A carefully constructed Quiptic from Chandler for our Sunday morning entertainment. Hits the spot, I think.
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 Doctor pried into case of somebody regarding some handwriting?
SPIDERY
An insertion of (PRIED)* in SY for the outside letters of ‘somebody’. The insertion indicator is ‘into’ and the anagrind is ‘doctor’.
5 Corps deployed around two points in series of steps
PROCESS
An insertion of E and S for two ‘points’ of the compass in (CORPS)* The insertion indicator is ‘around’ and the anagrind is ‘deployed’.
10 Award touching on gallantry in part
GONG
Hidden in touchinG ON Gallantry.
11 First person in main spot represented farcical situations
PANTOMIMES
An insertion of ME for the grammatical ‘first person’ in (MAIN SPOT)* The insertion indicator is ‘in’ and the anagrind is ‘represented’.
12 Worker blocking sign in temporary shelter
LEAN-TO
An insertion of ANT in LEO. The insertion indicator is ‘blocking’.
13 Play set point and hurry up
STEP ON IT
(SET POINT)* with ‘play’ as the anagrind.
14 Endorsement without leading pair for trial period
PROBATION
[AP]PROBATION
16 Piece of wire left in taxi close to office
CABLE
An insertion of L in CAB and E for the final letter of ‘office’. The insertion indicator is ‘in’.
17 Second journey to get identifying outfit
STRIP
A charade of S and TRIP.
19 A resort given backing for sweet stuff, food in spears?
ASPARAGUS
A charade of A, SPA and SUGAR reversed. The reversal indicator is ‘backing’.
23 Bear, maybe, a red port in a tipsy state
PREDATOR
(A RED PORT)* with ‘in a tipsy state’ as the anagrind.
24 Particular military unit
DETAIL
A dd.
26 Submission from newly constituted comic panel
COMPLIANCE
(COMIC PANEL)* with ‘newly constituted’ as the anagrind.
27 Recall star, noted English runner
AVON
A reversal of NOVA. The reversal indicator is ‘recall’. We have ‘runner’ (the other one to look out for as a beginner is ‘flower’) as a marker for ‘river’, and it’s ‘noted’ because there are at least five of them in England alone. That’s because River Avon is a tautology: it literally means River River. Avon derives from the Brittonic abona, ‘river’ and is cognate with modern Welsh afon, which is seen in the anglicised names of towns like Aberavon and Blaenavon. There’s even a river in Wales called Afon Afan, which is even more confusing.
28 Dull figure getting level
FLATTEN
A charade of FLAT and TEN.
29 A mistake in front of elders makes one foolish
ASININE
A charade of A, SIN, IN and E for the initial letter of ‘elders’.
Down
2 Individual inspired by seaside feature is trailblazing kind
PIONEER
An insertion of ONE in PIER. The insertion indicator is ‘inspired by’.
3 Daughter beginning to imbibe drink gets to start eating
DIG IN
A charade of D, I for the initial letter of ‘imbibe’ and GIN.
4 Criticism found on left for link
RAPPORT
A charade of RAP and PORT.
6 By the sound of it, given a direction and fixed in a firm way
ROOTED
Aural wordplay (‘by the sound of it’) for ROUTED.
7 Small sausage from joint varying a lot in California
CHIPOLATA
An insertion of HIP and (A LOT)* in CA. The insertion indicator is ‘in’ and the anagrind is ‘varying’.
8 Distinctive exercise with agents put in confines of school
SPECIAL
An insertion of PE and CIA in SL for the outside letters of ‘school’. The insertion indicator is ‘put in’.
9 North agonises about having hardly any money
ON A SHOESTRING
(NORTH AGONISES)* with ‘about’ as the anagrind.
15 Learner in quandary has to identify area where view is obstructed
BLIND SPOT
An insertion of L in BIND followed by SPOT. The insertion indicator is ‘in’.
18 Upheaval starts to undermine real mission in work
TURMOIL
An insertion of URM for the initial letters of ‘undermine’, ‘real’ and ‘mission’ in TOIL. The insertion indicator is – once again – ‘in’.
20 Tackle thing needed for a delivery?
ADDRESS
A dd.
21 Place of learning associated with staple mythical creature
UNICORN
A charade of UNI and CORN.
22 Earnestly try least riveting clothes
STRIVE
Hidden in leaST RIVEting.
25 Coach getting tense over damp weather
TRAIN
A charade of T and RAIN.
Many thanks to Chandler for this week’s Quiptic.
Delightful with ticks for STEP ON IT, COMPLIANCE and ON A SHOESTRING. Interesting DETAIL about AVON.
Ta Pierre & Chandler.
Enjoyable puzzle, not a write-in, and I think it is quite a good one for beginners to attempt.
Thanks, both.
Chandler reliably produces accessible Quiptics, although I did think there were a few more bear traps for newbies – LEO as a sign, for example. (I tend to be aware what we’ve blogged for the Quick Cryptics.)
Thank you to Pierre and Chandler.
That was a nicely pitched Quiptic. I found it easier than today’s Everyman. A few “aha” moments – like when the penny finally dropped on PANTOMIMES (I was trying to get Adam or Eve to fit as “first person”).
With regard to River River, “abhainn” is the Irish word for river (the “bh” in this instance is pronounced like a “w”, giving us “Ah-wen”).
A great bit of Sunday morning fun. Thanks Chandler and Pierre for the blog.
Gentle fun with several quietly amusing moments: perfect for a lazy Sunday morning.
Some setters seem to have a particular knack for well-judged Quiptics, and this one is a little cracker – with nothing too obscure, no needlessly-convoluted parsing, and no laboured and/of slightly desperate “Spooner”.
Thank you Chandler for the entertainment, and Pierre for the blog and for the extra info on avon.
Very enjoyable, and doable. There were certainly some chewy moments in there, but all very well-clued and which made for a satisfying solve, rather than a laboured or frustrating experience.
Great stuff.
That’s interesting about the Gaelic “abhainn”, Lechien.
Nice. Did it in bed. Just finished Everyman too. Happy.
Thank you for the blog Pierre. While I completed it without any reveals, at least three or four were from the cross letters and the definition part of the clue. This blog has cleared things up.
I can concur this was an excellent Quiptic for beginners, I got almost every clue with the exception of Avon (runner for river was new to me). A few I couldn’t quite parse (SPECIAL, ASININE, LEAN-TO), but a few highlights of understanding too (DIG IN, ROOTED, CABLE). As the parent of a 4 year old daughter, UNICORN was a particular highlight!
Lechien @4, but in Scottish Gaelic the bh is pronounced as “v”.
I would not have got RAPPORT without the crossers; it’s far from the first word I think of as “link”.
I’m probably missing something obvious, but why is “STRIP” an identifying outfit?
Many thanks to Chandler and Pierre. A great Quiptic and blog, both of which hit the spot for me 😎.
Nakamova @13, a strip identifies a team…
Monkey@11, it can be in Irish too. The pronunciation depends on a process called lenition, which – if memory serves – depends on whether the vowel preceding it is broad or not. For example, “aoibhinn” – meaning attractive or joyful – would roughly be a homphone of the English word “even” with the emphasis on the first vowel.
Nakamova @13: it’s a usage that doesn’t exist in American English, so I only learned it from reading British sports coverage, but one of the definitions of “strip” is “the clothing worn by and distinguishing a football team.” (OED).
Pauline@14 and mrpenney@16 — Thanks! This Yankee will file that info away for future reference.
I found this more difficult than recent Quiptics. I think it was due to a number of cryptic or semi-cryptic definitions that I was not expecting. No clue stood out as a favourite. No issues either.
Thanks Chandler and Pierre
A pleasant diversion for a Sunday afternoon, and we’d think it a good puzzle for newbies and/or improvers.
Thanks, Chandler and Pierre.
I’d forgotten this meaning of STRIP too (I’m from the US, where we don’t have this usage), but I had definitely seen it before and eventually I dredged it up from my memory.
The tiniest of cryptic-grammar quibbles: in 29ac, it’s not clear what role “one” has in the cryptic reading, although I suppose it could be that the wordplay “makes one” the answer in the same way that a baker makes one a cake.
In any case, I agree that this was a very enjoyable Quiptic. I would definitely recommend it to those still learning their way around cryptic crosswords.
Enjoyable puzzle and managed it mainly – although some guessed from definition and then reverse engineered the parsing. Was not inspired by “inspired by” as an insertion indicator even though I did tease out the answer; is that a usual insertion indicator?
Thanks Pierre for the blog and Chandler for the puzzle.
Mostly fun for me. One question, in what dialect does routed and rooted sound the same? I only know of rout rhymes with shout and root rhymes with shoot.
Crackers@22. If you mean “routed” as the past tense of “rout” – to thoroughly defeat (e.g “the enemy was routed”) – then I don’t know! As far as I know that rhymes with “shout” in all dialects.
If you mean it as the past participle of “route” (e.g “all communications are routed through London”) then that is British English.
thecronester@21: ‘inspired by’ works as an insertion indicator if you think of ‘inspire’ as a synonym for ‘breathe in’.
Enjoyable, although I thought I was going to canter home when I got ON A SHOESTRING immediately. The SE was a nightmare, but we got there. I really liked how SPIDERY used doctor as the anagrind – and for similar reasons that a “learner in a quandary” might have neglected their BLIND SPOT. Clever, as always. Thanks Pierre and Chandler.
Crackers @22
It always sounds odd to us Brits when US commentators (on American football, for instance) pronounce “route” to rhyme with “shout”. It is always pronounced “root” here, so “routed” as in “given a route” would be “rooted”.
Being an old-fashioned sort I do my quiptic alongside my Monday cryptic 🙂 and today the cryptic was noticeably easier to complete, though both would qualify as a quiptic in my humble opinion.
One technical thing I noticed that made this slightly less approachable than most quiptics: the grid was a tad unfriendly, with a lot of lights where less than half of the squares were checked; on shorter words that can make things a little trickier. All gettable by a reasonable solver I think, but perhaps one of the suitability criteria for quiptics should be grid layout?
Thanks both!
me @26
How do Americans pronounce the iconic “Route 66”? I’ve always heard it as “Root 66”, but perhaps that’s not the American way.
muffin @28 Well, Chuck Berry certainly called it Root 66
I found this pretty hard, gave up after doing about half of it. I might give today’s cryptic a go as per Rob T @ 27
Cheers both.
Thanks southofnorth @29
Lechien@15, thanks – I thought bh could be “v” in Irish, and hadn’t realised it could be “w”. Now I’m wondering whether it’s sometimes “w” in Scotland too …
This USAnian has always pronounced route like root, but I have heard rowt from non-Northeasterners all my life, and it seems to be spreading. The computer device router is always rowter here, perhaps influenced by the woodworking tool (which actually does rout and unlike the computer device does not route).
I had check STRIP after entering it based on the wordplay, so thanks for the explanation, mrpenney@18, and thanks for asking, Nakamova @13.
Hi fifteensquared.net administrator, Your posts are always insightful and valuable.
@Monkey, it gets even more complicated when you take different dialects into account. In most of Connemara “bh” will be pronounced as a “w” regardless of the preceding vowel whereas in Corca Dhuibhne (Dingle peninsula in west Kerry) it will be a “v” sound.
Really appreciate the blog, as someone who finally finished this today, there were a few pieces that this cleared up for me nicely. I do agree with thecronester that inspired by seems an excessively obscure insertion indicator for a quiptic. I might well have missed ‘breathed in’, but a rarely used synonym for that seems into regular critic territory to me.