Quiptic 1,227 by Hectence

39 comments on “Quiptic 1,227 by Hectence”

1. TEXT I found took me much longer than anything else, partly because I discounted the X because it was used in EXECUTOR, otherwise fine.

   Thanks to Widdersbel and Hectence.

2. Thanks Widdersbel, particularly for parsing BOUNTY. I was removing the U from BUY, and thought there was a mistake in the clue. I should have known better. Thanks to Hectence too. TRUMP = FART. My inner schoolboy still finds that funny.

3. TEXT & HANG ON I couldn’t parse. Everything else fell into place and elicited a good number of smiles. I was unaware at first that a trump was a fart. You learn so many useful things doing cryptics. 🙂

   Thanks Hectence & Widdersbel.

4. About the right level for a quiptic I thought, with only one slight eyebrow raise (in BOUNTY, ‘disheartened’ as an instruction to remove the middle letter of a pair of words seemed a tad advanced as a device…)

   I liked FAR TOO MUCH, TAP WATER and UPSTAGE.

   Thanks Hectence and thanks widders for the excellent explanations.

5. Very enjoyable Quiptic.

   Favourites: LEAVE IT TO ME, UPSTAGE, QUICKENS, HANG ON, FAR TOO MUCH. I wish I had known that trump=fart back in 2015/2016. I learnt this in cryptic crosswords a few years ago 🙂

   Thanks, both.

6. Thanks Hectence and Widdersbel
   Nice to see “trump” not giving “donald”.
   Further to the recent discussion about “drugs” for E, Hectence missed a chance of a better clue for 21d by using “drugs” instead of “keys”.

7. Not that often I do the Quiptic but an early awakening meant I had time and I’m glad I did. Light and entertaining as it should be. I shared the same misinterpretation in BOUNTY, only seeing what the setter intended some time after solving it. Widders has pointed out that W is not supported by dictionaries, though I have felt the B&W example he gives has justified the abbreviation for a long time. Boy = B is not actually supported by dictionaries either and, whilst it does appear in OB, isn’t that a bit like R and H not being standalone abbreviations, even though you can find them in HRH? Lastly, I’d hazard the ‘with’ is intended to be part of the def in 4a and ‘tackle’ defined in the sense of ‘deal with’, ‘wrestle with’ etc. Whilst ‘with’ is a fair linker, plenty of solvers cavil at its use and the setter could have avoided using it without too much difficulty so I’m guessing the ‘with’ definition was intended.

   Thanks Hectence and widders for a fine blog

8. I liked QUICKENS, I had to leave it and go bac. I had STAND OUT instead of STICK , which I coulldn’t parse apart from the OUT, so I scrubbed that , looked at 3d again and realised it was an anagram. Itoo failed to parse BOUNTY properly, butI don’t spend much time wondering when it’s obvious. CASEMENT held me up for a time, but I was thinking of the window, when I remembered Sir Roger, poor bugger.
   I think the blog will be a godsend to the Steffans of this site, so thankyou for that & thankyou to Hetence for the wit and wonder.

9. Sorry, I’m confusing my crosswords.

10. PM @7 – R for royal is used in a very wide range of acronyms and initialisms – RAF, RSPCA, HRH, RAC, RADA, RIBA and so on, which is why R for royal merits a standalone entry in dictionaries; whereas W and B are only white and boy in very limited contexts, hence no standalone dictionary listing and hence why some editors won’t allow setters to use them.

    I’ve included the contexts in the explanations, without judgment, to help explain the setter’s intentions for the benefit of rookie solvers who may not be familiar with these crossword conventions.

    I think you’re probably right that “with” is intended to be part of the definition for 4a.

11. Reasonably chewy for a Q, but perfectly fair, I think. Plenty to like, too. Chortled at the Twelvetrees titbit.

12. Good Quiptic with a variety of clue types.

    I liked the white fish in SWIMMER, SEETHE WORLD, TAP WATER for the parting drink, and FAR TOO MUCH and TENDENCY for the surfaces. For a discussion of B = boy and G = girl, see here.

    Thanks Hectence and Widdersbel (Collins has B = abbrev. for Bel [physics])

13. That was a Quiptic? Are any beginners commenting here? Not from what I can see up until this point.

14. Thanks for the excellent blog Widdersbel. Very helpful. But not a pangram. No z

15. There’s a z in THREE DOZEN !

16. Pleasant and not too time consuming. But I had “hang in”, as in “hang in there “ instead of “hang on “ , after all, gin is a spirit.
    Ta setter and blogger

17. As a relative beginner, I’m happy with this level of difficulty for a Quiptic. I’ve seen much trickier ones. Excellent blog from Widdersbel.

18. Over here (US), WH is used frequently for the White House, but maybe that’s not enough to tip the scales in the UK.

19. paddymelon @13 – probably depends how you define a beginner! I started doing cryptics just over a year ago and still consider myself one.

    Also, the G describes the Quiptic as for “beginners and those in a hurry” and so I reckon maybe a lot of more experienced solvers like it as an amuse-bouche before the Monday cryptic proper 🙂

20. As a beginner I found this at the hard end for a Quiptic – I managed to complete it, but had to come here for the parsing of THREE DOZEN (too many containers for my brain), TENDENCY (must remember EN for nurse in future) and BOUNTY (like others I was removing the ‘u’ from ‘buy’). Favourites were SWIMMER, FAR TOO MUCH and TAP WATER.

    Thanks to Hectence for the puzzle, and to Widdersbel for the blog – I very much appreciated the thorough explanations for the wordlpay elements.

21. Relative beginner? doing it for 2 years now.Guardian quiptics are fine with me,did reasonably well with this one.

22. OH MY GOSH!

23. The Z was well hidden – when I read that it was a pangram, it took me three scans to find it!

24. A good Quiptic and enormous fun.
    Worth it for FAR TOO MUCH alone!
    Thank you Hectence for the brilliance, and Widdersbel for a very illuminating blog

25. I’m no beginner, but I often squeeze the Quiptic into a coffee break during my workday, so I imagine I’m “those in a hurry.” (It’s not always a coffee break on Monday either–some weeks I don’t get to the Q until as late as Thursday.) Today I’m being lazy and taking a day off from work entirely, so I wish it had been a bit chewier!

26. Definitely consider myself a beginner to cryptics (only really started doing them consistently over the last month or two – had tried to get into them a few times before, but they never really started to click until recently) and I found this quite pleasant! There were certainly some tricky ones that I couldn’t get without liberal use of the check feature, but there have definitely been many Quiptics I’ve struggled with more than this!

27. Speaking of abbreviations, I always thought that it wasn’t allowed to “separate and lift” individual letters from e.g. acronyms if they themselves weren’t abbreviations in their own right. Specifically, I can’t find P=president in and of itself (from VP), likewise B=boy (from OB). what are the rules?

28. ariadne @26 – good to hear. Stick at it!

    Ilan Caron @27 – the “rules” are surely whatever the editor says they are, which varies from one publication to the next. There’s no definitive right or wrong but you’re right that some editors wouldn’t allow those abbreviations for the reasons you state. The piece linked by Robi @12 offers a kind of justification of “boy” for B. Up to you whether you agree or disagree with the reasoning. I’m not offering an opinion either way – I’ve just tried to explain in the blog what I think was the setter’s intention.

29. I’m a beginner (still haven’t managed to finish a quiptic/cryptic) and I got all but 8 clues on this, which is reasonably close by my standards. Like @8 I also guessed STAND OUT for 10a and then couldn’t make it fit. Also couldn’t get 15a, I knew it must involve simmer somehow but I was desperately thinking of types of fish instead of the more general case.

    Loved 2d.

30. Keep going, Shaun, you’ll get there – practice is the only way to get better.

31. …and reading fifteensquared”

32. Beginner here also. Started with Everyman and Quiptic, then Monday Cryptics. This site has been an enormous source of support, and my thanks to all to put the work into make it so. I wish I could remember who originally recommended it on the Guardian BTL to thank them properly. However, despite making huge strides with the three mentioned above, I am having great difficulty moving from Cryptic Mondays to Cryptic Tuesdays and beyond. I don’t know if that’s a mental block or if the level of difficulty really jumps that much higher from Monday to Tuesday and beyond. Any insights from fellow newbies?

33. 32. All brutally difficult for me. Complete beginner but I am not improving over the past 3 months.

34. Thank you, Widdersbel! As someone who has been doing quiptics for two years now and still finds them very tough, your excellent and extraordinarily clear explanations were incredibly helpful. Often I can find that when I come to the blog here I can still be confused how one or two answers are arrived at so I do want to emphasise how much I appreciate the effort you put into this.

    As for the crossword this week, it was a solo effort this week as my friend and I couldn’t meet this week. I did actually finish it which I’m pleased with but, as always, there were quite a few that I couldn’t parse. Thanks!

35. You’re welcome, Becks. 🙂

36. A beginner here. I got it in the end, but had to come here for a few explanations. So, not the hardest, and not the easiest. Helpful. Good crossword. Amazing blog. Thanks.

37. Good fun, didn’t realise trump=fart so initially thought I had that wrong! If someone could explain go=spirit it would be appreciated ?

38. dave @37 – in the sense of vitality, energy, enthusiasm etc – “he’s full of go”

39. Thanks Widdersbel, makes sense now!

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