Guardian Cryptic 28,904 by Brummie

81 comments on “Guardian Cryptic 28,904 by Brummie”

1. A bit like Tramp yesterday, this was on the easier side for Brummie, with CULPRIT, CADAVEROUS and SHOCK THERAPY particularly pleasing. RIPARIAN and DOTTREL were new but fair. Thought there might be a mini-theme with LORD GREY, BABY LORD (clothing) and (OVER)LORD but got no further with that.

   Ta Brummie & manehi.

2. Very enjoyable, plenty of smiles. New words I learnt AUBADE, RIPARIAN & DISTEMPER as a paint. I’m more used to spelling DOTTEREL thus, and was unaware there’s an alternative. Only after I had all the crossers did I get BABY SHOWER. My favourite was probably EMBER. Thanks Brummie & manehi

3. Took a while but I got there.
   I did enjoy DISTEMPER with its throwback to times past, not only with Mr James but also the paint name. Is there such a thing as Emulsion any more?

4. A had a similar experience to manehi with a fast start but then struggled. That was also because I had Gabor instead of Gable. Silly me. Also, NHO Riparian or Aubade. I liked 14ac, 18ac and the cryptic def at 22ac. Thanks Brummie and manehi.

5. Found this pretty easy. Unknown words (aubade, riparian) were well clued. Ta to B and M.

6. Thanks Brummie and manehi
   Pretty straightforward, with some nice constructions.
   I was writing in DOTTEREL for 27 before finding it didn’t fit! I’ve never come across the contraction, though the clue works better for it.
   I don’t see why 12 needed “surprise” repeated.
   (manehi: although Wiki lists Sid James as “British actor”, it also points out that he was born in South Africa.)

7. Me too (fast start in NW corner, thinking “this is very Mondayish”, then slowed considerably). Enjoyed WHATSIT, CADVEROUS and SHOCK THERAPY in particular. Thanks to B & m.

8. Another who found this on the easier side for a Brummie with some lovely clues and surfaces.

   I did know this vocabulary, but had to solve some of the crossers to drag AUBADE from the memory banks and to start building the wordplay blocks to suddenly see RIPARIAN. Didn’t know rod = gun, but had to be that.

   Thank you to Brummie and manehi.

9. Another one who tried Dotterel before realising it didn’t fit (either the clue or the letter count). Worked out there must be an alternative spelling once I had a couple of crossers. AUBADE came from the very depths of my memory, and I didn’t get it until I had all the crossers.
   I enjoyed this one, and as my third finish in a row, feeling ever so slightly smug. (I know there are plenty of you out there for whom that would not be an achievement, but for me, at the moment, it is).

10. I already knew RIPARIAN and DOTTREL from previous crosswords, and this was really pretty simple for Brummie. Thanks both.

11. Once again, I agree with your favourites, manehi and would like to add 3dn STRAVINSKY and 16dn ISOLATED.

    22ac reminded me of one of my all-time favourite clues: Philistine’s
    ‘End-of-term party? (6)’.

    I learned AUBADE from crosswords, years ago – ‘cf serenade: a piece of music appropriate to the evening’ (Collins).

    Thanks to Brummie for an enjoyable puzzle and to manehi for a great blog.

12. I know I made this point recently for another crossword. In reference to 19,6 a ‘Spiderman’ is a type of building worker and doesn’t shoot webs. The superhero who does is most definitely Spider-Man. Marvel insist on the hyphen.

13. Eileen @11
    Your Philistine clue reminded me that I thought that the a BABY SHOWER came after the birth, but Wiki says it could be either.

14. Pleasant puzzle. Fortunately there were no unknown words for me, which made the solve more straightforward than it might otherwise have been (I have found this week’s puzzles progressively less challenging, which is the reverse of the traditional order – is that anyone else’s experience?)

    Like GDU @2 the unusual spelling of DOTTREL gave me a pause, but it had to be thus. I can’t see a clear definition for COSTUMIER in 5dn.

    ‘PM’ appears quite often in charades – this is a rare outing for Charles, 2nd Earl Grey, best remembered for tea flavoured with bergamot, though it is unclear how and when the name originated.

    Thanks to S&B

15. An AUBADE is specifically a lover’s complaint at having to leave his partner at break of day. The best-known example in English is probably John Donne’s ‘The Sun Rising’, but possibly the earliest is embedded in Book III of Chaucer’s Troilus and Criseyde, when Troilus speaks a three-stanza AUBADE at the end of his first night with Criseyde. This is the first:

    `O cruel day, accusour of the Ioye
    That night and love han stole and faste y-wryen,
    A-cursed be thy coming in-to Troye,
    For every bore hath oon of thy bright eyen!
    Envyous day, what list thee so to spyen?
    What hastow lost, why sekestow this place,
    Ther god thy lyght so quenche, for his grace?’

    Sorry – just gratuitous information for anyone interested and for whom it was a new word. There is also a painting by Picasso on this theme called ‘AUBADE’, easily found on Google images.

16. Quite tough.

    Liked EMBER.

    I did not parse 22ac; 26ac except for B=book; 13d apart from THE.

    New for me: DOTTREL; DISTEMPER a kind of paint; RIPARIAN.

    Thanks, both.

17. Muffin@13 (re Eileen@11) – me too! I always assumed this baby shower thing took place postpartum. I hadn’t thought any earlier would be the best time for an expectant mother to party!
    I agree with others that, like yesterday, this was a favourite setter being gentle.

    Many thanks, both and all

18. Dear old Sid (loved his wicked laugh) emerged post-solve, after William, Henry and Clive … and not to forget the great Geraldine [JITC, and BOTL with Suchet]. Always lots of beaut associations in cwland. And some not so, as in 18ac. And some amusingly contentious, like whether yodelling is music 🙂 . All good fun, ta Brum and man.

19. Gervase @14, you reminded me with TURN GREY and the Earl reference that I just happened to plant a Bergamot today in the garden (next to the Cab Sav vines).

20. We enjoyed this – a bit of a struggle towards the end, but fair – though “BADE=past tense of bid/offer=”offered”” – I cannot think of how/where this would be used in the sense of ‘offered’. “How much did you offer for that at auction?” “I bade ten quid”. I don’t think so. The only usage I can come up with is ‘We bade them farewell’. Is that offering? Had to do a search for DOTTREL to confirm that someone, somewhere uses that spelling. Still, overall an enjoyable solve, and Anna is learning more about how these things work. Thanks, Brummie and manehi.

21. Not the hardest Brummie, but good fun, BABY SHOWER, EMBER, SHOCK THERAPY and LUNGFUL among the favourites. I wondered about DOTTREL but apparently it’s In Chambers – somebody spelt it like that once in 1872 so it’s allowed from now until the end of time. Google just asks me if I mean dotterel.

    JerryG@4:another GABOR here.

22. Pedants’ corner: (TassieTim @20 gave me all the excuse I needed 😉 )

    There are two verbs ‘to bid’ in English, from two different roots.

    (1) meaning to command, tell, invite, summon – also used in phrases like ‘bid farewell’
    infinitive/present tense bid, past tense bade, past participle bidden
    (bade/bidden less and less common, replaced by a simple ‘bid’ for both)
    Middle English bidden, bad, beden
    Old English biddan, bæd, (ge)beden
    Cognate with German bitten, bat, gebeten

    (2) meaning to offer (to pay a price) or to attempt – the noun ‘bid’ comes from this
    infinitive bid, past tense bid, past participle bid
    Middle English beden, bede, boden
    Old English bēodan, bēad, (ge)boden
    German bieten, bot, geboten

    That said, the two verbs have been confused and conflated ever since the Middle Ages (in English, not in German), so it may be possible to find a quotation which supports Brummie’s bade = offered in 2dn. (I’d be interested if anyone can do so!)

    Sorry to be a bore; I really enjoyed the crossword, especially the grammatically impeccable hence/whence. Thanks B & m.

23. … as for bade (lovely disquisition re aubade, S’s C @15), the sense of bid that it’s the past of I always thought meant more command than offer. Happy to be wrong tho … I often am.

24. Well another good workout for the old brain. Laughed at SPIDERMAN’S story and ORDEAL, found bottom half easier than top, and totally fooled by the gang boss surprise. DNK RIPARIAN or AUBADE. Thanks Brummie and manehi.

25. Liked a lot of this with WHATSIT, EMBER, CADAVEROUS, DOTTREL, COSTUMIER and REHEARSAL being favourites. Although they were used in different ways, the two successive Acts in 8d and 13d jarred slightly as did the two Criminals in the Across clues – which are both used in definitions. Both repetitions could have been avoided easily. And, whilst I am no stickler, I would have liked to see rod indicated as American usage; I’ve never heard it used in a UK context to mean gun.

    Thanks Brummie and manehi

26. Moth @9: we’ve all that triumphant feeling at some time. Keep the run going 🙂

27. Yep, TT @20 and eb @22, just what I thought 😉

28. These last few kept me honest at the end – CULPRIT, RIPARIAN (always useful to have that one up one’s sleeve), DRUG LORD and loi TURN GREY. I’ve never been a great fan of Brummie’s less than smooth surfaces, and wonder how many would think Henry rather than Sid for James. And are dogs still called Rover? Perhaps I’m quibbling too much this morning. BABY SHOWER is a fairly recent one for me too, as the new generation of grandchildren and their parents seem to be comfortably au fait with this kind of get together…

29. [essexboy @22: No apologies needed, from me at least 🙂

    I agree with your comment about WHENCE: the beautiful ablative expressions hence/thence/whence and the corresponding allatives hither/thither/whither are unfortunately falling out of precise usage, except in a few stock phrases (‘hither and thither’), so that we often now see the tautological ‘from whence’]

30. G@29 lovely words indeed but maybe there’s a slight risk you end up sounding like Jacob Rees-Mogg?

    Bid/Offer is interesting as in financial markets they refer to two different things; what someone will pay / sell for – hence the “bid offer spread” ie the difference between the two

    Straight forward stuff overall – I thought WHATSIT was a bit cheesy 🙂

    Cheers B&M

31. … or as my old music teacher used to say, Gervase @29, slither hither and thither on your zither …

32. No birder that I know has ever used the spelling DOTTREL. Annoying.

33. I found this fairly straightforward, but enjoyable.

    BABY SHOWER is surprisingly not to be found in Collins or Chambers, although it’s actually in the Chambers Thesaurus! It’s in the ODE, which says:‘US a party held for a woman who is expecting a baby …’. I liked EMBER, where I was wrestling with ‘quarter’ for a while, and ISOLATED, where the D=dead was nicely misleading.

    Thanks Brummie and manehi.

34. CS@32; DOTTREL is given as archaic in Wiktionary, but it’s in both Chambers and Collins as an alternative spelling, so I guess Brummie is off the hook.

35. bodycheetah @30: I’m not recommending that you should use these words much (which would sound rather prissy), only that they shouldn’t be MISused 🙂

36. [copland+smith @32: Commiserations. Personally, I can’t tell a DOTTREL from a ringd plovr]

37. Thank you to Brummie for this very likeable puzze and to manehi for the helpful and positive blog. My favourites have already been mentioned. Lots of good things going on in this grid.

38. Thank you AlanC@26

    Re the timing of a BABY SHOWER – I am not personally experienced, but all the ones I have seen on film or telly seem to come before the birth. I would imagine a new mother would be a bit too busy for parties just after. And I think the gifts are supposed to be useful as soon as the baby is born.

39. Took me a little while to get going, but fell in smoothly enough. Never heard of any version of DOTTREL, so that was straightforward enough for me! Still not entirely sure on how fashion=cult, but never mind.

    Especially liked RIPARIAN and COSTUMIER. Not usually a fan of names as anagram fodder – they tend to stick out – but the clue was lovely.

    Thanks manehi & Brummie.

40. Gervase @29. I would take issue with your ‘now’. Psalm 121 in KJV has “I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help.” Tautological but poetically brilliant.

41. Thanks manehi; I too found this on the easy side, though still challenging enough to be enjoyable. I had heard of RIPARIAN but did not know what it meant. Discussion above of AUBADE and mention of other poets, reminded me of the Philip Larkin poem of that name, a late work, but widely regarded as one of his greatest. Recommended, if you can stand its unflinching bleakness…

42. Thanks both – most enjoyable with AUBADE and RIPARIAN providing a nice crossword experience, being just on the edge of my vocabulary range.

    Valentine – if you drop in – I’ve left a note for you at the end of yesterday’s Tramp blog.

43. [I met Sid James once as a kid. I came home from being – out somewhere – and he and my dad were chatting in our living room. Quite surreal!]

44. I’m with Gervase @14 in finding this week’s crosswords gradually getting easier. AUBADE last appeared on 9 August this year and was previously unknown to lots of solvers then too. I knew it from listening to Radio 3, and I knew DISTEMPER from the Ragged Trousered Philanthropists, I think.

    Favourite was my last one in, YOU SORRY LOT. Was that ever used by one of my teachers at school? Probably.

    Thanks to Brummie and manehi. And thanks to essexboy @22 for resolving my difficulty with ‘offered’=BADE. (It wasn’t at all boring/tedious/pedantic!)

45. Another gentle work-out with a couple of tricky ones to keep us on our toes.

    DOTTREL was a new spelling for me.

    Thanks Brummie and manehi

46. Today I learned that a BABY SHOWER is a US thing. (And yes, most that I’ve attended are while the honoree is still expecting. Usually it is an afternoon thing with coffee and light refreshments, so don’t think of it as the kind of party where everyone cuts loose! Everyone is expected to bring, as a gift, an item of baby paraphernalia so the new mother is well set up, in the theory that she won’t have time to shop for that stuff after the baby arrives. As each gift is opened, everyone is expected to fall over themselves admiring how cute it is. It’s a repulsive custom, in my opinion; fortunately men are not often invited, so I’ve only had to endure a couple of them.)

    Like others, I found the first half-ish of this very straightforward, but slowed down some towards the end. The bird was new to me (though clued so precisely that I had little trouble with it), but there were no other unfamiliar words. I learned of AUBADES in a high-school English class, and RIPARIAN during my long-ago days as a geology student. The clue for LUNGFUL was particularly amusing, and with the DRUG LORD and the CULPRIT could be said to be part of a little narcotic theme…

47. Moth@38 – thanks for your sensible enlightenment; I clearly hadn’t given it enough thought. Or had enough exposure. I doubt mum-to-be would be doing much dancing – but then neither do folk, usually, at cocktail or tea parties…..

48. Sheffield hatter and Bullhassocks The AUBADE featured on August 9th was part of a Larkin themed puzzle. I echo the thanks to essexboy for clarifying bid and bade.

49. Nice degree of difficulty for a Tuesday and a couple of new words including DEAL as a type of timber.

    My dictionary has “obsolete” for DOTTREL, but never mind

50. Thanks both,
    Thanks, too, to Essexboy @22, for the confirmation of my thoughts about bid/bade. Did anyone else try hard to fit Garbo into 26ac before the penny dropped?

51. As manehi implies, DEAL is a generic term for softwood – i.e. from conifers, It doesn’t refer to a specific tree.

52. Tyngewick@50: I tried both GARBO and GABOR!

53. @50 and @52. I also tried Garbo and finally got to Gable via (Betty) Grable. Strange how the mind works at times.

54. Thanks for the blog , AlanC returning to number 1 immediately, I am removing my hat, a black top hat covered in mirrored discs.
    I knew AUBADE from Larkin and as Sheffield Hatter and Peter mention it was in the recent themed puzzle .
    RIPARIAN is a great word widely used in Three Men in a Boat.
    I liked TELEVISED for the reminder of The Avengers.
    I must remember to use BADE next time I play bridge.

55. I found this a very satisying crossword and, as usual enjoyed the disccussions here.. Another fine aubade is John Donne’s The Sun Rising:

    Busy old fool, unruly sun,
    Why dost thou thus,
    Through windows, and through curtains call on us?…

56. A pleasant solve that I enjoyed much (with the exception of DRUG LORD, which I thought was a bit weak…). Like others I too tried GABOR initially, using GAB for “talk” and trying to figure out how OR with a B (or with an A and a B) could lead to “hard to follow”!!
    Thanks Brummie and manehi.

57. A curious thing about RIPARIAN: I knew the word and I thought I had learned it from its occasionally cropping up in Guardian crosswords. However I can find only one such occurrence: 26,007 by Gordius, July 23 2013 – so long ago.

    Given the comparative rarity of the word, I thought a little more help would be given in the clue:
    
    Prayer for a deceased heretic by the river (8) RIPARIAN RIP (rest in peace, prayer for a deceased) ARIAN (of Arius (ca. AD 250–336), a Christian presbyter in Alexandria, Egypt, deemed a heretic by the Ecumenical First Council of Nicaea of 325

    but then it was Gordius.

    michelle@16 You might be interested in your comment on Gordius’ crossword (you are the same michelle, are you not?)

    Thanks manehi and Brummie

58. [Roz @54: a Nod to your comment which really slayed me. How’s that for a naff homophone? Hope I haven’t lessened KPR’s chances at Norwich this evening 🙂 ].

59. Spooner’s Catflap@15 – the form is older than that. My favourite is Reis Glorias, by the Provencal troubadour Giraut de Bornelh, which I leanrt from the Marin Best ensemble, and performed on the medieval harp at a son et lumiere for the anniversary of the Battle of Lewes . Arthur Brown, god of Hellfire, was Henry III at the same event

60. Very pleased with this. Not only did I finish it (with only a little help) which is pretty rare for me, but I also got three unknown words just from the word play and crossers, which hardly ever happens. AUBADE, RIPARIAN and DOTTREL. Slow progress – I’ve only being doing crosswords for three years now!

61. [ AlanC@58, I knew you would get the reference , perhaps you are in quantum entanglement with KPR, if your are Spin Up then they become Spin Down]

    Andrew@60, after 20 years it starts to get a bit easier, getting unknown words is always the best bit, they were very fair clues.

62. Goujeers @59. Yes, I know: I was just referring to the earliest version that I am aware of in English poetry.

63. AUBADE and RIPARIAN escaped me, not words I had come across before.
    A friendly week so far, must be with completions/near completions for me.
    I thought EMBER was very clever, thanks both.

64. I wonder if mrpenney@46 learned AUBADE in high school from Richard Wilbur’s ” A Late Aubade,” which was included in the much-used anthology Sound and Sense. Here it is: http://homepages.gac.edu/~cpb/ALateAubade.html

65. I got and parsed it all, but was hoping someone here would explain why it is “surprise, surprise” rather than merely “surprise.” Is it just emphatic?

66. I’ve never heard of Sid James, and DOTTREL is a jorum.

    I’m not sure I buy CULT = “fashion”.

    I’ve learned from British fiction that “distemper” is a kind of paint over there. Here it’s a usually fatal disease of cats and dogs that they get shots for.

    Gervase@29 I’ve never seen “allative” before, though its meaning is clear. Thank you.

    alphalpha@42 Thank you. I still don’t get ADONIS.

    Thanks to Brummie and manehi.

67. Very enjoyable puzzle. I expected more would people would have remembered ‘riparian’ from “Keeping up appearances“. Forward to 2:09, 3:34, or 9:24 if you don’t want to watch it all through.

68. [Valentine @66
    “to cock” is a British expression to mean “out of order”, so it’s an anagram of “said no”.]

69. Valentine @66 – distemper is specifically the paint used on lime plaster and stone walls or wattle and daub – so for old and listed buildings. It’s interesting: it’s powdery, f you brush against it it leaves a white (it’s usually white or pastel) dusting on clothes (yes, I’ve lived somewhere we had to use it on parts of the house). But it allows these older forms of walls to breathe and prevents problems that would be caused by modern paints on those surfaces. When I’ve seen it, it came as a powder we made up into a paint.

70. muffin@68: I did not know that British expression; thanks.

71. [Alphalpha: It’s usually an exasperated “it’s all to cock!”]

72. big@65. I’ll give it a bash.
    LORD in this sense could be clued by words expressing surprise, like Wow! or Really!
    Surprise! on its own isn’t an expression of “I’m surprised”, but someone surprising someone else..
    The expression Surprise, surprise! means that this is a surprise to me, something I didn’t know.

73. big@65 sorry, on re-reading the clue, amending my comment @72.
    Surprise, surprise! has an element of sarcasm, which fits with the clue. In other words, it’s no surprise that the criminal boss is a dope.

74. Thanks manehi, thanks all above for Aubade and other discussions, and thanks Brummie for getting it all going, this hit the spot nicely.

75. [I still reckon, Roz @61, if the pissant’d been at Solvay ’27 he’d have been on Bohr’s side 😉 … ]

76. [William F P, Alphalpha, Gervase @yesterday, just loved what the pretty boy said .. brilliant! (wonder if it’s in Eileen’s little book 😉 )]

77. 27a I’m another who only knew DOTTREL with two Es but the other reason I hesitated to write it in was that I didn’t think that Brummie (or anyone else) would use OTTER as an anagram of OTTRE – too simple.
    I knew AUBADE from classical music but I can’t remember whose. It’s unlikely to be Chabrier or Poulenc or Ireland, the wiki suggestions. Not surprised to learn from Bullhassocks @ 41 that Larkin’s Aubade is considered one of his finest.
    Thanks to Brummie and manehi

78. I found this on my wavelength and over too soon. Why 2 x surprise for LORD…wouldn’t one suffice.
    15d REHEARSAL is from same root as HEARSE which was in wordplay …both from the useful shape of a wolf’s teeth. I’ll get my anorak.
    Thanks both

79. Nice puzzle (meaning I could do it, and even figure out how). Riparian is not at all an unusual word in New Zealand, but it appears in the context of ‘riparian rights’ which means right of access to a river for fishing.

80. Like muffin@13, I had it in my mind that a baby shower came after the birth of a baby so couldn’t parse the clue. Where I come from, it would be considered tempting fate to have the party before the birth.

81. Aubade is a movement in Prokofiev’s R&J. The score includes a rare appearence of mandolins. Genius writing!

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