcan’s offering: I ended up posting late in the day on Friday so my thanks to those who responded to my observations and query about Shed’s surfaces would not have been seen by several.  I reiterate those thanks.  Given that that late post of mine was pretty critical of Shed’s puzzle, what a pleasure (and a relief) to find a wealth of enjoyable surfaces in both today’s and (without any spoiling whatsoever) the excellent Prize on Saturday.  Such a contrast to Friday’s experience.  Given that we have no Guardian crossword on a Sunday, I’ve got into the habit of tackling some old puzzles and have reached early 2004.  Yesterday it was a Shed and it was absolutely superb.  Witty, challenging, cunning, lots of clever devices and lovely surfaces!  Praise where it’s due!]

18. Thanks for the blog.

    Took two bites at this, not a write-in. Liked mad keen. Generally great surfaces, elegant.

19. Message to Mark. Try AZED inthe Observer. The pinnacle of setters!

20. Ah, the new Vulcan. Much preferable to the old one. Proper thought required in teasing out the solutions rather than a blind stab at what might function as a cryptic definition. OSPREY is a classic example.

21. I couldn’t parse TAIL-ENDER but cobro knew it was cricket.

    Favourites were MAD KEEN and DOG-EAR.

    Thanks, Vulcan and manehi.

22. @Essexboy No need for apologies. I’m happy other people enjoyed the puzzle, it just wasn’t my cup of tea.

23. A good deal tougher than the usual Monday fare, but mostly good, though I too was flummoxed by TAIL-ENDER. A clue combining two terms of cricketing argot with a solution requiring a third, and nothing else to indicate where to look for the answer? I also don’t understand it. Surely every batsman wants to avoid a ‘duck’?

24. Like others, found this a lot tougher than the usual Monday shoo-in but that woke what little is left of the grey-matter up.  FOI was 3d but only because I had actually managed to buy two rashers-of in a roll from the Greggs at the station this morning (some normality is returning after alll…).

    LOI was quite a lot of the rest!  Now, I am going to take issue with “CUMBER” because I thought that the usual word these days was “ENCUMBER” for the verb and “ENCUMBERANCE” for the noun.  I notice that I am told that CUMBER as both verb and noun are archaic but given that I am as well and therefore should remember them in general usage, this seems somewhat tenuous.  However, it was an easy-in so I’m not going to complain too much!

    Anyway, it was fabulous fun and as per usual thanks to Vulcan and manehi!

25. No-one seems to have a problem with 27, and it may be that my approach is overly restrictive for a modern cryptic crossword. Compare the definition (‘works easily’) with the solution (‘user-friendly’). Here are two ways of describing why for me this doesn’t work: (1) The definition consists of a verb and an adverb, whereas the solution is an adjective. (2) It would be difficult to construct a sentence in which the solution and the definition were interchangeable.

26. … oh and I should have added that 14d was SO well clued that even I as possibly the only Englishman who hates cricket with a passion got it withint seconds 🙂

27. A nice variety of clues.  Favourite was 1d MALADROIT.

    Desmodeus @3: Chambers has, for COSMOS, “the world or universe as an orderly or systematic whole”.

    Mark @17 (and Cedric @19) – or try the Everyman on Sundays.  The new setter (since early 2019) has tended to divide opinions but usually comes up with something interesting, and occasionally (in my opinion) something brilliant.

    Many thanks Vulcan and manehi.

28. Been out all day since that early entry, so, fraffly nace of essexboy for explaining 🙂 .

29. MadMax @16 – if you have been away from crosswords, you won’t have noticed that “men” = OR has recently become common usage in the Guardian crossword. Like “good” = PI or “take” = R. Obvious once you have seen it a couple of times, but impenetrable if you have not. Best avoided in my book and a sign of a setter looking for a quick route to an elegant surface and relying on the solver to have the specific experience to sort it out.

30. I’ve been critical of Vulcan in the past so credit where credit’s due, I thought this was excellent. If I was Vulcan’s headmaster I’d now be delivering the “now you’ve shown us what you’re capable of …” speech

    I initially assumed party was DO GEAR but then the clothes were unaccounted for 🙂

    As a lover of cricket clues TAIL-ENDER was right up my street and I think we had “bunny” quite recently.

    So what are the top ten most popular animals in clues I hear you ask …

    1 Bird 1658
    2 Fish 1295
    3 Dog 845
    4 Horse 672
    5 Cat 466
    6 Duck 386
    7 Bear 204
    8 Fly 186
    9 Sheep 178
    10 Snake 157

    Some of these numbers will be a bit high as some words like bear & fly appear in their non-animal sense

    Cheers all

31. bodycheetah @30: presumably the bird count is inflated by all the Charlie Parker clues; the fish count by any clues referring to rock band, Marillion; the dog count by any following; horse by heroine; cat by vomit; duck by cricket…..

32. A slow start with the bottom half eventually completed but not much showing in the top half. Yes, IMHO this was much better than many previous Vulcan puzzles.

    TILT was rabbit as: ‘An inferior player at golf, cricket, etc.’ I liked CLOUDLESS with the unusual anagrind – I spent ages trying to work ‘al’ into the answer.

    Thanks Vulcan and manehi.

33. Vulcan’s USER-FRIENDLY puzzles are growing on me; I was pleased to note an absence of feeble CDs today. WARY, DUTY, WAIVE, SPELL and BACON were all rather easy write-ins, but on the plus side were OFLAG, DOG-EAR, the economy of PERFORM and the well-concealed SINUS. Our American buddies might have tried to misspell FIBRE and been confused by TAIL-ENDER, but, like bodycheetah, I’m a sucker for any cricket-related clue. (An utterly hopeless batsman is called a ferret, as he goes in after the rabbits.)

    Three answers bring to mind songs, very different but all excellent: Howlin’ Wolf’s SMOKESTACK Lightning, the Nightingales’ Urban OSPREYs and NO DICE by Pete Atkin / Clive James.

34. Ahh Ginf, your comment takes me back fondly to Afferbeck Lauder’s books, sadly out of print and hard to find. Very clever and a splendid addition to the reading matter shelf in ones’s smallest room.

    Thanks also to Vulcan for an excellent start to the week and Manehi for the blog that, rarely, I didn’t need.

     

     

35. Doofs @34 – you beat me to it. But it seems to me that ‘plate sarty’ (@1) and ‘fraffly nace’ (@28) are not so much Strine [Afferbeck Lauder’s book was called Let Stalk Strine, for those puzzled, Strine being The Aussie mangling of English], as a Strine attempt at posh. Maybe I’m wrong – GinF?

    I too found this fairly chewy, but got there eventually. Nho OFLAG, which didn’t help, so the NW was my last part. SOme nice PDMs along the way. Thanks, Vulcan and manehi.

36. 2Scotcheggs @33: I regularly marvel at your eclectic music library.  How you remember them, I have no clue.  Unless you pick unusual words from the grid, as I have sometimes done when prompted by your posts, and Google them + the word ‘song’.  Did you know there is a Fibre Optic by bands called both Echo Park and Shadrow, Mean Business is an album by The Firm (including Paul Rodgers and Jimmy Page) as well as a song by Whitesnake and there’s a track called Tail Ender by an electro band called Midland!

37. Good to see some praise for Vulcan, who has come in for his share of criticism in the past, some of it from me. My enjoyment of this one wasn’t even spoiled by missing OFLAG (_ _ L _ G has to be gulag, doesn’t it? What, it isn’t? As others have mentioned, CLOUDLESS, MAD KEEN and PERFORM were nicely done, and I’ll put in a good word for SPORTS CAR. Thanks to Vulcan and manehi.

38. poc @23. Yes, every batter wants to avoid a duck, but the point about a TAIL-ENDER is that avoiding a duck is the limit of their ambition.

39. Delightful puzzle.  Finished most of it last night, a few hangers-on this morning.  Thank you for it, Vulcan, and manehi for the useful explanations, especially about cricket.

    The poacher definition brings back Maria’s line from Twelfth Night as she waits with her co-conspirators for Malvolio to find the faked letter that convinces him that his patroness is in love with him and that he can please her my making a total fool of himself: “Here comes the trout that must be caught with tickling!”

    22a What a horrible surface!  And yet I liked the clue.

    I googled “plate sarty” and found the same as Eileen.  You’re famous, ginf!

    Maidenbartok @26  It’s one thing to hate cricket and another to be as ignorant as most of us are outside the UK.  I had no idea that the clue was even about cricket, and I bet I’m not alone.

40. Since we got from Plate Sarty to Lets Talk Strine, its worth remembering the phrase from that book which took us into Dismal Guernsey when we abandoned £SD.

41. Robert M @25, I think you’re correct re 27a.  The definition and the answer are different parts of speech and not equivalent, so strictly the clue does not work.  I suppose in its defence you could imagine an advert for a product saying either “User-friendly!” or “Works easily!”, and those two slogans would convey essentially the same message (though of course they are not proper sentences).

42. I really struggled with this — not because the clues were cleverly constructed but more because they were rather ragged, I thought. Others have noted the rather wonky defs of USER-FRIENDLY and COSMOS (= more than ‘world’) and the shambles that was TAIL-ENDER. I found poacher=TICKLER to be similarly flimsy as a def. “Get transferred” is ungrammatical as an anagrind and “for a pound” jars likewise. In this puzzle it feels like the setter is rather clumsily bashing out the clues with an airy wave of the hand just to achieve the surface he/she seeks.

    Not one I enjoyed, I’m sorry to say.

43. Foubnd this quite tough but got their eventually. Favourite was SMOKESTACK, having been born in Stoke I can confirm there used to be plently of them (sadly not anymore), so that added depth to the clue, as well as nostalgia. Also really liked AUTHORITY, DOG-EAR, USER-FRIENDLY, BORROWED and CONTENDER. Wondered if MrsGif’s view could be BEYOND THE PALE (which doesn’t quite work)- thanks to essexboy@6 for clarifying.

    Many thanks to Vulcan and Manehi

44. … and actually, reviewing “Female, a gem that cheat pulls”, the surfaces don’t even work very well. Hmmm.

     

45. Apologies for spelling – typing too fast. Also meant to say TAIL-ENDER impossible for one not familiar with cricket argot to parse….

46. It’s a bit of a relief to note the absence of folks calling this crossword a Quiptic-level write-in because I found it quite difficult. Being unfamiliar with OFLAG, MAD KEEN, TICKLER, ANGLESEY, and TAIL-ENDER made it impossible for me to finish. That’s not to say that all was lost — favourites included FAST ONE, AUTHORITY, and DEFACE. Thanks to both.

47. Absolutely love plate sarty, fraffly nace and Dismal Guernsey. Surely a setter somewhere is already compiling a crossword incorporating these into a grid. More, please!

48. Took me a while to get started – but once I had, this was good fun. Amongst a host of delights, DOG EAR, NO DICE and FAST ONE stood out. I’d never come across “cumber” before, but am definitely going to try and work it into my conversation from now on…
    Thanks to Manehi and Vulcan

49. Van Winkle @ 29

    Many thanks for your support.

    I was never very good at solving ordinary crosswords and used to work backwards to the solution from the cryptic clues.

    In the days of paper and pen, it was a slow process to get into the setter’s mindset. Nowadays, I’m spotting the literal answers much better with the use of “checks” and guess-work to make sense of the cryptic part.  I am getting answers such as “MALADROIT” against all my expectations (before I see it is an anagram) and feel I am getting a sixth sense from some compilers.

    I’m slowly learning some modern short-cuts e.g. ‘Yellow to OR’ , and your ‘good to PI’  and ‘Take to R’ hints are very welcome. They are now on my list to research :O)

     

    I look forward to non-reliance of “check” which is is perfect for me currently.  And fifteen squared is brilliantly helpful when all else fails.

    Thanks to everyone involved.

     

50. Lord Jim @ 41: Brilliant! Thank you for extending my notion of a working solution. To build on your advert idea, the two expressions could be said to have the same meaning in, say, the title of a product review, or a brief answer to a conversational question. I’ll remember that when next assailed by the pedantry of a failed classicist.

51. Mad Max @49 & VW @29: I am missing something.  Familiar as I am with the various short-cuts, the ‘Take = R’ is leaving me bemused.  How does that work?  Thanks in advance.

52. It’s a standard abbreviation in prescriptions, Mark.

53. This was definitely among the neatest of the Vulcans, although – unlike some – I’ve been following his career with interest.

    PURSE, PERFORM and SPORTS CAR had very neat wordplay. DOG EAR and SINUS made me chuckle. The dds and cds seemed very sound, given that this has been a source of debate in the past.

    A bit verbose in parts (OSPREY and USER-FRIENDLY had just too many words), but it’s a minor complaint.

54. muffin @52: thanks my friend.  Never encountered it and would have been stumped if I did.  (Fortunately, not too many needs for prescriptions).  Suggests it may not have been used in a Guardian puzzle for a while; I’d have thought I’d have come across it in a blog and, whilst I’ll confess to sometimes speed reading, it certainly hasn’t caught my eye.

55. Was, uh, the surface of 14d supposed to be a nod to Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck or was that just me being American? (It even had the same amount of letters! Okay fine, the answer was hyphenated and Bugs Bunny isn’t, but still!)

    Aside from 14d and all its cricket-ness, the trickiest one for me as an American was 8d (never heard of the River Spey). Never heard of OFLAG or trout-tickling either.

    I’ll echo all the others and say I liked the clue for SINUS as well.

56. Shirl @11

    It was in Picts and Martyrs that “tickling trout” occurred, but the local who showed Dick how to do it referred to it as “guddling”.

57. Mark @36, thanks for your words. I like to think I have wide-ranging musical tastes, as should anyone who’s a genuine music lover. It helps that I’ve always maintained an interest in new music, from my pre-teen years to my current age of 62, while continuing to listen to old favourites. But I’m afraid I’m unfamiliar with any of the tracks you mention; I must investigate them!

58. Khitty Hawk @55:  Oh boy, fwesh wabbit stew!  I never even thought of that, but looking at 14d again it does have a Looney Tunes flavour, sorry flavor.  Then again, wouldn’t it have been Elmer Fudd that Bugs was hoping to avoid?

59. [muffin @52 – I don’t think I got that far down the Swallows and Amazons list in my youth – I think it was Swallowdale]

60. Re world/cosmos, note there was a similar discussion recently for another Guardian puzzle, re cosmos as a synonym for world (see https://www.fifteensquared.net/2020/08/28/guardian-28224-philistine/#comment-425068).  Similarly, if one looks at several online thesauri they’ll often find world (or sometimes even earth) listed as a synonym for cosmos.  Granted, not the most commonly understood meaning in our time… but then that’s often part of the art and wonder of cruciverbalism… asking us to look at what we thought we knew in a different way that expands our knowledge and understanding of the “world” around us :^)

61. [Sorry Shirl – definitely Picts and Martyrs!]

62. 2Scotcheggs @57: I’m not vouching for their quality!

63. My boozy travels have taken me into pubs called The Tickled Trout and The Guddled Trout.

64. Best Vulcan by far. A good workout for the start of the week. Plenty oF ‘doh’ moments when the penny sank in.
    Thanks, and to Manehi too for the blog.

65. It’s been a while since I failed to complete a Monday puzzle, but this one defeated me. I couldn’t spot MEAN BUSINESS, although in hindsight it doesn’t seem hard, and I failed to get OFLAG or ANGLESEY until after I’d cheated on 1ac. I don’t think I’ve heard the word OFLAG, so I guess that one’s not surprising.

    There were lots of fine clues in this puzzle, but I particularly loved the compactness of the clue for 24ac (PERFORM) and the deceptive anagrind in 10ac (CLOUDLESS).

    And I’m another who needs to express gratitude to essexboy @6 for explaining “plate sarty”, which certainly made me laugh.

66. Tassie Tim @35, yes, something like that…the originator was a fraffly chaffle chappie I knew in Sydney in the ’60s…

    essexboy@6 re oflag, yes Colditz does ring a bell.. there have been shows about it, and I have the vaguest feeling our boys even had a Colditz board game…

67. Wow – I’ve bitten off a 4 course meal.

    Good=PI is missing Take=R is missing but men=or is there amongst one or two others.

    http://www.crackingcrosswords.co.uk/abbreviations.html

68. Very good=pi is there.

    Society = S is missing – makes me feel better!

69. Thanks both,

    As others have said, an excellent puzzle from Vulcan. I solved ‘tail-ender’, after much head scratching and trying to fit ‘talk’ in somewhere, from the observation that rabbits have tails. ‘Tail-ender’ then seemed like a cd for a rabbit. It was only then that I realised that it fitted the whole clue. Playing with ‘hoping to avoid a duck’ as ‘endear minus a = ender’, has proved ultimately fruitless, even tho’ ‘duck’ and ‘dear’ are both words used familiarly in the midlands for women of a certain age.

70. [Robert M, this is really weird: you have the [user-]name of my father (who sadly died several years ago) and sort of of my (ex) brother-in-law who to the best of my knowledge is not a cryptic crossword sort of guy. Seeing my dad’s name here gave me quite a turn, I can tell you!]

71. OddOtter @60: I thought of, and nearly referenced, your recent cosmos observation in connection with the Atlas debate.  Someone else had picked up on the point so I didn’t but you made a fair point at the time.  And you were nicely namechecked at the end of that thread: “…a hatter, an otter…”  Redolent of the Hunting of the Snark!

72. Shirl@11,59; Muffin@52,61
    Chapter entitled “Tickling Trout” begins at p119 in, to be pedantic, “The Picts and the Martyrs”.
    I don’t recall a reference in Sawllowdale but it’s a couple of years since I last read it so I can’t be sure.

73. Me @72
    Swallowdale, of course

74. Boffo @53, This was definitely among the neatest of the Vulcans, although – unlike some – I’ve been following his career with interest.

    I am sure today’s setter will smile at this comment!

    24ac (PERFORM) was not just neat, it was a real gem.

75. They catch trout in Swallowdale, but tickle them (but doesn’t Jackie call it guddling?) in The Picts and the Martyrs.

76. Beobachterin @75

    Yes – see mine @56

77. TassieTim @35 – This sits on my shelf for the occasional perusal:

    I thought that Mr Alphabetical Order’s “Fraffly Suite” was taking the rise out of RP rather than Strine?

78. Ugh – image didnt’ post…”Let Stalk Strine” and “Nose Tone Unturned” by Afferbeck Lauder.

79. Sorry muffin, we somehow crossed. (I think I wrote that and got distracted and did not posts it until later. I should have checked.)

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