A cracker of a crossword by Ludwig

by

This special puzzle was included in the Guardian’s magazine today.

Ludwig has set two puzzles for The Guardian previously this year; the second one caused some controversy. This one is less likely to do so, being obviously Christmas-themed and aimed at casual, rather than regular, solvers. I’ve had to put this blog together in something of a rush, so apologies for any errors.

ACROSS
1 EMMA THOMPSON
Love Actually star portraying matchmaker with submachine gun (4,8)
Jane Austen character; brand of submachine gun
9 ADULT
Commercial with gateau: sinful, succulent ultimately – and fruity, perhaps?(5)
AD (commercial), final letters of gateaU sinfuL succulenT.
10 GOAL-TENDER
Long-eared bats surrounding tense person playing on ice (4-6)
*(T inside LONG-EARED). Bats is the anagram indicator.
12 MADONNA
Nativity figure who wore conical bras? (7)
Double definition.
14 NICHOLAS I
Gift-giving saint, one that’s ruthless autocrat (8,1)
(St) Nicholas I.
15 NUTSO
What comes after pudding? Nothing? Foolish! (5)
NUTS might follow pudding: O. The word doesn’t appear in Chambers but can no doubt be found in other dictionaries.
16 LIE-ABED
Wife absent, sadly bewailed: She’s still asleep! (3-4)
*BEWAILED less the W(ife). “Sadly” is the anagram indicator.
18 MPS
Starters of mince pies served for politicians (3)
First letters of Mince Pies Served.
19 BADINAGE
Somewhere in hubbub – a din – a genial back-and-forth (8)
Hidden in “hubbub a din a genial”.
20 POT BELLY
Woman who put the kettle on, having eaten last bits of sweet honeycomb toffee – the result? (3,5)
Last letters of sweeT honeycomB toffeE inside POLLY (who put the kettle on).
23 IVY
Holly’s partner audible in Latin foursome (3)
IV is four in Roman numerals; I suppose that if you add the Y, you might choose to say it out loud, but I fear that I may be missing something.
24 BAGFULS
Amounts carried by Santa – for the black sheep? (7)
Cryptic definition, referring to the nursery rhyme.
25 ELENA
Woman taking part in ukulele nativity (5)
Hidden in ukulele nativity.
26 GREETINGS
Get singer tipsy? On the cards, you’ll find (9)
*(GET SINGER).
29 MIDDLE C
Line below treble stave as featured in The Nutcracker? (6,1)
Middle letter of (the nut)C(racker). My very musical wife assures me that the definition is perfectly accurate.
30 COLOURINGS
First bit of cake mix glorious, jammed with new red and green icing? (10)
C(ake) and N(ew) in *GLORIOUS.
32 LEVEL
What may come after spirit – looking backwards and forwards! (5)
Cryptic definition of a palindrome.
33 MICHAEL CAINE
You might take this walking stick, gripping one as portrayer of Scrooge (7,5)
MICHAEL (you might take the micky, or Michael), I (one) in CANE. The film was The Muppets’ Christmas Carol.
DOWN
1 ELTON JOHN
Christmas hitmaker, Ben, on the loo in America? (5,4)
(Ben) ELTON, JOHN (slang for loo in the USA).
2 MUG
It might be cocoa, simpleton! (3)
Cryptic definition.
3 TRAIN SET
Coach ready for railway enthusiast’s gift (5,3)
A simple charade of TRAIN (coach) SET (ready).
4 OPTIC
What follows fibre – something containing a little whisky? (5)
Double definition.
5 PENFOLD
Danger Mouse’s sidekick to hem in congregation (7)
PEN (hem in) FOLD (congregation),
6 OPERA
Appearing in panto, per annum – it‘s a lavish stage show (5)
Another hidden answer.
7 RAYMOND BRIGGS
Cartoonist in whose tale an inhuman being is ultimately liquidated? (7,6)
Cryptic definition, referring to the story (and animated film shown every Christmas) of The Snowman, who (spoiler alert) melts at the end of the story.
8 OUTDATEDLY
Yule: dad and tot made mincemeat in old-fashioned way (10)
*(YULE DAD TOT); another word that doesn’t appear in Chambers.
11 KIRSTY MACCOLL
Small city, Cork, excited seeing duettist on festive classic (6,7)
*(SMALL CITY CORK). The song was Fairytale of New York.
13 ALL AGOG
Like children on Christmas Eve, at long last anticipating glimpsing obese gifter? (3,4)
Initial letters of all the words following the comma, although there’s nothing in the clue that I can see to indicate that.
17 BLOSSOM
Poinsettia perhaps blooms extravagantly around start of season (7)
S(eason) inside *BLOOMS.
18 MOLTEN LAVA
Noel toasted with a malt, very very warming liquid (6,4)
*(NOEL A MALT V(ery)).
21 BRENDA LEE
Spooner to loan French cheese to American who sang about a Christmas tree (6,3)
Spoonerism (lend a Brie).
22 SUBSONIC
Billion cousins gathered, not as quickly as you hear (8)
*(B(illion) COUSINS).
24 BETROTH
Be on time, turn heads initially as you give true love a gold ring? (7)
OR (gold) (rev) inside BE T(ime), T(urn) H(eads). I’m not sure I’ve got this right, as I can’t see a reversal indicator for OR and it seems to be doing double duty anyway,
27 EMOJI
Recalled this writer twice screening Ms Brand as🎅 (5)
I ME (this writer twice, rev) around JO (Brand).
28 NORSE
Origin of Trafalgar Square tree: northern or south-eastern? (5)
N(orthern) OR SE (south-eastern).
31 SKI
Have fun in the snow, ignoring some riskiness (3)
Another hidden clue.

28 comments on “A cracker of a crossword by Ludwig”

  2. Enjoyed that. Thankfully my general knowledge was up to scratch which gave me all the sides within minutes so one of my quicker solves.

    I thought IVY was just a homophone of “I” & “V”

  4. Entertaining puzzle with a fun theme.

    I think Staticman1@2 has IVY parsed.

    My other quibble was that poinsettias are not flowers or blossoms, the red (usually) comes from the bracts or leaves, the flowers are nondescript.

    Thank you bridgesong and Ludwig with Christmas greetings to all.

  6. Rob in Brussels @5 – where does the ROT come from?

    The clue says:

    Be on time, turn heads initially as you give true love a gold ring? (7)

    So parsing that: BE (from the clue) + (on) T (time), T H (turn heads initially) gives BE T TH

    That’s missing the RO to make it BE T RO TH with definition of: as you give true love a gold ring

    OR means gold in heraldic colours, but there’s no reversal indicator, and the grammar of cryptic crosswords are that there should be indicators for reversals.

    Alternatively O means love, but unless there’s a missing initially after ring to give the R that’s not clued properly – but with that initially you could argue for an &lit.

  7. Shanne @6 – I’m suggesting BE + T as you have it, then ROT (= turn, as in go off, spoil) + H (heads initially), and the rest as a wordy definition to fit the Christmas theme (true love/gold ring).

  9. The Trafalgar Square Christmas tree has a NORSE origin – but C isn’t the middle letter of nutCraCker – or am I missing something? Never heard NUTSO before either. But a nice crossword to fill in time for those who don’t propose to tackle that daunting Prize.

  11. Thanks to Staticman1 @2 and to Rob in Brussels @5 for correcting my parsings of IVY and BETROTH. Had I not been in such a rush to get the blog up, I might have worked them both out.

  12. I wasn’t really concentrating so quickly entered MULLED WINE at 18d (more Christmassy than MOLTEN LAVA) and so failed to finish.

  13. I don’t understand the comment about the Trafalgar Square tree. Doesn’t it come from Norway, hence is NORSE?

  14. I didn’t notice this puzzle yesterday so have just whizzed through. I rather enjoyed it. It’s a good grid fill with plenty of festive elements. Thanks to bridgesong for the short notice blog and for other commenters for sorting out the queries – I think Rob in Brussels (seasonally appropriate) has the right parse for BE T ROT H and I parsed NORSE in the same way as KVa though making the same mistake as Gladys and possibly others when I first attempted it. Including ‘The’ is totally fair – indeed, the word would otherwise be filler. I managed to misdirect myself for a while by entering GLASS, which can follow fibre- and might contain whisky, instead of OPTIC but crossers noted that out. MICHAEL CAINE, KIRSTY MACCOLL and the delightful MOLTEN LAVA – which I SO wanted to fill in as MULLED WINE but could not pass – were my podium.

    Thanks Ludwig and bridge song.

  15. Anyone for eggnog? A comforting Christmas concoction from Ludwig.
    I can’t find a “bah-humbug” anywhere.

    13(down) concludes “early on”, so that’s yer “initial letters indicator”; 28(down) concludes “southeastern”, for “SE”.

    I can’t see why IVY, 23(ac), is an issue….it’s just a nice seasonal phonetic.
    NUTSO, 15(ac), is a bit more US slang, a pejorative for “insane”, and I might have preferred

    ” What comes after pudding? Nothing, silly!”

    but that’s just splitting walnuts.

    So much to enjoy in this crossword, but the idea for a Spoonerism on “Brenda Lee” is genius.
    Compliments of the Season, Ludwig. For me, “all the right notes, and…in the right order”.

  16. The problem with the clue for NORSE is that in my rush to write the blog, I mistakenly put north-eastern instead of south-eastern! My apologies to Ludwig. I have now corrected the error.

    I should add that normally the excellent blogging utility simply cuts and pastes the clues so there is no risk of this sort of thing happening, but last night the pdf of the puzzle simply failed to load so I had to type the clues into the utility individually.

  17. Thanks Sphinx and Bridgesong

    A couple of great misdirections made this a bit trickier than otherwise. All fair and quite amusing. Not as polished as some of the usual but not to a distracting extent

    Was Sphinx a celebrity Setter (Mark Gattis comes to mind) or am I barking up the wrong tree?

    More please ed.

  18. Bridgesong. On my app it does read ” northern or southeastern”.

    Typo gremlins striking grunniad again

  20. Thnx Bridgesong – so I had wrong Setter and wrong member of League of Gentlemen; apart from that…

    More coffee needed before Everyman

  22. Pleased to see this pop up on Sunday as I was mourning the absence of the normal Saturday Prize this week.

    Got stuck thinking the West side long clue was an anagram but ground it out from the crossers. Similar story on the East side but I stuck with the letters that seemed clued for the anagram and it eventually jumped out at me.

    Overall very enjoyable indeed thanks to Ludwig and bridgesong.

  23. Rickk @22: there is a Guardian Prize puzzle In yesterday’s paper, although for some reason it is labelled Guardian special cryptic crossword. It’s on page 54 of the main section and is also available on the Guardian website.

  25. Many thanks for the festive offering bridgesong and Ludwig. Well done to bridgesong for an excellent blog in less than ideal circumstances, and to Ludwig for managing not to be controversial at all. This wss just right for Christmas.

    I went for MULLED WINE, but then saw the error of my ways. My favourites this time we’re all people: BRENDA LEE, KIRSTY MACCOLL and MICHAEL CAINE.

    Merry Christmas everybody, and all the best for 2025.

  27. oed.com has 15a “NUTSO colloquial (originally and chiefly U.S.).”, as adjective (1971–), noun (1975–), and even adverb (rare 1980–), with citations including:
    “1981 Are you stark raving nutso, schmuck? Rod Sterling’s Twilight Zone Magazine July 31/2″ (though they’ve misspelt Mr Serling’s Sername [sic])

  28. Ludwig’s puzzle was really good fun with some laugh out-loud moment. Without using Google very often, I got the cultural references. Thank you Bridgesong and commenters for providing assistance.

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