Guardian 29650 / Vulcan

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Vulcan sets the Guardian cryptic puzzle every second Monday at the moment.

The only entry that I didn’t know today was PENSTEMON, the ‘showy flower’ at 27 across.  The wordplay though was clear and PENSTEMON seemed to be the most likely arrangment of the letters before I checked the definition in a dictionary.

I liked the ‘school reunion’ at 7 across and the word picture of ‘being so captivated by [the music of] Schumann’ at 8 across.

I thought many of the surfaces were very good and effective in very few words.  For me, clues in this category included those for AGENT, SPIN OFF, VILLA and TALLOW

I’m not a great fan of cryptic definitions, but I know other solvers take a different view and I also know that Monday morning Guardians have a long history of such clues.

FFF for ‘unbelievably noisy’ raised a smile.

No Detail
Across  
7 School reunion you can’t get out of your mind? (9) 

OBSESSION (something that occupies the thoughts obstinately and persistently; can’t get out of your mind)

OB (old boys; former pupils) + SESSION (sitting; meeting) – taken together the two words could describe a gathering of former pupils at a school reunion

OB SESSION
8 Being so captivated by Schumann (5) 

HUMAN (a being; a HUMAN being)

HUMAN (hidden word in [so captivated by] ScHUMANn)

HUMAN
9 They lend two overlapping signs (9) 

LIBRARIES (organisations that lend books)

LIBRA (one of the signs of the zodiac) + ARIES (another sign of the zodiac) – the two signs overlap to share the A

LIBR A RIES
10 Factor in a chap (5) 

AGENT (factor [an AGENT managing heritable estates for another person])

A + GENT (man; chap)

A GENT
12 Park official who won’t give up? (6) 

KEEPER (reference a PARK–KEEPER [official employed to patrol a public park, keep order, etc] or someone who looks after animals in a zoological park)

KEEPER (someone who retains items; someone who won’t give [things] up)   double definition

KEEPER
13 Half caught in large-scale outbreak (8) 

EPIDEMIC (outbreak)

DEMI (half) contained in (caught in) EPIC (large-scale)  – large-scale could also apply to the description of an EPIDEMIC

EPI (DEMI) C
14 Incidental benefit of bringing fast bowlers back? (4-3) 

SPIN OFF (incidental benefit)

SPIN OFF (if the fast bowlers have returned to bowl in a game of cricket, that means that the SPIN bowlers have been taken OFF)

SPIN OFF
17 Run into wrong castle, looking embarrassed (7) 

SCARLET (if someone is embarrassed, their skin colour may turn SCARLET)

R (run) contained in (into) an anagram of (wrong) CASTLE

SCA (R) LET*
20 Accurate, which this isn’t for Marianne (8) 

FAITHFUL (exact; accurate)

FAITHFUL (probably a reference to the singer Marianne FAITHFUL [1946-2025] who may not always have been [which this isn’t] FAITHFUL to her husbands.  Alternatively, a reference to the character MARIANNE Sheridan in the 2020 TV drama Normal People)

FAITHFUL
22 Foreign letter from boy a doctor accepted (6) 

LAMBDA (letter of the Greek alphabet; foreign letter)

(LAD [boy] + A) containing (accepted) MB (Bachelor of Medicine; doctor)

LA (MB) D A
24 House is plain, article not seen in it (5) 

VILLA (country house; also described by Chambers as a superior middle-class house)

VANILLA (plain) excluding (not seen) AN (indefinite article)

VILLA
25 Staff briefly enrage Norwegian city (9) 

STAVANGER (city in Norway)

STAVE (staff) excluding the final letter (briefly) E + ANGER (enrage)

STAV ANGER
26 Have no money, displaying spite (5) 

VENOM (spite)

VENOM (hidden word in [displaying] haVE NO Money

VENOM
27 Showy flower in enclosure Monet’s reproduced (9) 

PENSTEMON (a plant of a mainly N American showy-flowered genus)

PEN (enclosure) + an anagram of (reproduced) MONET’S

PEN STEMON*
Down  
1 Compel to be helpful (6) 

OBLIGE (bind morally or legally; compel)

OBLIGE (do something as a favour; be helpful)  double definition

OBLIGE
2 Partner and I ordered turtle (8) 

TERRAPIN (any of various webfooted pond or river turtles of the family Emydidae)

Anagram of (ordered) PARTNER and I

TERRAPIN*
3 A person of great interest (6) 

USURER (a moneylender who charges very high levels of [great] interest)

This is simply a cryptic definition

USURER
4 Was still off the ground? (7) 

HOVERED (of a helicopter, for example, remained suspended [was still] above the ground)

This too is simply a cryptic definition, although it could also describe the action of someone who loitered nearby in a fairly still manner

HOVERED
5 Reluctantly move across island for pet (6) 

BUDGIE (BUDGerigar; pet)

BUDGE (move slightly; move with difficulty; move reluctantly) containing (across) I (island)

BUDG (I) E
6 Yellow fever? (8) 

JAUNDICE (a disease [fever] in which there is yellowing of the whites of the eyes, skin, etc, by excess of bile pigment)

This is a cryptic definition, but could also be a double definition – JAUNDICE (yellow colour, Bradfords gives yellow as a definition) and JAUNDICE (fever)

JAUNDICE
11 CID’s erroneous record (4) 

DISC (record)

Anagram of (erroneous) CID’S

DISC*
15 For hypocrite, hard to get up to join in exercise (8) 

PHARISEE (a self-righteous or hypocritical person)

(H [hard, descriptive of a pencil lead] + ARISE [get up]) contained in (to join in) PE ([physical] exercise)

P (H ARISE) E
16 Unbelievably noisy about a fiddly task (4) 

FAFF (a task that is tricky and time-consuming to complete; a fiddly task)

If F (forte) is ‘loud ‘and FF (fortissimo) is ‘as loud as possible’ then FFF could be ‘unbelievably loud or noisy’, so we have

FFF (unbelievably loud) containing (about) A

F (A) FF
18 Catholic church’s love stories (8) 

ROMANCES (love stories)

ROMAN (a ROMAN Catholic) + CES ([Churches [of England])

ROMAN CES
19 Conspirator’s device for making chart (7) 

PLOTTER (conspirator)

PLOTTER (devices for drawing graphs or charts)  double definition

PLOTTER
21 Incredible – old wife is fat (6) 

TALLOW (fat)

TALL (unbelievable; incredible) + O (old) + W (wife)

TALL O W
22 Like loos to be abundant? (6) 

LAVISH (abundant)

LAVISH (like LAVatorieS; like loos)

LAVISH
23 Approached in trembling wonder (4,2) 

DREW ON (approached)

Anagram of (trembling) WONDER

DREW ON*

 

63 comments on “Guardian 29650 / Vulcan”

  1. thanks D and V! I think that 20a is actually a reference to her actual last name FAITHFULL – so not so faithful.

  3. Iran Caron@1. Agree, it’s the spelling of (Marianne) FAITHFULL. I went on a wild goose chase with this one. Initially I thought it was a French indicator, this isn’t for Marianne. I thought that’s Nice, and it’s not Nancy. Makes a change. Couuldn’t come up with French for that isn’t which met the crossers. Then finally cottoned on. She was there in my youth in the 60’s, but as they say, if you were there you may not remember … and I didn’t remember how to spell her name. This clue is very timely. She died in January this year.

  4. STAVANGER the most challenging clue for me today. Had to get the right synonym for staff and enrage and figure out what briefly applied to, without having any idea of the answer. Finally with crossers, I remembered stave. (Doing cryptic crosswords must be helping keep dementia at bay, to some extent.)

  5. I didn’t parse ROMANCES properly and just shrugged at a possibly whimsical clue of Rome-ances. Favourite for me was the lovely OBSESSION, followed closely by TALLOW and LAVISH. 🙂

  7. Yes, pdm, vale Marianne, I remember her (somewhat) from back then.
    On a different note, I have a Schumann piano quartet ringtone, so I liked that one, and the triple fortissimo was fun too. Thanks to both.

  8. Yep, I took FAITHFUL to be a not-quite-faithful rendition of Marianne’s surname. Neat trick. Struggled a bit with LOI PHARISEE as I was looking for a contained reversed word for ‘hard’ rather than a synonym for ‘get up’. I liked LIBRARIES though I have seen it several times before; LAVISH was amusing and the three-F FAFF reminded me somewhat of the Ogden Nash lllama.

    Thanks Vulcan and duncan

  9. I don’t think the faithfulness of Marianne FAITHFULl was under question, she stuck by Mick Jagger to her own detriment, and was seen as sidekick not the artist she really was and got hooked on heroin from that liaison.

    I’m in the camp of not loving cryptic definitions so didn’t find this particularly Monday-ish.

    Thank you to Vulcan and Duncan.

  10. Nho the Norwegian city, so it must’ve been the musical cues because the voice of my first music teacher saying “staff or stave” popped straight up, making Stavanger the likely answer.

  12. One of the delights of this eccentric hobby is to construct the nho PENSTEMON from the clue, and look it up to find a flower.

    Mine is a simple mind… I’ll get my coat.

  13. Yes, it very much looked from the precise clueing that 27ac just had to be PENSTENOM, but surely there’s no such plant as that? Oh, yes there is, as I discovered by looking that one up. This left me with the whole of the NW corner unsolved early this morning, and when I came back just now it held out again for quite some time. However, eventually last one in LIBRARIES provided the clue of the day for me, and left me with a pleasant glow of satisfaction. Many thanks Vulcan and Duncan, complementing one another as a rather nice rhyming couplet this Monday morning…

  14. My favourites today were VILLA, LIBRARIES, LAVISH, FAFF and OBSESSION. I’d not heard of the city or the flower but managed to get them from the clue. I wasn’t sure about HOVERING, it seemed too obvious. Thanks to duncanshiell and Vulcan for a pleasant start to the week.
    William @12, I share your delight in unexpected discoveries 😎

  15. LIBRARIES was clever, LAVISH made me grin; I liked the surfaces, and the simplicity, of HUMAN and ROMANCES.
    STAVANGER is one of the few Norwegian cities I’ve been to – though the answer still took an age to come to mind…
    Thank you Vulcan and duncanshiell

  16. …should really have twigged LIBRARIES much sooner, as I’m in the middle of reading an incredibly detailed biography of Philip Larkin by Andrew Motion (1993) and apart from the poetry he was a rather excellent librarian himself in places such as Wellington, Leicester, Belfast and Hull…

  17. Thanks Vulcan and duncanshiell
    A couple of oddities. I agree with scolopax that jaundice isn’t associated with fever, and the “For” in 15d was strange.
    Favourite also OBSESSION.

  19. Very difficult – I failed to solve 7,24ac and 1,3,4,15d.

    Of ones I solved, I could not parse 16d.

    New for me: STAVANGER (thanks, google); PENSTEMON.

  20. FAITHFUL was the only one I didn’t understand, as I was unaware of how Marianne spelt it. Thanks Ilan Caron @ 1.
    Enjoyable today; the only one I’d never heard of was PENSTEMON.

  21. Good Monday puzzle.
    JAUNDICE may be accompanied by a high temperature, eg if caused by some types of hepatitis, and there is a question mark in the clue, so that’s OK by me.
    I’m of the generation that remembers Marianne FAITHFULl from the ’60s; her renaissance from the late ’70s onwards was IMO much more interesting, as exemplified by comparing her first hit ‘As Tears Go By’ with her 1990 version of the same song.
    Thanks Vulcan and duncanshiell.

  22. A pleasant Monday workout for the little grey cells, which are currently bathed in morphine as I recover from surgery on a broken wrist. Which is probably why I couldn’t for the life of me see how EPIDEMIC worked. Yes, overall a few too many CDs for my taste, and I wasn’t totally convinced by JAUNDICE, but like others here I enjoyed LIBRARIES, FAFF, LAVISH and STAVANGER in particular. Thanks duncanshiell and Vulcan.

  23. HUMAN my favourite because it echoes Schumann’s love of encryption in his own compositions. [Jealous of Grantinfreo@7’s Schumann piano 4tet ringtone, maybe Zoot should have a Brahms piano 4tet one having revealed he’s just acquired the Beaux Arts box set 😉] I found this at once smooth and tricky, a rewarding combo; I like the cryptic definitions (sorry Shanne@9!) precisely because they ARE quite Monday-ish in the Rufus tradition. Thank you Vulcan, and duncanshiell for doing it proud

  25. Thanks Hadrian @24 – sadly it is my dominant typing wrist! Just means that, like everything else, it takes a lot longer now…

  26. 15d I was held back by the extra ‘For’ at the beginning. Decided finally to ignore it and went ahead.

    Thanks V and D

  27. It is such a common misconception, that it was acceptable to define vanilla as ‘plain’ (in 24a), but technically it is incorrect. Anyone who has ever eaten fresh vanilla will know that it has its own distinct flavour. It is just after it has been processed that it looses this flavour and becomes ‘plain’.

  28. I remember seeing LIBRARIES before – shortly after I started doing cryptic crosswords – and I thought it was so neat it stuck in my mind so I wrote it in straightaway.

    Too many cryptic definitions for me too – but still enjoyed it – especially FAFF

    Thanks Vulcan and duncanshiell

  29. WordSDrove@26
    PHARISEE
    I think I have seen this format ‘For def, WP’ before. As good as WP for def. No?

  30. I enjoyed that after my spectacular failure at the prize on Saturday. It was more my level. I didn’t particularly like OBSESSION. ‘OB’ = ‘Old Boys’, maybe if you went to Wellington in the 1950s. It feels like crossword vocabulary rather than English. That’s not a complaint, but for me such clues go in, when I am lucky, but don’t bring a smile. I did enjoy LAVISH, a nice jokey stretch, FAFF, for its playing with crossword conventions, and LIBRARIES because it was just so pleasing.

    I’m not convinced that DREW ON is ‘approached’. It seems more like ‘enticed’, but I must alone here on that one.

    Any way I enjoyed a friendly and pleasing puzzle. Thanks Vulcan and Duncan

  31. Roberto @30
    That old soundlike pun “winter draws on”?
    OB for Old Boys featured in the names of lots of rugby clubs when I used to play – some time ago, admittedly.

  32. I suppose USURER is better than lender for 3 but I wasn’t sure until I got the crossers. I liked SPIN-0FF, HOVERED and LAV-ISH. The grid was a bit of four puzzles in one.

    Thanks Vulcan and ds.

  33. Andy in Durham @27. I suspect VANILLA came to mean plain because it was the “ordinary” ice cream before they started introducing supposedly sexier flavours at an inflated price. Remember Raspberry Ripple? (Or, preferably, don’t!). Personally, I think vanilla is THE great flavour.

  34. I enjoyed this much more than yesterday’s Quick Cryptic. I like cryptic and double definitions partly because I have as much chance of getting them as experienced solvers do – and I generally do see them. Anything involving an ‘envelope’ is more challenging for me but I’m improving. Couldn’t see the parsing of EPIDEMIC and LAMBDA though I found the answers from the clues.
    Thanks duncanshiell for the lovely clear blog.

  37. I do object to ROMAN being clued as Catholic. Yes, it’s the Roman Catholic Church, but it’s called that because there are other flavors of Catholicism. So Catholic does not equal Roman.

    Speaking of flavors, I agree with Blaise above that a really good vanilla ice cream is the best thing out there. And truly plain ice cream, which you can also find, doesn’t taste at all the same. But people think of vanilla as “plain” because it’s the base of so many other ice cream treats: mix things in, add toppings, and what you taste are the toppings and mixings. Also, it’s moved on from ice cream to other things: “plain vanilla” means “nothing fancy” in so many contexts that it has nothing to do with actual vanilla beans any more.

  38. AiD@27 Quite! When I was very young I thought vanilla just meant “no flavour”, but I soon learned differently. My new definition was “a missed opportunity for chocolate”. [But adult me acknowledges that fresh vanilla can be very nice.]

  39. Enjoyable puzzle. I like the cryptic definitions, they make a nice change from the slog of wordplay.

    Slight correction to 18dn. It’s church’s > CE’s.

  40. Great Monday fare by Vulcan. I came to a hault in the NE quadrant so revealed OBSESSION then everything else was in within the minute. Not really on the wavelength with the cryptic definitions today but that’s how it goes with them sometimes.

    Liked FAITHFUL (I agree with other posters’ parsing of this. I did wonder if it was a Graundian special before it clicked), SPIN-OFF and SCARLET.

    Thanks Duncan and Vulcan

  41. Nice to see the Uxbridge English Dictionary making an appearance at 22d.
    Hadrian #23[ I don’t have a ring tone, but if I did it might be the intro to Charlie Parker’s ‘Parker’s Mood’. More ear-catching than the Brahms.]

  42. When I was young, a special treat was a Hocking’s ice cream (made in Bideford, as I remember). It tasted like no other yellow/white ice cream. I now realise that it actually tasted of vanilla (and clotted cream)!

  43. muffin @42. You want clotted cream on it? Nuts… but if you’re ever in Cornwall visit the beach café at Chapel Porth and try their hedgehog.

  44. Blaise @43
    It was made with clotted cream. However there was an ice cream shop in Croyde where they would plaster clotted cream on your ice cream cone if you wanted it.

  45. Blaise @43
    It was made with clotted cream. However there was an ice cream shop in Croyde where they would plaster clotted cream on your ice cream cone if you wanted it. No nuts though!

    (Sorry if this is a duplicate – it was showing no sign of posting.)

  46. Very enjoyable with all the favourites already mentioned especially FAITHFUL which I did twig. I was struck by a couple of Ninas with an anagram of DISC intersecting the clue itself and also RHS under PENSTEMON. I know I should get out more.

    Ta Vulcan & Duncan.

  48. Thanks for the blog , neat set of clues but perhaps a bit stiff for a Monday and sticklebrick grids should be banned for Monday puzzles .

    @various – the modern meaning of vanilla = plain refers to boring nooky .

  49. What have they done? tab key no longer works worse no print option so stuck with the awful PDF version with wasteful jet black & tiny squares and script. the library puzzles don’t even have the PDF option.

  51. tony @49; from the Guardian crossword blog: Adding /print to the URL still works. On a PC, you can also use CTRL p.

  52. tony@49. As I said on the Graun thread, the print option has actually improved (from a PC at least). Just hit Ctrl+P, or right-click just about anywhere and choose the print option. You MAY need to adjust the sizing to get everything on a single page (I find 80% works a treat). Not only does this print in the same lovely ink-saving grey tones as before, but it also saves at least one click on the old method AND as a bonus the word dividers and hyphens are printed explicitly in solid black.

  53. The issue with “cryptic definitions” is that there is little or no check in the clue.
    Case in point 3 – A person of great interest.
    My initial guess was starer – surely someone with great interest. Only fails on one crosser.

    [I also am not a fan of the new web interface — particularly the fact that tab no longer reliably takes one to the next clue.]

  54. 27a. I have a PENSTEMON in my garden but I wouldn’t describe it as “showy”. At least I haven’t killed it yet.
    Thanks to Vulcan and duncanshiell.

  55. Unlike others I’ve never seen LIBRARIAN clued in this way before and I think it’s a beaut. Thoroughly enjoyed this puzzle. Also liked penstemon, obsession. Thanks V and ds.

  56. Grantinfreo @7, the Schumann piano quartet is a new love of mine with a slow movement too die for.
    My ringtone is the rather noisy Messiaen Joie du sang ded etoiles

  57. Timed out on the edit
    I thought of Clara, Brahms and Florestan and Eusebius (the 2 sides of his character)

  58. Final musical comment from me, Tchaikovsky’s 6th symphony features the markings pppp and ffff.
    Someone else has the marking ‘as fast as possible ‘ and a few bars later ‘even faster’

  59. Am I the only person who didn’t like/get SPIN OFF?
    I can see it’s incidental to the original but why beneficial? In the context of TV shows there have been some very poor spin offs and in the corporate world have all secondary companies or by products been beneficial?
    Hmm. Happy to be corrected if I’m missing something.

  60. Mrpenney@37. I understand your dislike of ‘Catholic’=ROMAN, but Chambers has almost exactly that. Under Roman: relating to the Roman Catholic religion. The Chambers section on Catholic (with cap!) is more complicated, in an attempt to get it just right, but in effect it’s “what Vulcan said”.

  61. I struggled with this yesterday, I think because I’d spent an hour finishing off Saturday’s Enigmatist. Switching to Vulcan is like a different game altogether. I ground to a halt with three left to do, but a refreshing night had left me fit for the challenge and I got OBSESSION, OBLIGE and HOVERED in about 60 seconds this morning.

    I had also blocked myself by putting an unparsed TRUTHFUL in 20a, but working out PHARISEE (the hypocrite definition is last on the list in Chambers) helped put me right eventually.

    Thanks to Vulcan and Duncan.

  62. After struggling with the quiptic yesterday I thought this was a lovely puzzle, as everything could be worked out without tying clues in knots. I have penstemons in my garden. Thanks Vulcan; you are my favourite setter. Thanks also to Duncan and the other bloggers.

  63. Enjoyed completing this one

    Since no one else responded, I’ll highlight that FrankieG@11 has what I consider the correct parsing of 27a PENSTEMON = PE(MONETS*)N

    My first pets were BUDGIEs

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