Guardian Quiptic 1,174/Anto

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I’ve often commented that Anto seems not to set puzzles specifically for the Quiptic slot, but I felt that this one was aimed more at beginners and improving solvers. That said, there were some tricky parsings, and there’s one where I have gone into ask-the-audience mode.

Abbreviations
cd cryptic definition
dd double definition
cad clue as definition
(xxxx)* anagram
anagrind = anagram indicator
[x] letter(s) removed

definitions are underlined

Across

1 Switch edges on dresses? That’s rational
SOBER
Anto is inviting you to switch the outside letters of ROBES.

4 Ambition to have job that’s upright
GOALPOST
A charade of GOAL and POST. ‘Kane’s shot grazed the upright.’

8 In no time, a local concocted soothing medicine
CALAMINE LOTION
(IN NO TIME A LOCAL)* with ‘concocted’ as the anagrind. Used to soothe skin irritations, mostly. Had a bit of use in our household when the children had chicken pox.

10 For example, add young parsnip tips to dish from north Africa?
EGYPTIAN
This one has me defeated, I’m afraid. I get the EG bit for ‘for example’ …

Edit: several commenters have explained this below, but Rob T wins the sticker because he can type the fastest.  A charade of EG, Y and P for the initial letters of ‘young’ and ‘parsnip’, and TIAN for the ‘dish’.  Thanks to all for helping me out.

11 Stressed from being off centre? Au contraire!
ON EDGE
The setter is indicating that being ‘off centre’ would mean that you are ON EDGE. But then the ‘au contraire’ isn’t needed, is it?

Another edit: Rob T wins a second sticker for pointing out that ‘au contraire’ does work if you consider that ‘off’ is the opposite of ON and ‘centre’ is the opposite of EDGE.  But the clue would have been simpler (and hence more Quiptic) if ‘au contraire’ had been omitted, I think.

12 Big band playing around Long Island, performing without rehearsal
AD-LIBBING
An insertion of LI in (BIG BAND)* The insertion indicator is ‘around’ and the anagrind is ‘playing’. Nice surface.

15 Pick up hot dog
INCUR
A charade of IN and CUR.

17 Joint that with added grease helps hard work
ELBOW
Referencing the fact that ELBOW GREASE ‘helps hard work’.

18 Desires to have apprentice replace new young horses
YEARLINGS
You need to replace the N in YEARNINGS with L for learner or ‘apprentice’.

19 Dealer made to return revolutionary painting?
TRADER
A reversal (‘revolutionary’ ‘made to return’) of RED ART.

21 Semi-verbal, say, after drinking too much of this?
VERMOUTH
A charade of VER[BAL] and MOUTH. ‘Semi’, in its meaning of ‘half’, gives you the instruction to carry out the reduction in letters.

24 Jail sentence still active after death — that’s disproportionate
LARGER-THAN-LIFE
I think that this is just a cd, intimating that if you had a life sentence, it would be larger than your life span. But I am happy to be corrected.

25 One following whiskey carrier in this detective story
WHODUNIT
A charade of W, HOD (for the ‘carrier’) and UNIT. When a setter uses the ‘whiskey’ spelling (rather than ‘whisky’) you can be pretty certain that the W from the phonetic alphabet is needed.

26 Star I’m backing to take off?
MINUS
A reversal (‘backing’) of SUN IM.

Down

1 A place to go after hidden traitors
SECRET AGENTS
A charade of SECRET and A GENTS.

2 Truncheon William shortened, adding wedge perhaps
BILLY CLUB
A charade of BILLY and CLUB (a golf reference). It’s in my dictionaries, but marked as AmEng, so there will be those who would have insisted on an indication of such.

3 Rescind brief authority
REMIT
A triple definition, I think, although the last two are pretty similar in meaning.

4 Tailor (tiny and agile) creates warm atmosphere
GENIALITY
(TINY AGILE)* with ‘tailor’ as the anagrind.

5 With skill, you can take odd bits off fat belly
ABLY
The even letters of fAt BeLlY.

6 Strong face lacks depth but shows some promise
POTENTIAL
A charade of POTENT and [D]IAL.

7 Find fault with shot when the temperature drops dramatically
SCOLD
If you change the ‘hot’ to ‘cold’ in ‘shot’ you will end up with SCOLD.

9 Iron-based swings sound like suitable fairground attractions
FERRIS WHEELS
A homophone of FERROUS and WHEELS. The homophone indicator is ‘sounds like’.

13 We blogged about having slight limb deformity
BOWLEGGED
(WE BLOGGED)*

14 Cluster of small pellets thrown at gophers
GRAPESHOT
(AT GOPHERS)* with ‘thrown’ as the anagrind.

16 Roman team leader‘s small change with first game coming up
CENTURION
A charade of CENT and NO 1 plus RU reversed. The reversal indicator is, since it’s a down clue, ‘coming up’, and RU – Rugby Union – is the setters’ favourite game, except when it’s golf.

20 In parts of Ottawa, shops are inundated
AWASH
Hidden in OttAWA SHops.

22 Without hesitation, the smallest note
MINIM
MINIM(UM)

23 Bird will resist eating nuts, initially
WREN
Perfect. A bird to finish. The initial letters of the second, third, fourth and fifth words of the clue. The obligatory Pierre bird link shows you not Britain’s smallest bird (that’s the goldcrest), but – as regular quizgoers will know – Britain’s commonest bird. Because Jenny Wren is a shy creature, she’s not seen that often, which is why the quiz question trips a lot of folk up.

Many thanks to Anto for this week’s Quiptic.

47 comments on “Guardian Quiptic 1,174/Anto”

  3. 10 across is eg for example, yp for young parsnip, and tian for an earthenware dish.
    From North Africa is of course Egyptian.

  4. I can add the YP to the EG – tips of Young and Parsnip. But I am no wiser on where the TIAN comes from. The less said about this crossie the better for me. Thanks, Pierre.

  5. 11 across: the ‘au contraire’ makes sense if you look at ‘on’ and ‘edge’ being the opposites of ‘off’ and ‘centre’

  8. 11ac ON EDGE. I’m puzzled by au contraire too.
    24ac LARGER-THAN-LIFE isn’t quite disproportionate, is it?
    2dn Never heard of BILLY CLUB. Golf not my thing in any language.
    20dn AWASH appropriate for here. Huge storm last night with torrential (for these parts) downpour. Kept us awake. Also meant the blood moon was behind cloud.

    Have to confess I didn’t stop to parse everything once it was obvious what the solution was.

    Thanks Anto and Pierre.

  9. I can somehow see Orson Wells sitting on that Ferris Wheel debating the merits of Switzerland
    Posh for a Quiptic and better for it
    Thanks Anto and PIERRE

  11. Thanks Pierre and Anto. I agree with you, Pierre – I think Anto has hit the Quiptic brief very nicely today, although there are a couple of typical Anto-isms to chew over. All very enjoyable though.

    Rob T @5 – I think you’ve nailed it. That works for me.

  12. Good quiptic today, relatively easy for this setter in my experience. I managed it all apart from the second half of 1d, had to reveal that one. A proper forehead slap moment when I realised that ‘A place to go’ = ‘A GENTS’…! Bravo for that one.

  15. Can someone explain 9 down for me? I wasn’t sure about WHEELS = swings, but I just found it in a thesaurus so fair enough. But how can WHEELS be a homophone for itself?

  16. Paul b @14 – you reckon? Perhaps I’m just used to Anto being a lot trickier so was expecting to find this harder than I did, but I thought it was about right overall. Maybe one of the newbies would care to share their thoughts – I’d be genuinely interested to know (in my own amateur dabblings, I’ve been trying to write easier lately – it’s very hard to judge).

  17. Tim, at 9dn the homophone indicator is only applying to the FERRIS bit, but I can see why you’re querying it, because it’s not very obvious that’s how it works, is it?

  18. I’m not sure that the difficulty level is way off, paul b. You could say that about some of Anto’s previous puzzles, certainly; but I think overall this is in the zone. Widdersbel is right to call for some more views from newer solvers and lurkers.

  19. @16, @18 – I’ve only been doing cryptics / quiptics on and off for a couple of months and had already formed the opinion that Anto’s were at the tougher end of the scale. But I thought this one was relatively straightforward, and only missed completion by half a clue. Having said that, I often get completely bamboozled by puzzles that other solvers thought were simple…

  20. For 24 across, I was thinking that if a life sentence ends with your death, than a larger-than-life sentence would still be active after your death. I liked this clue.

    Overall, I found this puzzle a bit difficult for a Quiptic (but enjoyable) because I hadn’t heard of “calamine lotion”, “billy club”, nor of the dish “tian”. I also failed to notice that you get SCOLD from SHOT by turning HOT to COLD (it is obvious in retrospect, of course), and I missed that FERRIS is a homophone of FERROUS. I had heard the word GRAPESHOT, but it didn’t spring to mind until I had a number of crossers. I also failed to parse the “URION” part of CENTURION (also obvious in retrospect).

    Thanks to Anto for the nice puzzle and to Pierre for clearing up everything that I hadn’t figured out myself!

  21. I’m a relative newbie and I thought it hard for a Quiptic. It took me ages (well, ten minutes) to really get going (I spose the big anagrams were obvious, in hindsight) and I think that fiddly clues like 16d (CENTURION) are a bit unfair, specially as the word ‘leader’ would send a newbie down the wrong path. Thanks to all!

  22. This was a sub-20 minute solve for me – yes, I did know what a TIAN is, it’s also the name of the dish that you cook the recipe in – so I am with those that think that it’s suitable Quiptic level. I didn’t start writing them in until CALAMINE LOTION, my FOI, but a lot of the clues were write ins. I think my last in was SCOLD.

  23. I am a relative newby and I went through this quite quickly with several write-ins so I think it was at the right level. Didn’t get MINIM so revealed it and then got MINUS to finish.

    Didn’t parse SCOLD – really like it now I see it.

    I did get EGYPTIAN – all that time flicking through cook books sometimes comes in useful – never made a tian though.

    Thanks Anto and Pierre

  24. It seems to me that the quiptic slot is now filled based on the identity of the setter, not the difficulty of the crossword.

    That said, this was mostly enjoyable, except for a little head-scratching.

    Like Martin@13 I was wondering about 1d: Is there a confusion with double agents?

    I probably wouldn’t have got WHODUNIT so fast if we hadn’t seen it a few days ago, nor egypTIAN if I hadn’t cooked one recently.

  25. [Off topic, but maybe someone can answer a question I’ve always wondered about: if a life sentence ends when you die, does a lifetime guarantee end when the bloody thing breaks?]

  26. SCOLD was my LOI as well, and like others TIAN was new to me, but it couldn’t be anything else. Overall, I thought a fair Quiptic. I liked WHODUNIT.

  27. Excellent. Anto has cracked the art of doing the quiptic.
    Lots of inventive clues and good surfaces.
    Thanks both.

  28. CALAMINE LOTION was recommended by the Rolling Stones for treatment of Poison Ivy

    I don’t believe any of the were medically qualified though

    Cheers P&A

  29. I did enjoy this, but never heard of the TIAN dish, so the parsing of EGYPTIAN got as far as EG + Young Parsnip Tips and no further. Had the replacement the wrong way round in YEAR(N/L)INGS for some time. Didn’t suss how SCOLD works, and ferris/ferrous isn’t a homophone for me (but I solved it anyway, so no worries). A nice pairing with Matilda this morning.

    “You’re gonna need an ocean
    Of CALAMINE LOTION…” which I also remember with gratitude from my childhood when mosquitoes found me very tasty.

  30. Nice puzzle, just about right for a Quiptic.

    Liked INCUR, SECRET AGENTS, LARGER THAN LIFE.

    New: TIAN = a dish of sliced vegetables.

    I did not parse 3d.

    Thanks, both.

  31. Anto often produces some brilliant clues these days, and 12a AD-LIBBING was one of them. It might make it into my hall of fame.

    24a LARGER THAN LIFE had me scratching my head. On reflection I think it’s saying that if a life sentence lasts until the end of your life, a larger than life one would still be in force after your death. (Which I think is slightly different to your explanation Pierre.) But is “disproportionate” ok as the definition? I can’t quite decide.

    BILLY CLUB I knew from the Bob Dylan song Man on the Street:

    Well, the policeman come and he looked around,
    “Get up, old man, or I’m a-takin’ you down.”
    He jabbed him once with his billy club
    And the old man then rolled off the curb.

    Many thanks Anto. And thanks Pierre for the excellent blog as usual. Interesting about the wren being Britain’s commonest bird – I’ll try to remember that.

  32. I thought this was a bit tough for a Quiptic.

    BILLY CLUB is not in Chambers, and in the ODE, it’s given as North American, so I think it should have had an indicator.
    I liked AD-LIBBING for the surface and SECRET AGENTS for the place to go, although as pointed out above, they’re not usually traitors.

    Thanks Anto and Pierre.

  34. [Merci, Clive en France. So it’s the usual BS, as I suspected… I’ve been on the harsh end of the 10-year guarantee in France. The cowboys who installed our solar panels wound the company up after a couple of years. I can still hear them laughing on their way to the banque… ]

  35. [blaise and Cliveinfrance: I am the owner of the “World’s Sharpest Knife” which says that it is “guaranteed… forever!”. This initially sounds promising – not just until the extinction of the human race, say, or the death of our solar system, but way beyond that. It’s a bit less promising when you read that “This guarantee shall be enforced for the lifetime of the World’s Sharpest Knife company”, which I’m guessing has already passed.]

  36. As a beginner, I found this at the trickier end of the quiptic spectrum. There were a few that really slowed me down.

  37. I found this quite hard for a Quiptic, with several that I failed to parse.

    My dictionaries don’t support the notion that MINUS can be a verb, but maybe I don’t have the right dictionaries. (I confess that I don’t own the One True Chambers; the version that’s available online doesn’t have it as a verb.)

  38. Yes, much too hard for a Quiptic. Words like TIAN should be reserved for the Mephistos and barred puzzles of this world, not used in a daily, and never in a purportedly easy one such as this, so I agree thoroughly with those who have questioned its positioning and content.

  39. I still no reason to give anto a chance. I will happily stay with times quick cryptic. my level I enjoy it.

  40. Thank you Pierre (and sorry as I somehow failed to post this yesterday) for the triple def confirmation and the wren fact (you are right, I would never have guessed that!), Rob T etc for the TIAN, majortom and Lord Jim for a game effort at making full sense of 24A. i share some quibbles over the traitor and the fairground attraction but overall enjoyed the range of devices and wit employed by the setter, thanks Anto.

  41. Thanks for your thoughts, Gazzh. The Quiptic is a weekly puzzle, so there’s no obligation to post your comments on the same day it’s published.

    It’s also been interesting to get a wider range of comments than usual from newer solvers.

  42. 24a LARGER THAN LIFE feels wrong to me. Surely you get sent to jail with a long sentence, not a large sentence.

    On the solution to 19
    Dealer made to return revolutionary painting?
    TRADER
    A reversal (‘revolutionary’) of RED ART.

    I think the reversal is indicated by ‘return’ as the revolutionary provides the RED part of the answer

  44. You are quite right, Click. Thank you and blog corrected.

    Jen, since I didn’t know the word in the first place, I wasn’t sure myself. Seems like it’s near your first option, but with the nasal French ending. It sounds like the last part of the French word for ‘Christian’, chrétien. Or in fact, the word ‘Tiens!‘ which they use as an equivalent of ‘Well!’ or ‘I say!’ (as well as for a few other things). That’s only a help if you speak French, of course.

  46. It’s not the correct was of doing it, but I stumbled across 10a with an anagram of YP (from young parsnip) and TAGINE (a dish from North Africa). Still not used to parsing clues properly, but this blog has been a great way to learn. Thanks!

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