Guardian 29,472 – Anto

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Some nice clues here – I liked the appropriate anagram in 9a – but also some niggles, as noted below. Thanks to Anto for the puzzle.

 
Across
1 BED HOPPER Spooner’s accused principal dancer of being a promiscuous type (3,6)
Spoonerism of “head bopper”; “accused” seems superfluous to the cryptic reading
6 BIGOT Important religious text is sectarian (5)
BIG + OT (Old Testament)
9 BECAUSE IT’S THERE Melting ice sheet’s a brute – why climb it? (7,3,5)
(ICE SHEET’S A BRUTE)* – George Mallory’s famous reply when asked why he wanted to climb Everest
10 YODA My good man – regularly forceful he is (4)
Alternate letters of mY gOoD mAn – the definition is an example of the kind of inverted speech used by Yoda (from Star Wars)
11 ARROGATE Appropriate entrance for central Harrow? (8)
[h]ARRO[w] GATE
14 ODD MAN OUT Normal lady at home opposes such a loner (3,3,3)
The opposites of normal/lady/at home (in)
15 LLANO Plain part of Cornwall an oasis (5)
Hidden in CornwaLL AN Oasis
16 SATYR Your drained, after having modelled for this randy fellow (5)
SAT (modelled) + Y[ou]R. The illiterate “your” for “you’re” is needed for the surface, but I don’t like it (to put it mildly)
18 ONION RING No ironing when drunk! Get some food (5,4)
(NO IRONING)*
20 EXCUSE-ME Let me through for this dance (6-2)
Double definition (though the two meanings are essentially the same)
21 BAHT Asian money needed when adding height to club … (4)
H in BAT – the Baht is the currency of Thailand
25 BETWEEN YOU AND ME … our central location for revealing secrets (7,3,3,2)
Cryptic definition
26 DOSES Drug measures would be heartless for some females (5)
If you remove the “heart” from DOSES you get DOES (female deer)
27 OLFACTORY Faded plant lacks depth on the nose (9)
OLD less D + FACTORY (plant)
Down
1 BOBBY Constable is a bit soft, having released Liberal (5)
BLOBBY less L
2 DECIDED Made call to get cops involved in action (7)
CID in DEED
3 OVUM It was used to make Roman omelette (4)
It’s the Latin for “egg”, so if the ancient Romans made omelettes that’s what they’d use
4 PEEK Look briefly at reports of maximum irritation (4)
Homophone of “pique”, but why the plural “reports”? Thanks to commenters: it’s because it’s also a homophone of “peak”
5 RETURN TRIP Experience of getting high yield before – it’s coming back (6,4)
RETURN (yield) + TRIP (drug experience)
6 BOTTOM LINE Pay-off at end of poem (6,4)
The last line of a poem would be at the bottom
7 GRENADA Island got really enraged initially over nothing (7)
G[ot] R[eally] E[ngaged] + NADA
8 THEME SONG Seem awkward wearing underwear for introduction to programme (5,4)
SEEM* in THONG
12 BARRISTERS They’ll see you in court for covering street with obstacles (10)
ST in BARRIERS
13 GO COMMANDO Omit cover for privates providing order in sticky situation (2,8)
COMMAND (order) in GOO. To go commando is to dress without underwear
14 OYSTER BED Seafood store where ragged boy rested (6,3)
(BOY RESTED)*
17 TACITUS He recorded his times without telling us (7)
TACIT (without telling) + US
19 I SAID SO Authoritative reason given to child querying parental order (1,4,2)
A non-cryptic definition, from the classic parent’s reply to a child’s “why?” – “because I said so”
22 TEENY Stand over major city – just a bit (5)
TEE (a “stand” for a golf ball) + N[ew] Y[ork]
23 GOOF Make mistake and scarper without finishing (4)
A truncated GO OFF
24 MARC Spirit shown by master catholic (4)
M.A. + R.C. – marc is a kind of brandy

80 comments on “Guardian 29,472 – Anto”

  1. Anto’s a bit like a box of fireworks – some absolute crackers and occasionally a few damp squibs.

    ODD MAN OUT made me chortle when the penny dropped. Likewise the THEME SONG and GO COMMANDO pair

    Cheers A&A

  2. I thought this was the setter’s best so far, with a keen sense of humour shining throughout. There was some criticism on the G site last night about SATYR and like Andrew I can sort of see why? Lots of ticks with favourites including BECAUSE ITS THERE, ARROGATE, ODDMAN OUT, TACITUS, GO COMMANDO and GOOF. I thought OVUM was a bit weak. Oh and Oasis are reforming…

    Ta Anto & Andrew.

  3. Thanks Anto and Andrew. Why the plural in 4D? I think it’s because there are two homophones, ‘peak’ (maximum) and ‘pique’ (irritation).

  4. 4d “PEAK” = “maximum” & “PIQUE” = “irritation” [Edit: brian-with-an-eye@3 just beat me to it]

  6. May as well point this out before someone else does – 13d is COMMAND in GOO, not GO. Thanks Andrew for the blog and Anto for a fun puzzle – especially liked 10a and 11a. Less said about 16a the better.

  8. I also got “maximum irritation”, as Andrew from the ‘illiterate’ 16a SATYR “Your drained”
    [There’s a nail bar near me called Your Beautiful not only illiterate, but also an awful song by James Blunt.]
    (I’m a miserable old hack, too)

  12. At 3d, I assumed that Roman was French (quite a common name in France) and entered ‘Oeuf’. A little learning is a dangerous thing.

  13. As Eileen says, “a mixed bag”.

    GO COMMANDO jumped out easily enough but I still don’t see how it works. Isn’t sticky an adjective, and GOO a noun? Perhaps I’m missing something.

    Thought the “your” was horrible.

  14. I know I shall annoy Anto’s many fans but SATYR is inexcusable. ‘Youngster’ would have done the trick. Or even ‘yawner’ who would be clearly drained. THEME SONG made me smile and, were Everest an ice sheet, BECAUSE IT’S THERE would have been COTD. As it is, it’s still a nice spot.

    Thanks Anto and Andrew

  15. George @12, I refrained from saying @ 10 that un oeuf wouldn’t be enough – but I’m afraid you’ve forced me into it. 😉

  16. I came here expecting a clever explanation from one of the parse-masters showing how Your in Satyr was ok as I didn’t believe it would have been approved otherwise. Oh well seems like a bad clue. Enjoyed the crossword.

    Like Yoda, arrogate, and odd man out.

    Thanks Anto and Andrew

  17. I know a lot of people are annoyed by the ‘your’, but it really didn’t bother me. Helped me to solve the clue because it was clearly an out of place word so drew my attention.

    I loved the crossword generally, particularly the long clues, the spoonerism and 14. Llano a new word so that was good – love learning new words. I found the difficulty just right with enough brain stretch to make it fun. Thanks Anto and Andrew.

  18. Loved the fodder for BECAUSE IT’S THERE. Enjoyable, though I agree that OVUM is weak. Others have beaten me to my comments on the blog, though when solving PEEK I had the opposite reaction to Andrew: “what’s irritation doing?” Thanks, Anto and Andrew.

  19. Why the ellipses in 21a and 25a? Enquiring minds want to know.

    19d simply isn’t a cryptic clue. I’ve no idea what it’s doing here.

    Aside from those quibbles, there were some good entries, 9a being a standout.

  20. The clue for I SAID SO was humorous, but not cryptic, I thought. (Just noticed you said that, Andrew.)

    I’d not heard of LLANO, YODA or MARC.

    Enjoyable, thanks Anto & Andrew.

  21. I pay so little attention to surfaces (except for a few very clever ones) that I didn’t even notice the problem with 16a – but I do agree it is a flaw. Otherwise mostly pretty good. Favourites and less-than-favourites already mentioned by others.

    William@13 – it’s ‘sticky situation’ so the syntax does work.

    Thanks A & A.

  22. YOUR in SATYR seems to be causing peak pique, and I never even noticed how ungrammatical it was. I liked PEEK.

    Agreed with poc@19 that I SAID SO isn’t a cryptic clue, and EXCUSE ME isn’t much of one. But BECAUSE IT’S THERE is brilliant.

  23. Anto’s crosswords are reliable in the way they irritate some solvers, but I continue to enjoy his quirkiness, particularly in the Cryptic slot.

    I saw peak for PEEK and didn’t think to look for pique. The spot for BECAUSE IT’S THERE is great as is GO COMMANDO.

    Thank you to Andrew and Anto.

  24. Just to add that ‘accused’ in 1a works if you read it as how the reverend would say it when ‘accusing’.

  26. When I saw TEENY I immediately conflated it with BOPPER in the spoonerism. …and wondered if there were other “paired” clues as a kind of metaTHEME. I found GOO in GOOF, and I imagine TACITUS would have used at least one OVUM in his omelettes, but I guess it was just coincidence.

  27. Thanks Anto and Andrew
    16a should never have got past the editor. Is NADA now an English word, or does it need an indicator?
    LOI DOSES, not helped by carelessly not checking the anagram fodder and putting OYSTER BAR at 14d (a closer definition for “store”).
    Favourite 9a, though it was another anagram I didn’t check very carefully.

  28. Talking about a possible part-of-speech errors, I’m going to ask about TEENY. TEENY is an adjective and “just a bit” is either a noun or adverbial phrase, at least in all contexts in my head. Anyone?

    Your was terrible, but BECAUSE IT’S THERE was wonderful, though.

  29. Absolutely loved this. Particularly TACITUS and OYSTER BED. With the O and the U crossers in place I did think (very briefly) whether it might be a French Oeuf rather than a Roman OVUM. And with Enraged in the clueing I wondered for a while how exactly GRENADA was constructed at 7d. GO COMMANDO caused the most head scratching here, but loi was I SAID SO after I found myself trawling thru the alphabet to supply the important 4 letter middle word.
    Whenever a SATYR pops up I’m reminded of those (usually green) postcards I used to send when on holiday in Greece to shockable relatives. Many thanks Anto and Andrew…

  33. A satisfying solve: I enjoyed the playfulness of the clues, with TEENY and YODA making me smile amongst many others. I can see how SATYR would be irritating but the grammar issue was how I found my way in.

    Another good balance between accessible and tricky, for me.

  34. Favourite: BECAUSE IT’S THERE, BED HOPPER.

    New for me: ARROGATE; MARC – alcoholic spirit.

    I did not parse 20ac – and I still don’t get why excuse-me = dance, 26ac, 5d.

    Thanks, both.

    A friend of mine is distantly related to George Mallory so I told him about the clue for 9ac. He does not do cryptic crosswords and he put it through ChatGPT and got this answer – which was close but slightly off. Turns out AI/ChatGPT is not good at cryptic clues LOL:

    QUOTE:
    I’m hopeless with cryptic crossword puzzles, so I asked ChatGPT to help out. This is what it said:

    The cryptic clue your friend sent appears to describe George Mallory, the famous British mountaineer who attempted to climb Mount Everest. Let’s break down the clue:

    “Melting ice sheet’s a brute” suggests an anagram, as “melting” often indicates that the letters of “ice sheet’s a brute” need to be rearranged.
    “Why climb it?” can be seen as a definition pointing to a famous climb or climber.
    The clue is structured as (7, 3, 5), indicating the solution has three parts with 7, 3, and 5 letters, respectively.

    Let’s try the anagram:

    “Ice sheet’s a brute” consists of 15 letters.
    Rearranging the letters gives us “George H. Mallory” (7, 3, 5).
    So, the answer to the cryptic clue is “George H. Mallory.” The phrase “Why climb it?” could refer to Mallory’s famous quote, “Because it’s there,” explaining why he attempted to climb Everest.
    END QUOTE

    I then told my friend that ChatGPT got it wrong and explained why, and got this back:

    QUOTE:
    So I just told it “Close. But no cigar.” Then I told it the answer. This is its response:

    Ah, I see now! The answer “Because it’s there” perfectly fits the cryptic clue structure (7, 3, 5) and is famously attributed to George Mallory when asked why he wanted to climb Mount Everest.

    Breaking it down:

    “Melting ice sheet’s a brute”: This is the anagram indicator and the letters to rearrange.
    Why climb it?: This refers to Mallory’s famous quote, which is the solution to the anagram.
    When you rearrange the letters in “ice sheet’s a brute,” it forms “Because it’s there.”

    Great clue! Thanks for sharing that puzzle.
    END QUOTE

    I would never use ChatGPT to do cryptic crosswords – I much prefer to work things out myself 🙂

  36. Like poc@19 I’m enquiring as to the ellipses in 21 and 25. Couldn’t make sense of it, even with imagined additional punctuation.

    Enjoyed this. Anto’s sense of humour made me laugh.

    I don’t do the clues in order so I thought that nothing at the bottom of the clue for GRENADA may have been FA. Couldn’t think of an island ending in FA.

    muffin@27 I think that foreign words should be indicated, like the French and German that is assumed by Guardian crossword setters to be familiar to solvers, but the horse has bolted on that one. However, nada seems to have also been absorbed? Familiar to me anyway.

  37. Good, fun puzzle. LLANO and ARROGATE are frequent fliers.
    Anto has certainly stirred up the pendants but I agree with @17 greyhound it actually made SATYR easier.
    Thanks both

  38. While 16a is, for whatever reason, hideously wrong, let us be grateful that 25a is not “Between you and I”. That would surely signal the imminent apocalypse.

  39. Hi, thanks for the run through the puzzle. In regards to 1a I would have thought the “accused” is to signal that the answer involves a “sounds like” solution, ie here this would be “hed” for “head”? Yes, the SATYR does depend on a deliberate misspelling of “you’re” , as a typical spell corrector might do. So, for the pedant, not a good clue. But saved by some very good ones, esp the anagram for “because its there” Arrogate was a good clue, so simple, but it was nearly my LOI

  40. I parsed BOBBY as BOBBLY less L because of the connotations of wool. I can’t really see BLOBBY, which seems to refer to shape rather than feel. Not that it matters.

  41. I found this a mixed bag with some entertaining clues (BED-HOPPER, GO COMMANDO, BECAUSE IT’S THERE, BOBBY, THEME SONG, GRENADA), but also several rather weak and barely cryptic (OVUM, I SAID SO, BOTTOM LINE, THEME SONG). SATYR is so plainly wrong that I wonder if it’s actually a transcription error, and started out as “Youngster drained, after having modelled for this randy fellow” …which would have been rather good.

  44. Chamber lists Nada as “Nothing, Nothingness” with an origin as “Sp” but not as a word foreign to English. In other words it’s been assimilated into the language as have so many other words.

  45. Frankie @42, C2016 has

    “blob
    n a drop or globule; anything soft and round; a round spot; a score of zero, a duck (cricket sl)
    vi(blobb’ing; blobbed) to make a blob or blobs, to form into a blob or blobs. [Imit]
    blobbˈy adj.“

  46. Michelle @34 – I can’t see that anyone has answered your query on “excuse me” as a dance. It’s a dance where someone is allowed to cut in to replace one of the partners, usually tapping on the shoulder and saying “Excuse me”!

  47. This was very much in my comfort zone, and very enjoyable (pace “your”). One of the things I enjoy with these puzzles is that they can send me off to research things in more depth. I read this morning that there are two clues that may point to Mallory and Irvine having succeeded in reaching the summit of Everest before they died on the journey down: one hundred years ago this summer. One is that Mallory took a photograph of his wife with him which he said he was going to leave there. Despite the discovery of other personal effects in his pockets, the photo was never found. Also, he was not wearing his sunglasses, which may suggest they were returning after the sun had gone down. What might clinch it is the discovery of a Kodak camera (apparently, even after all these years it might be possible to develop the negatives), or the photo of his wife somewhere on the summit. With thanks to Anto and Andrew.

  48. Enjoyable solve with some humour.

    We all make mistakes, and the ‘your’ is not a cardinal sin in my opinion. I liked the BECAUSE IT’S THERE anagram and the wordplays for ARROGATE and GO COMMANDO.

    Thanks Anto and Andrew.

  49. Muffin–blame American English for absorbing NADA. We are, after all, the world’s fifth-ish largest (depending on who’s counting) Spanish-speaking country. Anyway, it’s in the dictionary now. It started off slangy, until everyone knew it.

  50. 16a is a shocker! Slippery slope, beginning of the end, is nothing sacred? Bah!
    But I liked the rest of the puzzle very much .

  52. 3d, so actually just asking for the Latin for ‘egg’? What an odd clue, never seen one like that before

  54. Thanks to Anto for a quality puzzle. Lots to enjoy with some clever cluing and a number of new words for us. Favourites: BECAUSEITSTHERE, ODDMANOUT, ONIONRING, BETWEENMEANDYOU, thx also to Andrew for his very helpful blog.

  55. Thanks Anto. Really enjoyed this, with a few challenges and lots of laughs. Don’t see anything wrong with the clue for 16ac – it’s just a simple manipulation of the word YOUR, which stands on its own. Thanks for the blog Andrew.

  57. [1d Mr B[L]OBBY – The UK No. 1 at Christmas 1993 (and still there in the New Year 1994, (a 30th (Pearl) anniversary)):
    ‘tried to kill music… with what might be the worst song of all time” — In case that doesn’t put you off…

    ‘

  59. PostMark@14, you beat me to it suggesting “youngster” would have served better in 16a; not only grammatically correct but also giving a delightfully creepy surface. You’re/your errors, like there/their/they’re and it’s/its, cannot be dismissed as typos, and it’s hard to believe this made it out of Anto’s pen and past the editor, which is why I wonder whether it started as ‘youngster’ and lost its ‘ngste’ in transcription. I’m surprised how many commenters here and on the Guardian site think this is pedantry, or even that ‘your’ is correct, but maybe it’s an age thing.

  60. Michelle @34 In our office we often ask ChatGPT to assist with cryptic clues, and have become convinced that it is the new Turing Test. They can convince us that they’re human through communication, but they still can’t solve a decent crossword clue!

  61. As ever with Anto, I think the good here outweighs the bad/indifferent. BECAUSE IT’S THERE is a classic.

  62. Re 16a SATYR, PostMark’s “youngster” suggestion @14 works. My immediate thought was “Without drug, you’re drained after…”.

    For me this one bad apple didn’t spoil the barrel. I agree with Alan@2, that this was Anto’s best yet – great surfaces with so much humour. I set a personal record with 12 ticks, so I won’t bore you with the list.

    Thanks A&A for the excellent puzzle and blog.

  63. Thanks Anto. I enjoyed many clues including BECAUSE ITS THERE, ARROGATE, LLANO, ONION RING, THEME SONG, BARRISTERS, and TACITUS. I thought OVUM, EXCUSE-ME, and I SAID SO were hardly cryptic and therefore disappointing. Thanks Andrew for the blog.

  65. [Eileen @10, PostMark @14, Cellomaniac @62: My rewrite of SATYR — ‘Randy fellow modelled Lycra regularly’]

  67. P@64 and DrW I struggled too. Best I could come up with was “what size portion of caviar did you get? Tiny / just a bit – flimsy but feasible?

    But I’ve resolved to only quibble about clues where the issue actually holds up my solve so I’ll say no more 🙂

  68. Thanks to Anto and Andrew. I thought most of the clues worked well but I agree with the quibbles about “your” and TEENY, plus a few being barely Cryptic. For me this was outweighed by the two long clues plus ODD MAN OUT, YODA, TACITUS and GO COMMANDO, all of which were lovely.
    [FrankieG @58, I’m wagging my finger sternly in your virtual direction, and for those who suffered that earworm, here’s a topical one…]
    https://youtu.be/TDe1DqxwJoc?si=AsNSn3VL_CvaAS_X

  70. Nice work from Anto.

    I had a good chuckle at GO COMMANDO – has to be my favourite – brought back memories (forgive the self-plug!) of a very silly puzzle I uploaded to MyCrossword last New Year’s Eve (no. 1531). Hmmm….

    Some of the clues and surfaces a bit iffy, as has been said above. But I liked BECAUSE IT’S THERE, YODA (for those with the GK), ODD MAN OUT (not sure about the grammar but it’ll do); EXCUSE ME, OLFACTORY, DOSES, GOOF and TEENY.

    I think I get I SAID SO but I would have liked to see a stronger clue perhaps?

    Thanks to the two A’s – Anto and Andrew. Good fun.

  71. I thought there were connections in the spoken phrases I SAID SO, BECAUSE IT’S THERE, BETWEEN YOU AND ME, and EXCUSE ME, all with an authoritative perspective of the speaker.

  73. nuntius@47 Mallory was notoriously disorganised so he could have lost or misplaced the photo, sunglasses or camera anywhere, including possibly the summit of Mt Everest, although, in my view, they didn’t get there.

  74. John Munro @39
    Late to the party, but: Spoonerisms are often “sound-alike” without any prompting; and how does ‘accused’ in 1A indicate a sound-alike anyway? The most famous “J’accuse” was written, in an open letter.

  75. Yeah wooden_tree@72. That occurred to me too when I did the crossword. Gotta be deliberate I reckon. Loved THE ME SONG. Made me laugh. Some say I SAID SO isn’t sufficiently cryptic, but if it’s a pointer to the me theme, then maybe it is. I think Anto was having a lot of fun with that. I did anyway.

  76. 16a I didn’t think that YOUR was a mistake for “you’re”. I parsed it as the word YOUR drained. Rubbish surface but not wrong.

  78. I thought this was a brilliant puzzle and I don’t understand all the kerfuffle about 16a. I read YOUR as a stand alone word, not as part of a sentence. Everything else I was going to say has already been said and some of it was very entertaining so thanks to the solvers, as well as to Anto and Andrew.

  79. [Regarding the “Your/you’re” discussion – reminds me of the time I spotted a bit of graffiti sprayed on a wall not a million miles from the then Brighton & Hove Albion football stadium. It read “CPFC YOUR TOAST”. I recall thinking at the time, it wasn’t meant to be a compliment to BHA’s arch rivals Crystal Palace! Rather the opposite, and YOUR should have read YOU’RE.

    Illiteracy abounds and there’s nothing new about it, nothing we can do about it. Go with the flow!]

  80. “Llanero” is also common, but not seen it for a bit

    Surely the French name equivalent to Roman is Romain or Romaine

    I would have thought that, given the speed at which most of you seem to get your solutions, the ‘your’ error would not have registered. It didn’t with me. I am quite slow, but got ‘satyr ‘ without thinking or noticing what would have earned me a detention at school

    Loved ” Because it’s there”

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