The puzzle may be found at https://www.theguardian.com/crosswords/cryptic/29783.
Vlad gives us some ingenious constructions to test us, but there are a couple of questionable definitions.
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | TRUISM |
Is cutting politician not all there? That’s obvious (6)
|
| An envelope (‘cutting’) of ‘is’ in TRUM[p] (‘politician’) minus the last letter (‘not all there’). | ||
| 4 | PROTESTS |
Objects for experiment satisfactory (8)
|
| A charade of PRO (‘for’) plus TEST (‘experiment’) plus S (‘satisfactory’). | ||
| 9 | BUSTLE |
Breasts extremely large, and does my bum look big in this? (6)
|
| A charade of BUST (‘breasts’) plus LE (‘extremely LargE‘); you might prefer just ‘this’ as the definition. | ||
| 10 | BY CHANCE |
Before children’s party, taking pill not planned (2,6)
|
| A charade of BY (‘before’ – ‘before Wednesday’ should mean “by Tuesday at the latest” but often does not) plus CH (‘children’) plus ANC (African National Congress, ‘party’) plus (‘taking’) E (ecstasy, ‘pill’) | ||
| 11 | CREDIBILITY GAP |
Loss of trust in ICE (and prat) bigly – I’d run (11,3)
|
| An anagram (‘run’ – think colours) of ‘ICE’ plus ‘prat bigly I’d’. | ||
| 13 | WEEPING ASH |
Tree in Wigan sheep attacked (7,3)
|
| An anagram (‘attacked’) of ‘Wigan sheep’. | ||
| 14 | OLEO |
Marge and Homer’s second sign (4)
|
| A charade of O (‘hOmer’s second’) plus LEO (‘sign’ of the zodiac), for (oleo)margarine. | ||
| 16 | LARK |
Early singer’s a joke (4)
|
| Double definition. | ||
| 18 | UTTERANCES |
Embarrassed aunt with secret observations (10)
|
| An anagram (’embarrassed’) of ‘aunt’ plus ‘secret’. | ||
| 21 | BLOCK AND TACKLE |
They take up defender’s responsibilities (5,3,6)
|
| Double definition. | ||
| 23 | INFORMAL |
Playing well, Arsenal wingers relaxed (8)
|
| A charade of IN FORM (‘playing well’) plus AL (‘ArsenaL wingers’) | ||
| 24 | PIERCE |
What Vlad liked to do to support church (6)
|
| A charade of PIER (‘support’) plus CE (‘church’). Vlad the Impaler. | ||
| 25 | THRENODY |
‘Don’t mess with her!’ Hubby’s last lament (8)
|
| An anagram (‘mess’) of ‘don’t’ plus ‘her’ plus Y (‘hubbY‘s last’). | ||
| 26 | KNOTTY |
Heard A,I,O,U might be complicated (6)
|
| Sounds like (‘heard’) NOT E (‘A,I,O,U’ might be). | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 1 | TABU |
Moving about after leaving centre not allowed (4)
|
| An anagram (‘moving’) of ‘ab[o]ut’ minus its middle letter (‘after leaving centre’), for an alternative spelling of taboo. | ||
| 2 | UPSURGE |
United clear-out involving boss finally leads to boost (7)
|
| An envelope (‘involving’) of S (‘bosS finally’) in U (‘united’) plus PURGE (‘clear-out’). | ||
| 3 | SALAD OIL |
Dirty like Duke found inside dressing (5,3)
|
| An envelope (‘found inside’) of À LA (in the style of, ‘like’) plus D (‘Duke’) in SOIL (‘dirty’, verb). | ||
| 5 | ROYAL ASSENT |
Bill needs this bloke unfortunately transferred (5,6)
|
| A charade of ROY (‘bloke’, as a man’s name) plus ALAS (‘unfortunately’) plus SENT (‘transferred’). | ||
| 6 | TAHITI |
Back shortly going round affected island (6)
|
| An envelope (‘going round’) of HIT (‘affected’) in TAI[l] (‘back’) minus its last letter (‘shortly’). | ||
| 7 | SENEGAL |
Dope turned up in secure country (7)
|
| An envelope (‘in’) of NEG, a reversal (‘back’) of GEN (‘dope’, information) in SEAL (‘secure’, verb). | ||
| 8 | SHEEPDOGS |
Female setters possibly receiving letter – they may be put on trial (9)
|
| An envelope (‘receiving’) of EP (‘letter’ – probably an abbreviation for epistle, but it could alternatively be for epsilon) in SHE DOGS (‘female setters possibly’). | ||
| 12 | BOG-STANDARD |
John’s bar is pretty basic (3-8)
|
| A charade of BOG (‘john’, both slang for a toilet) plus STANDARD (‘bar’ – “the bar for passing the exam is very low”) | ||
| 13 | WELL BUILT |
Rugged cowboys not involved if so (4,5)
|
| I suppose that the remainder of the clue is intended as a second definition; if a well is built, cowboys would not be needed to herd cattle to water. | ||
| 15 | SANCTION |
Not allow back (8)
|
| Double definition, using opposite meanings of the word. | ||
| 17 | ROOT FOR |
Support announcement of D road (4,3)
|
| Sounds like (‘announcement’) ROUTE FOUR (‘D road’). | ||
| 19 | CULPRIT |
Dog eating left-over pie crust – it follows he’s the guilty party (7)
|
| A charade of CULPR, an envelope (‘eating’) of L (‘left’-) plus (-‘over’) P (‘Pie crust’ – but I would have thought that ‘crust’ would indicate both ends) – or you might interpret LP as (‘Left-over Pie crust’, which strains ‘crust’ even further) – in CUR (‘dog’); plus (‘follows’) ‘it’. | ||
| 20 | SKI RUN |
Risk coming a cropper on one in Chamonix (3,3)
|
| A charade of SKIR , an anagram (‘coming a cropper’) of ‘risk’ plus UN (‘one’ in French, Chaminix being a French ski resort), with an extended definition – or a kind of &lit if you prefer. | ||
| 22 | DENY |
Animal refuge – why say it’s fake news? (4)
|
| A charade of DEN (‘animal refuge’) plus Y (‘why’ – I would like to add ‘say’ here to make the sound-alike clear, but ‘say’ is required for the definition, so we will have to pretend we are texting). |
This took a long time to get beyond my foi (THRENODY), but once I got a few more in it really sped up.
Fave was SKI RUN – I always like &lits.
Eyebrows were raised for a couple of substitutions: “not planned” is not necessarily BY CHANCE because it might be a last-minute decision (but if we’re looking for a narrowing rather than equivalence, it’s ok). Observations aren’t necessarily UTTERANCES, and vice versa, but maybe close enough.
I first misread the clue to PROTESTS as saying “experiments” (plural), so I wondered what the “satisfactory” was doing. I saw my mistake, but now I’m wondering if the clue had said more concisely “Objects for experiments” would it have not worked as well?
I think the clue for KNOTTY could have benefitted from an approximate indicator, because the stress/intonation is quite different in the two cases.
Thank V&P
Thanks Vlad and PeterO.
Good one.
Couldn’t parse WELL BUILT. I suspect there is more to it.
I think the cowboys in 13d are cowboy builders who would nor be involved if anything was WELL BUILT.
WELL BUILT
Had the same parsing as Balfour@3
DENY
Agree with the blogger on ‘Y’.
Liked SKI RUN and CULPRIT.
Thanks Vlad and PeterO.
Yes, I agree on WELL BUILT.
I thought this was going to be extremely difficult, but I plodded steadily through on my second attempt, to enjoy it after all.
Thanks both
Vlad continues to be my nemesis, although today was definitely a less KNOTTY affair and managed to get most in fully parsed (except 10 and 13, which appear to have raised eyebrows elsewhere, so I’ll take that)!
Thanks PeterO for the clear explanations, and Vlad for another challenge.
Enjoyed this. Lots of nice clues, took a bit of doing but not too much (cf Saturday).
Still not sure I see ‘ep’ for letter but it had to be right.
That issue in 10ac — whether or not ‘by’ means ‘up to and including’ — is why I like the American way of saying, eg, ‘one through five’ rather than ‘one to five’.
SHEEPDOGS
Ep is given as an abbreviation for epistle in Collins (online).
BY CHANCE
Collins again:
If something happens by a particular time, it happens at or before that time.
So before=BY is expected to be debated further.
grantinfreo @8: but if you go ‘through’ 5, you pass onto somewhere further.
Well, yes I suppose so if you’re being strictly literal, MR @10, but I think ‘through’ works ok as a shorthand.
I also took cowboys as Jerry-builders.
For “Ep” Chambers has…
Epis.
abbrev
1. Episcopal (also Episc.)
2. Epistle (also Ep.; Bible)
Could not parse 10a) and this description is something Turing would probably have winced at. Several others I couldn’t parse either. 1d) was never spelt thus in any dictionary I’ve used, cannot recall if I have. Gave it up, made a second cuppa, returned and groaningly revealed the 26 ones.
I don’t know what dictionaries you use Chris @13, but 1d with that spelling is found at least in Chambers, Collins, the North American Oxford, ODE, OED, Shorter OED, Australian Oxford and Canadian Oxford
CULPRIT
crust
(Collins online)
A crust is a hard layer of something, especially on top of a softer or wetter substance.
As the water evaporates, a crust of salt is left on the surface of the soil.
pie crust (assuming no link between these words)=the top layer of the word ‘pie’=P
(a bit of a stretch…mmm…maybe).
To me ‘by Wednesday’ means ‘before the end of Wednesday’ so by and before not quite equivalent; however if a precise moment is specified, ‘by 12:00:00’ and ‘before 12:00:00’ do mean the same thing. So I had no problem with that bit of the BY CHANCE clue; but I hadn’t parsed it, as I saw BY + CHildren + dANCE (party), thinking ‘taking pill’ meant removing the ‘d’ which I assumed was slang for some drug I’d not heard of – thanks for the correct parsing PeterO.
Also didn’t get the EP from SHEEPDOGS.
Liked many including BUSTLE, WELL BUILT (definitely the builder type of cowboy), CULPRIT.
Thanks PeterO and Vlad.
Could not parse 5d as I seem to have a blind spot (and hence dislike) for random names being indicated by “a bloke” or some synonym. If there had ever been a King Roy I might be less grumpy. As a matter of interest, has any child been christened Roy in the last 30 years? But otherwise no complaints.
Bit of a theme here? Since a certain controversial law got ROYAL ASSENT there’s been an UPSURGE in PROTESTS for a SANCTIONed group that a lot of people ROOT FOR. One CULPRIT even had the temerity to wear a “plasticine action” T-shirt, which was, deemed TABU as Labour tries to plug its CREDIBILITY GAP.
I have a weeping ash in my garden – a fascinating tree which is formed by grafting a mutant weeping variety, which grows no trunk, onto a standard cultivar. The weeping part comes from a single original variant from over 200 years ago. It is quite unlike the weeping willow or similar, which grows naturally.
Much fun – thank you Vlad, and PeterO. I was unclear on “Ep” = “letter” until your explanation.
Wow, very difficult.
I could not parse 5d, 6d, 8d, 13d.
New for me: BLOCK AND TACKLE.
Chris@13 Alternate spelling of TABOO was something I learnt today and also its origin, which I found in the online dictionary app that comes with my Mac/Apple laptop:
taboo | təˈbuː | (archaic or in anthropological use also tabu)
ORIGIN
late 18th century: from Tongan tabu ‘set apart, forbidden’; introduced into English by Captain James Cook.
I feel this is strictly for seasoned veterans only.Not enjoyable(for my level of experience).
I liked WELL BUILT, BUSTLE, CULPRIT. I almost put in ‘uneasy’ for KNOTTY. Thanks to Vlad and PeterO
A bit early in the week for a Vlad puzzle but I worked my way through it. The alternate spelling of TABU and the unheard of BLOCK AND TACKLE and THRENODY causing me the most problems. I was making slow progress with this so persevered with the long anagrams which gave me just enough footholds to make my way to the summit.
Enjoyed ROYAL ASSENT, TRUISM and SHEEPDOGS
Thanks Vlad and PeterO
I suppose it was too much to hope that we’d said bye bye to the by / before debate 🙂 Chambers has “past” as a definition for both words which works for me
Cream of today’s crop were the dirty duke, SHEEPDOGS and the delightfully daft KNOTTY which had me excited about a possible Ken Dodd theme as ASH also made an appearance
Cheers P&V
BUSTLE
I get the construction but still don’t get the definition. Probably being very thick. Anyone shed some light?
Never thought I’d be relieved to see Vlad’s name – but as I’m still struggling tortuously with the prize …
Some enormously satisfying surfaces, my faves being THRENODY, CULPRIT and SKI RUN.
I loved the succinctness of the clues to SANCTION and LARK; PIERCE, BUSTLE and KNOTTY made me grin. (Cros @ 24, wearing a Bustle makes your bum look huge)
I agree with Balfour @3 on the parsing of WELL BUILT.
Thank you Vlad for the fun & PeterO for the blog.
Enjoyable puzzle from the PIERCEr. Rather a lot of anagrams, which helped a lot. Favourites already flagged up.
John W @17: The parliamentary formula for declaring that a bill has received the ROYAL ASSENT is ‘Le roy le veult’ (‘The king wishes it’ in Norman French). This clue is clever: ‘this bloke’ is ROY, the king, and not some random person
I finished a Vlad!
I finished a Vlad!
I FINISHED A VLAD
(cough)
Definitely not as hard as some of his, but fun. NHOs OLEO, THRENODY (returned by a Googling of ‘thernody’ – hey, close!), BLOCK AND TACKLE pulley, SALAD OIL. Favourite SKI RUN, LOI an unparsed TRUISM (got hung up on the possibility of “Truss” and missed the reference to the Dear Leader).
Thanks PeterO and especially to Vlad for a rare boost in solving self-esteem. Maybe I’ll manage an Enigmatist next? In, er (checks Prize) a few years’ time?
Cros @24
One meaning of BUSTLE is an item of clothing that made a woman’s backside stick out. See here.
TABU has appeared several times in recent memory (though I haven’t checked) so it didn’t cause me any disquiet. Couldn’t parse WELL BUILT but it had to be that. I found this a tad easier than a typical Vlad (and I’m still struggling with Saturday’s Enigmatist).
PS Is the absence of an online version of Monday’s Maskerade due to a policy change at the Grauniad?
I liked the clever &lit SKI RUN and the amusing surface for THRENODY (with ‘last’ maybe also serving the definition?).
I also now fully appreciate ROYAL ASSENT (thank you Proteus@27).
Thanks to Vlad and PeterO.
Thanks Muffin@29 & Proteus @27. One of the many things that has escaped me over the years.
Solved with lots of aids, as is usual for me when tackling Vlad crosswords. I was another who failed to notice the ANC party; it occurs quite frequently in crosswords but I was misled by dance. I liked BUSTLE, OLEO, BLOCK AND TACKLE, SALAD OIL, SHEEPDOGS, ROOT FOR, and SKI RUN (nice &lit).
Thanks Vlad and PeterO.
Very tough to start and worried it was going to break my Grauniad streak. All came well in the end. Clever and amusing.
Thanks both.
Another super puzzle from Vlad.
My favourites were 1ac TRUISM – a great start! -14ac OLEO (clever), 24ac PIERCE, 25ac THRENODY (lovely word and an amusing surface), 19dn CULPRIT (no problem at all re ‘pie crust’ – neat story-telling surface) and 20dn SKI RUN (great &lit).
Thanks, Vlad and PeterO.
Warning: I’m going to have a bit of a whinge.
On the plus side, I knew THRENODY (from a Fay Weldon story, decades ago, that stuck with me) and got the cowboy reference in 13D. And TABU seems vaguely familiar from previous puzzles. And congratulations to those who solved this. A bit above my pay grade, I’m afraid.
On the negative side…
NHO OLEO nor SALAD OIL (still not sure what it is – do people put something other than olive oil on their salads?) and I could have stared at 10A until Sunday without parsing it – and even with the explanation in the blog it seems dodgy.
I have a dislike for obscure (bordering on arbitrary) abbreviations (on par with some solvers’ dislike for “man” or “boy” indicating some male name otherwise unclued). I suppose somebody will inform me that S for “satisfactory” and D for “Duke” are commonplace in crosswordland, and EP is, I suppose known to some who spent a lot more time in Bible study than I have. Nonetheless, I find that if one must resort to “it’s in Chambers” to justify such a thing, it’s a sign of a weak clue.
Very entertaining with some clever clues. Nice to see the Impaler himself at 24a. PeterO, that’s an ingenious explanation of WELL BUILT! — but I agree with Balfour @3 that Vlad was thinking of cowboy builders.
Ace @36: I don’t remember coming across S = satisfactory before. It doesn’t seem to be in Chambers but it is in Collins.
Many thanks Vlad and PeterO.
Ace @36
Avocado oil is very good on salads, as are walnut and hazelnut oils
Excellent puzzle! Challenging but rewarding to attempt and complete. Thanks to Vlad.
I didn’t parse the EP=letter in SHEEP DOGS or the ANCE part of BY CHANCE. Also wasn’t sure why pie-crust was only P but now I see it. Thanks PeterO for explanations.
I parsed WELL BUILT as Balfour@3 et al.
Favourites among many great clues were BUSTLE, KNOTTY, SKI RUN, OLEO.
I also liked CREDIBILITY GAP for its surface, words highly suggestive of the cause of said gap, and PIERCE for Vlad’s novel self reference.
Being married to a lady Alpinist (just turned 80), and despite our both having “come a cropper” more times than we ought, I loved SKI RUN. OLEO defeated me, though. TTS&B.
Slightly more difficult than yesterday’s which is how it should be I think
@30. I found The dreaded Enigmatist on the Grauni website and printed it off.
Ace @36 – I did know Ep for Epistle as in Biblical letter. S for satisfactory is, apparently, from US academic grading systems, that the student has passed the grade at an expected level (I was expecting coins or second-hand books, because that’s where G for good and F for fine come from). D for duke comes up a lot, I suspect that one is genealogy.
Solved this this morning, and didn’t think it was impossible (I completed the Enigmatist on Saturday).
Thank you to Vlad and PeterO
Like bodycheetah, I noticed KNOTTY ASH but it ended there. This was hard to get into but it fell nicely eventually. Liked WELL BUILT, SALAD OIL, OLEO, BLOCK AND TACKLE and ROYAL ASSENT, the full significance, which was well spotted by Porteous @27.
Ta Vlad & PeterO.
I think “bloke” is cluing “roy” because in Chambers, roy is Australian slang for a certain type of man. Maybe. Bit obscure but I liked this crossword and I thought ROYAL ASSENT, BY CHANCE, CREDIBILITY GAP and UTTERANCES were really good. Oh, and PIERCE as well.
Am increasingly concerned about the need to know street slang for illicit drugs to be able to solve Guardian crosswords. One word or abbreviation seems to come up every day. How do the setters get to know these?
For that reason I could not parse Senegal. Otherwise found it hard but fair.
Chardonneret @ 46 In this context both ‘dope’ and ‘gen’ are slang for ‘information’, not drug-related.
Thanks Simon@47. Dope meaning information is a new one for me!
A good test for this intermediate solver. Favourites were ROYAL ASSENT, OLEO and SKI RUN. Only quibblet was SALAD OIL, a very nice construction but I’m pretty sure that in my many years of conspicuous eating I’ve never seen, consumed or been offered a “salad oil”…
Mandarin @ 49
It’s a generic term: you have cooking oils and salad oils, though some of the latter can also be used for cooking.
Mandarin @49
See mine @38. I’m quite happy with “salad oil”. We quite often use one instead of an oil/vinegar dressing.
I’m trying to account for the apostrophe-S in 10. PeterO’s gloss, CH (‘children’), seems to disregard this. One thought I had is that perhaps “children’s” is a common shortening of “children’s hospital”, with CH, I believe, an accepted abbreviation for the latter. In any case a most pleasurable solve. Thanks Vlad and PeterO.
For me this was the hardest Vlad I have solved. I started very slowly with only a handful of fills, picked up the pace some, but couldn’t finish last night. A good night’s sleep (well, some sleep) got my head cleared and I saw the rest this morning. My last fills were PIERCE and WELL BUILT, the former from the word play but not understanding the answer, the latter from the crosses but not understanding the wordplay. 17D was another(ROOT FOR) where the answer was obvious from the crosses but not knowing that D Road was Route 4 I had no idea why the word play worked. I got a great feeling of satisfaction finishing the puzzle but some of the knowledge required to cross the all the T’s and dot all the I’s was beyond me. Thanks to PeterO for the insights and Vlad for being entertaining as always.
BTW, I think 10 could be parsed a little differently. Children’s party could be CH + DANCE. Taking pill( Hydromorphone, a narcotic whose street name is D) removes the D from DANCE and voila we have CHANCE. I know pill is almost always E, but I think this works too.
Shut out on the first pass, so I feared the worst. I stuck with it and gradually completed it, to my surprise. Quite a workout, and my first Vlad completion — take that Vlad! Favourites 18a UTTERANCES, 21a BLOCK AND TACKLE, 24a PIERCE (for the definition). Couldn’t parse 5d ROYAL ASSENT, 13d WELL BUILT (loi)
1a TRUISM, I thought the politician was TRUMAN. I guess I’m living in the past
4a PROTESTS, I think I recall “S” for “Satisfactory” on report cards in my youth
2d UPSURGE, spent far too long looking for an anagram of “u-clear-s”
19d CULPRIT, I think we’ve had discussions about “pie crust” for “p” or “e” before. An open-face pie (say quiche) would have a crust only on the bottom, I suppose?
Seven completions in a row — a personal best
Re “crust”, found these two:
29,712, Imogen has “loaf crusts” (plural) for “lf”
29,318, Boatman has “shortcrust” (singular) as a first and last removal indicator
Looks like we have to be prepared for “crust” to mean one or both ends
Coloradan @52
In my opinion not the happiest of devices, but an apostrophe s is sometimes used by setters to mean “has”, essentially with the sense of “is followed by”.
Ah, got it. Thanks PeterO.
Mig @55 & 56
When I bake a pie, it has crust top and bottom; if open-faced, I would call it a tart. As far as I can recall, a steak and kidney pie can have just a top crust. I suppose the upshot is that there are no hard and fast rules about what constitutes a pie.
PeterO @ 59
I would have said that a pie has crust on the top: if there is pastry on the bottom (and presumably round the sides) I would call it a pudding (cf steak & kidney pie vs steak and kidney pudding).
I think that crust implies a crispness, whereas I doubt that the bottom of a pie is crusty.
On the other hand you have ‘pork pie’, which has crispiness all around, but I gather it is a different sort of pastry.
I won’t be taking this any further as I’ve been vegetarian for over 40 years.
Late to start today, but a fun solve. As a former Stokie, reference to the D road in 17d can only mean the A500 between junctions 15 and 16 of the M6. Something which always confused me as a child – there were A roads, there were B roads, no C roads and just the one D road.
Loved this and could not suppress a mean chuckle at PeterO‘s imaginative cowboy‘s visiting wells construction for 13 down as we too had been down many equally daft routes (in our case, we thought it was WILD something—‘wild steer‘ and the like were favourites). Many thanks Vlad and PeterO.
[We are print readers of the Guardian – does anybody know why the usual excellent as-ever and much anticipated Maskerade was NOT the prize puzzle, but rather something-else (Enigmatist?) which we didn’t even get a copy of?! This may be the final straw for our Guardian print subscription or indeed anything-else subscription…]
Many thanks to Peter (again) for the blog and to others who commented.
Simon S @60
Wikipedia thinks a steak and kidney pudding is a rather different beast.
Many recipes for pies/tarts require the bottom crust to be baked blind – that is, without contents (other than maybe a non-edible dry filling to prevent the sides from collapsing) in order to avoid a soggy bottom, with the edible filling aded for a second bake.
Just to confuse matters further, there is the Tarte Tatin, which is baked with a top crust, which becomes the bottom when served.
A pie needs some starch-based container. Whether it’s on the top or bottom or both. Shepherd’s pie anybody – only potato only on the top!
A loaf meanwhile has to have a crust all round as a result of the baking process.
It made sense to me. (And far from everything did!)
In most situations a crust is only on top, e.g. the earth’s crust. Just because the associated word is “pie” doesn’t mean we have to use the pie crust meaning of crust!
Matthew@66 inspired me to finally look up “crust” in Chambers, which includes “outside coating” and “ice on top of soft snow”, among other examples. In the cryptic sense, clearly it can mean both ends of a word or just one, so watch out when you see it!