Guardian Cryptic 29,121 by Imogen

97 comments on “Guardian Cryptic 29,121 by Imogen”

1. Thanks, Imogen and manehi
   Liked CLEMENCY, BUGS BUNNY, HINDMOST, MATCH and NEATEST.

2. BEAUTY SPOT
   I thought along the same lines.
   Maybe BEAUTY is a very popular car(anything-here car) and SPOT is a parking spot.
   This is the only clue I think you have expressed some tentativeness on.
   All other clues seem to be perfectly parsed to my understanding.

3. SAFE SEX doesn’t quite work for me: “to be” ought to be “if” to make sense, but of course then the original surface is lost.

   No comment about FORT in 2ac.

   Gave up on my last few (2a and 9d) and revealed the answers

   Thanks manehi and Imogen

4. MATCH. Could even be a quintuple definition as “equal contest” is also a match?

   Toughest crossword I’ve done in ages

   Lots of slightly left field stuff but that’s Imogen for you

   Ticks for SAFE SEX, MUG UP and BUS BUNNY

   Cheers M&I

5. This one was above my pay grade with several that resisted, even after taking a break and returning to it. FORTINBRAS and BARCAROLE were reveals and a number of others went in without much of a parse. On reading the blog, some exceedingly cunning definitions and some wordplay I was nowhere near spotting. So, all-in-all, a tough Thursday morning.

   Nonetheless, thanks to Imogen and to manehi for making things clear. I decidedly needed you today.

6. Tough and enjoyable.

   Favourites: OXIDATE, AMATORY, FORTINBRAS.

   New for me: PIER glass.

   Thanks, both.

7. Only half finished and wasn’t enjoying it, so I went for a walk on the beach, then did the FT.

8. Found this one tough ! No expert in French but I wondered if “coup d’état” ought to have been flagged (4,1,4) rather than (4,5).

   Agree with you regarding BEAUTY SPOT. 22d brought back memories as my Dad was a JOINER and one of my youthful chores was to take his union subscription fees to the meeting room. He was the inspiration who taught me cryptic crossword solving.

   There haven’t been so many earworms since the 15^2 crash and recovery – so here’s one

   https://youtu.be/F-t8PngHgWY

   Thank you Imogen and manehi.

9. Thanks Imogen and manehi
   Yes hard – several not fully parsed, including BEAUTY SPOT.
   Despite being a chemist, I had never come across OXIDATE as a verb, just as a noun. The verb I know is “oxidise”.
   How is the last syllable of FORTINBRAS pronounced? I always thought it was “brass”.

10. I must have been unusually on Imogen’s wavelength because I completed the northern half of the puzzle in about 15 minutes, apart from 1a which was last in. The south, particularly the south west, proved much more testing: but suddenly remembering who succeeded Claudius as king of Denmark in Hamlet gave me FORTINBRAS and opened up that corner. I found that clue amusing: since I’m from Gloucestershire hearing fought as FORT is pretty normal. I thought CLEMENCY and BARCAROLE very clever, too. But FAT WAD should have been 3,3. I don’t like it as a past participle. I’m sorry that @3, Dave finds safe sex doesn’t quite work for him! I also found the clue a bit tortuous.

11. 25D have never heard of TED talks so couldn’t get this clue at all.
    Also didn’t know fatwad could be an adjective. And is a promenade really a pier? I know you can promenade on a pier but….
    However we loved barcarole and Fortinbras and thought safe sex was very clever.
    So a bit of a mixed bag for us today.
    Thanks Imogen & manehi

12. This was tough. BROMIDE went in with a smile, and the blog reminded me that Potassium Bromide was used as a sedative. My chemist (pharmacist) father had it in a jar labelled Pot. Brom. I suspect I used to be given a bit of it come Christmas Eve to settle the little lad down for the night!!

    Loved the quadruple definition for MATCH.

    I now can’t get “fought in bras” out of my head.

13. Despite a few gems I found this so difficult as to be way beyond me. A 1922 film? Please!

14. I can’t be the only person who struggled to fit Nero into 26A until the penny suddenly dropped. With thanks to Imogen and Manehi.

15. KateE@13: Not just any old 1922 film, but THE original classic horror film. ..The more I look back at this puzzle, the more I like it. Some very clever clues.

16. I had some trouble with this one but got it out in the end. Wish I had been on the track of “Hamlet” rather than Roman emperors for 26a FORTINBRAS, as I found that SW very tough. A couple of unfamiliar references like 23a HINDMOST and, like michelle@6, PIER glass at 27a. I thought 28a should have read “I’m a Tory” instead of AMATORY but that’s my own pickiness. I quite liked BEAUTY SPOT at 11a (my LOI) for its “cheekiness” despite others’ question marks. Thanks to Imogen and manehi.

17. Hard work. I eventually found an answer for everything except FATWA’D (ouch) but failed to parse CLEMENCY, HINDMOST, GROUCHO among others. I thought that must be “hol(e)” at the end of WARHOL but only because I couldn’t think of anything else. Had BARCELONA for BARCAROLE, and spent forever trying to fit Nero into FORTINBRAS (wrong Claudius). That one is fun, but it will have the homophone and rhotic police out in droves.

    BUG=enthusiast? If Imogen says so.

18. FORTINBRAS – the parse should be
    sounds like/”said” ‘fought’=”gone to war” + in bras “in underwear” – to avoid what muffin@9 rightly said about FOUGHTINBRASS

19. Nice blog , manehi for what all seems logical now but the bottom half reminded me of the South Circular in rush hour with a detour at the time. But I got there without a scatch or a speeding ticket and had to beamed home.
    learnt a new verb I fatwa, you fatwa. he she or it fatwas
    very good puzzle.

20. Yes, even from 1922, NOSFERATU is an all time film classic: the original vampire movie.

21. FATWAD doesn’t seem to exist – FATWAED does – or do we take it as FATWA’D as in Shakespeare: “More honour’d in the breach than the observance”?

22. There was also a 1979 version of Nosferatu by Werner Herzog.

23. FORTINBRAS: and for a rhotic speaker even worse. For some reason I will never ever get over this linguistic problem.

24. Good puzzle. I made rather heavy weather of this, but it all turned out well in the end. It wasn’t helped by my forgetting the ‘does’ trick until I found a word that fitted, and spending far too long interpreting ‘Claudius’s successor’ as NERO and looking for unlikely underwear as the solution (great clue, though a question mark might have appeased the rhoticists). I also parsed NEATEST as N(EAT)EST and thought there was a tense misMATCH. D’oh! manehi’s parsing of BEAUTY SPOT is absolutely fine – no hesitancy here.

    Other favourites were CLEMENCY, BARCAROLE, ANTHER, COUP D’ETAT

    Chambers gives FATWA’D as the past participle, Collins online doesn’t list ‘fatwa’ as a verb. Wiktionary offers only ‘fatwaed’, which is logical but looks odd. I think I would plump for ‘fatwahed’ but all possible spellings seem weird.

    Thanks to S&B

25. That was tough. Ended up revealing the last few. Never heard of TED talks, nor BARCA for Barcelona, nor indeed, BARCAROLE.

    Liked: BUGS BUNNY, CANCEL CULTURE, BEAUTY SPOT, and HINDMOST – although I didn’t parse it – always forget DOES can be deer as well as the verb.

    Thanks Imogen and manehi

26. [Non-rhotic ‘homophones’ cause more irritation than any other dialectal pronunciation variance. I don’t know why setters persist in doing this without a rider like ‘some say’. Paul is a repeat offender – practically all of his homophone clues include the dreaded R. Perhaps ‘he only does it to annoy because he knows it teases’, to quote from Qaos’s recent source of inspiration]

27. I agree that this was hard. Managed almost everything with the help of Bradford and Google, apart from a couple where I bunged in letters until the check button confirmed them. NHO BARCAROLE despite several trips to Venice (never went on a gondola) and I was properly fooled by the ‘other’ Claudius.
    On reflection there were no clues that made me laugh which is my criterion for a good puzzle, but I suppose I enjoyed the workout so thanks Imogen and especially manehi for parsing.

28. I didn’t think it was hard, just tricksy. Unnecessarily complicated.

29. While it is reasonable to assume that Fortinbras will eventually become King of a combined Norway and Denmark, I can’t think of anything in the play that actually says so. “I have some rights of memory in this kingdom, Which now to claim my vantage doth invite me.” comes closest.

30. FrankieG@18
    FORTINBRAS
    Agree with your parsing.

31. Nuntius@14. Another here who tried to fit in Nero in FORTINBRAS. Couldn’t figure out the underwear though.

    I wondered about a connection between 1a and 5a and 9d. BROMIDE CARNAGE and CANCEL CULTURE?

32. TBH I got a bit annoyed about all the ‘foreign’ or ‘cultural’ stuff in the clues and answers until I got CANCEL CULTURE and then wondered if Imogen was taking the mickey.

33. pdm@31
    What is BROMIDE CARNAGE?

34. KVa @33. I just wondered seeing that they were both in prominent positions in the grid.
    Something like “Get rid of all the BS.”

35. I agree with Bodycheetah @4; the toughest crossword I’ve done in ages, including the John Henderson ones. I needed a couple of sessions and like Gladys @17, ended up missing on FATWAD, which I didn’t know could be a participle or verb, as discussed in several posts above. Several others went in unparsed, including FORTINBRAS which didn’t sound very Roman; I had no idea about the Hamlet connection. BROMIDE for ‘Trite remark’ unknown and PIER for a ‘Sort of glass’ forgotten.

    Clue of the day for SAFE SEX.

    Thanks to Imogen (though I’m hoping for something a bit gentler from Vulcan on Monday!) and to manehi

36. Got it. Thanks, pdm@34

37. Gervase @26 et al; as I have said several times before, homophones are unusable by setters if people persist on saying: “I don’t pronounce it like that”. The standard (as with spelling) should be reputable dictionaries. If one listens to fort and fought in the ODE or Collins, they sound the same, so that is good enough for me.

    As to the puzzle, a bit above my pay grade, having to reveal a couple even after computer help. Some good clues for the experts (and it is almost Friday after all). I agree with FrankieG @26’s parsing of FORTINBRAS.

    Thanks Imogen and manehi for a sterling job unravelling it all.

38. Academic and to appreciate BEAUTY SPOT better:
    What do you call a car parking area in the UK? Parking lot? parking spot? Car park?

39. That was too much of a slog for me to call enjoyable, I’m afraid. A few too many obscure (to me) words and overly stretchy definitions. When pennies finally dropped most were accompanied by “really?” rather than “aha!”… and I resorted to reveals, which I try hard to avoid.

    Thanks for the blog for clarifying the bits that still eluded me at the end!

40. KVa @38, having returned recently from a visit there, I’d call it a Rip Off. Northumberland was the best with disc parking almost everywhere.

41. MikeB @29: I think it’s fairly clear that Fortinbras does become King of Denmark. Hamlet says

    But I do prophesy th’election lights
    On Fortinbras. He has my dying voice.

    I was actually wondering though whether Hamlet was Claudius’s immediate successor as he survived him, by a few minutes at least. Or isn’t that long enough to count?

    A very tricky puzzle as everyone seems to agree. I laughed out loud at the OX I DATE.

    Thanks Imogen and manehi.

42. On the Claudius/ Fortinbras and Claudius/Nero issue, I note that Wiki has an interesting few lines: “The king [in Hamlet] is named after the Roman emperor Claudius, who was considered the archetype of an evil ruler in Shakespeare’s time.The historical Claudius’s incestuous marriage to and alleged poisoning by Agrippina the Younger, who was later herself murdered by her son Nero, are mirrored in the play, as Hamlet himself appears to note in Act III, Scene 2: “Soft! now to my mother. / O heart, lose not thy nature; let not ever / The soul of Nero enter this firm bosom ….”. You live and you learn…

43. A tough one. I can’t say I’m very happy with NEATEST using ‘at’ to indicate a filler or, the alternative parsing, expecting the solver to think of ‘in nest’ as a synonym for ‘at home’.

44. Thanks to Imogen and Manehi.
    A tough but rewarding puzzle with plenty of laughs along the way. Favourites:
    FORTINBRAS; OXIDATE; and MATCH;

45. Robi @37: Indeed – but you are a non-rhotic speaker (as am I, in fact) so you can’t really understand the annoyance.

46. I sometimes wonder if people who get annoyed at “homophone” clues in crosswords also get annoyed at “puns”. Which is basically what such clues are… 🙂

47. Completely agree with ShropshireLass @44. Superb. FORTINBRAS and OXIDATE made me laugh out loud. Thanks, Imogen and manehi.

    Nuntius @14 – yes, I spent far too long thinking of the wrong Clavdivs…

48. Thanks for the blog, very good tough puzzle lasting the perfect time. HINDMOST and CLEMENCY are very neat , ANTHER is a very clever definition.
    KVa@38 the usual term is car park, in the Lake District there are many National Trust car parks near to beauty spots.

49. This was the toughest for a while and took several sessions to work through. Even then I failed on PIER. Like many I spent ages on Nero on 26ac especially with the N and R crossers. Luckily we did Hamlet at school and the penny finally dropped.
    Thanks to Imogen and manehi.

50. I don’t understand this cry of “I don’t pronounce it that way so can’t do homophones”.
    I am neither a Yorkshireman nor a Cockney, but I can cope with those dialectical homophones when they come up.

51. ragged@50: I agree. It’s all part of the fun and the challenge…

52. Last night I got all but 8, all on the left side. This morning I thought of MO rather than MD for “medic” and it all flowed from there up to the last one, 22. But I forgot that does are hinds and the best I could get was that B=”bird” = “time inside,” which left puzzles. So my hindmost answer was HINDMOST.

    Andrew, thanks for parsing WARHOL CLEMENCY, BARCAROLE (forgot about Barca), NOSFERATU, GROUCHO,

    I don’t buy FATWAD as an adjective. I’m with Gladys@11.

    20a OXIDATE I don’t buy it. An ox is a castrated male bovine and a cow is a female one. I now know (thanks, google) that the ox is castrated after maturity so he can have the muscular strength of a bull, and a cow is “rarely trained as an ox.

    6d If called by a panther
    Don’t ANTHER.
    Ogden Nash

    Thanks to Imogen and manehi.

53. I was pleased to finish this, even more so on finding that it wasn’t dismissed here as more of a Quiptic — which is what usually happens.

    BARCAROLE: the C in the football side is soft, which rather spoilt it for me.

    Thanks to I & m.

54. Late to the party today. The NW corner went in so swiftly I thought this might be unusually easy for an Imogen, but there was plenty of much chewier stuff to come. Very very good, with the superbly smooth surfaces that are so characteristic of this setter. Unlike Gladys@17and Valentine@52 I thought FATWAD was among the highlights, I do like a neologism.
    Thanks to Imogen and manehi.

55. BARCAROLE is clever – “one heard” looks like a homophone indicator, but isn’t – it just means you’d hear the song in Venice.
    The wordplay works fine: BARCA/Barça “Spanish team” + ROLE ”position”

56. Difficult. Reassuring to see others didn’t find it a gentle stroll. FORTINBRAS eluded me completely, but it’s not Imogen’s fault that I didn’t pay attention in school.

57. Tough but fun.
    Worth the entrance fee for FORTINBRAS alone! Mind you, NOSGERATU, MUG UP, BEAUTY SPOT and JOINER were also very satisfying.
    (Perhaps those who get all het up about homophones that don’t “work” in their respective accents would be happier if such devices were henceforth just called “a play on words”, or – in Auriga’s great suggestion from a day or two back – similiphones.)
    Thank you Imogen and manehi

58. Too many NHOs for this to be fun for me but all the clues (excepting FATWAD) seemed fair enough after the fact. Even after researching it, I still don’t understand the devil/hindmost saying. I’m just writing it off as one of my dumb days.

59. V@52 Chambers has “A general name for the male or female of common domestic cattle (bull and cow), esp a castrated male of the species” for OX

    If you think that’s a load of bull your beef is with them

60. Wellbeck @57 — I just finished reading Ximenes and the Art of the Crossword and he simply referred to that particular ‘aural wordplay’ clue device as a “pun”, which I like a lot 🙂

61. Wellbeck @57 – it’s irrelevant what you call them, making up a new bit of jargon won’t suddenly make such clues work for those solvers.

    Nor am I convinced it helps much to qualify the homophone indicator, eg “some say” – you’re still left guessing exactly what accent the setter has in mind.

    Unless setters limit themselves to the very few homophones that work in every accent, it’s always going to be an issue for some solvers. But then we would miss out on such delights as Paul’s KINK EARN NEWT the other day (which doesn’t work in any accent) and our lives would be poorer for that.

62. Well, I completed it, but it was a tough one, and I see that there has been discussion on several points that I mulled over in my own mind while solving.

    I thought FATWA’D was ok, even though I didn’t know it was a verb until now. BEAUTY SPOT was a better clue than I thought at first: a busy car park invariably does indicate a site of scenic beauty. HINDMOST was clever and a favourite. I also liked ANTHER and NEATEST.

    Thanks to Imogen and manehi.

63. BlueDot@58 I suppose literally it means do not lag behind or you will be “taken” . It used to be the name of a cycle race indoors, now called elimination. Every 5 laps or so the last to cross the line is removed. I suppose metaphorically it means think of yourself, plough ahead and do not worry about others less fortunate.

64. [I wonder whether people who pronounce non-rhotically ever consider why the Rs are in the word?
    I was once on a bird-watching trip with a woman who pronounced “flowers” as “flahs” and “wires” as “wahs”. Why?]

65. Re the never-ending homophone saga, I’ve been posting for the last few years that they should just be called puns. Mostly I was falling on deaf ears (pun intended), but just maybe the tide could now be starting to turn.

66. Made it about halfway, but too tough I’m afraid. I salute all you finishers.

    Ta Imogen & manehi.

67. Simon S @65 — “TEAM PUN!” ?

68. The emoji turned into a question mark there. Please be assured that I am most definitely Team Pun!

69. Yup, north half tough, south half pretty much impossible. CLEMENCY is surely MEN + CYCLE ‘cycling’ it. BEAUTY SPOT was my fave, and I think works perfectly. An easier one tomorrow please!

70. Muffin@64: You may as well ask why the French don’t pronounce the h at the start of a word, or why people T stop. The latter really irritates me, though I know there are regions in England where that has been the way since Noah was a lad.

71. Thanks very much Manehi as I had forgotten the “does” trick too and after getting nowhere thinking about idle hands was unable to explain the eventual answer. I found the SE toughest and after a lucky guess with PIER I eventually hit on TAPED (clever as while clearly a fair equivalence I can’t actually think of a direct replacement instance) and have Loadsamoney to thank for the unlikely FATWAD. Thanks for a tough workout Imogen but some smiles along the way.

72. Ps muffin@64 quite right, everyone knows it is “fl-ow-uz” and “wye-uz”

73. [Nuntius @70
    I may have posted this before, but I am reminded of a Dane called Høst checking in to a French hotel. The receptionist said welcome Monsieur… then was thrown, as he didn’t pronounce the leading H or the trailing ST, which only left him the O, and that was crossed out….]

74. I think the Fortinbras clue works but not in the way others have said ; ‘said to have gone to war’ = ‘fought’ which (for me anyway) sounds like ‘fort’ and that leaves ‘in underwear’ to clue ‘in bras’, I don’t thing the homophone is supposed to apply to the whole of the rest of the clue after the word ‘said’.

    Another way of parsing it is to consider ‘Fortinbras’ as a homophone of ‘fought in bra’ which is how some people say it (though not me, I say ‘fought in brass’ – though I should add that I say ‘brass’ with a short ‘a’ sound).

75. muffin@73: That’s rather good…It’s funny how certain ways of pronouncing words can be really annoying; and I certainly have a personal list. They don’t have to be wrong, like substituting f for th…I’m really not sure why t stopping gets on my nerves. Perhaps it’s the fact that if it’s not an aspect of a person’s natural regional way of speaking then it strikes me as affected; and it is creeping in everywhere.

76. Imogen sometimes strikes me as one of those people who think it’s funny to stick out a leg to trip someone up when they’re running for a bus. In the clue for BARCAROLE the words ‘one heard’ are deliberately placed in such a way as to seem to indicate a pun involving the football team and the position. The (surely invented past tense) FATWA’D has been discussed plenty above, as has ‘cow’=OX, which I think has appeared here before and defeated me then too. But the palme d’or must go to the totally weird clue at 20d, where Imogen has used ‘to be taking part’ when in any normal use of English one would use ‘if taking part’. Fair game, maybe, but when seeing the answer I want to be able to go: that’s clever. Instead of which I find myself thinking, “you’ve got to be kidding”.

    Thanks (I think) Imogen. (NOSFERATU was good. 🙂 ) Thanks (and commiserations to) manehi, for coping so well with the short straw you’ve been dealt.

77. muffin@64

    [long time ago I was a teacher and was asking the kids to do an experiment involving iron (which I pronounce with the r). the class looked blank. I asked what was the matter. they asked what’s iron. I was confused and wrote it on the blackboard (yes that’s how long ago it was) and they all chorused – “oh ion”. I never understand why people do not pronounce the r in iron – apart from anything else how do you distinguish between the metal – iron – and the charged particle – ion.] By the way I am not too fussed about rhotic / non-rhotic homophones – all part of cryptic crossword language.

78. [The usual homophone discussion prompted the memory of the time I was in a bar in Manchester and (for reasons I forget) wanted to stand out as an American. So I deliberrately overrprronounced all of my arrrrs. It worked. Memorable quote from that night: “So you’re an American, eh. Love Americans. But we can drink you under the table.” Which was true. Best people ever, those Mancunians.]

79. I suppose it is entirely a reflection on me that the first thing that flashed across my mind for “popular car park” was DOGGING SPOT…

80. [nuntius @75
    What’s this ‘ere glo-al stop, then?]

81. [Final-ever post on this subject. What’s most annoying, to be honest, about the non-rhotic homophones in these clues is the implied assumption that everyone pronounces it that way, or should if they don’t. If a Cockney or Yorkshire pronunciation is needed for the clue to work, the setter will indicate that that’s the dialect we’re working with. I’d assume they’d do the same if it were an accent from Kentucky or Jamaica. (In Kentucky, PEN and PIN are homophones–did you know that?) But if the clue only works in RP, there’s no indicator. It’s like that dialect is the winner. The rest of us–a majority of the speakers of the language, not that that should matter–just have to adapt.]

82. [To be clear, pronouncing pen as pin is a feature across most of northern Appalachia, but the larger cities in Kentucky plus most of the west of the state don’t do it. So it’s also heard in Knoxville, but not in Paducah.]

83. I got everything but HINDMOST, which was tough to approach since I never had heard that phrase before. Hard but fair, which is all one can ask. Tip of the hat to Imogen.

84. I have no words.

    Literally and metaphorically!

85. Steffen@84. Glad you’ve still got your sense of humour!

86. I’m learning to choose my battles.

87. Nuntius@70 T stop?

88. Good test which I passed except got FATWA but couldn’t put a D on it! COUP D’ETAT I thought a dodgy 4,5 but on reflection I give way.
    NOSFERATU a favourite film.
    Thanks both

89. Valentine @87 glottal stop – if I speak in RP I say water as wawtuh, in Cockney/MLE (Multicultural London English) it’s waw’uh.

    I solved this, but was glad to find everyone else found it tough, too. Last in FATWAD and HINDMOST, from all the crossers and the phrase. Checking with Wiktionary, , it starts appearing in print in the 1600s, and it’s a line in The Ode to the Haggis.

    Thank you to manehi and Imogen.

90. Flea@8 you’re quite right. COUP D’ETAT is three words and so the clue is unfairly misleading. Didn’t bother to finish after that.

91. For a change came to this very late last night, Thursday. Found it very tough at first, but came at it again this morning and everything in the until then impenetrable NW corner slipped in very satisfyingly. Particularly liked the loi BROMIDE, in fact…

92. Shanne@89: if you’re a Cockney, you use both the glo!!al stop and the w-for-l substitution, so bottle becomes bo!!w…

    The reason why non-rhotic speakers don’t pronounce some Rs (and rhoticists do) is the same reason that governs all accents: they learned it from their parents, and later from their schoolmates. Logic or laziness have nothing to do with it, though it’s nice to believe that the voice you grew up with is correct and other people’s are wrong. (I’ve always known that my native West Middlesex is “wrong”, so I have an upmarket alternative to use for jobs like answering the office phone.)

    Rhoticists complain constantly of homophones that don’t sound alike in a rhotic accent. But this is in a way a result of the “correctness” of their pronunciation. The “laziness” of non-rhoticism makes many pairs of words sound alike when they “shouldn’t” – so they can be used for punning when the rhotic versions don’t work. What we need is for a rhotic speaker to come up with some clues that work only in Rhotic and not in RP. I suspect there may not be nearly as many as there are the other way round, because Rhotic makes distinctions that RP doesn’t. I would be interested to be proved wrong.

93. Far too contrived and a dirge. No doubt he’s a 28.

94. Challenging but just about doable, although it did go over to breakfast time, today. I did like Fortinbras and amatory but as with a lot of your commentators, I thought that coup d’etat should be 4-1-4, grade 7 French ‘O’ level notwithstanding. Sad to read about the death of Margaret Irvine, Nutmeg. She will be much missed at our kitchen table.

95. In response to those who have commented on the (4,5) enumeration for COUP D’ÉTAT, I would just say that I believe this exemplifies the norm for puzzles like these in the national dailies and could well be in the house rules set by their crossword editors. Similarly, AIN’T (4) and FULLER’S EARTH (7,5) would be enumerated as I have shown. Also the French name D’ARTAGNAN (9), to give another French example.

    There was a time when ‘special instructions’ above the crossword might indicate something like “Ignore one apostrophe” or “Ignore two accents”, but we rarely see this sort of thing now.

96. I know it’s a bit late but just to say, 4 is a bit more precise than it might seem. A DABBLER is a class of duck, as opposed to a “diver”.

97. [I agree with Lord Jim @41 that we can safely take Fortinbras to be the next king of Denmark. In addition to the quotation he cites, there’s also the fact that in general, the last line in a Shakespeare tragedy is spoken by the monarch. (Othello is an exception, if I recall.) One of my teachers pointed this pattern out to us years ago. I suspect, although I don’t know, that it was a convention in Elizabethan drama, presumably meant to emphasize at the end of the play that the disruptions are over and that normalcy is expected to resume.

    This is why the plays often end with a clunker of a last line, spoken by a hitherto minor character, such as Malcolm in Macbeth and Albany in King Lear.]

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