Azed No. 2,637 Plain – Competition Puzzle

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Apart from the problem (so far as I can see) with 29dn, this is a good example of the elegant clueing that we have come to associate with Azed. I sometimes grumble about his surfaces (what does 20ac for example actually mean?), but he does produce these things week after week, not to say a whole lot of clue-judging and regular specials, and he generally does try hard to get decent surfaces; there are as always some lovely clues (like 30ac and 27dn).

Definitions underlined in crimson. Anagram indicators in italics.

ACROSS
1 GO DUTCH
After former affair, wife to settle up individually? (7, 2 words)
go = affair (archaic), dutch = wife (CRS possibly, but probably not)
11 PARCHEESI
Pairs falling out about endless effrontery in board game (9)
(pairs)* round chee[k] — evidently a bit of product placement, although maybe it’s so well-known that what the hell
12 SPOD
One’s clumsy in company, breaking end off fine china (4)
Spod[e] — more product placement: is this guy being paid?
13 CRAMPS
Late addition after stodge: nasty stomach ache (6)
cram PS
14 TALUK
Upper class requiring gossip about inherited estate (5)
tal(U)k — as often happens in Azed’s crosswords one comes up with a word that one only knew existed because it’s in the dictionary — hands up anyone who had heard of it
15 TRAPPER
Protective covering for old horse, one pulling light carriage (7)
per (= one) following trap — Chambers’s 4th definition is ‘A horsecloth (obsolete)’
16 PLASTISOL
It’s solidified in castings ? liquefied it’s all sop (9)
*(it’s all sop)
17 OAST
Oven joint ready for the table, right off (4)
[r]oast
20 PARTIM
Tons included in half of tote, not wholly (6)
It took me some while to parse this: it’s t in half of pari-mutuel
21 STORER
One hoarding rent in heart of newsroom (6)
tore in [new]sr[oom]
22 TATE
Lyle’s partner showing his bit in putt at eighteen (4)
Hidden in putT AT Eighteen — two references: to Tate & Lyle, the Golden Syrup (and much else) people, and to Sandy Lyle, the Scottish golfer who was very successful in the 1980s
23 MORTALITY
The human race displaying minimum of trust in ethics (9)
t[rust] in morality
26 PROCESS
Series of actions: original cover featured in newspapers (7)
pr(OC)ess — OC is philatelic
28 A-BOMB
Nuclear device that’s sunk mass in a dock (5)
a bo(m)b
30 HIRAGE
Exhausted fellow in rush: what’ll cab in Wellington charge? (6)
hi(rag)e — a New Zealand taxi-drivers’ term
31 AGEE
Generation with little energy straying off the straight (4)
age e[nergy] — no need for the ‘little’ since E = energy is in Chambers, but the surface is better with it
32 ENGRAVERY
Range adapted highly for the art of carving (9)
(Range)* very
33 DRYADES
End of spinney? Sadder to see rotting round such forest trees (7)
[spinne]y in (Sadder)*
DOWN
1 GASTROSOPHER
A person knowledgeable about diet (12)
The word for which we have, if we want to, to set a clue and which at the moment inspires me with absolutely no ideas (although at the time of my writing this there are several days to go before the deadline …)
2 OUPA
Head of SA clan maybe publishing firm answer (4)
OUP a
3 DHOLL
With pretty girl around there’s start of hurrying in pulse (5)
h[urrying] in doll — a variant spelling of dal or dhal etc.
4 TALKS
Lectures to follow carefully, first to last (5)
stalk with its first letter moved to the end — quite a regular device of Azed’s
5 CRITTER
Cowboy’s charge? First for him, leading cavalier (7)
c[owboy] ritter — another common device of Azed’s is to refer to a word in the definition by a pronoun — a cowboy looks after cows, which are animals, which are critters (now esp US)
6 PHRASAL
Refrain’s line, introduced by a harp’s tremolo (7)
(a harp’s)* l — under tremolo in Chambers it’s also an adjective ‘having a tremolo effect’, so there can be no grumbling that Azed has used a nounal anagram indicator (not that some people would mind, but Azed would)
7 SEAPORT
Deal e.g. supplying east with ace in game (7)
s(E A)port — it isn’t a very major seaport nowadays perhaps, but Deal in Kent was at one time: a Cinque Port and one of the major seaports of England
8 KEMP
Consort of Queen Empress, maybe, champion of old (4)
K Emp. — the consort of the Queen is the King (sometimes: the consort of the Queen Mother was King George VI, but the consort of Queen Elizabeth II was Prince Philip, and he wasn’t the King); it looks as if the ‘maybe’ just applies to ‘Empress’, since Emp. can stand for Emperor, Empire or Empress, but maybe it applies to both
9 ASPERITY
It’s year ending in crisp, shivery, bitter cold (8)
(It’s year [cris]p)*
10 MISREMEMBERS
Has forgotten king in layout with fellows in club (12)
mis(R)e members
16 PATARINE
Heretic, a sailor imprisoned in punishment once (8)
p(a tar)ine — pine is an obsolete word, hence ‘once’
18 TROCARS
Cast roar terribly, not one acting ? they’re piercing in the theatre? (7)
(cast roar – a)* — Azed takes the trouble, as he knows he should, although some setters don’t bother, to tell us that it’s just one of the a’s that’s missing — operating theatre
19 PEREGAL
Prince, English, king’s equal of old (7)
P E regal
20 PLASTER
Poultice, say, one that sticks round opening of laceration (7)
l[aceration] in paster — perhaps you wouldn’t think that a paster as someone who pastes would be in Chambers, but there it is
24 LAIRY
Fond of sledging at the Gabba? Offhand after half-century (5)
L airy — L = 50, the Roman numeral
25 TOGED
Like Caesar, wretchedly tinged with gore, losing reign, undone? (5)
*(tinged gore – (reign)*)
27 ORGY
Outsize bust? It must be held in for gym! (4)
Hidden in fOR GYm — you could call an orgy an outsize bust, since a bust is ‘a drinking bout, spree’
29 MESE
Lute string ? note position when it’s plucked (4)
me s[it]e — but is a lyre a lute? Chambers says that it’s a lyre string

11 comments on “Azed No. 2,637 Plain – Competition Puzzle”

  1. Thanks John,
    Since K.Emp. would be King Emperor, they would be consort to Queen Empress maybe, is Azed’s meaning in 8 I think.
    Thanks to Azed as ever.

  2. I found the cluing this time entirely understandable, except for MESE, which required a flip through Chambers plus a ??? on what the components of the wordplay were supposed to be (although I eventually settled on the parsing that you suggest). I had 15A simply as a double definition. I don’t see how “per” can be pulling “trap” when “trap” comes first (dare I say, that’s putting the cart before the horse?). Thanks for the blog.

  3. I took TRAPPER as a double definition, with the one referring back to the horse.
    I think you’re correct about MESE. I didn’t think about it at the time but the lute and lyre although both stringed instruments have significant differences.
    Favourite was LAIRY, a lair being someone “as flash as a rat with a gold tooth” as the saying goes.

  4. Thanks for a very interesting blog, I agree with Cineraria @2 that TRAPPER is a double definition, it is in Chambers as a horse pulling a trap.
    I asked at the music faculty about lute/lyre. Apparently there is a lute family , including the lyre which is sometimes called a yoke-lute.
    I think K EMP could be a consort of Q EMP, ER ll and Victoria chose not to have a king consort but other queens could , hence the maybe.

  7. Putting in my pennorth.
    Thanks to Azed & John for clarification.
    I actually finished this on the day (haven’t yet started this week’s) The only glitch was in writing the “clue word” as GASTRONOMIST and so getting stuck on the SW corner.
    The lyre/lute distinction did bother me. Such similar words.

  9. I don’t think I’ve ever come across gastrosopher before, and wondered if it was a relatively new word, but the OED cites an instance in 1894 (and ‘gastrosophy’ in 1824).
    Ended up reversing the whole thing for my competition clue, after a load of dead-end ideas that went nowhere – half of them involving gas and indigestion! 🙁

  10. Late to the conversation…. Re 1ac: I thought ‘dutch’ meaning wife was a contraction of duchess, but I may be wrong. 13ac: I’d always thought of stodge as a noun, but was interested to find Chambers’ first definition of it is as a verb, meaning stuff or cram. I thought 27dn was an excellent clue.

  11. MM@10 re 1ac: Chambers 2014 claims certainty that dutch is Cockney slang for wife, but only “Perh(aps)” rhyming slang as Duchess of Fife, which is the explanation I would generally expect to see.

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