Financial Times 18,027 by NEO

23 comments on “Financial Times 18,027 by NEO”

1. I found this quite tough, needing a couple of reveals at the end. The US choreographer was a total nho: very tough indeed to get that from an anagram. I had a tilt at the biological arrangement but, doing the anagram in my head, ended up with a hopeful SYMPATHIC SYSTEM which turned out not to be a Thing (and had too many S’s). MALTREATED, FROLIC and TWADDLE were my podium today.

   Thanks Neo and Oriel

2. A top-notch puzzle, mixing some old favourites ( Mae West, for one) with some original plays.

   Nice to see TWYLA THARP (24ac/12), as an anagram solution: I used to think her name was an anagram itself. 20 years ago, Twyla Tharp was a racehorse owned by Lord Lloyd Webber, her sire was the great Sadler’s Wells, so:cleverly – named.
   She won only one race, and £3500.
   Disaster for the noble lord? No, he sold her years later as a broodmare for £1.7m ! Some guys have all the luck.

   Neo: a glitch in your matrix? Very kind to solvers to insert the colon in 17(ac), “ticket:fare”……but surely an opportunity for one of those cryptic thingummies? You know, where two words commonly combined and read together, have to be plucked out, split, and treated as discrete synonyms?

   Prank=FROLIC (7d) looked a bit awry, but, no: it’s up there in the top synonyms.

   Great puzzle, very entertaining; the anagram/surface for 3(d) is a triumph; LYMPHATIC SYSTEM.
   Cap raised, Neo and Oriel

3. The first Neo I’ve ever completed (I usually don’t get more than a handful if Neo’s answers), but with help on 24/12, even after knowing it was an anagram.

   Mind you, being in Hong Kong gives me about an 8-hour start.

4. Found it tough but enjoyable.
   Top faves: F T N I WOMAN, CEDAR, MALTREATED, FROLIC and EXPORT.

   Thanks Neo and Oriel (excellent blog!).

5. I almost feel as if I cheated on this one. As soon as I looked at 7/8/22, the line leapt out at me, from the enumeration and so I broke the habit of a lifetime of working through the puzzle in clue order and went straight to 19dn for confirmation. That could have rather spoilt things but it simply whetted my appetite to continue with what promised to be a cracker of a puzzle – and so it was, of course.

   Neo had certainly not shot his bolt on that splendid first clue – there were lots more gems to come. From a considerable list, I’ll pick out MALTREATED, ETERNAL TRIANGLE, and MYSTICAL. The unheard-of choreographer was last in, needing all the crossers and even then didn’t sound real – what a super anagram! (Thanks to E.N.Boll& for the anecdote.)

   Many thanks to Neo for a splendid start to the day and to Oriel for a blog to match.

6. Thanks for the blog , very good set of neat and sound clues . FRAILTY …. used by Imogen last month , not the whole thing but the same idea and the quote was given in the blog so I was flying straight away . TWYLA THARP pretty famous for combining ballet with popular music , Dylan , the Beach Boys and others . I do not think she did the Black Sabbath .

7. First time doing an FT, and I made a mess of the NW, failing to get outcrop, claret and frolic. I plead stress of having to use my fat finger as a stylus, getting ‘ink’ everywhere, and having to spread,, shrink, and shift up, down and side to side. A laptop screen would be better, but my old Dell is past it and I cqba updating. Nevertheless, looking forward to trying again tmorr. Ta Neo and Oriel.

8. The Hamlet-related solutions provided a helpful framework for most of the grid, but I had to stop and think in the NW corner. I thought the clue for TUG was one of those ambiguous clues that is supposed to be a no-no, although admittedly, TUG is the more natural reading. No matter. One crosser sorted out that dilemma. A fine puzzle and a thorough blog.

9. I look forward to when I can go a week without seeing the ‘T’ word in a clue.
   But I digress… why is ‘i’ an upright character?

10. Thanks Neo and Oriel.

    24ac/12ac: The name Twyla Tharp may well have been spoken within hearing distance of me at some time(s) in my life, but it had not stuck in my memory, and Thyla Twarp seemed to me a more plausible way of fitting the letters together. Of course, I was wrong.

    28ac re Cineraria@8: I think it can be argued that “going around” only works as a reversal indicator if it follows the word(s) to be reversed.

    5dn re Heather @9: At least in a sans serif typeface, capital I consists of a vertical line, hence upright character as upright=vertical.

11. I was trying to remember who had defined FRAILTY as “woman’s name”, so thanks Roz. Great puzzle. Thanks both.

12. I did not find this all that difficult. So saying, several answers came to me well before I knew how to parse them. I knew TWYLA THARP, but a couple of other terms were new to me.

    There was good variety today and some interesting clues. No favourites though

    Thanks Neo and Oriel

13. Many thanks Oriel and Neo. I went to a National Geographic presentation last night. The theater next door had a dance performance by none other than the Twyla Tharp company. Lucky me!

14. Thanks Neo. I found this a mixed bag in terms of difficulty; LYMPHATIC SYSTEM & TWYLA THARP were write-in’s but I struggled with the quote from Hamlet (I read it in high school last century) & eventually revealed FRAILTY which helped unlock the stubborn NW quadrant. I enjoyed clues such as HINDI, TWYLA THARP, NOISOME, DREAM-WORLD, and WEIMAR. Thanks Oriel for the blog.

15. Hello! A lot of people popped in, including Martyn. No favourites though. Thanks all, esp Oriel.

    Didn’t see TWYLA coming until I’d got some fun things down the middle, along with GERTRUDE, so thought a recomputation in NE might be in order to get the THARP. It sure made her definition easier.

    I was wondering how m’colleague Arachne might treat the quote, as I desperately tried to avoid revealing the slimy patriarchal discourse-soup in which people like me inevitably swim, or flounder, or bog-snorkel. Probably having a disturbed chap is somehow -ist though, even where Shakespearean nuts is all out of Shakespeare’s own noddle. Weirdo right? AND he wasn’t even interesting, unlike Marlowe: be a spy and getted stabbed to death outside a pub, brilliant.

    Actually I don’t think we can even say ‘on the spectrum’ now. It’s more ‘neuro-diverse’, and where any verse is concerned, you can bet that’s a new one on old Will.

    Cheers
    Neo

16. An excellent and enjoyable puzzle only slightly spoiled by the reference to the orange man in 6dn. We couldn’t recall the line from HAMLET and rether than try to unscramble the anagram we resorted to a dictionary of quotations for 7/8/22 as our LOI. We did know of TWYLA THARP, but our favourites were INERTIA and TAGLIATELLE (we remembered the latter ends with an E, not an I).
    Thanks, Neo and Oriel.

17. I found this difficult in a good way. Opportunities for inspired moments are always appreciated. That’s what we’re here for I guess. Weirdly, I couldn’t see the wood for the cedar trees.

18. It took a long time, but I got there with the assistance of my son and daughter-in-law, and the Internet to get the quote, which I didn’t know.

    Too much general knowledge for my enjoyment

    Thank you for popping in, Neo.

19. Paul @15, why do you always say Martyn popped in when Martyn comments on your puzzles? It has a sarky tone – at least, that’s how I took it when you used to apply it to me commenting on your puzzles. Is there some reason why Martyn shouldn’t comment on your puzzles? If so, could you let us know?
    btw it was your alter ego, Occasional, who was interested in Arachne’s take on the quote when Imogen referred to it. Did you forget that?

20. Oh hi James. Again. Thanks for popping in.

    You have been popping in less frequently since you were unmasked, but just for the record you’re the compiler who goes around the various blogs trying to annoy certain other compilers, even though we know exactly who you are, and wonder why you persist. Is there a reason? You’re very welcome to email me personally if you’d like a chat. In fact, why don’t you do that.

    Thanks
    PB

21. I have no issue with 28a TUG. Rather than working out the logic of the reversal as PB@10 did, I simply entered T/G for the first letter and G/T for the third letter. That helped me get the long answers at 3 and 4d, which in turn confirmed TUG as the right answer. An example of a CROSSword doing what it is supposed to.

    Did others see 4d ETERNAL TRIANGLE as part of the mini-theme?

    Thanks Neo for the superb puzzle and for the equally fun comment at 15, and Oriel for the excellent blog.

22. Cellomaniac@21: When solving, I am sure that I had either the initial T of the answer or the final G (but not both) before I even read the clue to 28ac. Comment 10 was really retrospective analysis.

23. paul @20 thanks, I don’t think I will – my issue is with your use of the site so this seems the right place.
    You dodged my question. Why do you snipe at Martyn when he comments on your puzzles? I started, if I recall, when there was some discussion about sockpuppets.
    I don’t remember ever having a mask, or being unmasked as anything, perhaps you could remind me. I do compile, as you say, and I do comment on other puzzles, but only on this site, unlike you.

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