One or two niggles from me in this week’s puzzle, but overall a pleasing solve.
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 Short shabby detective – US – I went there!
COLUMBUS
The short, shabby detective in the UK would be Vera, natch, but the only US version is COLUMBO: so it’s COLUMB[O] plus US and an extended definition.
5 English: scratching head, unable to qualify
ENABLE
A charade of E and [U]NABLE.
9 Edward by island on sailboat, reversing at water’s edge
POOLSIDE
A charade of ED, I and SLOOP reversed.
10 Awkward, grand and long – at the outset, uncle’s hosted
GAUCHE
A charade of G and an insertion of U for the initial letter of ‘uncle’ in ACHE. From the French word for ‘left’. Left-handers have a hard time of it linguistically. Normal, right-handed people are DEXTROUS and ADROIT, but lefties are either GAUCHE or SINISTER and those like me who can’t dance for toffee are described as having two left feet. It’s so not fair.
11 Everyman is improperly described by two lines making damaging accusation
LIBEL
‘Everyman is’, expressed in an improper grammatical way, would be I BE. Insert that between two Ls and you’ve got your answer. The insertion indicator is ‘described by’.
13 Squeeze a beauty, we’re told, to arouse memories
RING A BELL
Aural wordplay (‘we’re told’) for WRING A BELLE.
15 Postpone unit’s dance and indoor game
TABLE FOOTBALL
A charade of TABLE, FOOT and BALL. I was not aware of the ‘postpone’ meaning and discovered why when I looked it up in my Collins, which has:
table (vt) to postpone discussion of (a bill, etc) for some time or indefinitely (N Am)
I have never personally heard this meaning in British English.
17 Range of human inaction unsettling
MOUNTAIN CHAIN
(HUMAN ACTION)* with ‘unsettling’ as the anagrind.
21 On track, bat’s simple stroke
DOG PADDLE
A charade of DOG and PADDLE.
22 Nosy astronauts left
NASAL
A charade of NASA and L.
23 Studious, tense and wimpish
TWEEDY
A charade of T and WEEDY.
24 Swayed, being camp
AFFECTED
A dd.
26 Once again despatched gift without slightest hint of provocation
RESENT
[P]RESENT
27 Suffers sea song I butchered
AGONISES
(SEA SONG I)* with ‘butchered’ as the anagrind.
Down
1 Feuding family’s pills laced with uranium
CAPULETS
An insertion of U in CAPLETS. I have never been afraid to display my ignorance publicly, so I will say that I have never come across CAPLET for ‘pill’ before. And that is because it is a US registered trademark. Bit of a trend emerging here.
2 ‘Animal star sign.’ ‘Chameleon?’ ‘Not entirely.’
LEO
Hidden in chamLEOn.
3 Brief moments with that French woman – and wine
MOSELLE
A charade of MOS and ELLE (which could be either ‘she’ or ‘her’ in French, before anyone gets excited).
4 ‘Undecorated’? Right to get rise, as base layer’s been applied
UNDERCOATED
Everyman is asking you, since it’s a down clue, to move the R in ‘undecorated’ two places upwards. I can’t make any sense of the surface.
6 Amateur artist to capture rising waterfall
NIAGARA
A reversal of A, RA and GAIN.
7 Great amounts rain heavily on blokes protecting duck
BUCKETLOADS
A charade of BUCKET and O for the cricketing ‘duck’ inserted into LADS. The insertion indicator is ‘protecting’.
8 In placid manner, pick six characters from seven lycanthropes
EVENLY
Hidden in sEVEN LYcanthropes.
12 Ones drawing fictional pig? They appeal to the girls
BABE-MAGNETS
A (slightly unreconstructed) young man might describe himself as a BABE-MAGNET because he considered himself attractive to women. And BABE was the fictional pig in the eponymous film of 1995 based on the Dick King-Smith novel. The ubiquitous Peppa Pig was not required this morning.
14 What the absent-minded (or uncaring) greengrocer does
NOT GIVE A FIG
A cd cum dd.
16 Doesn’t leave out trendy crosswords’ building blocks: about 500!
INCLUDES
A charade of IN and D for the Roman numeral for 500 inserted into CLUES. The insertion indicator is ‘about’.
18 Upriver, glimpsed along Nile’s drainage area: national, primarily?
UGANDAN
The initial letters of the first seven words of the clue and a cad.
19 Relate to sorrow
CONCERN
A dd.
20 Literary figure found meandering in Detroit, mostly
EDITOR
(DETROI[T])* with ‘meandering’ as the anagrind.
25 Stoves regularly seen in sets
TVS
The even letters of sToVeS.
Many thanks to Everyman for this week’s puzzle.
A bit easier than some of the recent Everyman crosswords. The slot seems to be gradually losing its unique features – no rhyming solutions this week, a geographical reference that doubled as the acrostic. Still a self-referential clue, but most cryptics have them these days.
As Pierre says, a few quibbles. Columbus never went to what is now the US; table=postpone is a North America-only usage. I worked for a news agency and their style guide specifically forbids using the phrase “to table a motion” – it means the exact opposite on each side of the Atlantic.
But, quibbles aside, I enjoyed a good number of clues. Thanks Everyman and Pierre.
I was doing well on this until I got to the top two plus 2d (not at all helped there by the wrong clue. All I could make of that was TWO, thinking it might be a too-clever-by-half use of the clue number as definition). I was eventually helped by a kind poster here pointing out that the clue had been corrected. Then: Columbo? Who he? And I considered – and rejected – ENABLE as the word more-or-less appeared in the clue. Only after succumbing to a word search and seeing there was no alternative did I enter it. So – a curate’s egg. Mostly enjoyed, but left with a sour taste. Thanks(ish), Everyman, and definite thanks Pierre.
I suspect the connected clues – they are not always rhyming – include TABLE and MOUNTAIN.
But I wasn’t happy with the ENABLE clue for the reason mentioned and I looked rather sideways at the COLUMBUS one.
But, it was a nice way to spend a little time. Thanks for t.hat fun and the blog.
This one seemed like a return to normal service.
TassieTim@2, Columbo is the owner of the battered trenchcoat from the previous week (2d).
Thanks Pierre and Everyman.
Yes, I think Everyman had a few flights of fancy this week, which have already been mentioned.
I did know The BABE pig as the movie was filmed not far from here.
Quite a nice Everyman this week.
I agree with Mystogre about the matched solutions, but for a different reason. The
Iink is BALL and CHAIN. I didn’t think there would be any balls or chains in the UK today, as they sent them all out to the colonies.
Thanks Everyman and Pierre
MOSELLE
I took the ‘brief moments’ as MO+S.
MOs for moments should be ok as well, I guess.
NOT GIVE A FIG and BABE-MAGNETS were my faves.
[You’re absy right Pierre. Dory Previn did a rather dark satire on it, in which the first verse ends something like
Left handed people are impure they go against the grain
Left handed children play with themselves and drive themselves insane.
Like Dory, the young ginf was made to change to the right hand at infants’ school. Been confused ever since 🙂 ]
We do get a choice of caplets, tablets and capsules for some drugs in the UK – caplets are a different shape of tablet, so I did know that one. I’ve also heard about tabling something to the next meeting, in a meeting or film. But I also quibbled at ENABLE.
I wondered about BALL and CHAIN or TABLE and MOUNTAIN as the paired solutions
Thank you to Pierre and Everyman.
Thanks for the blog, UNDERCOATED was a very good spot, thanks to Crispy last week for the correction for 2D. I thought this was more suitable overall.
Not keen on MOSELLE or ENABLE because some of the wordplay is directly in the clue.
I actually found this much harder than recent Everymans. Didn’t get close to a finish, with lots of the top half missing.
One or two iffy clues which Pierre has largely addressed. My main problem was that my copy of the Observer just had ‘entirely (3)’ for 2 down. I had to search for the full clue. That helped with 9 across which was holding me up. Thank you.
Quite difficult. Not recommended for beginners.
New for me: I was able to parse 1ac because I am old but wow, it’s a reference to a TV show (Columbo) that ended 46 years ago.
Thanks, both.
That’s not the clue I had in the newspaper for two down. I wondered why I couldn’t figure it out!
Most of my historical problems with this crossword have been the NW corner.
Several objections have already been addressed: COLUMBUS (not COLOMBUS Pierre) never went to what is now the US, and ‘table’ is simply wrong in British English. Schoolboy howlers.Otherwise fairly easy.
Finished OK, but didn’t enjoy it very much – thought there were some rather clunsy clues, including the one for GAUCHE. Couldn’t think of a context where you’d replace NASAL with “nosy”, or “astronauts” with NASA, for that matter.
Thank you, Everyman and Pierre
I thought it was a big return to form, both in being more fun and a gentler level. I quite like the linked words in the long clues as a change from the rhyming pairs, but as I’ve moaned a lot about the recent changes in style, I won’t admit it.
Found this to be just about the right level and a return to the old Everyman days i,e.- I completed it but it was challenging. May this continue! Thanks Everyman and Pierre
Glad to see that our not being able to get 2d was down to a misprint and not our being thick. 🙂
Some Smiles in this one. But 2D typo was frustrating in the paper.
2 entirely (3)
yes I too was frustrated by 2d.
And if I had suspected a typo, the downloadable edition of last Sunday’s Observer agreed with my printed copy:
2 entirely (3)
Loved BABE MAGNETS, POOLSIDE and LIBEL; as a fellow-leftie, sympathised with Pierre over GAUCHE; had lived in the US in the 1970s so got the Columbo connection quickly.
But although I saw TWEEDY easily enough I have a problem with the parsing.
My Chambers tells me that tweedy means “Of a predominantly upper-class, hearty, outdoor type”.
Surely that’s the antithesis of “studious”?
Apologies for the typo in COLUMBUS. Now corrected. I was in Latin American mode when I typed in the solution.
Agree with Shanne @9 about TABLE FOOTBALL + MOUNTAIN CHAIN giving us TABLE MOUNTAIN and BALL and CHAIN. A nice change to the rhyming pair.
Adrian@21 Chambers does not have this but apparently , tweed jackets etc are much favoured by academics.
I would never call somebody studious ‘tweedy’. Rather striding or riding across the English countryside!
I think tweedy referring to academics is quite old – when they also smoked pipes and smelled of tobacco (and the jackets often had leather elbow patches)
Roz@24 – as you are (maybe?) an academic is it still the case?
[ Fiona @26 , not for me , I am still stuck in the 60s, my mother really looked after clothes and kept everything for me. I got lots of Mary Quant and Biba still in the original boxes. The students call it vintage, I call it hand-me-downs. There are still a few of the jackets you described but the smoking has died out. ]
[gif@8. Was it a Catholic school where you had to switch hands? Sinister/dexter? I have read that there are more left-handed sportspeople than in the general population, and more prisoners too. 🙂 ]
TWEEDY is given in what I take to be the intended sense as ‘of a predominantly upper-class, hearty, outdoor type’ or similar in the dictionaries I use, so it has to be an error, presumably based on an incorrect assumption. I’m sure academics are allowed to wear tweed, but never mind.
Just a thought. Columbus is a city in Ohio. Perhaps our esteemed setter “went there”
TWEEDY
(Merriam-Webster-Not the right dictionary?)
ACADEMIC, SCHOLARLY
tweedy authors
There is no Americanism indicator in the clue. If one doesn’t mind that, ‘studious’ seems fine.
I see that Merriam-Webster is ‘America’s Most Trusted Dictionary’ according to its tag line, which should give us a clue. Worth remembering is that there are many words in American English that do not currently mean the same in English, such as ‘momentarily’. In any case, so as to be even-handed, I also checked OED and SOED, which both eschew the meaning used in the puzzle.
I quite liked the TABLE MOUNTAIN and BALL & CHAIN clues. Here in Canada our UK and US connections have turned TABLE into a contranym. It can mean put on or take off the table, so we have to be careful about the context when we use it.
My older brother was forced to switch to right-handed writing and developed a reading disability as a result, so I refused to change. I take advantage of the pejorative connotation of left-handedness to explain any awkward behaviour. “I can’t help it, I was born gauche and sinister.”
I quite liked this puzzle. My only quibble was the historical inaccuracy of 1a COLUMBUS, but it didn’t impede the solution. Having worked for a university, I fully accept the academic connotation of 23a TWEEDY.
Thanks Everyman and Pierre for the excellent puzzle and blog.
[ ginf@8, I subscribe to the old maxim that, since the left side of the brain controls the right side of the body, left-handers are the only people in their right mind. ]
[Not a bad comeback, Cello @34. Pdm @28, no, my folks were lefty atheists, so no nuns or brothers thankfully, but back then state schools too were doing the ‘correction’]
Liked: LIBEL for the improper “I be” 😊
Quite liked: INCLUDES
GAS – an interesting take on the “regularly” type of clue. Reminds me of this one I stole from Dave Gorman (the definition bit of my clue was far easier than his original): Pavlov commands a dog using prime bits of guacamole’s key ingredient? (7)
POOLSIDE: these charades with lots of component parts really are tricky.
DOG PADDLE: here, does “dog” = “on track” (as in Walthamstow)?
Is a concern a sorrow?
Is TABLE FOOTBALL and MOUNTAIN CHAIN the pair this week?! Is it too difficult to come up with a rhyming pair each week?
DNF 23a, 24a.
Zihuatanejo@36:
DOG PADDLE: I think, “dog” = “track”, as a verb, while “on” is just an indication of “paddle” = “bat” simply following it.
Collins’ Thesaurus indeed lists “concern” and “sorrow” as noun synonyms of each other, in the sense of “distress”/”worry”.
Though I am not that sure about “the pair of the week”, I can imagine that it is quite difficult to include all Everyman’s staples in each puzzle. If you think about it, it’s a long one-word anagram, a geographical location, a self-reference, a “primarily” clue, a homophonous one, a person and a matching/rhyming pair. I mean, it’s a lot to come up with within 28 words which also have to cross each other at every second letter (or so).
Not so difficult, but didn’t lie 1ac,
Liked the comments on GAUCHE as s leftie. [See the number of US Presidents who were gauche!]
Rob from Epsom in Auckland, NZ, where Spring is just round the corner.
Not so difficult, but didn’t lie 1ac,
Liked the comments on GAUCHE as s leftie. [See the number of US Presidents who were gauche!]
Rob from Epsom in Auckland, NZ, where Spring is just round the corner.
Slightly easier but too many loose clues, mostly for reasons already pointed out. 5A in particular was awful.
Also to me 25 across is the wrong way round: the TVs are seen in the sToVeS, surely.
‘Slightest hint of provocation’ for the letter P is a bit desperate imho.
Yes Rob, Spring is nearing, I heard the first lawnmower yesterday, I think that’s our cuckoo.
We got this in one sitting, huzzah! Last week ‘s took all week to complete. Liked NASAL ; INCLUDES. TWEEDY is a classic cryptic term for Studious due to the plethora of tweed jackets once worn by professors, even at Auckland Uni! Gorgeous day for a spot of gardening here in Whangaparaoa, spring definitely on her way. Thanks Pierre & Everyman.
Tweedy = studious (23 across) is poor.
5 across is poorly clued.
Did not get the ring/wring homonym in 13 across (duhhh!), so could not parse the answer. Thanks to Pierre for enlightening me.
To me “caplet’ (1 down) is an amalgam of capsule and tablet, so I found this clue to be easy.
1D was my last answer after I decided that
COPULATE could not be correct. I was ok with table. I think that in the Commons there could be a motion that something ” lie on the table”
Zihuatanego @36 – I went to the dogs at Walvamstow many years ago.
1D was my last answer after I decided that
COPULATE could not be correct. I was ok with table. I think that in the Commons there could be a motion that something ” lie on the table”
Zihuatanego @36 – I went to the dogs at Warvamstow and Arringay many years ago.