Guardian 28,461 – Imogen

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For no particularly good reason I made a slow start on this one, but I found myself working from the bottom up, and then everything went (more or less) smoothly. Thanks to Imogen.

There a quite are few geographical references, though maybe not enough to constitute a theme.

 
Across
1 HADRIAN’S WALL In law, handrails to be fitted for protection across the country (8,4)
Anagram of LAW HANDRAILS
9 MIDAS Miserable? I’m about to become a king (5)
Reverse of SAD I’M, giving the mythical king whose touch turned everything to gold
10 ANNE FRANK Diarist‘s manner not extremely honest (4,5)
mANNEr less its “extremes” + FRANK (honest)
11 LIBERTY Leisure finds French composer in empty library (7)
(Jacques) IBERT in L[ibrar]Y
12 ABEYANT Bishop leaves church worker in suspense (7)
ABBEY less one B + ANT (worker)
13 THUMBSCREW One puts the squeeze on Tom’s team (10)
THUMB’S CREW
15 RASH These spots not considered (4)
Double definition
18 REDO Make significant changes out of boredom (4)
Hidden in boREDOm
19 EMULSIFIER Food additive spoiling muesli that is eaten by Father (10)
MUESLI* + I.E. in FR
22 SCRAPER Abrasive republican slogan? (7)
A republic, i.e. an anti-monarchist, would want to SCRAP E.R.
24 MODICUM A little bit of male offensiveness gets Charlie arrested (7)
M + C in ODIUM
25 MIDDLESEX A new gender identity in this part of the country? (9)
The new identity is a MIDDLE SEX
26 EMMER Crop sounds novel, some say (5)
Homophone (“some say” – possibly not all) of Emma (novel by Jane Austen). Emmer is a type of wheat (new to me)
27 UNITED STATES Scruffy nest situated in the country (6,6)
(NEST SITUATED)*
Down
1 HIDEBOUND In disguise, spy entertaining unionist Conservative (9)
HIDE (disguise) + U in [James] BOND
2 DESCRIBE Define and date key part of vault (English) (8)
D[ate] + ESC (key) + RIB (part of an architectural vault) + E
3 ITALY Essential to spend first year in the country (5)
VITAL with its first letter “spent” + Y
4 NONPAREIL Beyond compare, I could be no plainer (9)
(NO PLAINER)*
5 WAFTED Holding back, made one be carried gently (6)
AFT (back) in WED (made one)
6 LHASA Capital has to be banked in US city (5)
HAS in LA (Los Angeles) – Lhasa is the capital of Tibet
7 AMULET A cross on centre of altar shows charm (6)
A + MULE (cross) + middle letter of alTar
8 SKETCH Rough plan from special executioner (6)
S[pecial] + KETCH (Jack Ketch, 17th century executioner, whose name became a generic name for an executioner)
14 COMPRISED Exposed to disrepute, ignoring order to be made up (9)
COMPROMISED less OM. This seems to be using the “wrong” use of “comprised”, i.e. “made up” (often in the phrase “comprised of”), as opposed to the traditional sense of containing or included – the difference between “this puzzle is comprised of 30 clues” and “this puzzle comprises 30 clues”
16 AS IT COMES Showing no special preference, not land up catching show (2,2,5)
SITCOM (a TV “show”) in reverse (up) of SEA (which is “not land”)
17 WILD WEST Stew made like this on the American frontier? (4,4)
The word STEW is, anagramatically, WILD WEST
18 RESUME Start again and take for granted pressure is off (6)
PRESUME less P
20 REMARK Observe scripture lesson — and what is being studied? (6)
RE (Religious Education) + MARK (gospel, which might be studied in RE)
21 APPLET Tempting fruit basket’s last one made in Java (6)
APPLE (tempting fruit from the Garden of Eden story, though it isn’t called an apple there) + [baske]T. Applets in web pages are (or were) written in the Java programming language, now mostly unsupported because of security concerns
23 RADON Managed to suppress party as a health hazard (5)
DO (party) in RAN (managed)
24 MIX IT Team in university start a fight (3,2)
XI (eleven, football or cricket team) in MIT (US university)

62 comments on “Guardian 28,461 – Imogen”

  1. I loved this crossword but especially EMULSIFIER, DESCRIBE and AS IT COMES. Thanks Imogen!

    And thank you to Andrew for parsing help with ITALY and SCRAPER (which, now I see it, is a clever clue).

  2. For a very good reason – a squabble between jackdaws outside my window this morning – I made an early start on this one, so I found myself working from the top down, and then everything went (more or less) smoothly. ( 😀 ) I also share with our blogger the learning re EMMER.

    Nice to get the reverse anagram thingy, as I believe they are now called, in WILD WEST; I loved the sitcom in upside down ‘not land’; I smiled at the new gender identity (I do hope no one takes offence at that) and the anagram for UNITED STATES. SCRAPER was clever – I wondered about the non-majusculation of republican and it was that which confirmed the solution – and I do love the word(s) NONPAREIL which always take me back to O Level English and Macbeth. APPLET was the classiest of a good bunch for me – such a pleasure to discover my relative ignorance about the island was not going to hold me back – though maybe an excuse to do some geographical research just in case it pops up in the future. And who else found themselves “WAFTED in from Paradise” this morning?

    No theme I can spot though I did find myself thinking there were a lot of containments going on. Thanks Imogen and Andrew

  3. Hope Middlesex doesn’t offend anyone; my feeling was Imogen’s ‘ear’ is good: nice to see gender identity become so mainstream as to be a source of of ordinary punny humour. Easy for a white hetero male to say, though.

  4. As for the rest, enjoyed it as I usually do Imogen, nwst some of his characteristic obscurities. Abeyant, eg, I don’t think I’ve ever seen, unlike its noun form abeyance. And M. Ibert struck only the vaguest of chords. Didn’t parse scrapER, but that’s just me being witless, touche to Imogen. As.for others, emmer too was a nho (is it on the paleo menu, like spelt?). Mr Ketch too was on the dnk list, as was the applet-Java connection (one Intro unit of Basic decades ago is my limit). So, plenty to learn, but all in good fun, thanks A and I. PS agree with Andrew about ‘comprised of, erk!

  5. Thanks Imogen and Andrew
    7d and 18d were write-ins, and I then progressed from NW to SE, with WILD WEST LOI. Smooth and enjoyable, with favourites EMULSIFIER, NONPAREIL, and AS IT COMES.
    There’s a slightly unfortunate “in” in 27a, but the “in” in 1a is just wrong; I was expecting an anagram of “handrails” contained within LAW until this was ruled out by HIDEBOUND.

  6. Got the I and Y of 3dn early but then took the rest of the puzzle time to think of a five-lettered country to fit! Spent too much time mentally touring the Middle East, I think. Yes, the dawn chorus had me on the case early as well; there must be studies on the theme of brain function at different times of the day.

    I rarely remember to thank setter and blogger so here’s my opportunity to thank them ALL for providing a daily mental work-out; perhaps Dr Michael Mosley should include crosswords in his Just One Thing series …

  7. Bottom up here, for the second day in a row. I’m another who liked the spoilt muesli and the US anagram.

    I think Andrew’s right that COMPRISED is non-kosher. I just spent a while up-ending it and turning it inside out, trying different combinations of past tense/past participle and active/passive, but I can’t justify it.

    And yes PM @2, I had another Lorraine Chase moment this morning with WAFTED, but I’ve already posted a link to the Campari ad twice in recent months, so I’ll leave others to find it today.

    ginf @3: Middlesex are only offensive when they play Essex.

    Thanks Imogen and Andrew.

  8. Tim @6 you weren’t alone! My apparent inability to identify a major European nation held me up too.

    Pretty easy by Imogen’s standards, I reckon. Thought APPLET and SCRAPER were very enterprising. Enjoyed THUMBSCREW, too, when it finally clicked after some rambling thoughts about tomatoes.

    Thanks to Andrew and Imogen.

  9. I found this slow but steady. Hadn’t heard of EMMER, Ibert or Jack Ketch, who apparently made a complete hash of executing people (see Wikipedia, but it’s rather gruesome). Liked EMULSIFIER and MODICUM in particular. Many thanks to Imogen and Andrew.

  10. Lovely! Enjoyed that a lot this morning especially 21d which was very nice indeed.

    For my musical piece, Jacques Ibert’s ‘Little White Donkey’ as the last accompanying I did was at a concert in December 2019 – flute and piano whete the flautist decided to take what I can best describe as a ‘relaxed’ approach to both the tempo and the notes leaving the pianist to guess what the hell may happen next! I miss those sort of things and hoping that they soon return…. https://youtu.be/vHEW3By8xtc

  11. Well, top downwards for me this morning. Held up at the end by the elusive EMULSIFIER, and therefore COMPRISED. Last one in was SCRAPER as I just couldn’t parse it, even though the letters already in strongly pointed to that as a solution. The abrasive bit, fine, not the other Republican suggestion. Nearly paid a visit to HADRIAN’S WALL last week, but only got as far as Carlisle.

  12. grantifeo@3
    There is a very interesting novel called Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides about a person who is intersex and their struggle with their identity

  13. [ grantinfreo , tassietim , anna v h and others , there is a great photo in the Guardian today, part of the Eyewitness series , double page spread in the centre. I do not know if you can access this online ? ]

  14. Most enjoyable, though I also winced at the use of ‘comprised’ to mean ‘composed’ (“This train is comprised of ten coaches”, as they announce at Euston, which always makes me want to scream – but that’s the way language evolves…).

    Favourites were MODICUM, SCRAPER and WAFTED, and I also liked NONPAREIL because it’s a beautiful word.

    Nothing unfamiliar here for me, fortunately. EMMER is an ancient variety of wheat, popular in ITALY, where it is known as ‘farro’ – often mistranslated into English as ‘spelt’, which is actually a different type.

    Thanks to setter and blogger.

  15. re @13, the Guardian photo is of climbers on Bruny Island in Tasmania. Not relevant to today’s crossword, though.

  16. Nice puzzle.
    Did not parse SKETCH, SCRAPER.
    New: EMMER, Ibert (composer).
    Liked THUMBSCREW, ABEYANT.

    Thanks, I+A.

    Maybe Imogen is noting the start of Pride month with the Middlesex clue.

  18. I agree with muffin re 1a. The ‘in’ is there purely to make the surface make sense. Odd that a former crossword editor of the Times – where it would be rejected – thinks it ok

  19. I also worked my way up from the bottom and same favourites as others above esp HIDEBOUND, NONPAREIL and THUMBSCREW. There seemed to be a lot of hidden forenames but maybe the sun got to me yesterday 🙂 Apart from the obvious ANNE and FRANK, I spotted ADRIAN, IDA, BERT, YAN, ASH, RED, FI, LES, TED, DEB, AL, ESU, ASA, WES, MARK and DON. Maybe just another band thingy.

    Ta Imogen & Andrew

  20. My edition of Chambers has COMPRISED: ‘to consist of (often, incorrectly, with of)’, so the error in the clue is that it should say ‘made up of’, not simply the use of comprised. “This train is made up of eight carriages”=>”This train comprises eight carriages”=>”Yesterday’s train comprised four carriages only”=>”Yesterday’s train was made up of four carriages only”.

  21. As for yesterday, my vote for best clue was also my LOI (ABEYANT). Also enjoyed MODICUM, EMULSIFIER and EMMER, among others. The long anagrams at top and bottom were well-disguised, and original. A lengthier solve than yesterday (almost an hour), but somehow not quite as much oomph, overall. But no quibbles, and thanks to Imogen for exercising the little white cells.

  22. rodshaw @21. I don’t often think too much about favourite clues, but when I do it is often my last one in, because I appreciate the difficulty overcome. Unless of course it seems to be last because of brain fade on my part, rather than ingenuity on the setter’s. Today it was RASH that held me up longest, but there were a multitude of clues that I enjoyed more than that one! SCRAPER was the one that raised the corners of my mouth the most.

  23. sh @22: RASH was my LOI also – as is often the case with four-letter solutions in which the initial letter is unchecked.

  24. Thanks both for an enjoyable tour and particularly for some parsings. (On which Andrew, if I may, posterity might be served if you were to anagrind your MUESLI?)

    Yes, I also struggled with ITALY even with all crossers in place – I propose that this was a compliment to Imogen’s range: in most crosswords a write-in but here, because of the need to juggle seven or more teatrays at one time, it took one of them to smash down on my head before I saw it.

    There is a word (I think) for navigating a chasm (vide. roz@13 ably attended by PM@17) but I cannot conjure it (begins with “v”?) – anyway I couldn’t do that from the wordplay to the solution SCRAPER, so I got a knee-slap and a bray of amusement out of that.

    [ginf@4: “vaguest of chords” – made me smile.]

    A lot of fun.

  25. Thanks, Andrew. I couldn’t parse ITALY – as so often, bleedin’ obvious once pointed out. And thanks to Imogen for “some say” at 26a: I like it when setters acknowledge that we don’t all come from the Home Counties.

  26. [Alphalpha @24: it includes but doesn’t begin with a V – were you thinking of traverse? The Tyrolean traverse is an acknowledged method of crossing a chasm.]

  27. Like all the best crosswords, now it’s done I can’t see why I found it difficult – some lovely smooth surfaces and cunning disguises here. Not sure where I’ve met EMMER or APPLET or the composer IBERT before, but our office deals with RADON surveys all the time when people are buying houses. The last in was ABEYANT which was new to me and tricky to parse as well.

    [Sorry, essexboy but I am a MIDDLESEX girl born and bred, though apart from cricket it barely exists any more, having been consumed by Greater London (though sometimes useful for annoying online forms that have a “county” box and insist you fill it.) Interesting to discover that Middlesex is also one of the three counties of Jamaica, where it is conveniently next to Cornwall – if only that were the case here!]

  28. Can you read anything into the use of capitals? Small R republican was perhaps a clue to look beyond a letter “r”, but, in that case, why small u unionist?

  29. PM@26: Traverse – that would be it thanks. (I think I was locked into a vault of some sort…)

  30. SCRAP E.R. totally escaped me. Clever!

    Puzzling, trying to think of countries with two-word names .. Burkina Faso, Costa Rica — oh! It’s the one I can see out the window!

    RIB defeated me. I was wondering whether a “crib” was part of a bank vault, but I needed the C for “esc,” … oh, dear …

    I’m with Sheffield Hatter @20. You can say “six states comprise/make up New England” without using the dreaded “of,”

    I like the composition of AS IT COMES, but the surface doesn’t make much sense.

    essexboy@7 I do these puzzles every day, but I don’t recall your Campari ad. Can you re-post? I did look up Lorraine Chase and found that she’s famous for being Cockney and stars in “Emmerdale” — what’s a Cockney doing in the dales?

    There are some half dozen counties in the US called Middlesex in various states, including mine.

    Thanks, Imogen and Andrew.

  31. [Why did the north Saxons not get a county? (Serious question, not the first line of a joke.)]

  33. [Sorry gladys @27, I could hear my Pinner-esque forebears tut-tutting at me as I typed my post @7!]

  35. Valentine@30 beat me to it re: Middlesex – the setter didn’t say which country! As it happens I lived for several years in the Massachusetts Middlesex.

    I found this quite mild compared to earlier Imogen puzzles. Considering the various questionable usages today, I was wondering whether he wasn’t being deliberately provocative to see what he could stir up.

  37. “Comprised of” is important enough, or complex enough, or thorny enough, to have its own Wikipedia entry. The link is below, but there’s one sentence I thought I should include directly here:

    ‘The style guide for the British newspapers The Guardian and The Observer says that “The one thing [about comprise, consist, compose or constitute] to avoid, unless you want people who care about such things to give you a look composed of, consisting of and comprising mingled pity and contempt, is ‘comprised of’?.” ‘

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comprised_of

  40. Since I had hiked the length of HADRIAN’S WALL a few years ago, 1a was a write-in clue for me. The remainder went in a bit more slowly with EMMER, HIDEBOUND, and RASH never dropping. I agree with Valentine @30 about the surface of AS IT COMES not making sense — when there are so many witty and readable surfaces I guess a klunky one stands out. Favourites included ANNE FRANK, ABEYANT, THUMB SCREW, LHASA, and RADON. Like others I could not parse ITALY and the very clever SCRAPER. Thanks to both.

  41. Teachers of English and GCE examiners also groan when they see “comprised of”. 14 Gervase: my favourite Euston announcement was, “This train is about to disembark!”

  42. A great puzzle that made me work – and then I still came here with SCRAPER ITALY WAFTED and AS IT COMES unparsed! Thanks for sorting those out Andrew. I also went down the IRANY and IRAQY route before getting to a European country. I had ticks against 1, 13, 15, 22a and 1,7 down. AMULET was a write in from the definition but the clever use of ALTAR to suggest a church cross meant it took a while for me to see MULE as one. As usual superfluous ins didn’t bother me so I had nonwuibbles. Thanks also to Imogen.

  44. Very satisfying puzzle with ticks everywhere. Several dnks (ABEYANT, EMMER, APPLET etc) but which were solvable from the excellent cluing.

    One question, while I agree with muffin et al ‘re the’in’ in 1a but equally what is it doing in 1d?

  46. Enjoyable puzzle. While I did finish it, I could not parse SCRAPER, SKETCH and WAFTED until seeing Andrew’s explanation!
    Also, why the “I” in 4 Ac? It seems superfluous and certainly threw me off initially…

  47. William @44. One of the setters explained this on here a few days ago: in {this wordplay} find the answer. That’s not verbatim, just the way I understood it.

  48. Jay in Pittsburgh @46. The ‘I’ in 4d is the answer NONPAREIL speaking to us through the medium of the setter! I guess it also makes the surface make some sort of sense that it would otherwise lack.

  49. SH @47
    I can see how that can justify the “ins” in 1a and 1d (though I don’t like it), but how about the “in” in 27a?

  50. muffin @47. Was it Tramp who said recently that he used to think that ‘in’ only worked in one direction (answer found in wordplay, or “in wordplay answer”), but he now thought it was justifiable in either direction? So, anag (fodder) in (answer). He said he was aware that not everyone agreed, but it looks like Imogen does, even if you don’t!

  52. 24d the team is IX (9) not XI (11) baseball or rounders? Is our setter American by any chance?

  53. tony smith @52. Well, it’s either M_ _/IT with a baseball team, or MI_/_T with a cricket team (or, as it’s an American university, perhaps an American football team?). Your choice!

  55. I’d usually agree with you, Fingal, but Imogen did say “some say”, which is undeniable, I think (though wouldn’t include me!).

  56. [Me @55
    …though I do wonder what non-rhotic speakers think the reason for having “rs” in words is. I once shared a botanical trip with a woman who called flowers “flahs”, (and wires “wahs”).]

  57. Fingal @54: At least round these parts it certainly is. Most of England is non-rhotic so “Emmer” would be pronounced ‘Em Ah’ and wouldn’t be discernable from the novel ‘Emma.’ So I’m with muffin @55 on this – ‘some’ definitely say Emma for Emmer.

  60. Surprised no-one’s mentioned the rather quaint ‘be’ in 5d.
    Enjoyed nevertheless, thanks Imogen and Andrew.

  62. Sheffield hatter 53: Good point, funny how you can get one line of thought stuck in your head.

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