The puzzle may be found at https://www.theguardian.com/crosswords/cryptic/28503.
Curiously, I sailed through this, but I can well understand why others of at least comparable experience may have had more difficulty. There is no doubt that 12A PRONOUNS is the anchor. So, for me, a brilliantly themed puzzle, but I would not be surprised at a wide range of responses. Now’s your chance to make your voice heard.
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | SETTER |
One with rigid response to game, such as me (6)
|
| Double definition, the first referring to the dog breeds. A partner to 1D. | ||
| 4 | SELVES |
The real me and others reassembled container broken in half (6)
|
| VES SEL (‘container broken in half’) with the two parts switched (‘reassembled’). | ||
| 9 | CLUE |
Odd parts of culture, as this itself is (4)
|
| Alternate letters (‘odd parts’) of ‘CuLtUrE‘. | ||
| 10 | HAIRSPRING |
Season preceded by 1960s’ musical — watch part (10)
|
| A charade of HAIR (‘1960s’ musical’) plus SPRING (‘season’). | ||
| 11 | HEWERS |
Ones who cut nested 12 (6)
|
| An envelope (‘nested’) of WE in HERS (both ’12’ – PRONOUNS). | ||
| 12 | PRONOUNS |
Formal declarations, excluding 27 words of certain type (8)
|
| A subtraction: PRONOUN[cement]S (‘formal declarations’) minus CEMENT (‘excluding 27’ – more specifically, the answer to 27A) | ||
| 13 | ASPERSION |
Like something that may be first, second or third, without one negative comment (9)
|
| An envelope (‘without’) of I (‘one’) in AS (‘like’) plus PERSON (‘something that may be first, second or third’). | ||
| 15 | ITEM |
Couple, pair of 12, one returned (4)
|
| A charade of IT plus EM, a reversal of ME (‘pair of 12, one returned’). | ||
| 16 | HERE |
What distinguishes French girlfriend and boyfriend at this point (4)
|
| In French, ‘boyfriend’ is AMI, ‘girlfriend’ is AMIE, so they are distinguished by HER E. | ||
| 17 | POSSESSED |
Like something of yours or mine that’s crazy (9)
|
| Double definition. | ||
| 21 | SINN FEIN |
Small pub organised fine party in Ireland (4,4)
|
| A charade of S (‘small’) plus INN (‘pub’) plus FEIN, an anagram (‘organised’) of ‘fine’. | ||
| 22 | EITHER |
English 12 — one or the other (6)
|
| A charade of E (‘English’) plus IT HER (’12’ PRONOUNS). | ||
| 24 | MONOVALENT |
Like some elements second kind of star made available (10)
|
| A charade of MO (‘second’) plus NOVA (‘kind of star’ – sort of) plus LENT (‘made available’). | ||
| 25 | THEE |
2 removing me and then them, for you once (4)
|
| A charade of THE[me] (‘2 removing me’) plus [them]E (‘… and then them’). | ||
| 26 | SASHED |
Like beauty pageant participants, for instance, that woman had put outside (6)
|
| An envelope (‘put outside’) of AS (‘for instance’) in SHE’D (‘that woman had’). | ||
| 27 | CEMENT |
American’s ready, minimally, to embrace Brendan — it’s hard stuff (6)
|
| An envelope (‘to embrace’) of ME (‘Brendan’) in CENT (‘America’s ready, minimally’). | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 1 | SOLVERS |
People like you — extremely passionate types, missing nothing (7)
|
| A subtraction: SO L[o]VERS (‘extremely passionate types’ – but SO is awkward) minus an O (‘missing nothing’). | ||
| 2 | THEME |
Unifying idea that begins with and ends with 12 (5)
|
| A charade of T (‘That begins with’) plus HE ME (’12’ – i.e PRONOUNS). | ||
| 3 | EPHESUS |
Ancient city in European power, second among 12 (7)
|
| A charade of E (‘European’) plus P (‘power’) plus HESUS, an envelope (‘among’) of S (‘second’) in HE US (’12’ – i.e. PRONOUNS). | ||
| 5 | EUSTON |
Station 1 across and down together in school (6)
|
| An envelope (‘in’) of US (‘1 across and down together’) in ETON (‘school’), for the railway station in London. | ||
| 6 | VERMOUTHS |
Extremely limited openings for it and others (9)
|
| A charade of VER[y] (‘extremely’) minus its last letter (‘limited’) plus MOUTHS (‘openings’). In the definition ‘it’ refers to Italian vermouth. | ||
| 7 | SYNONYM |
Eg best for worst, verbally (7)
|
| Cryptic definition. | ||
| 8 | MISPRONOUNCED |
Pen music, rondo needing change, sounding wrong (13)
|
| An anagram (‘needing change’) of ‘pen music rondo’. | ||
| 14 | ERRONEOUS |
Wrong or right, third person’s invested in euros, oddly (9)
|
| An envelope (‘invested in’) of R (‘right’, the second R in the answer) plus ONE (‘third person’ – even if one is referring to oneself, one is doing it in the third person) in EROUS, an anagram (‘oddly’) of ‘euros’. | ||
| 16 | HEINOUS |
Awful man with the writer? On the contrary, you and me (7)
|
| A charade of HE (‘man’) plus I (‘the writer’) plus NO (‘on the contrary’) plus US (‘you and me’). | ||
| 18 | SHEATHE |
Heterosexual couple hiding half of what’s put inside cover (7)
|
| An envelope (‘hiding’) of AT (‘half of whAT‘) in SHE HE (‘heterosexual couple’). | ||
| 19 | ELEMENT |
He and I each represent one (7)
|
| Cryptic definition – He is helium, and I is iodine. | ||
| 20 | FEMALE |
For example, initially he or she (6)
|
| A charade of FE (‘For Example initially’) plus MALE (‘he’). | ||
| 23 | TITHE |
Money for church, as 12 after short time (5)
|
| A charade of T (‘short time’) plus IT HE (’12’ PRONOUNS). |
I really enjoyed the theme of this puzzle.
Favourites: HERE, HEINOUS, ELEMENT, SASHED, FEMALE, SHEATHE, ITEM.
New for me: MONOVALENT.
Did not parse SELVES.
Thanks, both.
PeterO has said it very well. I also suspect this puzzle will divide we solvers into two camps – the lovers and the opposite. Somewhat torn, I’m slightly with the latter, on balance. The clues varied from guffaws (HERE, EITHER, CEMENT) to groans (SETTER, SOlVERS, etc), and by the time I’d got to the LOI (SASHED), the theme actually had become irritating to me/we/us/whoever.
Thanks Brendan for arousing so many mixed emotions. I’m sure there are more to follow.
I liked the theme, but had a somewhat rodshaw@2-like attitude to it at the end. I didn’t think any of the clues were intrinsically devious, or even heinous, the main difficulty being cracking the theme, which in my case was managed rather early on with a mixture of guesswork and working backwards. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I think there might have even been too many theme-related clues, given the small number of pronouns used (Brendan avoided the interrogatives, demonstratives and some others).
I quite enjoyed this once the pronoun thing emerged – in particular, 1a/d=US in EUSTON was very satisfying. I kept waiting for a nod to inclusive pronoun language like “they” or “cis”.
Loved this puzzle.
Couldn’t parse SASHED.
I loved it too: so clever with all the pronouns and then the misdirection of HE and I for ELEMENT. Ta muchlt to Brendan and to PererO.
A nice puzzle but I was losing patience by the time the NE went in and used a bit of checking to speed the last couple of entries along. I must be missing something with 6D though – I just see antonyms. Please could someone explain?
I’m with PeterO: ‘a brilliantly themed puzzle’ indeed. I’m sure there are additional subtleties that have passed me by (as always with Brendan) but I’ll just mention one – SINN FEIN, of all parties in Ireland, is definitely the PRONOUN party, as the name means ‘we ourselves’. I only know this thanks to an episode of Columbo.
Alton @7: ‘verbally’ in 6d means we have to interpret ‘to best’ and ‘to worst’ as verbs, in which case they both mean ‘to defeat’. ‘Bested’ is quite common, eg in sports commentary; ‘worsted’ is much rarer, but you’ll find it in Little Women:
When Amy had whetted her tongue and freed her mind she usually got the best of it, for she seldom failed to have common sense on her side, while Jo carried her love of liberty and hate of conventionalities to such an unlimited extent that she naturally found herself worsted in an argument.
rodshaw @2: I spotted the (no doubt deliberately) ERRONEOUS PRONOUN – is there a prize? 😉
Many thanks Brendan and PeterO.
ALTON#7 BEST and WORST as verbs are synonyms for beat as in a fight
Good puzzle, and a good workout for the grey matter. My first answer at 16a was EAST, but sneaky use of the check button told me to think again. However, it works, as a sort of reverse definition… I think?
Anybody, anyone or anything who didn’t enjoy this is missing something. He, she (or they – whatever!) ought to look again. Surely there is something for everybody in here. I loved it, once me, myself and I had got our heads around the theme. That’s enough pronouns for now. Favourite – by some distance – VERMOUTHS. And I enjoyed PRONOUN contained within MISPRONOUNCED down the middle as well.
Thanks Brendan and PeterO
No divided opinion here. Brendan generally has a 100% success rate with me.
Not the trickiest, but I got held up by MONOVALENT/SELVES/VERMOUTHS for some time. Very much enjoyed the latter, as well as ELEMENT, SINN FEIN and HERE, but the whole thing was a treat, really.
A DNF, but I was satisfied with what I could find.
I would have gotten 16A a lot sooner if it was “What distinguishes French girlfriend FROM boyfriend at this point”, but I’m sure it was obvious enough for everyone else. I guessed it was some “extra e” wordplay but couldn’t quite get there!
There was so much clever stuff here that some of it passed me by – the meaning of SINN FEIN was particularly smart. My thanks to PeterO for parsing SELVES and HEWERS which went in on a wing and a prayer. I particular enjoyed VERMOUTH (though only in its cruciverbal sense !)
This started as a breeze and ended as a slog. Needed PeterO’s parsing for SELVES and PRONOUN and @9 Toadfather’s parsing for SYNONYM. My favourite was HERE.
Head spinning.
Thanks Brendan
I’m in the enjoyed camp. Couldn’t get MONOVALENT, but it was totally fair. Favourite is VERMOUTH, mainly because I now finally understand the glamorous people in 50s and 60s movies asking for a ‘Gin and It’.
Thanks Brendan and PeterO
I’m in the “got a bit fed up by the end” camp, though I’m easily irritated by much repeated words in a puzzle, even when, as in this case, they are derived from a solution. This was despite a flying start – I solved TITHE as the puzle ws printing, so decided that 12 must be either PRONOUNS or ARTICLES.
A DNF in fact – failed on HEWER, didn’t parse SELVES, and had SASHED as SHE in a baffling SAD.
Brilliant!
Alas 16a went in first. Difference between ami and amie? Thats E so EAST went in
Not so fast Sonny!
Then I got the PRONOUN theme and had a fair bit of sorting to do in the SW
Somehow this added to my enjoyment
Thanks Brendan and Peter
Afraid I’m in the Mr Grumpy group this morning. Didn’t really enjoy this very much at all, decided quite early on that I wouldn’t persevere with it, a DNF therefore….
Thanks, essexboy@8 and Toadfather@9. I guess I may never get round to reading Little Women.
Thanks also to Brendan and PeterO.
You never get a run of the mill crossword from Brendan. This was really impressive as always. The SETTER, SOLVERS, CLUE (me, you, this) and THEME all interlinked in the top left was brilliant.
Many thanks Brendan and PeterO.
For once I managed to work out the theme very early on thanks to solving 12a as a write-in and this mostly happened over the next wee-while.
What a clever puzzle and I’m with PostMark @11 that the COTD has to be VERMOUTHS (although I don’t think I’ve ever had an ‘Gin & It’ and maybe 9am is too early to start? Then again…)
Thanks to Brendan and PeterO!
A bit dicey on the left-hand side, trying not to fall into the CHASM.
Thanks Brendan and PeterO
[MB @22
In my opinion, a dry martini is much better with Noilly Prat (a French vermouth) than with Italian vermouth.]
[MB @22: as a keen reader of your posts, I have to say I’d always assumed Gin & It as a standard breakfast component was the explanation! So, thing I learned today 😀 ]
Another awesome offering from Brendan. I’m very firmly in the ‘enjoyed it’ camp and I’m totally with PostMark @11.
I was particularly impressed by the number of clues that included two pronouns (as they had to, to fit the references to ’12’) – 11, 15 and 22ac and 2, 3,14, 16, 18 and 23dn and the fact that Brendan had managed to find an anagram of MISPRONOUNCED, as well as having PRONOUN contained in it, as PostMark pointed out.
I won’t list all my ticked clues today but top favourite, appropriately, is the clue for PRONOUNS – and, as so often with Brendan’s puzzles, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.
Many thanks to Brendan for an excellent puzzle and to PeterO for the blog.
What Eileen @26 said. Apart from the fact that I would put MONOVALENT up there with PRONOUNS, I see no point in trying to paraphrase.
Brendan is my favourite of the Guardian’s current stable, and for me, today’s puzzle is a good example of why. It took me ages to find a way in – I found it almost impenetrable at first, but once 12 clicked, it became a lot plainer sailing. I really enjoy the way Brendan integrates his themes, with consistency in the style of clueing (and I think I would recognise a Brendan puzzle even without his byline). I also enjoy the way he interlinks clues – I solved 12 and 27 jointly, one giving me the answer to the other. That’s clever.
I also think he’s perhaps the setter who gives me fewest quibbles – generally pretty scrupulous in both his definitions and wordplay, so you can never (or hardly ever) accuse him of unfairness, even when he is being Very Hard Indeed.
Maybe it’s one of those wavelength things. But it works for me.
And after all that effusive praise for Brendan, I should also remember to say… thanks for the excellent blog too, PeterO!
Eileen @26 – “the whole is greater than the sum of its parts” – yes, that sums it up perfectly.
Witty and brilliant once again, thank you Brendan.
As usual Eileen has said it all before I got here! I loved it – the sort of crossword that makes you wish that Brendan turned up more often than he does
Thanks to Brendan and PeterO
[PostMark @25: My tipple-of-choice for many years has been a Kir but mixed to my own special recipe, closer to 5/5 than the usual 9/1 parts wine/Creme de Cassis. I do have a rather lovely bottle of Slake’s Sussex Dry gin on the go at the moment though so I may go and dig out the Vermouth (or muffin @24’s suggestion) and tip that over my cornflakes…
In the back of what sometimes passes for my ‘mind’ I knew that there was a ‘Pronoun Song’ from the 1960/70s TV show ‘H.R. PufNStuf.’ Enjoy… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3LnJ5ixcFyU ]
Not clear to me how “America’s ready, minimally” is cent. Can someone tell me please?
VDS @33: it might be ever so slightly stretched but I took it as American currency – America’s ready – and then the smallest denomination – minimally – cent.
VDS Prasad @33
“ready” meaning money. A cent is the smallest denomination, so “minimally”.
I thought this was excellent, witty, challenging in places. Solved, eventually, with a smile on my face! Thanks Brendan and PeterO.
Thanks for the blog and a very thoughtful verdict. The setting is impressive, I am a big fan of Brendan but i do feel the theme was a little contrived this time . Too much jumping around to spoil the flow, and I personally like to solve the down clues individually without looking at the grid. Perhaps one to admire rather than enjoy.
I hated this with a passion barely decent but then I got almost no sleep last night due to the weather. I found the extensive use of pronouns aka some of the dullest words in the english language tiresome and some of the definitions were pretty dismal. Overall it felt like all the fiddle and faff of a Paul but none of the fun. Just when I thought it couldn’t get any worse the coup de grace was applied with the VERMOUTH/IT synonym which for reasons I can’t adequately explain I detest.
Phew – glad I got that off my chest – think I’d better have nap
I’m in the “loved it” camp with this one. SUIT almost worked for ITEM. Thanks to Brendan and PeterO.
VDS Prasad @33 – “ready money” is an old idiom for cash (with the sense that it is immediately available to spend, most likely on something frivolous rather than being saved to pay the rent or bills). You’d more usually shorten it to “readies” in the plural rather than singular, but I think the clue is fine as written. And “minimally” because a cent is the smallest denomination.
I forgot , one minor quibble. Nova is transient behaviour of a star , not a star in itself.
Thank you, PostMark@34 and muffin@35.
Failed to parse SELVES, SOLVERS. Failed to solve VERMOUTHS, MONOVALENT (new to me), POSSESSED. Put in quite a few more from def and crossers without having the patience to disentangle all the PRONOUNS. Technically excellent bravura setting, guaranteed to separate the clever from the failures, of whom I am definitely one this morning, so PostMark can write me off as “missing something”. Liked SETTER and ELEMENT and the PRONOUN(CEMENT)S pairing.
Thank you, widdersbel@40, for explaining. Have heard of ready money but could not connect to the answer.
gladys @43: I wouldn’t dream of writing you off for any reason. I was just trying to fit in an unreasonable number of pronouns into my comment 😉
Huge thumbs up from me – a hyperthematic puzzle from a setter who is a master of such things.
I threw in ‘antonym’ for 7dn until I realised it messed up 4ac and then thought more about it. I failed to parse SASHED, though the solution seemed secure.
VERMOUTHS was COD for me also – clever to include a pronoun not as a pronoun. [I’m with muffin @24 that gin and French is preferable – with a decent proportion of the latter]
Many thanks to S&B
A lot to be admired and enjoyed here but like some I was getting a bit frustrated at the end. Thanks Brendan for challenging the old grey matter and PeterO for the excellent blog.
It took me a while to get 12ac. Having solved Ephesus and Euston I was convinced it must have something to do with America (US), an idea reinforced by ‘America’ in the clue for 27ac. Once the penny finally dropped (with a thud) I quickly lost interest as I found the repetitious use of pronouns dull and slightly irritating. I soon gave up, so a DNF.
Nevertheless, I can appreciate the cleverness in some of the clues – the failing is all mine.
Thanks to Brendan and PeterO
Essexboy @8: Brilliant spot re SINN FEIN, how on earth did that crop up in Columbo?
Can’t remember the last time I had so many ?’s in a completed grid. Well worked out PeterO.
On the Marmite scale, I’m just on the side of the lovers.
Many thanks Brendan.
Roz @41: re nova, this is such a crossworder’s chestnut that I’m surprised it’s not come up before. Jolly good spot.
Do setters have a rigid response to game? I thought that was pointers.
Thank you William @ 50 , it actually would have worked fine today by putting STAR BEHAVIOUR, the clue would still make sense.
MikeB @51
I thought that too, so I looked it up. See “Function” here.
Clever stuff! Thanks Brendan and PeterO. I loved it, and I now need it!
SINN FEIN is a particularly satisfying inclusion. MONOVALENT held me up for a while.
I think the definition for SHEATHE (as verb) should be ‘put inside cover’?
Ouch !
Excellent! The use of pronouns as definitions for elements and booze was particularly enjoyable.
Thanks Brendan & PeterO.
There seems to be quite a CHASM here between those who liked this puzzle and those who did not. I loved it!
Thank you Brendan and PeterO, and essexboy @8 for pointing out the SINN FEIN connection.
Re SINN FEIN, it is worth pointing out to those who may be unaware that Brendan is Irish but long resident in the US Pacific NW (I presume he took his nom de plume from St Brendan, who according to legend made the same crossing). I hope he is well out of the line of fire.
A fun puzzle and very kind of Brendan to get us off to a flying start with the THEME announced so clearly in the NW corner. From there the answers went in steadily, even if the parsing wasnt so clear. (Thanks PeterO for SELVES and SASHED.)
Favourite by a long way was VERMOUTHS, but also loved the construction of MONOVALENT.
Thanks to Brendan
Loved this, as a former linguist and teacher of languages, even then had to reveal a few. So clever, solutions and clues.
Shoulddabeenaprize to save-our enjoyment over a we-ek.
Many thanks to Brendan and PeterO. And to essexboy. We ourselves indeed! Solvers and setters unite, OK?!
[Just one more thing… William @49: if you click on the ‘Columbo’ link @8, that should shed some light on the mystery. And if that doesn’t solve the case, there’s another clue here.]
Brilliant! My favourite puzzle in a while. Thanks both.
Just realised COPINE and COPIN also work for HERE as well so chapeau to Brendan for that one
Still don’t like singular ready for money but it seems to have become a crossword staple
bc @63: almost! It’s actually copAin in the masc. form, so it would be HEREHISA. If he’d gone for petit ami/petite amie, it would be HERES.
[EB @64
In the original French version of The Magic Roundabout, Dougal (called Pollux in this version) was English, with an appalling French accent. He regularly greeted the others “Bonjour copains”, pronounced as spelled!]
[muffin @65: I’m sure I remember hearing somewhere that the French were appalled when Eric Thompson & Co changed the name to Dougal, because they thought it was a send-up of De Gaulle. I can imagine them objecting: Mais non! The dog’s Pollux! 😉 ]
[muffin @65: Sounds a bit like me ordering aforementioned Kir… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B5KNkC7QHbY ]
essexboy @64 you’re right – more napping required I fear
[EB @66
Classic bit of Franglais! 🙂
Thanks MB.]
SYNONYM makes no sense to us (nor to the blogger given the explanation of “cryptic clue”, Even if “best” can possibly be a synonym for “worst”, why “verbally”. Please explain someone!
p & a & g @70 – have a look at posts 8 and 9 – hopefully that makes it clearer.
[ MrEssexboy@66 you are truly spoiling us today. My favourite was the episode with Dougal and the talking pear, hilarious at 5 years old. ]
Strictly speaking CEMENT is not the hard stuff but what holds the hard stuff (concrete) together.
[Roz @72: Hilarious at any age (click here if you can suspend your anti-link policy for a second or two. No one will know 😉 )
“I’m a pear”, said the pear.
“Then why is there only one of you?” said Dougal.]
Didn’t enjoy this and gave up half way through. I got quite fed up with all the pronouns – I guess it just wasn’t for me. I am not much of a linguist – I even had to look up pronouns to remind me what they were and then I just got confused trying to think which one to try in each clue. (We didn’t do grammar at school for some reason.)
Thanks PeterO for all the much needed explanations. I did read the whole blog and will consider this a learning experience. Thanks Brendan.
peter & ant & gavin @70
Sorry. It seemed obvious to me at the time I wrote up 7D, but evidently I should have added something on the lines of essexboy @8.
[ Fiona Anne @ 75, you put a late ( for me ) post on Qaos @ 102 yesterday. I did read it this morning . Just want to say it was extremely useful and I am very grateful ]
Thank you Mr Essexboy @74, yes that is the classic line of the whole series. I will try the link when someone is here to help me, last time I got stuck with never ending videos. ]
Thanks for untangling THEE, PeterO, it was too scrambled for me.
essexboy@8 What ERRONEOUS PRONOUN?
I have to go out now and don’t have time to read all posts (will read them when I get back) but for now I’ll say I’m in the love-it camp. Can’t think of a favorite, too many winners.
Thanks to Brendan and PeterO — are you getting thunderstorms on Long Island? In Connecticut the never seem to quit.
Is CEMENT actually hard stuff or is it a constituent component which needs the addition of other materials (or just water), to become hard?
Thanks Brendan and PeterO for parsing a couple or three which stumped me
Oops! Cross posted with David Mansell @73
Thanks for bringing in Magic Roundabout, a favourite. Maybe my next pseudonym will be “Snail”. To this day, when I visit my sister, when I lay down my head it is on the Dougal pillowcase.
Thanks PeterO for fully explaining lots that I somehow got without understanding eg SETTER, SASHED and ERRONEOUS (overthought it with ER…S as odd letters of EUROS and then got stuck – interesting that ONE = third person is commonly replaced with YOU = 2nd person by oiks like me), got HERE from the Copain/copine route wondering what happened to the A.
Also thanks essexboy@8 and others for full justification of SYNONYM (and your translation of SINN FEIN, which struck me as an odd entry at the time but now makes perfect sense).
Share the objection of Roz@41 and that held me up for quite a while, and David Mansell@73 I see what you mean although cement generally dries hard doesn’t it?
Have seen “short time” = T recently but why not just use “time” which = t in science?
Ground to a halt in the NE until remembering It = vermouth from a crossword a few months back, nice when that happens, and overall thought this was great, enjoyed broadening my grammatical knowledge (I did look up a list of pronouns without which I would not have got far) and spotting thematic elements (or misleading variations, looking at you ELEMENT) woven into clues and solutions in Brendan’s usual style. Far too much said but still room for thanks to Brendan for another wonderful language lesson.
It’s perfectly fair, I think.
The grey powdery stuff will go hard as it absorbs water, and it doesn’t just ‘hold the hard stuff together’. The hard stuff forms as a result of the chemical reaction between the cement, water and whatever else it’s mixed with (cf the difference between concrete and mortar).
And there are other types of cement which harden when they cure in the air.
[Regarding ‘worsted’, paradoxically SYNONYMous with ‘bested;’ as exemplified in essexboy’s comment @8, here is another example. This comes from Tobias Smollett’s 1771 novel, The Expedition of Humphry Clinker, a wonderful text, in part because it comprises a series of letters written by a set of characters of different social classes, genders and ages who embark together on a tour of England and Scotland, and so is a treasure trove of late-18thC idioms and registers. (Their visit to Bath is also a glorious antidote to the Austenised Bath of that period that is fixed in cultural memory.) Here, Matthew Bramble writes to his correspondent, Dr Lewis, concerning a visit they have paid to Squire Burdock in Yorkshire. On arrival they have found that the squire is being treated for a severe head injury, the cause of which is not immediately known: “We afterwards understood he had quarrelled at a public house with an exciseman, whom he challenged to a bout at single stick, in which he had been worsted; and that the shame of this defeat had tied up his tongue. As for madam, she had shewn no concern for his disaster, and now heard of his recovery without emotion.”
I have some other examples but will go away now rather than burdening the thread further.]
Thanks Brendan and PeterO! This was a fun one, and for me went in easily (except this American did have to look up a list of Irish political parties.) The parsing stumped me in a few places though—I had no idea it could mean vermouth, and the chemistry clues went over my head :-). The sweet, in-club feeling of the NW started me off with a smile, and of the rest I think I liked 13A ASPERSION best.
Well, I quite enjoyed that. Sorry to be slow (and the point may be addressed above), but could someone explain 7 down for me please? Best and worst are obviously antonyms…? And syn in synonym sounds like sin..but then what ? Am sure this is a Doh moment….
Generally I have a bit more success with Brendan (I ended up revealing about a quarter of the answers this time) but I’m still a fan because Brendan has created yet another brilliantly themed crossword. He elevated the mundane pronoun as few others can do. Favourites included PRONOUNS, MISPRONOUNCED, and ELEMENT. Thanks to both.
I’m late to the party because three or four answers were eluding me, but my verdict is: a great puzzle!
Nuntous @87, see comments 8 and 9 above. I had it as bad = good in young people speak, hence verbally, but those above make more sense.
Like others, put EAST for HERE, and since I couldn’t get the SW without the HERE crossers a spectacular fail overall. NHO it = vermouth so wouldn’t have finished anyway.
Strangely today, I neither loved nor hated this one!
Thanks Fiery Jack. Not exactly a “Doh!”, but I get it now.
I’ve always been a brendan fan and I did enjoy the theme, but the surface readings tend to get lost in puzzles like this so I find them mechanical, less of an art.
Dutch! Please no-one call me durch
Remarkable how, when invited to espouse one of two diametrically opposing viewpoints, we are sorely tempted to do so. (Fiery Jack, you are an honourable exception.) Must be a moral somewhere here.
Very clever and for me mostly fun, despite being worsted by a few. ELEMENT was a lovely misdirection given the theme. Ilan@4 if you’re still around I think 20 is a nod to the trans community if you take the entire clue as a definition of FEMALE. Many thanks PeterO (spot on with your prediction) and Brendan.
[ Paul @95 if you are still tempted by the Azed then the puzzle this week, 2562, is pretty friendly by Azed standards. Still pretty daunting if you are not used to it I must admit. ]
Like PeterO I was expecting a mixed reaction but was really surprised by the vehemence of the negative responses to what I thought was an excellent application of a theme – with a side theme of “likes” (?) which is the plural of one of my least favourite words as it is used today, like ( 😉 ).
My “in” to the theme was in getting 27a CEMENT for which I had no problem with CENT – and its subtraction in the foothold clue 12a.
My ticks were for SHEATHE and POSSESSED. I had a problem with HERE because I was on copain/copine rather than ami/amie which I’d overlooked and was waiting with the spelling correction.
Many thanks to PeterO for the parsing of SASHED which I’d never have realised, SETTER for which the link also educated me about birdy dogs and THEE which was very clever.
Thanks Brendan for a great challenge
For me the Marmite element was spread a little too thickly, and I suspect that’s why some people reacted badly to it. If you get to the last five or so clues (which by definition are almost certainly the ones you’ve struggled most to solve) and find yourself thinking “not this again…” then any puzzle will start to drag.
There was lots to like along the way though, and I’m certainly not in the “hate” camp.
Ed The Ball @97
After reading your post, I looked back through, and (unless you count “Ouch”) there was only one vehemently negative response that I read; the other negatives (including mine) were of the level of “a bit irritated by”….
Also sailed through but mostly through guesswork and instinct. Grateful for your parsing of answers.
I didn’t enjoy it, but that’s because I’m a poor solver who is easily exasperated, not because I thought it was in any way lacking as a crossword: I just wasn’t up to it.
Thanks both,
[ 1.My old mum’s tipple of choice was a gin and it, so when it comes up in a crossword I get fond memories of her. 2. It’s surprisingly easy to make your own creme de cassis out of blackcurrants and red wine.]
muffin@99. Maybe I did exaggerate but Grumpy and fed up along with bodycheetah@38’s rant, these
were not ringing endorsements. I’ve never been good at dealing with negatives.
Not sure quite what ouch means!
Ed The Ball @103
OK, some semi-vehement ones too (is that a valid concept?).
Clever puzzle which, of course, means you enjoy the theme whenever it helps and dislike it when it presents extra difficulty.
The parsing of SYNONYMS here was something that had evaded me, and hat doffed to the setter as I think that is very elegantly done in what was generally a very fine puzzle.
As expected, a midweek Brendan puzzle was a solve too far, but I did get halfway which was pleasing and dare I say it, progress.
I got the theme by ‘reverse engineering’ (as we IT nerds like to say) from the answer to 3d, that made 12a pretty obvious.
I shall now read the blog, but will be surprised if there are any dissenting voices.
Thanks both.
Just brilliant and Brendan still my favourite. Top marks essexboy, I’ve always translated it as ‘Ourselves alone’ but I see that is ERRONEOUS.
Brilliant stuff from both Brendan and PeterO
[Roz@96, time I took some concrete pills & hardened up you reckon?]
[Of course I meant cement pills. We use both interchangeably down here so I had no problem with 27.]
[Tyngewick @102: ‘make your own creme de cassis out of blackcurrants and red wine…’ You could be my new best friend…]
A masterpiece of design, construction and clueing from a top setter. I’m glad I found the time today to do this. There are too many comments here for me to read, but I have seen enough to be sure I am in good company.
Thanks to Brendan and PeterO.
[ Paul@109, I never really knew the difference between cement and concrete, probably still don’t. Over here we say our brain is like concrete/ cement if we are stuck on a crossword and cannot think. This week has been the best weather we have ever had for swimming, going soon once the light improves ]
[Good on you Roz. My family came out from Liverpool & another lot of cousins are near Whitehaven, but I’m afraid I was never tempted to dip my toe in whilst visiting either.]
Most of this was straightforward, but like many others I got stuck on 4ac. 6dn was another one where, once I had the answer, I could see how the parsing worked, but I wouldn’t have got the answer from the clue in a million years.
[ We are on the coast between those two places, surprisingly warm sea from the Gulf Stream , time to go.]
Coming very late to this, as I love Brendan’s puzzles, but did not have time to look at it yesterday and only came to it with much anticipation this morning. Brilliant clueing of PRONOUNS that got me started but SYNONYM really held me up. I had to put it in without understanding why, so thanks to essexboy, whose comments and links have become as enjoyable and illuminating as the puzzles themselves. It’s quite a trick to be that widely read and knowledgable without a hint of pretension. Thanks, too, to Spooner’s catflap for the Humphry Clinker reference, which I also greatly enjoyed, and to all other contributors, since almost all of the comments on here are worth reading.
And, of course, thanks and gratitude to Brendan for yet another enjoyable workout.
I really enjoyed this crossword from Brendan, got the theme early on which really helped. My parsing is definitely improving!
Put me down in the “absolutely loved it” column. Among my favorite individual clues were SINN FEIN and VERMOUTH, but as is often the case with Brendan, the cross-referencing and playful use of the theme (including some lovely misdirection with ELEMENT and the aforementioned VERMOUTH) elevated the puzzle to another level. Many thanks to setter and blogger.
PS – how could I fail to mention SYNONYM? This was LOI for me, and when the penny finally dropped I laughed aloud for joy. Well done Brendan!
Had to admit weary defeat over the last few SELVES and ITEM among them and to parsing of SYNONYM
Thanks though Brendan PeterO and Essexboy