Guardian 29,553 – Imogen

71 comments on “Guardian 29,553 – Imogen”

1. Good fun as always with Imogen. Struggled for some time with FIENDS (is a fiend an addict?). MICKEY was LOL. Many thanks to I & A.

2. A solve of two halves, with NE proving trickiest for me. I particularly liked 6d; Manioc was a dnk for me. Thanks Imogen and Andrew.

3. Thanks Imogen and Andrew
   I didn’t parse OUTHOUSE or DESIGNER, and had a sticky finish in the NE. Favourite SATURNINE. (Jupiter from The Planets was on the radio as I started this – I might have got SATURNINE more quickly of it had been the next one!)

4. I agree with your assessment Andrew. I didn’t know EMBER and needed your help with that. I decided NO END IN SIGHT had to be a reverse definition, which I think is what you are saying? NHO MANIOC but it was fairly clued. Some nice anagrams, SPOILER ALERT for example. I wondered if LAUREL WREATH and MARATHON could point to a theme because I solved them early on, but I doubt it now. DESIGNER made me smile. Thanks to you and to Imogen for a fine end to a very good week of challenges. Happy weekend all 😎
   Drofle@1, addict e.g. dope fiend

5. Absy no idea about both bits of September (who knew about quarterly periods of prayer, not this old heathen). Otherwise quite fun and not too obscure from the sometimes-erudite Imogen, thanks both.

6. re Drofle@1. I too worried about Fiend=Addict, but I suppose a crossword fiend is a crossword addict. Do you think?

7. I got beef stuck in my head for the sandwich and Marat doesn’t ring any bells so I struggled with those two. Spoiler Alert was my favourite.

8. Like grantinfreo, SEPTEMBER was a mystery until I came here – thanks to both.

9. ravenrider @7
   There’s a famous David painting of the Death of Marat.

10. A totally enjoyable puzzle. I forgot about David Icke until I finally realised it was Mickey Mouse and then having bunged it in the penny dropped! It was my LOI. Many thanks to Imogen for the fun and Andrew for a couple of tricky parsings.

11. I got Mickey early on. I did remembered Mr Icke. Wish I had forgotten him like SInCam @ 10.

12. Addicts used to be described as “dope fiends” – but I haven’t heard it for years.

13. Drofle@1 ‘Dope fiend’ is old-fashioned slang for ‘drug addict’.

14. I would never have parsed SEPTEMBER, in a month of Sundays.

15. E.N.Boll&@14 Me neither.

16. In contrast to Andrew’s experience, it was the NW corner that yielded last. And many thanks to him for explaining how HEAVE and SEPTEMBER worked. Some very nice clues today, the puzzles have been good this week IMHO.

17. I got that nice penny-drop / Aha! feeling when I realised how HEAVE works

18. SPOILER ALERT was very good. I’ve heard of Ember Days but wasn’t sure what they were before checking. MANIOC is possibly better known as cassava.

19. Like a lot of others, it seems, I stared at SEPTEMBER for ages before resorting to Google and discovering it was just a charade. SEPT I think has featured before, but this atheist was totally at a loss for that meaning of EMBER. I solved the middle section first, and then filled out the rest gradually. Agree with Andrew and others that this was a good solid puzzle, with, apart from 11 already discussed, no obscurities and good surfaces. Thanks to Imogen and Andrew.

20. Thanks Andrew. I did know SEPT(ember) from previous crosswords. Others more knowledgeable than me would be able to comment. Wiki gives: A sept (/sɛpt/) is a division of a family, especially of a Scottish or Irish family.[1] The term is used in both Scotland and Ireland, where it may be translated as sliocht, meaning “progeny” or “seed”, .
    Having got SEPT I googled EMBER and got the Christian day.

    I think whether it was NE or NW (me) corners that held people up, it was more to do with familiarity with the GK involved. MARATHON got me. There are so many battles that I don’t expect to know, and with the intersecting 1 down, I didn’t know Mr Icke in MICKEY, so the mouse was hiding. I spent some time looking for a reversal (revolutionary) of murdered, but with the T at fourth last letter, and not having the wordplay yet, I then went for TROT(sky) who was a revolutionary, also murdered.

21. I missed a few parsings, as is clear from seeing the blog and some comments, but I completed the grid. Which was satisfying, and this was an enjoyable challenge. I think, although it’s felt like a tough week overall, that’s been to my benefit and I felt more match-ready today as a direct result.

22. My daughter lives in Hove, so HEAVE raised a smile.

23. I was convinced DESIGNER was connected to RESIGNER = one withdrawing, so failed to find the explanation.

    Thanks Andrew, particularly for September. Thanks Imogen, too

24. [ muffin yesterday. Wildy off topic, I’m afraid. I left a taster for a lockdown themed version of “Innisfree” and others here yesterday but it was probably too late for you]

25. Everything fell nicely into place for me this morning although I couldn’t quite parse ECHINACEA and SEPTEMBER
    Many thanks Imogen and Andrew. Lovely puzzle.

26. I understand why people wait for our illustrious bloggers here on fifteen squared, but I don’t understand why people don’t look up the web or dictionaries for bits that are unknown. Perhaps, as an Antipodean, I expect definitions and parts of wordplay will be unknown to me, so I’m in the habit of looking things up.
    I’d like to share something that I’ve found recently. I don’t have Chambers and usually go to Onelook, but I’ve recently found this search https://www.google.com/search?q=define:(whatever you want to define). Some searches result in an AI summary which is very helpful, and then leads to the dictionary sources. Or just go to Google and type define:(the word you’re looking for, for example SEPT define:sept

27. I understand why people wait for our illustrious bloggers here on fifteen squared, but I don’t understand why people don’t look up the web or dictionaries for bits that are unknown. Perhaps, as an Antipodean, I expect definitions and parts of wordplay will be unknown to me, so I’m in the habit of looking things up.
    I’d like to share something that I’ve found recently. I don’t have Chambers and usually go to Onelook, but I’ve recently found this search https://www.google.com/search?q=define:(whatever you want to define). Some searches result in an AI summary which is very helpful, and then leads to the dictionary sources. Or just go to Google and type define:(the word you’re looking for, for example SEPT define:sept

28. Nicely constructed puzzle. I enjoyed the well-spotted anagrams for CUSTOMER and SPOILER ALERT and the clever constructions for MARATHON, NO END IN SIGHT, OUTHOUSE and HYBRID (cleverly hidden).

    ‘Drug fiend’ for addict is definitely pre-war slang; Agatha Christie used the expression frequently.

    It’s possible to be an atheist and still be familiar with religious terminology. This one was, and SEPTEMBER posed no parsing difficulties (though I spotted SEPT first) 🙂

    Thanks to S&B

29. [pino @24
    Thanks, but my search only found the Yeats version, despite being careful to type “won’t”!
    Links are quite easy to enter. Copy the URL (CtrlC), highlight the text in your post you want the link on, click on “link” (underlined, above the text entry box), then paste the URL in the box that appears (CtrlV), OK it, and there you are.]

30. Gervase@28. I was raised an Anglican, later converted to Atheism. Had never heard of ember . I had to channel Pasquale today, ember and rosary. I even looked up Imogen to see if he’d also set for the Church Times, but not that I could see.

31. A nice chewy puzzle. I knew the sense of ‘fiend’ from an old American folk song ‘Like a fiend with his dope or a drunkard his wine, A man will have lust for the lure of the mine’.

32. A couple of clues that will go into my little book of crossword delights…EARTH, NO END IN SIGHT, and HEAVE for example, but a few that got bifd in but which I would never have parsed in a million years. Never heard of M Marat, Sept, ora ember (days).

    Thanks to paddymelon for the search tip, really useful.

33. [Apologies for the duplicate posts at 26 and 27. I’ve been having a bit of trouble with that lately and attempted to cancel the duplicate, but it didn’t work. I know others have had similar experiences. )

34. This seemed a bit gentler than some of Imogen’s output. Unlike others above, I got stuck in the SE corner. I thought the DESIGNER was likely to be some clothes’ manufacturer that I had never heard of. I manged to forget the THOU in OUTHOUSE.

    I liked NO END IN SIGHT, the good anagrams for LAUREL WREATH and SPOILER ALERT, the sweaty beads, HEAVE (ha ha!), and the bed cover in SATURNINE.

    Thanks Imogen and Andrew.

35. paddymelon @29: I thought that the Battle of MARATHON was perhaps the only well known one from ancient times, because the legend of a messenger running all the way to Athens to announce that the Greeks had defeated the Persians (and promptly dropping dead) is the origin of the name of the long distance run.

36. I agree with others that HEAVE is a gem. I inadvertently left it off the podium…

37. I liked ‘my mouse’ MICKEY, OUTHOUSE for its surface, and the shedder PEELER.
    Thanks Imogen and scchua.

38. ‘Addict’ is a straight definition for ‘fiend’ in Chambers. Though I do wish I had actually checked ’ember’ whilst I was there: my bad for dismissing the very idea that it might be a day. I am guilty, with that one, of doing precisely what pdm refers to @26! Needless to say, that was nho. I found this tough but the grid did clear on the second attempt once I had returned to it after a work break. Some cunning constructions right from the off with ‘Revolutionary murdered’ = MARAT – very nice. CUSTOMER is an amusing subtractive anagram and LAUREL WREATH an even more amusing one: what an image! ECHINACEA was a neat way to clue a potentially tricky word and HEAVE a clever little trick. Finally, the ‘paid for cover’ was smoothly done and HYBRID utilises a hidden indicator this solver has not seen before.

    Thanks Imogen and Andrew

39. Yes, Gervase@35. . I did know about the battle of Marathon, but I had to get the right wordplay and the right revolutionary and sweetie, and Mickey Mouse and crossers to get it. I’ve found that GK and word patterns really affect the solve, while the synapses fire back and forth in the brain, which is what cryptics are all about, exemplified today where solvers have had success in different quadrants. Gotta give it to Imogen.

40. Regarding 27 across, today is my youngest son’s 20th birthday. He has very long hair and, being extremely prone to over-anxiety, he is always unable properly to relax. The appearance of the clue today appeared to be a bizarre coincidence to both of us.

41. This was good fun, my favourite the simple but effective “Sod the planet”. “Present from Hove” was also very neat.

    I think I first came across MANIOC in one of the Nigel Molesworth books, in which he’s answering some geography questions and he does indeed confuse it with “maniac”. (Alas I no longer have the books so can’t look up the exact quote.)

    Many thanks Imogen and Andrew.

42. The NW corner took a long time to fall. NHO Marat nor Icke, which didn’t help. Also NHO manioc or echinacea; sept or ember days, which made 13A a bung-and-hope;

    I failed to parse the “reverse clue” at 14a, although in hindsight it is very clever, and the parsing of outhouse defeated me.

    Other than that, this was a roaring success

43. What a great clue at six down – so simple yet …!

44. Lovely puzzle from Imogen, eventually solved but not totally parsed.
    Thanks Andrew for Mr ICKE, EMBER, SAE and THOU.
    I loved MARATHON, which demonstrated the usefulness of once studying French history. Other favourites were ROSARY (beads of sweat, a great misdirection), the cleverly constructed OPEN SANDWICH, the anagram SPOILER ALERT and the well hidden HYBRID.
    Thanks to Imogen and Andrew.

45. And I agree with others, HEAVE was brilliant!

46. Paddymelon@26 Looking things up for definitions and explanations is certainly sound advice when one has the whole word, or indeed only lacks some component of a charade. But not knowing either SEPT or EMBER, I had nothing to go on, and I doubt googling SEPTEMBER would have helped much 🙁 Regardless, I think it is a good clue for those who had the vocabulary.

    Anyway, I now have SEPT in my back pocket for the next time it surfaces [sic] which it surely will.

47. Grantinfreo @5 I knew about Ember days and I’ve seen sept before, but I needed the crossers to see it.

    I knew Marat from the painting and took a minute to remember his namem

    Needed the blog to parse OUTHOUSES. Thank you to Andrew and Imogen.

48. A DNF after I for BYROAD for 20d, which is a pity because DESIGNER is lovely; but a decent amount of fun on the way. A delight of MARATHON lay in “revolutionary” for once not being CHE. 18a is a brilliant spot though prompts a “Eeugh” moment rather than an “Aha!”
    Nice contemporary political reference in 12a, too.
    Thanks to Imogen and Andrew

49. Nduto @22: I have a flat in Hove so I also liked that one. Another with no idea about EMBER but easy to solve. I thought the sweetie was MARATHON so couldn’t parse that either, along with OUTHOUSE. All in all a fun solve, despite suffering with return from Japan jet lag. The SE was my nemesis but my favourite was HYBRID for the surface and def.

    Ta Imogen & Andrew

50. I had the opposite experience to our blogger, as 1a and 1d in the far NW were my last ones in. I had been looking for a synonym for ‘my’, such as COR or GEE, and it was a very late thought that it could be MY itself, and then the ‘mouse’ himself also came to mind. Doh!

    I’m another atheist who knew of (SEPT)EMBER days, but it took me much longer to put E(CHINA)CEA together, some sort of neuron malfunction having hidden that old Cockney rhyming slang chestnut in the wrong memory cell.

    I really enjoyed the clue for HEAVE – so many writers use hove as if it is the present tense, and what today’s setter wrote would be a great aide memoire for them.

    Thanks to Imogen and Andrew.

51. Solved only 7 clues on my first pass. Tough but enjoyable.

    I could not parse 13ac and 16d.

    Favourites: OUTHOUSE, DESIGNER, MARATHON.

    New for me: English conspiracy theorist David Vaughan Icke (for 1d) – found via google, never heard of him; SAE = stamped addressed envelope .

52. Much gentler than yesterday’s, no big problems. I wasn’t sure of the parsing of SEPTEMBER, if the WP had included something for P in SET it would work better for me.

    Having once lived in Hove, was racking my brains for any distinguishing feature of that not-very-inspiring neighbour to Brighton. Just shows how misdirection can stump one.

    Everything else was fine. Liked NO END IN SIGHT, SPOILER ALERT, OUTHOUSE, ROSARY, MICKEY, CRIBBAGE (learnt to play it once, but long forgotten how it’s scored). And more…

    Thanks to Imogen and Andrew.

53. Very enjoyable, with all my ticks already mentioned above. Like some others, I failed to parse SEPTEMBER. Last one in was ECHINACEA (I think you meant E-CHIN(ACE)A sheffield hatter@50), one of two new words that were very gettable from the cluing. Thanks Imogen and Andrew.

54. Another good crossword today. ‘Fiends’ is still used, or at least was used until recently, if the Baltimore of The Wire is as realistic as it seems to be.

55. [Pino@24 and muffin: is this what you have been trying to find and link?]

56. [Many thanks, gladys @55]

57. Thanks Paul@53. That’s how the clue works, but I was highlighting that CHINA was the bit that my memory inexplicably failed to retrieve!)

58. Is a BAGEL a roll?

59. 9a and 18a are my successes.

    If I’m allowed, could I ask for a hint about how to look at 1a & 5a please?

    Just to try to get some letters on the board.

60. Hi Steffen
    For 5a you need to insert an H (“hair at first”) into a word for bags to get a word for sheds (noun rather than verb).
    1a is very difficult if you haven’t heard of the murdered revolutionary. He was French.

61. Great puzzle – I liked the ones that everybody liked.

    “Policeman once” in 26a suggests that PEELER for copper is an archaic or obsolete term, but you’ll still hear it in Northern Ireland.

62. Miche @61
    The origin of “peeler” (and, indeed, “bobby”) goes back to Robert Peel’s time as Home Secretary in the 1820s, when he started to create a police force. I wonder why, this side of the Irish Sea at least, “bobby” seems to have survived better.

63. Fiends of Dope Island was the title of The Cramps last LP.

64. Thank you @60.

    A day to forget.

    “Reveal” is a magical function.

65. gladys@55
    That’s it. Many thanks. I thought it might be an amusing test of GK for readers.

66. George Clements@31: Nice to hear Merle Travis quoted in these hollow walls.

    PostMark@38: ‘a work break’? Hope you don’t mind my finding that very funny. I used to take those myself back in the day…. 🙂

    gladys@55: Pam Ayres?

67. muffin@62 re PEE;ER and Bobby on either side of the Irish Sea. I wonder if it was how police were viewed? As your enemy (surname) or your friend, (first name and a familiar one at that)?

68. sheffield hatter@57 – oh I get it now. Sorry!

69. Alphalpha@66: it does sound like her, but the sources I found don’t give an author’s name.

70. Alphalpha@66 and gladys@69
    Most persuasive suggestion I’ve seen is that the author is a retired civil servant from the Cotswolds. The first version I saw had a rude word in the last line instead of “trial”. My brief study of philology leads me to think that versions without this are unlikely to be original.

71. I was defeated by MANIOC: never heard of it, so I bunged in an unparsed MANIAC. I also didn’t get FIEND, although I do know this meaning of the word and in hindsight it seems like a straightforward clue.

    I’d managed to forget all about David Icke, so thanks (?) to Imogen for bringing him back to mind.

    I’m usually not a big fan of cryptic definitions, but 6dn (HEAVE) made me laugh when I finally spotted it.

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