Independent 11,146/Filbert

by

Chuffing Nora, as they say in these parts.

 

 

I only ever blog the weekday Indy on a Monday, so am habituated to a reasonably gentle puzzle to start the week, but this one took me the longest time to solve (three goes, since you ask) and about as long to parse. It’s all sound, and I was pleased to finish it in the end, when I stood back to admire some delightful surface readings. There is FIFTIETH as 1 Across, so I’m not sure if Filbert is celebrating something.

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 Golden farthing provided small change for tithe
FIFTIETH
A charade of F, IF and (TITHE)* with the ‘small change’ as the anagrind suggesting that it’s not a massive rearrangement of the letters (as well as providing for a good surface).

5 Artist quietly fills one with optimism
HOPPER
An insertion of P for the musical ‘quietly’ in HOPER, with ‘fills’ as the insertion indicator. Referencing Edward Hopper (July 22, 1882 – May 15, 1967) the American realist painter. No, me neither.

9 Have opening of present delayed
OWN
Filbert is intimating that if you delay the ‘opening’ of NOW, by moving it to the end, the result is OWN.

10 Clips of actor occupying a hundred stages
CLOTHES PEGS
An insertion of O and THESP in C LEGS. The O for ‘of’ correspondence comes from its use in Jack o’Lantern or John O’Groats.

12 René’s Cycle Among Nomadic Tuareg?
TRAVELOGUE
An insertion of VÉLO for the French word for ‘cycle’ in (TUAREG)* and a cad. The insertion indicator is ‘among’ and the anagrind is ‘nomadic’.

13 A slice of beef is highly inappropriate food for vegetarian
FISH
Hidden in beeF IS Highly. Great surface.

15 Thread stitching wounds without us?
STRING
S[U]T[U]RING. You have to read ‘us’ as Us, meaning two letters Us.

16 European received simple epitaph, perhaps writing his own eulogy?
EGO TRIP
A charade of E, GOT and RIP.

18 Old gunfighter to carry a silencer
EARPLUG
A charade of [Wyatt] EARP and LUG.

20 Stuff dug up by university that promises repercussions
OR ELSE
A charade of ORE and LSE for The London School of Economics and Political Science, a university in Central London.

23 Hunter returning in the morning in good spirits
PUMA
A reversal of AM and UP.

24 Bride aged badly, hiding old age in a good way
BIODEGRADE
An insertion of O in (BRIDE AGED)* The insertion indicator is ‘hiding’ and the anagrind is ‘badly’.

26 Economy: German nation’s redeeming feature
SAVING GRACE
A charade of SAVING, G and RACE.

27 Step back in disgust out of cow’s droppings
PAS
PA[T]S. A French word, familiar to ballet enthusiasts: pas de deux, pas de chat, pas de bourrée …

28 Daughter left covered with unfortunately oily soap
DALLAS
A charade of D and L inserted into ALAS. The ‘oily soap’ is the soap opera from the 1970s and 80s which featured the Ewing family and their oil empire. Who did kill JR?

29 Temporary accommodation’s insulation is disappointing
LETS DOWN
A charade of LETS and DOWN (from ducks).  You need to read the clue as ‘accommodation has’.

Down

1 Very unfriendly back home on the farm
FROSTY
A charade of FRO (as in to and fro) and STY.

2 Visionary pop star out of Arkansas
FANTAST
A charade of FANTA, the soft drink and ST[AR].

3 Amazing finch grew odd ribs and flew without wings
INCREDIBLE
‘Without wings’ is the instruction to remove the outer letters: so it’s [F]INC[H], [G]RE[W], [O]D[D], [R]IB[S] and [F]LE[W].

4 Absolute thug punches even if on his last legs
THOROUGHGOING
An insertion of ROUGH in THO and GOING. The insertion indicator is ‘punches’. ‘We are happy, tho’/even if we are poor.’ ‘The boxer is going/on his last legs.’

6 River flow that’s sluggish, you’d say
OUSE
A homophone (‘you’d say’) of OOZE.

7 Leading empire corrupted Republican
PREMIER
A charade of (EMPIRE)* and R. The anagrind is ‘corrupted’.

8 Spooner’s stockings get torn going for fruit on thorny bush
ROSEHIPS
A Spoonerism of HOSE RIPS. The fruit of various rose species. I am exceptionally old, so I remember having rosehip syrup as a child. Now it’s available in health shops, so our mam must have known what she was doing.

11 Celebrity had no soul, he rehashed Sam & Dave in the end
HOUSEHOLD NAME
A charade of (HAD NO SOUL HE)* and M and E for the final letters of the two boys’ names. The anagrind is ‘rehashed’.

14 Warning siren worried guards back to tag immigrants
FOREIGNERS
A charade of FORE (something to do with golf, apparently) and G for the last letter of ‘tag’ in (SIREN)* The anagrind is ‘worried’; the insertion indicator is ‘guards’.

17 Very unpopular journalist has pissed off in the van
DESPISED
A charade of (PISSED)* and ED. The anagrind is ‘off’ and ‘in the van’ tells you to put the anagram in front of the ED.

19 Taking soldiers miles round after stretching?
REMOVAL
A charade of RE for Royal Engineers, M and OVAL, which is what you would get if you ‘stretched’ a circle or ’round’.

21 That was a silly mistake, on reflection, retaining clumsy cleaner
SHAMPOO
An insertion of HAM in OOPS reversed. The reversal indicator is ‘on reflection’; the insertion indicator is ‘retaining’. HAM-FISTED for clumsy, certainly, but just HAM?

22 Briny issue, maybe salt
SEASON
A charade of SEA and SON.

25 Girl‘s coin the same however you flip it
ANNA
The ANNA is a coin from India; both it and the girl’s name are palindromes, hence ‘the same however you flip it’. Not sure how to describe this: a type of dd, I guess.

Many thanks to Filbert for a challenging but pleasing puzzle to start the Indy week.

26 comments on “Independent 11,146/Filbert”

  3. OUSE is one of those words I only know from crosswords. I’ve never heard it said out loud and hence thought it rhymed with mouse.

    You learn something every day

  4. Blimey! As Pierre intimates, this was a bit of a wake up call for a Monday morning. I think I need to go back to bed.

    Yes, it’s all fair but it easily defeated me with the NW proving nigh impossible to crack. FIFTIETH, THOROUGHGOING, FANTAST and TRAVELOGUE all proved beyond the Monday mind of this poor solver.

    CLOTHES PEGS, EARPLUG, SAVING GRACE, SEASON, DESPISED and DALLAS were my favourites with the last two sitting on top of the others; DALLAS for the witty surface and definition, DESPISED for the lol moment when the penny dropped on what to do with the wordplay.

    Thanks Filbert and Pierre

  5. English is a frustratingly non-phonetic language, Shikasta. I fancy we’ve all had that ‘I never knew it was pronounced like that’ moment. Makes it a good language for setting crosswords, though.

  6. A THOROUGHGOING (which I couldn’t parse) work-out which only gave up its secrets bit by bit. I tried to be too smart and wondered if there might be an “Easy Rider” theme with HOPPER, TRAVELOGUE and perhaps EGO TRIP, but I couldn’t find anything else.

    Favourites among many good clues were the TRAVELOGUE &lit, the ‘oily soap’ def for DALLAS and the ’round after stretching?’ wordplay for OVAL at 19d.

    Thanks to Filbert (and congrats if the FIFTIETH is significant) and to Pierre

  7. Chuffing Nora indeed. Needed a bit of help to finish this but really enjoyed the challenge. Strange start to the week again with a bit of a toughie in the FT as well. (Not a spoiler but if you haven’t done the FT yet and are going to, I was held up somewhat by an enumeration error in 5d which should be (5,10) not (6,9).)

  8. I only finished this with a fair amount of help from my wordlist app (Crossword Solver King). Though even with that I sometimes haven’t been able to finish a Filbert, so well done me! Thanks Filbert and Pierre.

  9. Thanks, Pierre – this was certainly quite chewy for a Monday morning, and although I managed to fill it all in, I couldn’t parse S[u]T[u]RING or PA[t]S. Not sure I understand your “No, me neither” comment on 5a – are you saying you’ve not heard of Edward Hopper? I’m sure his Nighthawks painting will be familiar, even if you don’t know the name.

    Thanks for the challenge, Filbert.

  10. This was one of those days when the blog opening with “Chuffing Nora, as they say in these parts.” was a relief – it wasn’t just me being thick!

    Ouse was one of the few I got on first pass, but as I’m about a five minute walk from the banks of the Yorkshire one it’s always nice to see in a puzzle.

  11. Pierre’s opening comment says it all – I confess to having thrown in the towel at around the halfway point at which time the RH side was more or less filled but the LH side resembled no-man’s land!

    Thanks to Filbert nevertheless and well done indeed to Pierre.

  12. Not sure I have seen the Nighthawks painting, Widdersbel. I will have a browse about his work later.

  13. Thanks Pierre for the O of 10a which I just couldn’t see, and for the blog intro that warned me not to expect a bunch of write-ins! But despite (or maybe because of) the trickery (and not helped by lazily writing PAT for 27a before 22d became clear) I found this extremely enjoyable, lots of ticks of which maybe 18a (also appreciated the singular definition) or 3d (loved the grotesque surface and clever construction) triumph – thanks Filbert.

  14. We might have thrown in the towel about half way through, but with wordfinder and anagram solver to hand we finally finished, though with several answers unparsed. We did like CLOTHES PEGS and INCREDIBLE, though.
    Thanks,then, to Filbert and particularly to Pierre.

  15. Pierre @12 – Interesting. I’m hardly an expert on Hopper, but I thought Nighthawks was one of those paintings that *everyone* knew. Just goes to show it’s never safe to make assumptions about that kind of thing. (Meanwhile, over on Big Dave’s Rookie Corner today, there’s some discussion over whether a certain rock band are well enough known to be appropriate material for a crossword. General knowledge is a real minefield for setters.)

  16. Shikasta@3 – I’ve not seen your handle before but it is a capitalised version of mine – would you mind changing to something that will not lead to us being confused?

  17. As I am sure has been said before, this setter is often a hard nut to crack, but worth the effort with a bit of help DALLAS the pick of a fine crop of clues for me.

  18. Thanks both. Can only echo all the above, which in summary says it was an enjoyable but difficult battle, with THOROUGHGOING yielding last where it was an unknown and including my only mini-quibble with ‘going’ meaning on one’s last legs….yet I was certainly going something by the end

  19. Thanks to Pierre and everyone.
    Hopper is quite a big name in his world, but I remember the first time I heard of him he was dropped into a conversation as if it were taken for granted that I already had. He had an exhibition at the Tate Modern in 2004 which was seen by nearly 1/2 million people; in checking the year of that exhibition, which I saw, I discovered that there are no works of his in British museums. Lots of postcards of his everywhere, though.
    Fiftieth is a coincidence.

  20. I gave up on this after getting only four answers all day.

    I have actually seen Nighthawks at the Art Institute in Chicago. Didn’t help me get 5ac, though.

  21. Phew…thanks for parsing those we couldn’t. It took me 4 readings of the blog to realise what Rene was doing in the clue for travelogue but I’ve finally caught up!

  22. Slow going indeed with the check button helping toward the end — thanks Filbert for some excellent cluing. My top choices were TRAVELOGUE, ROSEHIPS, HOUSEHOLD NAME, and FOREIGNERS. I though “oily” was extraneous (though not inaccurate) in the clue for DALLAS and I spent too much time trying to use it as anagram fodder because it was preceeded by “unfortunately.” Thanks Pierre for helping me with my many parsing gaps.

  23. This was very good and a fair bit harder than the bulk of the daily blocked puzzles in GIFT-land nowadays, I thought. Re Nighthawks…If you’ve seen the film The Equalizer starring Denzel Washington, you’ll recognise where the director got the idea from for the cafe scenes.
    Thanks to Filbert & Pierre.

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