A fun solve with a few slightly trickier clues – my favourites were 1ac, 25ac, and 5dn. Thanks to Vulcan.
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | IMAGINARY |
I am angry; I may become fanciful (9)
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anagram/"may become" of (I am angry I)* |
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| 6 | STOIC |
In beds, one’s flipping long-suffering (5)
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I="one" is in COTS="beds", reversed/"flipping" |
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| 9 | INCONSEQUENTIAL |
Quaint insolence upsetting but trivial (15)
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anagram/"upsetting" of (Quaint insolence)* |
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| 10 | THIN |
Believe king should be deposed, being weak (4)
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definition: 'thin' can mean 'weak' in e.g. a 'thin argument' THIN-[K]="Believe" with K ("king", chess abbreviation) removed |
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| 11 | ESPALIER |
Tree flattened, by psychic power? A fib, right? (8)
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definition: a tree that is grown flat against a wall ESP (Extra-Sensory Perception, "psychic power") + A (from surface) + LIE="fib" + R (right) |
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| 14 | PUNCH BOWL |
A magazine to deliver, one filled with party spirit (5,4)
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definition: a PUNCH BOWL may be filled with "spirit" as in alcoholic drink, served at a "party" PUNCH was the name of a UK "magazine", plus BOWL="to deliver"=to make a delivery as a cricket bowler |
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| 15 | BORED |
Tried the patience of top managers when speaking (5)
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sounds like (when speaking) 'board' of a company="top managers" |
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| 16 | NAHUM |
From the start, no ancient historian underestimated minor prophet (5)
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definition: a prophet in the Bible starting letters of N-[o] A-[ncient] H-[istorian] U-[nderestimated] M-[inor] |
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| 18 | PRESSED ON |
Hurried to finish the ironing? (7,2)
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PRESSED ON can also describe clothes that are being ironed |
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| 20 | MISHEARS |
Gets wrong impression of motorway cuts (8)
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MI=M1="motorway" + SHEARS="cuts" |
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| 21 | AFAR |
A service returns from a distance (4)
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A (from surface); plus RAF (Royal Air Force, "service") in reverse/"returns" |
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| 25 | ROOM TO SWING A CAT |
In funny cartoon, wag omits enough space (4,2,5,1,3)
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anagram/"funny" of (cartoon wag omits)* |
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| 26 | LAY IN |
Had extra sleep, to build up supplies (3,2)
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double definition: past tense of 'lie in'; or to lay something in means to stock up on it |
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| 27 | NO-FLY ZONE |
Prohibited area, as hygienic kitchen should be? (2-3,4)
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a hygienic kitchen would have no flies (the insects) |
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| DOWN | ||
| 1 | IDIOT |
Fool, standing up to African dictator (5)
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reversal upwards (standing up) of TO (from surface) + IDI (Idi Amin, African dictator) |
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| 2 | AUCTION |
From which you may come away with a lot (7)
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cryptic definition: "a lot" meaning something sold at auction, rather than 'a large quantity of something' |
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| 3 | INNS |
North Europeans won’t open pubs (4)
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[F]-INNS="North Europeans" without the opening letter |
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| 4 | APEX |
Top copy, with illiterate’s signature (4)
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APE="copy" + X=symbol that could be used as a signature by the illiterate |
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| 5 | YOURSELVES |
QI signature for solvers (10)
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definition: referring to the solvers from the point of view of the crossword setter wordplay: the UK show QI has a team of writers and researchers called the QI Elves, so… YOURS, ELVES might be how the QI team signs at the end of a letter |
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| 6 | SUNDAY BEST |
Saturday better for smart clothes, but … ? (6,4)
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the clue suggests a comparison between "Saturday better" and SUNDAY BEST |
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| 7 | OLIVIER |
Old organ drowning one actor (7)
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definition: Laurence OLIVIER the actor O (Old); plus LIVER="organ" around I="one" |
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| 8 | COLORADAN |
American statesman has some guts, touring drama school (9)
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definition: someone from the US state of Colorado COLON="guts", around RADA (Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, "drama school") |
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| 12 | CHAMBERTIN |
Barmen itch excitedly to pour this? (10)
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definition: a name of a wine anagram/"excitedly" for (Barmen itch)* |
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| 13 | COMPARISON |
In contrast, firm with a thousand working across Olympic city (10)
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CO (Company, "firm"); plus M (thousand in Roman numerals) + ON="working" around PARIS="Olympic city" |
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| 14 | PENUMBRAL |
Burn ample rubbish, somewhat shady (9)
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anagram/"rubbish" of (Burn ample)* |
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| 17 | HISTORY |
Man’s right-wing background (7)
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HIS="Man's" + TORY=Conservative="right-wing" |
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| 19 | DEFACTO |
In practice, certainly about to perform (2,5)
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DEFO (informal way to say 'definitely'="certainly"), around ACT="to perform" |
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| 22 | RETIE |
Bind over again, reducing sureties (5)
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hidden in (reducing the letters of) [su]-RETIE-[s] |
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| 23 | FIEF |
Cockney burglar’s land grant? (4)
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someone with a Cockney accent might pronounce the word 'thief' ("burglar") like FIEF |
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| 24 | EGGY |
Like something scrambled, say, extremely gently (4)
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EG=e.g.=for example="say"; plus extreme/outer letters of G-[entl]-Y |
Great fun with some brilliant anagrams. ROOM TO SWING A CAT my clue of the day.
Cheers V&M
Favourites: ESPALIER, NO-FLY ZONE, APEX.
New for me: NAHUM, DEFO (19d).
I could not parse 5d apart from def = solvers. Never heard of the QI (TV?) show.
Totally lacking in the UK GK to parse 5d, but, now that I know, what a brilliant clue.
5d is pretty obscure even for UK solvers. I struggled with the parsing until the penny dropped. I haven’t watched QI in years as the quality seems to have diminished noticeably after Fry left.
Top picks: R T S A CAT, APEX, YOURSELVES (Didn’t know anything about QI, but Google didn’t let me down) and SUNDAY BEST.
PRESSED ON
Read it as
1. Hurried to finish
2. Kept pressing/ironing or PRESSED ON (In this sense, it seemed like a CAD to me).
Thanks Vulcan and manehi.
The elves in YOURSELVES was a mystery. (We do have QI on television here, but it’s not something I usually watch.) Never heard of “defo”, nor the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art. CHAMBERTIN & NOHUM were unknown.
Lovely Monday crossword, it took the second cup of coffee to enable me to parse 5D which made me laugh out loud when the penny dropped.
I spent a while looking for a “J” for a pangfam.
12D allows me to offer my favourite Belloc quotation. “I forget the name of the place; I forget the name of the girl; but the wine was Chambertin.“
Great fun, loved YOURS, ELVES!
I read somewhere that the expression ROOM TO SWING A CAT derived from the problems of inflicting punishment in confined spaces in the navy using the cat-o-nine tails. Anyone know if this is right?
Nice puzzle for a Monday, solved it on the commute to work which usually doesn’t happen for me!
Punch feels like a bit of a dated reference for a magazine given that it’s been out of print for over 20 years and arguably irrelevant for far longer, though I was able to understand the reference so I guess I can’t complain too much.
Loved the long anagram for INCONSEQUENTIAL though, and DE FACTO was equally great. Hope the rest of the week goes this smoothly!
Thanks Vulcan for a good start to the week. My favourites were PUNCH BOWL, MISHEARS, NO-FLY ZONE, and DE FACTO. I failed to parse YOURSELVES, although I have occasionally watched QI on the TV.
Thanks Vulcan and manehi.
NHO QI so could not parse 5D, otherwise a fun start to the week.
Thanks Vulcan and manehi
Some nice anagrams. I thought NO FLY ZONE was a bit odd.
Alternative clue for PUNCH BOWL:
Jorum? (5,4)
@8 William. That was my understanding of the cat swinging.
Lovely stuff throughout, I thought this morning. Particularly liked MISHEARS and HISTORY. LOI the famous U.S. statesman who wasn’t, the COLORADAN…
…though that last one was delayed because I was mistakenly trying to shoehorn in an anagram of Drama into Colon. Ten letters in a space for only nine will never fit, silly me…
Very enjoyable.
I could not parse YOURSELVES, despite watching QI. Now it’s explained, it’s very clever.
I liked the long anagrams of INCONSEQUENTIAL and ROOM TO SWING A CAT as well as well as the cryptic defs NO FLY ZONE and SUNDAY BEST.
CHAMBERTIN was new but gettable with crossers in. Last in COLORADAN – misled there for a while.
Thanks Vulcan and manehi.
“I forget the name of the place; I forget the name of the girl; but the wine was Chambertin.”
— Hilaire Belloc
Thought the clue for SUNDAY BEST was a bit weak, but overall an enjoyable, if straightforward, start to the week.
William@8 – the cat o’ nine tails point you raise is the one I have always understood as the root of the expression. Swinging a moggie really makes no sense at all.
Poc@4 – I’m completely in opposition to you on QI. The latter days under Stephen Fry became little more than a shouting match, usually between him and Alan Davies. Sandi Toksvig has, for me, made the programme much more watchable. But each to his (or her) own, of course.
QI with Fry has to be one of the best comedy panel shows ever. Noticed that YOURSELVES = Y + OURSELVES, and expected that to be the wordplay, but it wasn’t. This time.
William @8 et al. Yes, the cat is the cat o’ nine tails, but naval floggings were administered on deck, with all hands summoned to watch. The punishment was also used in the army. The military administration of the penal colony in Australia was particularly brutal.
Straightforward enough apart from the parsing of yourselves. They are too smug for me on QI.
I’m awaiting the arrival of our regular commenter COLORADAN to acknowledge the name-drop.
I’m another for whom QI, and thus 5d, was a mystery. It’s a cute clue once explained, but given that most of us needed the explanation…Anyway, it was a BIFD for me, of course.
Glad to know they’re swinging a whip, not a poor terrified little kitty, although that’s not much of an improvement tbh.
Very smooth as always. Thanks.
I don’t know about the cat swinging in particular, but I do know that for some reason people love to invent nautical etymologies for popular expressions. And that “I read it on the internet” does not establish that an etymology is sound. See also brass monkey, posh, and on ad infinitum.
Too late to edit: I see that “room to swing a cat” is attested thirty years before “cat o’ nine tails,” which at least calls the supposed nautical origin into serious doubt.
A few unfamiliar/unknown references (I’m another who didn’t get the QI ref), but a fine puzzle which didn’t prevent me from solving those unfamiliarities.
Delightful Monday puzzle, one of Vulcan’s better ones I thought. It was fun to solve some unknowns like 11a ESPALIER, 12d CHAMBERTIN, as well as unknown elements like 5a YOURSELVES (QI (elves) signature), 8d COLORADAN (RADA drama school). Unfortunately, for 23d I had TIEF instead of FIEF. I found a Tax Increment Equivalent Fund in the city of Brockton, which I though sounded British, but turns out to be an Ontario municipality. So dnf — ah, well!
Some favourites: 10a THIN, 14a PUNCH BOWL (for the definition), 3d INNS (great surface), 6d (Saturday better, but…) SUNDAY BEST, 17d HISTORY
Sorry to be enlightened as to the supposed nautical origins of ROOM TO SWING A CAT, which is pretty grim. The image of swinging our cat Frodo around the living room by the tail is much funnier. VinnyD@25 gives me hope!
CHAMBERTIN is one of the most revered (and expensive!) red Burgundies.
VinnyD@24 N.A.M Rodger’s book The Command of the Ocean quotes a seaman using the phrase cat o’ nine tails in 1678. I presume the 1695 date refers to Congreve. Perhaps the researcher looked at literary sources rather than naval records. There may be earlier references. My library isn’t extensive enough. As you say, the internet isn’t always entirely reliable.
MrP@22: truth be told, I struggled mightily with 8 until the drama school’s initials somehow emerged from deep within the grey matter. Of course I’m still high from our beloved Broncos’ win over the Super Bowl champ Eagles yesterday — in Philly no less! I should note that the Broncos will be at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium this coming Sunday to take on the New York Jets. For anyone in or near London, especially if you’ve not witnessed American football, treat yourself to a dazzling show!
A most enjoyable Monday solve. Thanks Vulcan and manehi.
As a novice/improver solver who has been practising on quiptics and quick cryptics as well as attempting and failing the daily cryptic. This was a perfect puzzle for me. Fully completed and parsed for the first time. Smug? Who me?
Thanks too Vulcan and Manehi.
That was fun and mostly gently Monday-ish. The odder words (CHAMBERTIN, NAHUM, ESPALIER) were very cleanly clued.
The QI elves reference is bafflingly niche. I’ve watched the show for years and the references to the researchers being called ‘elves’ are occasional at best, not what I’d consider to be a ‘core’ aspect of the programme. The clue was solvable via the def anyway so no harm done 😁
Many thanks Vulcan and manehi.
All done and dusted, but no 5d parse for me either. I have vague memories of a show that used to finish with the phrase “and most of all YOURSELVES” and wrongly thought that was the reference. But it was obvious from the crossers. IMAGINARY was my fave, for the oddness of the fodder.
Thanks, Vulcan and manehi.
Thanks both and a fine entertainment. CHAMBERTIN is out of my price range even if it were available hereabouts, which as far as I now it isn’t. NAHUM was a hidden prophet as far as I’m concerned and when I decide to stay in bed I ‘lie in’ not LAY IN. I hate to be reminded of Idi Amin, the clue for IDIOT being particularly apposite, but it’s only a crossword….
Bexleyred@31: Smug is good!
phitonelly@33: That was ‘The Good Old Days’ – I’ll try to find a link.
Heres one
Great fun.
I thought the QI clue was a bit obscure.
NO-FLY ZONE was my LOI.
Thanks both
Thanks, Alphalpha. I knew someone would know it 🙂
Lovely Monday crossword with a nice friendly grid to start the week. 5d was hilarious when the penny finally dropped, though it is obviously a bit obscure if you don’t know the programme; 27a is also worthy of special mention. Thanks Vulcan and manehi
Alphalpha@34. Hmm. This is one of those difficulties in English/American where some of us have forgetten our past tenses of the verb to lie. I lie in. I lay in. I’ve lain in. The clue says “[I] had extra sleep”, which I would say as “[I] lay in” but the more I think about it the less sure I get.
Some of the doubts arise from watching American shows and films where characters always use lay as present tense, which is only correct if there is an object – “lay the table, please” – not when it is without an object – “I lie down for a siesta every day”. I believe the confusion is caused by the prayer – or hymn, is it? – “now I lay me down to sleep I pray the lord…” which has an object “me” but because people see themselves as different from cutlery it’s been elided with the other one, perhaps influenced by the word for lying down being a homonym for the word for telling a fib. I lie = I repose = I am lying = I am telling porkies = I lie.
sh@39: and of course let’s not go to the various meanings of ‘lay’ eg ‘laid out’, ‘egg-laying’, ‘the lay of the ancient mariner(?)’ which have nothing to do with being in bed. (I think I need a lie-down…).
Dynamite@9, Punch was a significant piece of British culture for a long time, and while it no longer exists, it lives on in collections of its writings, many of which are still in print.
Once I got 5d YOURSELVES from the definition and crossers, the QI elves jumped out at me, and this became a favourite clue. I had other ticks for the excellent anagrams with great surfaces at 1a IMAGINARY and 9a INCONSEQUENTIAL.
I thought this was Vulcan at his wittiest. Much thanks to him and manehi for the fun puzzle and blog.
Very enjoyable – we did not know about the QI elves
Enjoyed SUNDAY BEST & PUNCH BOWL
Cellomaniac @41. While I was never a Punch fan, I remember that after I moved to France in the late seventies I picked up a copy that was themed on either France in general or specifically Paris. The thing that stuck in my mind was a Honeysett cartoon of two of his typical old fogeys perusing the panels in front of one of the enclosures in the Jardins Zoologiques. The caption went something like…
“It doesn’t say anything about their geographical distribution, or their ancestry, or their typical diet, or their mating habits. It just tells you how to cook them.”
I remember a very funny article in Punch by Alan Coren called “The unnatural history of Selborne”, but I can’t find a hit to link to.
Thanks for the blog.
I am still struggling with 5d, despite all the comments.
Where does YOURS come from?
I’m sorry if this is a daft question.
It’s how the elves might sign off a letter. Yours etc…..
I pushed out the boat for a bottle of Gevrey Chambertin at a family meal out on me. “Mmm that was good” remarked my stepson.
I smiled and nodded.
“Same again” he called to the waiter – who happened to be passing at the moment – waving the bottle…
Cheers all.
Muffin@44: That reminds me of a piece by Coren wherein he describes some domestic emergency in the middle of the night, with a lot of running around, when he was interrupted by a child asking “Daddy, do worms have babies?”. I’ve often wondered if that was Victoria.
This was only my second serious attempt at a full fat cryptic having completed all 79 of the Guardian ‘s quick Cryptics. It seems I chose an excellent puzzle to test what I have learned in past weeks. I managed to get 23 clues! Though to be fair, several I couldn’t see the parsing and only got through the definition or the crossers. Thoroughly enjoyable, I shall try more. Thanks to Vulcan and the blogger especially.
I’m afraid the QI clue was very weak, not cute, just baffling. And yes I’m annoyed I DNF.
But the rest of it I loved, just right for me! And SUNDAY BEST I thought was excellent – unlike a contributor above. Takes all sorts I guess!
Rob @32 – while I agree with you that YOURSELVES was too niche, particularly for a newspaper with international editions, the QI Elves have an existence outside of the programme. They have a long-running podcast, No Such Thing as a Fish, and they appeared as a team on Only Connect (series 10 and a special in series 14). I missed the parsing in htis crossword, though.
A very enjoyable crossword nevertheless – favourites include the 2 long anagrams and the twist in Coloradan.
That was a very nice puzzle. Almost got everything. Thank you.