The puzzle may be found at https://www.theguardian.com/crosswords/cryptic/28241.
As a crossword with very few easy answer, I found this challenging, particularly for the cross-references, but very well crafted, and worth the effort. There are lots of painterly references, with a few side trips into other arts. My apologies if the illustration in 1A causes the text to be truncated on whatever device and browser you are using, but if I made it any smaller the detail would be lost. On my iPad, at least, the blog is rendered correctly in 19A LANDSCAPE mode.
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | HAY WAIN | 26 work — Dance with Excellent Knight (3,4) |
| A charade of HAY (‘dance’) plus W (‘with’) plus AI ( A1, ‘excellent’) plus N (‘knight’, chess notation), for John CONSTABLE’S (26A must be given an apostrophe) painting. |
||
| 5 | GAUGUIN | 6 celebrated, shedding stones, cutting drink (7) |
| An envelope (‘cutting’) of AUGU[st] (‘celebrated’) minus the ST (‘shedding stones’) in GIN (‘drink’). | ||
| 10 | ET AL | Delayed returns with others (2,2) |
| A reversal (‘returns’) of LATE (‘delayed’). | ||
| 11 | PAINTBOXES | Old man fights over international cases for 21s (10) |
| An envelope (‘over’) of INT (‘international’) in PA (‘old man’, father) plus BOXES (‘fights’). | ||
| 12 | CENSUS | Count coppers guarding first of electricity poles (6) |
| An envelope (‘guarding’) of E (‘first of Electricity’, whether you like that formation or not) plus NS (North and South ‘poles’) in CUS (‘coppers’, from Cu, the chemical symbol, supplied with an improbable plural). | ||
| 13 | TESSERAE | Small blocks put back by 6, interrupting view (8) |
| A charade of TES, a reversal (‘back’) of SET (‘put’) plus SERAE, an envelope (‘interrupting’) of RA (member of the Royal Academy, ‘artist’) in SEE (‘view’). | ||
| 14 | FORECOURT | Where to buy juice on behalf of English royal household (9) |
| A charade of FOR (‘on behalf of’) plus E (‘English’) plus COURT (‘royal household’). I take it that the ‘juice’ of the definition is petrol (or gasoline if you prefer). | ||
| 16 | BRUSH | Sweeper‘s light touch (5) |
| Double definition. | ||
| 17 | IMAGE | I learned one’s maybe bust (5) |
| A charade of ‘I’ plus MAGE (‘learned one’). | ||
| 19 | LANDSCAPE | 1, for example, left with small bill (9) |
| A charade of L (‘left’) plus AND (‘with’) plus S (‘small’) plus CAPE (‘bill’, headland). | ||
| 23 | PANORAMA | View troops occupying isthmus (8) |
| An envelope (‘occupying’) of OR (Other Ranks, ‘troops’) in PANAMA (‘isthmus’). | ||
| 24 | ASSIGN | A singular error masks good attribute (6) |
| An envelope (‘masks’) of G (‘good’) in ‘a’ plus S (‘singular’) plus SIN (‘error’), with the definition as a verb. | ||
| 26 | CONSTABLES | Firm cracking frauds beat police (10) |
| An envelope (‘cracking’) of STABLE (‘firm’) in CONS (‘frauds’). | ||
| 27 | ACER | Hole in one rare tree (4) |
| A charade of ACE (‘hole in one’, golf) plus R (‘rare’). | ||
| 28 | USED CAR | In which American raced buggy? (4,3) |
| A charade of US (‘American’) plus EDCAR, an anagram (‘buggy’) of ‘raced’, with an extended definition. | ||
| 29 | MAGENTA | School sent back tablet and books with a 21 (7) |
| A charade of MAG, a reversal (‘sent back’) of GAM (‘school’ of whales) plus E (ecstasy, drug ‘tablet’) plus NT (New Testament, ‘books’) plus ‘a’. | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 2 | ART DECO | Style that’s 7 damaged trade with business (3,4) |
| A charade of ARTDE, an anagram (‘damaged’) of ‘trade’ plus CO (Company, ‘business’). | ||
| 3 | WALES | Polish hero freed a country (5) |
| WALES[a] (Lech, ‘Polish hero’; in Polish the L and E both have diacritics) minus the A (‘freed a’). | ||
| 4 | IMPASTO | Thick coat finished in one second (7) |
| An envelope (‘in’) of PAST (‘finished’) in I (‘one’, Roman numeral, or the impersonal personal pronoun) plus MO (‘second’). | ||
| 6 | ARTIST | Arab is enthralled by Times expert (6) |
| A charade of AR (‘Arab’) plus TIST, an envelope (‘enthralled by’) of ‘is’ in T T (‘times’, two of them). | ||
| 7 | GEOMETRIC | Euclidean circle in stone square in Morecambe (9) |
| A charade of GEOM, an envelope (‘in’, the first) of O (‘circle’) in GEM (‘stone’); plus ETRIC, another envelope (‘in’, the second) of T (‘square’) in ERIC (‘Morecambe’). | ||
| 8 | ICECAPS | Room 101 all about wet blankets (7) |
| A reversal (‘all about’) of SPACE (‘room’) plus CI (Roman numeral, ‘101’), with a dubious definition. | ||
| 9 | VICTORIA FALLS | Thunderous African spectacle? Call for a visit to be arranged (8,5) |
An anagram (‘to be arranged’) of ‘call for a visit’. Mosi-oa-Tunya, “The smoke that thunders” in Lozi |
||
| 15 | ENGROSSED | Busy English cardinal hosts very large society (9) |
| An envelope (‘hosts’) of OS (outsized or oversized, ‘very large’) plus S (‘society’) in ENG (‘English’) plus RED (‘cardinal’ – indication by example, or is it close enough to a synonym?). | ||
| 18 | MEADOWS | Each day cuts surrounding pastures (7) |
| An envelope (‘surrounding’ – not the ‘cuts’ one might expect) of EA (‘each’) plus D (‘day’) in MOWS (‘cuts’). | ||
| 20 | DEAD SEA | Bill’s in river, a very low stretch of water (4,3) |
| An envelope (‘in’) of AD’S (‘bill’s’) in DEE (‘river’) plus ‘a’. | ||
| 21 | PIGMENT | Meat supplier intended scrapping a colouring (7) |
| A charade of PIG (‘meat supplier’ not voluntarily) plus ME[a]NT (‘intended’) minus the A (‘scrapping a’). | ||
| 22 | BANANA | Variety of yellow crackers? Not quite (6) |
| BANANA[s] (‘crackers’) minus the last letter (‘not quite’). | ||
| 25 | SHADE | Cover done within square edges (5) |
| An envelope (‘within’) of HAD (‘done’, in the sense of tricked) in SE (‘SquarE edges’). | ||
I agree with PeterO regarding the scarcity of easy answers. Most went in a steady pace, if slowly, but I had to reveal GAUGUIN (which with hindsight I should have gotten) in order to get IMPASTO and TESSERAE, both unknown to me. I also didn’t know HAY WAIN and needed google to get it. All in all a stiff challenge with some satisfying moments on figuring out CONSTABLES and ICECAPS, to name just two. Thanks to Crucible and PeterO.
Similar easy-ish solving-level to the previous three this week, but something didn’t feel right about this one. I felt like walking away from it when half-done, & not a fun-clue yet encountered, but that’s goes against the grain so I persevered to the end. At least no look-ups were necessary. Let’s hope that tomorrow brings a fresh dawn …
19ac: “cape” as a “bill” was sneaky, but the answer led quickly to 1ac and 26ac. “Artist” took a while, though the theme should have made it easy. Do golfers really score an “ace” other than in the United States? But yes, this was fun, and PeterO’s illustrative reveals are always illuminating. Many thanks!
Thanks PeterO – several I couldn’t explain, for example WALES. I was trying to remove H(ero) from WHALES.
I quite enjoyed this, finishing it in two steady sessions, the second in my insomniac period. We haven’t had an interconnecting numbers one for a while.
Thanks, also, Crucible
Thanks Crucible and PeterO. Did not get GAUGUIN – had Sangria (drink) having seen Sang (celebrated) and RA (artist). Very lazy parsing. I enjoyed the rest.
Tough but very satisfying and enjoyable. As so often with Crucible’s puzzles, what seemed unfathomable initially gradually became navigable.
I got 13 but parsing confused me. I had “put back” as RESET but it was already back so thanks to Peter O.
I used the button to check both that and that tricky duo of 25 and 27 in the course of which I spotted SANGRIA was not correct-I didnt think i would be alone.
Great puzzle-thanks Crucible
In contrast to previous posters, I really liked this. I am always a bit intimidated by a Crucible but this one worked for me. CONSTABLES was my FOI and that gave me HAY WAIN, though I did not know HAY as dance so could not parse it. GAM for the school of whale was also new, but I had PIGMENT so MAGENTA it had to be. I also could not parse PAINTBOXES having convinced myself that ‘old nan’ was EX (reversed)… The linked clues were all very fair and I much enjoyed the artistic references, though after GAUGUIN i was expecting more painters. Many thanks to Crucible and to PererO for the explanations.
Interrupted solve, liquidish lunch, so revealed icecaps. Ortherwise not too much struggle, tho bill for cape was a que?, and similar for forecourt (pop-up juice stall?). A framed Hay Wain print was over the fireplace chez nous, so a couple of write-ins there. All ebjoyable, ta both.
Tough! Like Eurobodalla@5, I had Sangria instead of GAUGUIN, but couldn’t parse of course. ICECAPS was my favourite. Thanks to C & P.
Kicking myself for not getting 5ac – like Eurobodalia @5 I had SANGRIA in my mind and couldn’t get rid of it. But once you know what the answer is, the wordplay is precise and clear.
And that is the case with so much of this elegantly constructed crossword. I like clues where the wordplay doesn’t give much away but, once you have identified the solution, makes it clear that you have identified correctly. Personally I thought 14ac was an instance of this – I don’t struggle with “juice” as a misdirection for “petrol” – and Portland Bill and Selsey Bill seem legitimate “capes”, at least if you are doing this crossword in England.
The longish anagram of 9dn seemed pleasantly unforced, too. A great deal to enjoy in this. Thanks to Crucible and to PeterO
Thanks Crucible and PeterO
Pretty unmissable theme! For some time I just had ET AL and BRUSH; I then guessed and parsed WALES (a bit confused by the unwritten “n” as his name is pronounced), then HAY WAIN, and the rest filled in remarkably quickly.
Favourite the easy but nice anagram for VICTORIA FALLS.
Tricky one today with some dubious definitions. LOI for me was 29a because apart from “gam” being new to me, my industrial chemist background taught me that magenta is a dye not a pigment.
Thanks Crucible and PeterO!
NeilH @11: I couldn’t agree more (apart from not falling for the Sangria option). Elegant is the word that came to mind and I, too, enjoyed the parse/solve/re-parse/confirm experience with many of today’s clues. Initially, as George Clements @6, this seemed unfathomable with only the easy ET AL and then PIGMENT going in on the first pass. I had a feeling, from “26 work” in the very first clue that there might be a theme involving creators of some kind of artistic work which pointed me at MAGENTA though I couldn’t parse MAG. Like Beobachterin @8, “it had to be”. With BRUSH following that, the theme was clear but I remained stalled for a while. Then ACER dropped (though I’ve not heard of ace in golfing context) and everything proceeded smoothly from there.
ICECAPS and CONSTABLES have already earned ticks from others. I loved FORECOURT – definition, charade and surface – and admired LANDSCAPE, again for the neat charade and the bill/cape misdirection. Finally, TESSERAE was clever and it was this that gave me the RA leading to the solve of ARTIST. Remarkable how many artistic references Crucible (yep – got it right today – even double-checked!) has managed to insert. I wondered, briefly, whether what I took to be non-themed answers might turn out to have an art connection – maybe there’s a painter called Wales? But then I got USED CAR which surely isn’t the moniker of even the most avant garde artist.
Thanks Crucible and PeterO for explaining both gam and the correct parsing of ARTIST.
Enjoyed this (mostly) but failed on GAUGUIN entering SANGRIA unparsed for ‘drink’.
Inwardly groaned on first pass due to the many cross-references which I sometimes find a little tedious but it all fell into place when the arty theme emerged.
Didn’t see had = done in SHADE but it’s perfectly fair. and, like Mark, not heard of ace in the golfing context.
ICECAPS for wet blankets takes quite a liberty but it was a fun clue so forgivable in my book.
Many thanks, Crucible, enjoyable crozzie.
I seem to have been on Crucible’s wavelength today with a few write-ins and an obvious theme getting me off to a good start. LOI was ICECAPS. Parsing more difficult than solution!
Thanks to Crucible and PeterO.
Thanks for the blog, PeterO. Re 12ac: I don’t think there’s any objection to ‘first of electricity’ – it’s ‘first electricity’ that people don’t like.
Like Mark @14, I’m in total agreement with NeilH @11 (and my first thought was sangria!).
My favourites were 24ac ASSIGN, 29ac MAGENTA [GAM, along with ‘pod’, for a school of whales, is worth filing away – they appear quite often], 3dn WALES, 9dn VICTORIA FALLS and 15dn ENGROSSED.
Many thanks to Crucible – I loved it. (Now for Redshank – a double treat today. 😉 )
I was just going to say … but Auriga says it … on Crucibles lambda today.
Really enjoyed it. (had an unknown GAM though).
Thanks to Crucible and to Peter O for the additional pics
A quick solve starting with 26/1ac and finishing with 5ac where not bothering to check the word play, I biffed sangria. Same mistake as William@15.
Goodness me that was very tough and slow going today. A DNF as the check was pressed more times than is acceptable.
FOI was CONSTABLE which had me immediately searching for a theme and helped a bit. Not being able to spell GAUGUIN was frustrating but my fault entirely.
What a strange one! Thanks Crucible and PeterO.
I had only ET AL on first pass, then slowly filled the LHS with little to see on the RHS. However, it gradually and satisfyingly fell into place thereafter.
I particularly liked the good anagram for VICTORIA FALLS, and the clue for ENGROSSED.
Thanks Crucible and PeterO for fine crossword and blog, respectively.
Does anyone else have a problem with 7? I am familiar with the phrase “Euclidean Geometry” so that translates to “Geometric Geometry” going by the clue which is a bit of a tautology.
…and the Home Secretary is to re-introduce capital punishment for anyone who she thinks looks a bit shifty. That’s the end of the news, now here’s the crossword forecast. Today’s grid will be bright with the occasional black square. An outbreak of answers, starting in the north-west, should spread to all areas within half an hour. An early fog of uncertainty about a possible theme will soon lift, all becoming clear and making much of the remaining puzzle a breeze, although parsing difficulties with 5 & 17A could cause a delay. 8 and 20D will be cold and wet, while smoky thunder is predicted for the fine anagram that is 9d. Down clues will be moderate to fair, becoming good (15, 18) later. Clue numbers could climb as high as 25 in the SHADE or even 29 further south. So overall, a sunny and enjoyable puzzle. That’s all from me; have a good day.
It’s not too unusual for me to be unable to parse the wordplay but ordinarily I can see without difficulty how the definition relates to the solution. Not so with either ICECAPS or FORECOURT. I wondered if there were Briticisms unfamiliar to me involved (e.g. whether “juice” was used for petrol, or if pop-up gas station juice stalls were more common than I realized, as also occurred to grantinfreo @ 9), but apparently not.
Maybe one of the reasons this one wasn’t so easy was that a couple of clues at least are problematic. Let me quibble.
Euclidean does not mean GEOMETRIC. Euclidean Geometry is a kind of Geometry, to be sure, but just because Impressionistic Art is a kind of Art, say, does not mean that Impressionistic means Artistic.
28a USED CAR is a different kind of problem. The wordplay is fine. However, for the definition, there is no hint of an association of American with being USED, or racing, or buggy with being used. Yes it’s entirely possible that someone will do Amefican buggy racing in a used car, but there is no reason to think it is expected. The question-mark at the end is being used as a Get Out Of Jail Free Card, but to my mind it doesn’t work.
I thought the rest were pretty good, though, even if they taxed the old grey cells a bit.
Tough going today but we were ultimately successful, although there were a couple of parsings we were unsure of. Need to remember gam of whales!
Favourites were VICTORIA FALLS and GEOMETRIC.
Thanks Crucible and PeterO!
Crossed with Pentman@22.
To expand on Tim@13, dyes are soluble in water wheareas pigments are finely divided solids. In watercolour painting, dyes penetrate the paper and cannot be removed, but pigments remain on the surface and can be removed if you don’t like what you’ve painted.
Pentman @22: Hmmm…yes, see what you’re getting at. The def here is Euclidean of course and it’s perfectly valid. The problem lies in the phrase “Euclidean Geometry” which (I think) simply refers to the geometry that most people think of when they think of geometry (regular shapes such as polygons, circles etc), as opposed to spherical or hyperbolic geometry.
VinnyD @24
Yes “juice” is sometimes used for “petrol” over here.
I wasn’t too keen on icecaps either, but they are made from water and cover land, so are, very loosely, “wet blankets” (though is frozen water wet? Discuss!
The increase in volume as water freezes incidentally explains why ice is slippery – it’s the layer of water that forms as you apply pressure to it. The more the pressure, the more effective the melting, which is why ice skates are very thin.)
My first pass gave me constables,hay wain, et al , victoria falls, and brush – all sensible clues and I was happy when I went to sleep.
This morning was a nightmare – got them all but was reduced to ‘checking’ one letter at a time, bloody mindedness to avoid using reveal!
I went for the X in paintboxes just needing the B and X – why didn’t I go for the B – sums my morning up!
Was jammy on 14a , thought it had to be based on Fortnum and Mason, so entered Fortnum and struck oil with FOR , which made it easy.
I take my hat off to you Peter , getting the answers today was easier than getting the clues!
Must say, I hate E,en?,ENG,engl?,engli?,englis? all being possible from English. And when it is done indirectly e.g ‘tablet’ to ‘ecstasy’ to ‘e’, I think that is close to moronic. Tablet can probably give 26 answers given all the drugs out there.
I have had 30 years away from cryptic crosswords, and am getting back to them over the last couple of months. If they were all like this one I’d give up.
However I do love the subtlety in most , I enjoyed Bananas and crackers once I saw you explanation, and yesterday “can it” and SH amused me – I’m still at the stage where I am taking each clue too literally. If E for English was the only shortcut, I’d go along with but to use ENG as well, is not playing the game imho. I’m sure in the old days there would have been a hint that you needed 3 letters not the usual 1 from the above example?
Against that, I wonder if they did do the same 30 years and that was why I did not complete so many :O(
We didn’t have check and reveal in newspaper form :O)
The theme (a) was seen (b) helped.
Constable’s work is surely THE HAY WAIN with a very definite definite article. Doesn’t matter on one level but all solvers are pedants somewhere deep down.
I wondered what was going on with ENGROSSED. My solving involved a Cardinal Ned. I refrained from Googling him as I recognised I might be disappointed.
Dr What’sOn @25
I think if you read the clue as “In which American raced against buggy?” with the whole clue as the definition it works. Perhaps the clue should have been “Against which American raced buggy?” which is an &lit clue I think.
Pentman@33 my beef is that a buggy isn’t necessarily a used car. You could think of it as being used as a car, but that’s not what the clue is trying to say.
2Scotcheggs,
Thanks for your creative and entertaining post.
[2Scotcheggs @23 Given the current incumbent’s propensity to ape “Estuary English” maybe that last f should be reflected about the centre and the cross-bar moved slightly]
Trailman @32 In total agreement here – it is THE HAY WAIN not HAY WAIN and I’m a pendant at an utterly superficial level.
Like Tim@13 & Togs@28 I suspected that magenta was a dye and thus shouldn’t qualify. A number of specialist web sites seem to concur. However, Chambers, the standard (?) reference for us normal folk, gives “paint or dye, any substance used for colouring”, so I decided that the quibble was a pigment of my imagination.
A puzzle of two halves, with a walk in between. Thanks Crucible, PeterO and 2Scotcheggs@23 for the shipping forecast. General Synopsis by The Rootsman would be a suitable soundtrack.
Nick Cave’s There She Goes, My Beautiful World provides the link between yesterday’s and today’s crosswords:
Gauguin, he buggered off, man
And went all tropical
And Philip Larkin, he stuck it out
In a library in Hull
I’m another in the “Can’t-be-GAUGUIN-because-it-doesn’t-parse-so-it-must-be-SANGRIA-which-nearly-parses” club.
Apart from that all tick VG as Richard Briers would say.
Thank you Crucible and PeterO.
Dr WhatsOn @34 – Agreed, the buggy needn’t be used, but it could be, which is, surely, why there needs to be a question mark at the end of the clue.
Mostly a fun solve with a few ‘aha!’ moments.
However, I’m not convinced by the definition of FORECOURT (too woolly to be equivalent to ‘petrol station’), and didn’t parse GAUGUIN.
On the plus side, GEOMETRIC was a lovely bit of cluing, and I enjoyed IMAGE too.
Thanks, Pentman, for your appreciation of my daft improvisation. I was just in a silly mood this morning.
MaidenBartok @36, it took me a minute to work it out, but yes, I get your meaning!
Thanks PeterO, I needed you today even more than I needed Eileen yesterday, and I share dissatisfaction over a few definitions and wordplay that you and others have raised – partly because I am mentally below par this week (eg completely forgot about GAM which I learned on this very site not so long ago) and partly because a puzzle of this (to me) difficulty is made even harder when some elements don’t quite sit right.
Thank goodness for the theme without which I would have given up about half way in, and even with it must follow MaidenBartok@20’s example and refrain from self-congratulation. But one of the best things about crosswords is that enjoyment can be salvaged from a small fraction of the whole, so along with VICTORIA FALLS and FORECOURT I enjoyed a wry smile when BILL = CAPE became clear with hazy memories of GCSE Geography. Thanks Crucible for a bit too much of a test! And thanks to various people for extra background information above.
(Boffo@41 now I think about it, yes FORECOURT is/was more precisely where the juice is obtained and perhaps that would have been a better word than “buy”, but in these days of credit cards and contactless transactions the payment often occurs at a machine near the pump too, so maybe Crucible gets out of jail.)
Ooh that was hard for me. 50% success.
Noob question: why is Arab AR? It’s not a country code as far as I know.
Since no one has asked this question earlier, it must be something I don’t know.
Help will be appreciated.
Never heard of Selsey Biil, but Portland Bill is familiar.
I did know gam, but never spotted it in MAGENTA. Doh!!
SANGRIA never entered my head, and still GAUGUIN was still LOI, with liberal use of the check button.
2Scotcheggs @23 — I loved it!
VICTORIA FALLS was a lovely anagram and I liked how the “firm” in CONSTABLE wasn’t CO for once and yet CO was in the answer
Not sure why R = rare? Can’t find it in Chambers but hey ho
It’s hard to imagine anyone dislodging Maskarade from the bottom of my favourite setters list but if anyone could do it, Crucible could
Thanks PeterO for persevering where I succumbed to ennui
A dnf for me today. No Sangria, but I got PARTIED (= celebrated) into my head as I was convinced it was ARTIST losing stones – but then of course I couldn’t get a drink out of PED….
Thanks to Crucible for the challenge, and to PeterO for the explanations.
Adriana @44, I also wasn’t sure about AR for Arab, but I put it in figuring that it was probably somewhere in some dictionary. Sure enough, among the various meanings of ar, Ar, AR, and Ar., Collins gives “Ar. Abbreviation for Arabia(n).”
Difficult – got a few straight away partly by guesswork including CONSTABLES, HAY WAIN, ETAL and GEOMETRIC. Then quite a slog and couldn’t completely parse all the ones I worked out. Had to reveal 6d and then got 5a (but not 13a) though needed help with parsing.
Quite enjoyed it though couldn’t get the last six or so at all.
Thanks to PeterO (I so needed your help) and Crucible.
Adriana@44 – very good point and this was one of the many wordplay elements that I didn’t get.
I just realised that Chambers exists online but no joy there (AR = Arkansas or Argon) – maybe the print version is more comprehensive. There is also a website called Abbreviations.com which does have AR as an abbreviation for Arabic (not Arab though) – but has so many other abbreviations (including A and ARA), without any source/attribution, that I question its authority.
Time to expand the golden rule – if in doubt take the first letter of the word, if that doesn’t work take the first two letters, then the first 3 letters (eg ENG) and so on!
(I also mentally queried artist = expert as definition – a Venn diagram of the two would certainly have a non-empty intersection but I don’t think that’s enough.)
sorry DaveinNCarolina@48 we crossed – I think it will have to do but I’m still not very happy about it!
Gazzh @50
The online version is the ‘Chambers 21st Century Dictionary’ not ‘The Chambers Dictionary’. The latter has:
Ar.
abbrev
1. Arab
2. Arabia
3. Arabian
4. Arabic
5. Aramaic
bodycheetah @46
No, R for rare is not even in the dead tree Chambers, but the question has come up before in this august forum, and I recall that, among various suggestions, the most likely place to find it would be in a restaurant, on a little flag on a toothpick stuck into a steak so cooked.
Thank you Gaufrid.
I enjoyed this one a lot and found it much easier than yesterday’s. I feel that Crucible’s cluing style is tighter and hence the answers can be more reliably constructed. LOI was TESSERAE which was the only one that I got in a parsing mess with. I was convinced that “Small blocks put back” was giving the TE(S)S part, so was looking for the definition at the wrong end. Got there eventually. Favourite was VICTORIA FALLS – nicely done.
Don’t really understand the 28 debate. As others have said, the whole clue is the (extended) definition, so the USED CAR is the other car in the race, not the buggy.
Good fun. Thanks C&P, especially for the pics decorating the blog.
Collins has for “r”: “abbrev. for rare”. Unfortunately it doesn’t give a context. Perhaps antiquarian books or similar?
I was trying to put my finger on what I found so tiresome about this and maybe it’s the extraordinarily high number of single/double letter abbreviations/synonyms …
W AI N ST E NS CU RA E L S OR G S E NT CO MO AR TT O T
Repetitive solve injury? Is that a thing?
I really admire setters like Crucible and Paul, both setters who can make a living out of compiling puzzles.
Setters who are, decade after decade, so prolific and still, after all these years, come up with crosswords that are as fresh as, er, something that’s fresh.
We, my crossword partner and me, enjoyed this one immensely.
Not the easiest of Crucibles, still easier than yesterday’s Imogen.
Perhaps not as light-hearted as today’s Redshank (Crucible’s alter ego in the FT) but really, really good.
We agree with a lot of other solvers that VICTORIA FALLS (9dn) is just a wonderful, natural anagram.
As was the crossword, I mean: wonderful.
Many thanks to Peter O & Crucible.
Thanks to PeterO and Crucible
10a I think “with” is part of the def.
28a Is what some call a “semi & lit”. In order to be a proper “& lit”, every element of the clue has to play a role in both the definition and the wordplay: “American race driver’s first buggy?”
3d Not keen on the past tense “freed”.
9d Is separating the def from the wordplay with a ? is a bit of a cop-out?
Pretty damn good overall
Todays puzzle prompted what has become my two pet peeves about the way cryptics are going these days. I think that the setters are only too often really stretching the definitional element of the clue. Again and again I find myself shaking my head and saying to myself–‘that’s hardly a definition, it’s way off.’
And my second pet peeve is the apparent allowing of the first letter of almost any word to be accepted as an abbreviation. I know it’s an area where there is a lot of flexibility, but I think too many setters abuse that flexibility.
Thanks all. Perhaps need a dead tree version of Chambers.
Adriana, get the app.
I’m in quarantine, so plenty of time to catch up with the crosswords. Almost caught up now. I enjoyed this one but couldn’t get a couple. The blog was very helpful and after reading it was left wondering how often a crossword with 12 envelopes and 12 charades occurs.