Independent 11,979 by Stamp

21 comments on “Independent 11,979 by Stamp”

1. Respect! A double pangram! And a very enjoyable one it was too.

   I’m not entirely convinced by the definition for 1d.

   20d – As a cricket player for over 70 years, except perhaps in the context of a crossword, I don’t think that “fielded” would ever be used interchangeably with “caught” (even though, of course, a catch is the action of a fielder.)

   My top picks from a great selection of clues were SATRAPS, QUEUE and UNFED.

   Many thanks to Stamp and to beermagnet.

2. Thanks Stamp and beermagnet.
   Enjoyed the puzzle and the blog.

   Faves: The differently masqued MASQUE, ATHWART (Another nice one to come across), EXACTLY (lively), QUEUE (is there something between the lines?) JEWELS (a gem of a clue-gems, grammar permitting) and YIELDED (full satisfaction).

   SATRAPS (I thought)
   Greek city state=SPARTA—->SPARTA’S
   TEACUPFUL
   CAD?
   AT PRESENT
   feel bitter about=RESENT
   def: Now

3. The double pangram gave me JEWELS, my loi.
   I parsed REACQUIRE as REAC(H) (range limited) + QUIRE (“CHOIR”).
   ATHWART always makes me thing of Kubla Khan

4. I was very pleased to almost solve this. Just undone at the end by nho SATRAPS. Double pangram is very impressive. I only spotted a single pangram but that at least nudged me into believing that JEWELS might begin with a J. I agree that one is COTD. Other favourites amongst a great bunch: OUTBRAG, TROPHY, COUCHETTE and REMIND. Thanks Stamp & beermagnet.

5. REACQUIRE
   Had the same parse as Hovis@3
   MASQUE (my understanding)
   grandma’s questioned about—>grandma’s questioned (is) around MASQUE
   Someone may explain this better. In any case, we can expect the setter to drop
   by sometime later.

6. The first time I’ve come across Stamp. It certainly required some head scratching and a second cup of coffee. SATRAPS dredged from memory and parsed as others above. In retrospect, all clues were fair and some clever and/or witty. When completing crosswords online I tend to write in the whole word regardless of any crossers already in place. The number of times I forget to uncheck the ‘skip over filled squares’ option constantly amazes me, you’d think I’d have learnt by now. That and my habit of completing a down answer before realising the across squares are actually the ones faintly highlighted!
   Thank you anyway to Stamp and beermagnet.

7. Setter dropping in early, before I head out for a while, to thank beermagnet for an excellent blog and to thank commenters for their input. I am pleased JEWELS and EXACTLY have been highlighted as they were two of my favourites. The setting of the double pangram rather mirrored the blogger’s solve: I had completed half the grid and discovered I had almost got one pangram by chance and was well on the way to a second. They are not a device of interest to all solvers but it seemed churlish not to complete the set (which is why HADJI and LUXOR found a home).

   KVa and Hovis have the right parse for REACQUIRE and SATRAPS was intended to be simply SPARTA’S (= Greek city state’s) in reverse. KVa also has the right parse for AT PRESENT with RESENT = ‘feel bitter about’ and the def being ‘now’. The only other significant tweak to the blog is QUEUE which I intended to be defined simply as ‘waiters’; the ‘should be’ is the link to the WP.

   RD @1: all mobiles tend to move due to air currents which can give them rotation but, in particular, many of the mobiles sold to encourage the sleep of cot-bound infants feature electronic or clockwork rotation so ‘works in rotation’ seemed a reasonable cryptic def. The editor did query (f)IELDING = ‘caught’ and, tbh, I’m not surprised at your query. I’m going to claim Chambers as justification: To catch (the ball) or stop and return it to the principal playing area. That certainly seems to give catching as one definition – particularly since the subsequent returning of the ball etc. is not required after a catch. Which, to me, confirmed that element as an alternative definition. Might one say ‘Well fielded’ to someone who has caught the ball?

   Thanks again.

8. Stamp @7. Many thanks for your comments and particularly for such a fun puzzle to solve.

   My points are very minor. For 1d, my concern is that MOBILES “work in rotation”. I would be happy with “works in rotation” as a definition for MOBILE.

   For 20d, I totally agree that catching is part of fielding, but I don’t think anyone (or rather any cricketer!) would say “well fielded” for a good catch! As an aside, I don’t think that particular Chambers definition for “field” is their finest, although Collins’ is even worse!

9. Parsed 24a QUEUE as a noun, with just “Waiters” as the definition. 29a REMIND: definition = “(to) serve as memento”. [The hyphen was cheeky.]
   LOi 8d JEWELS – Very Nice. 😉 [19d game = gammy]

10. Rabbit Dave@8
    MOBILES
    ‘Works in rotation’ in the sense of ‘works, that are in rotation’ seems to work all right.

11. I always find Stamp’s puzzles a challenge and this one lived up to expectations. I think I’ve always added ‘but ultimately satisfying’ and that’s true once more – but this time the ultimate satisfaction took a little longer.

    Like our blogger, I ended up bogged down in the bottom right-hand corner, with 19ac and 20 down. I, too, went for EXACTOR (a very poor clue I thought – and I couldn’t parse the second part! ) but it took ages to disabuse myself of that, until I realised that 20dn really was YIELDED, as I’d suspected from the outset, if only I could have seen the significance of the other side of folly! 8dn was still looming in the background, seemingly intransigent and I thought I’d have to give up on that. I am totally oblivious to and uninterested in pangrams and so I had failed to see that we had even one! I think I finally got my comeuppance on that one. I was rather bruised from so much kicking of myself but, yes, ultimately satisfied!

    I enjoyed the solve and had numerous ticks: ATHWART (liked the device and, like Hovis, thought of Kubla Khan), LUXOR and SATRAPS (both up my street), ELIZABETH, for the Queen bee, ANNUITY, for the night in Paris, although I’m still not quite convinced of the definition, HYDRA (also up my street but that didn’t stop me searching for an anagram of heady!) TROPHY and TEACUPFUL, for the amusing surfaces and REACQUIRE, which I parsed as Hovis and KVa did. EXACTLY came out as top favourite, once the definition penny dropped!

    I started writing this about an hour ago and was interrupted by an important telephone call, which needed action, so I have been overtaken by others, as I expected. I couldn’t start all over again, so please forgive my rambling.

    Many thanks to Stamp for another cracker of a puzzle and beermagnet for an entertaining blog.

12. KVa @ #2
    Agree with you about SPARTA’S, and the over enthusiastic underlining for AT PRESENT. I will correct.
    I didn’t understand your TEACUPFUL / CAD? comment

    Hovis @ #3
    I got the wordplay explanation for REACQUIRE very wrong – I lost the “AC” – I will correct

    And just like Eileen I started writing this about 2 hours ago and got interrupted

    Many thanks to Stamp for dropping in

13. beermagnet@12
    Thanks.
    TEACUPFUL
    I was asking if it was a clue-as-def. Probably not.

14. In addition to the generally praised EXACTLY JEWELS and ATHWART, I would add MOBILES for adding an admirable and new (for me) famous person to the crossword pantheon and SCRUFF for the neat construction. Great stuff, Stamp! I thought TEACUPFUL was a Cad, too.

15. Never think to look for pangrams and, to judge from our reviewer’s comments, maybe I do myself a favour sometimes! Found this puzzle tough but worth the effort and my top three were ATHWART. FALLING & REMIND.

    Thanks to Stamp for the challenge and to beermagnet for the review.

16. This was indeed on the harder side, but I’m a bit embarrassed that I didn’t figure out ELIZABETH immediately. I thought ER first for queen, but then switched to a few other names for queens without even thinking about the very name ER represented.

17. Thanks both. Very clever; alas, too clever for me in a few places, most notably the nho ATHWART, the once-seen but forgotten SATRAPS . I eventually worked out SIOUX , and can admire it, which assisted LUXOR but Latin will always be an unwelcome foreign language for me, JEWELS is impressive, though I had originally determined J was not a valid abbreviation for Japanese, yet evidently it must be.

18. For once I did spot the double pangram, but alas too late for it to be of any use! I found most of this quite approachable, with some typically smooth surfaces and entertaining wordplay, but took an age to properly sort out EVENTS. That then allowed me to think of the feminine form of the French word to get the carriage, having previously toyed with CET.

    I particularly liked EXACTLY, MASQUE, and TROPHY.

    Thanks both.

19. Thanks Stamp for a top-notch crossword. I spotted the double pangram in the works and that helped me with a number of solutions. Like others I found this moderately difficult and I resorted to ‘checking my guesses’ for the last few clues. My top picks were BROAD BEAN, DIPSO, SATRAPS (a lifetime of crosswords has taught me a few words), FALLING, MOBILES, SIOUX, and, of course, JEWELS when I saw the complete parsing on the blog. Thanks beermagnet for filling in my parsing gaps.

20. We’ve only just found time to look at today’s puzzle and were pleased to see that it was set by Stamp.

    Everyone has picked up on the clues that we liked but we did not pick up on the double pangram! Perhaps we can blame it on the fact that we are on holiday or it is late – apologies Stamp. You really did well to fit everything in. We did wonder about the inclusion of HADJI but all is now revealed.

    Thanks to S&B.

21. A full day late here–just wanted to mention that fielded = caught works just fine if you’re playing baseball.

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