Guardian 28,321 / Maskarade

49 comments on “Guardian 28,321 / Maskarade”

1. An nice puzzle which three of us enjoyed solving together.

2. For 16, I think the definition is “Ways to deal with”.

3. 26d. A bargee is “a person in charge of or working on a barge.”

4. Thanks to Maskarade for occupying much more time than usual with the crossword and mhl for the explanations.
   I think you will find 23a is an indirect anagram as ELAPSES is ASLEEP in another guise.
   My problem was 33a where I could not work out what the fish was, but apart from that it all fell into place before Christmas Day. Enjoyable but stretching.

5. An overly convoluted puzzle that left me disappointed. But each to his or her own, I suppose

6. Mystogre@4 Thanks for your kind comments, but I don’t think that works for ELAPSES, I’m afraid. (ASLEEP has one more S, but even ignoring that, I don’t see how you’d possibly get an anagram of ASLEEP from the clue.)

7. Monkey@2,3 – thanks for those notes – I’ve updated the post.

8. And thanks, mhl, for clarifying some parsing, and for a more accurate pair of fish lists! I had missed one or two of the 28.

9. I’m not sure the blogger’s objection to IGOR being clued by Stravinsky holds water: “I’d want an indication of the definition-by-example here: there are many Igors, Igor Stravinksy is just one of them.” That would be an argument against Igor in the clue and STRAVINSKY in the grid. When, as here, it’s the other way round, I don’t see the problem.

10. sheffield hatter@9 – I’ve removed that bit; you’re right it doesn’t make sense. (I still don’t really like it, but that wasn’t a good reason!)

11. “Raeburn’s Reverend Walker? Right!” is an out-right obscurity as far as I’m concerned, despite it being among mhl’s favourite paintings. Reading the description on the National Galleries Scotland website, it appears that it is the only skating portrait known in Raeburn’s oeuvre, making it even harder to have an educated guess at the answer.

12. mhl – thanks for changing that. I quite liked the clue for RUDDIGORE – at least, I was able to solve it by thinking of an operetta and a fish, and IGOR just fell into place!

13. Thanks Maskarade for a tough challenge – I confess to pattern-searching and Web searching to complete it.
    I think your initial feeling about ‘Stravinsky’ being a definition by example is right, mhl – other Stravinskys are available, even though Igor is the only one I know about. Always an issue with people’s names.
    I see ELAPSES as a cryptic def too.

14. Sheffield Hatter@11 – not only is this portrait Raeburn’s only portrait of a skater, but there is considerable doubt that it is by Raeburn at all!
    X-rays suggest Skating Minister ‘not by Raeburn’ http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-edinburgh-east-fife-21161074
    We very much enjoyed this crossword which we dipped into over several evenings last week. A great improvement on the alphabeticals which we feel had outlived their Bank Holiday welcome!
    Thanks Maskerade

15. Thanks Maskarade, mhl
    It took me ages to find the unknown Arrochar on google maps, but weirdly, since doing the puzzle I have watched The King of Staten Island in which the Arrochar Pharmacy has a prominent part.
    I’m afraid sheffield hatter has it the wrong way round. It is when the clue is an example of the solution that an indicator is usually given. Stravinsky is one of many Igors, so mhl was right the first time. For names like that which don’t have have any meanings it hardly matters whether there’s an indicator or not.

16. 1 ac Corfe Castle is not on the south coast – it’s at least 5km away.
    But apart from that, I enjoyed this puzzle which turned out to be far easier than i had expected.

    Thanks to mhl and Maskerade.

17. Re the dbe:

    Stravinsky is one of many Igors, but then Igor is one of many Stravinskys. Surely when clueing surname by forename, or vice versa, either way it’s always going to be (arguably) a definition by example?

    We’re not dealing with a hierarchical classification here, in which one (sub)-category is entirely contained within an overarching one, such as ‘elk’ within ‘deer’, ‘deer’ within ‘mammal’ etc.

    Rather we have a Venn diagram in which there is a circle of Stravinskys, a rather larger circle of Igors, and a zone of intersection. But how to deal with that situation in our clueing conventions?

    I’d suggest a ? is needed when there are a mind-stretching number of possibilities; but when the most famous Igor is Stravinsky and the most famous Stravinsky is Igor I’m happy without an indication.

18. I don’t recall any complaints the other day when Crucible used this clue: “Stubbs preserved large bone from horse’s leg”. (Hint: Igor Stubbs was not involved.) The same setter used Morecambe to clue Eric a few weeks back, again without indicating a dbe. I really don’t think a setter needs to *always* indicate a definition by example when a surname clues a first name and vice versa – obviously it depends on how common either the first name or the surname might be, and how well known the actual instance might be.

    I disagree with James @15 – yes, “Stravinsky is one of many Igors”, but I think this is the same mistake that mhl made at first. It doesn’t matter how many Igors there might be, it’s the frequency of Stravinskys that matters. When the clue is Stravinsky, surely the solver’s first thought is likely to be Igor? I think essexboy @17 has got it about right.

19. many thanks to Maskarade and mhl.
    For 60d I thought the first definition might just refer to the Rock Bass, a freshwater fish in North America. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rock_bass.
    however i’m pleased to be introduced to Bass Rock, which looks glorious.

20. I found that a very enjoyable challenge, but it was a challenge, not helped by my not having even heard of a number of the fish involved. Still, I got there over a number of days, with some time spent on Google – the Coval peninsular, rocks in the Firth of Forth (my last in was BASS, because I couldn’t see the rock connection until I thought of checking), some time reading up on the Hanseatic league without ever once seeing EASTERLING, which I finally hazarded from the crossers and was surprised to see was correct. Thanks for the blog mil, which cleared up a few things I’d missed; I had actually parsed CHAPPARAL as CHAR (tea) around PAR (which I see Chambers gives as a variant of parr) plus Mr Capone, and I’m amazed I went for that rather than the more obvious option!

    I’m surprised Stravinsky to clue Igor is proving controversial, when as mil notes this is the same as Porter to clue Cole. I had more trouble with the latter, given Porter has more possible meanings and I didn’t even know the fish.

    More generally, I hope you all had the best possible holiday under the circumstances, and I’m optimistic for 2021 and I hope that’s true for everyone!

21. I was looking forward to this, and it didn’t disappoint. Took a few days, on and off, but was well worth it.

    Re: 56d. There’s another connection between Barnet and THATCH(er) that might not be known to anyone who did not grow up there (like I did). Maggie was MP for Finchley, which was part of the borough of Barnet. [Before I even knew what elections were, way before her PMship, I remember seeing seas of blue and white Vote Thatcher signs at election times.] So the phrase in the clue “Barnet politician” was also true literally. Whether that makes it an &lit. now is a matter of opinion!

22. I knew ARROCHAR immediately as I visit friends there every year, and this gave an early clue as to the theme.
    I didn’t twig that Pedro was a Spaniard. And don’t understand ELAPSES.
    Otherwise an enjoyable puzzle, helped pass a couple of days with little else to do.
    Thanks to Maskarade and to mhl.

23. Almost didn’t bother with this after struggling at the first attempt, but it sat there winking at me through the wrapping paper and other Christmas detritus and eventually finished it with A LITTLE, ETYMON, & SPIKENARD unparsed.

    Quite an achievement to weave this many themed clues into a crossword so many thanks Maskarade and to others for the missing explanations.

    Happy Christmas, everyone.

24. sheffield hatter @18 I agree with you and essexboy that in this case it doesn’t matter that there’s no indicator for the example, because there’s not many ways for a solver to go given Stravinsky in the clue. But mhl made no mistake in his original comment (‘I’d want an indication of the definition by example here; there are many Igors, Igor Stravinsky is just one of them’). A punctilious setter or editor might well have put an indicator with the Stravinsky; it is the rule to give an indicator when there’s a surname in the clue and first name in the solution. It’s a rule that’s more often broken in wordplay than in definitions (like, say, the Stubbs clue). If the whole solution was Igor, I’m sure there would have been an indicator.
    Incidentally, the blog notes for at 60d, ‘BASS Rock (DBE)…’. Rock is not a definition by example for BASS, though Bass would be for ROCK.

25. The first special from this setter that has managed to keep us entertained over a few says – a bit here and a bit there – without abandoning it.

    Doff my hat to Maskarade for a fair and enjoyable offering, only defeated by the pesky SKI.

    Many thanks to M&M.

26. That took many, many days to solve which is just what I needed this enforced break period.

    Managed to do something horrible with the village of Toward also on the Cowal peninsula for 4d which caused me no end of trouble. FOI was BASILDON as I spent my formative years not too far from that radiant town of undoubted natural beauty – ah, Basildon, ses musées, ses plages, ses first-Tesco-Hypermarket-1978.

    SKATER was a shoo-in because I remember seeing this sometime, somewhere.

    Thanks to mhl and Maskerade and if you’re celebrating something, happy it.

27. [James @15 & MaidenBartok, I only managed to find Arrochar eventually on a fishing map]

28. I may be a little late but could anyone explain what ‘cock’ means in the clue for CHAPARRAL?

29. Davey@28 – see the definition in Chambers. “chaparral cock” is another name for “roadrunner”.

30. I rather enjoyed this one, easier than many holiday specials, largely because most of the themers are well known.

    Thanks to Maskarade and mhl

31. James @24, for me, the point is that, though there may be many Igors, there are few famous Stravinskies, so to get from Stravinsky in the clue to Igor in the answer doesn’t really require a ‘by example’ indicator.

32. We enjoyed casting the net and catching the fish, but we’re puzzled by the definition of “supercharge” in 66A. A surcharge is an extra amount due, but a supercharge is a boost, isn’t it?
    Many thanks to Maskarade and mhl!

33. We had trouble with the top rh corner. Like others, we do not properly follow “elapses”, and are not at all happy with “a little”. We decoded Pedro as a fisherman rather than a spaniard which didn’t help. “Ruddigore” seemed an easy clue – setters are always doing that sort of thing and (as someone has said) Stubbs for “una” is much dodgier than Stravinsky for “igor”. The puzzle was not quite the intellectual exercise over the mince pies of Christmas doubles by Araucaria in days gone by.

34. I had ROCK instead of OPAH, which I missed. I was also confused by 61 down, thinking DAB was the theme word rather than DABS. Thanks to mhl for clearing things up and to Maskarade for an enjoyable afternoon’s solving.

35. A lot of cleverness in this puzzle, and it must have been an incredible amount of work to put together, but there were many frustrating obscurities, including a lot of those fish; it’s one thing to be expected to come up with “Corfe Castle” (I acknowledge that I’m not going to recognize a lot of British landmarks), but when it involves getting “CC” for “volume” and realizing that there’s a fish called an “orfe,” it’s too much. And that there’s a special word for 80 yards of yarn!

    As an American I must say that 29ac is incorrect. A handoff in American football is the opposite of a pass; a handoff is when one player hands the ball directly to another, a pass is when one throws it overhand to another. Combined with the obscurity of “Han” for “Chinese fellow” I couldn’t get this.

    That said there was a lot of enjoyable puzzling in this, and if I’m able to get as much of a prize puzzle as I did it’s a good day. Or week, rather.

36. Surely everyone has heard of the Alps? That is: the Arrochar Alps!

37. As others said before me, a challenging puzzle which took some days to complete. For some reason the left-hand side seemed to go in far more quickly than the right-hand side, but I think that’s just me. I suffered a complete brain fade on OBSOLESCENT and eventually had to resort to a cheat; on the plus side, it unlocked a lot of the RHS so no complaint. The usual sprinkling of obscurities necessitated by the larger grid and theme but I expect this with Maskarade’s bank holiday puzzles. As I’ve said here before, I don’t expect to complete this kind of puzzle without a bit of Chambers Word Wizard and some Googling to discover whether certain words apparently indicated by the clues actually exist, and whether they mean what I hope they mean ! All in all, the right level for a Christmas special, Thanks to MHL and Maskarade !!

38. FOI was 1a which gave me the theme, though I hesitated for a while for the reason given by cholecyst@16. Unlike, say, Pevensey or Porchester, Corfe was never a coastal defence against invasion from the sea, which, if I remember rightly, cannot be seen from it. There were a number of clues where I had to check an answer reached from the wordplay which I don’t object to. It was a steady solve that took a relatively long time on Saturday and Sunday because there was lot of it.
    Thanks to Maskarade and mhl.

39. Jellyroll @36: indeed! And after finishing this crossword, which was not a load of Cobblers, it was time to Rest and Be Thankful.

40. My first one in was DOVER CASTLE at 1a so that held me up for a bit! My first correct solve was BASILDON immediately followed by SHAKESPEARE so I was off as these solutions contained familiar types of fish and I had the theme. After a couple of days I was only missing 61d, pondering EARS and FANS and not realising I was still one fish short of the the six as I had counted ROCK. I never did get DABS. How annoying. Great puzzle and much of it straightforward. Many thanks to Maskarade and mhl.

41. Fun, frustration and fish for me.

    I floundered into the theme via the CAR-PARK and netted most of the thematic and non-thematic ones at a steady rate. Particularly enjoyed MASCARPONE, SHOPAHOLIC, BLEAK HOUSE, IWO JIMA, REHAB, ORFE, ROCK.

    Frustratingly, I ended up with 27 hidden fish and 7 unhidden fish. The former because I only counted OPAH once (my mistake but easy to do with this many ) and the latter because I counted ROCK (given in Chambers as a shorthand for rockfish which can be inter alia wrasse, striped bass, black goby). So tracking the theme became a hindrance more than a help near the end of this puzzle.

    In such a huge grid, the quality of the clues varied from the easy to challenging but fair to the well (for me) just not gettable.

    For HANDOFFS (29A) I am interested to see that Matt W @ 35 confirms it isn’t even a pass! Also note that Chambers only gives the HAND-OFF (with hyphen) and the rugby definition. I spent a lot of time (which I don’t regret btw) hacking through Wikipedia’s list of passess in Appalachians etc.

    RUDDIGORE was a groan when the realisation dawned, though this was only once I found the leading R from ARROCHAR, which itself only became clear on perusing the Wikpedia article on Cowal peninsula. I likewise needed to “duckduckgo” the term for 80 yards of yarn.

    EASTERLING and SPIKENARD were only yielded by the pattern search feature on CHAMBERS, so essentially ‘reveal’. I thought those both fell into the category of ‘Hard answer, (even) harder clue’. Hat tip to anyone who worked those out from 1st principles from wordplay, or even who happened to know these pretty obscure terms. I did enjoy reading up on the Hanseatic league though.

    Like others on here ELAPSES just seems baffling. Along the way I did find there is an ELOPS genus of fish related to the tarpon, and though maybe this was another thematic one.

    Anyway, it was fun more than frustrating, and must say to Maskarade ‘…thanks for all the fish’ and to mhl ‘well done for catching so many fish’ and to all learned contributors on here ‘enjoy the rest of the holiday and happy solving in 2021 when it comes’.

    PS — I pointed a family member towards the ‘3D Crossword Calendar’ and received one as a Xmas gift. My first time seeing it, I love it! Have got January in the bag already. If they are still available, strongly recommended.

42. Whilst managing to complete about half the puzzle before getting fed up, this wasn’t a good experience. I believe that some of those in power at the Guardian read this site so would like to again register my call for the setters to try to give a good solving experience and not try to impress each other. I’ve no doubt that creating a crossword with the various rules that Maskarade, in particular, sets is impressive to other setters. However the setting restrictions mean that the solver has to try and identify quite a number of fish that most people haven’t heard of and fit them into some obscure words that, again, most people haven’t heard of. A few new words is fine but this puzzle had far too many.
    Some setters create crosswords that are enjoyable to solve and which then, after finishing, are found to have themes or other impressive features. However, achieving those features does not impact on the solver’s experience. Unfortunately, too often Maskarade’s offerings are not a good experience for the solver.
    Message of Christmas Cheer finishes!

43. I still don’t understand 65A “SUPERCHARGE”. So SU and ARGE combine to give you “argues”, but over? Over “perch”? Why? But then “super” can mean “extra” and “charge” can mean “amount due”. CHAR is also in there! Help please…

44. David Gomm: “over” is the anagram indicator, “Argues” is the anagram fodder and “extra amount due” is the definition. The unclued fish is PERCH (CHAR is just a red herring, ho ho)

45. I have to disagee with Matt W (#35) regarding Hand off. A hand off is the quarterback passing the ball to another player, so in that context it IS an american pass! And by the way, a ‘pass’ in the normal sense in NFL doesn’t have to be overhand – what about a shovel pass?

    Having said that, I didn’t particularly enjoy this offering…probably because I didn’t get near to finishing it! Having got ARROCHAR quickly and hence the theme, still struggled with Orfe, Ide and so on…

46. Just to make a pedantic point (what are cryptic crossword solvers if not pedantic, after all?) the serial number of this puzzle is 28321, not 28231 as in the blog heading. I don’t know if MHL would like to correct this to make it easier to find in future.
    Apologies for the late comment – it has taken me until now to finally admit defeat on this puzzle and look for the answers!

47. IsleworthMalcolm @46
    Thanks for the heads-up. Number now corrected.

48. Johnny-come-lately here – finally finished it! I too struggled with 23a ‘elapses’ – I can’t unpack it as a cryptic clue at all. I was very proud to insert ‘swiftly’ as the answer (flies = what a bird does – in this case a swift) so the NE corner took a long time to unpack!

49. E-commerce, e-tickets. Periods of time that fly wasted scrolling the internet may be e-lapses?

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