The puzzle may be found at https://www.theguardian.com/crosswords/cryptic/29850.
Mostly Imogen in an unbuttoned mood, although 20D SKILLY was new to me (as was its longer form, skillygalee), and the NW corner was last to fall. In all, a very satisfying crossword.
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | PROVERBS |
Gnomes check bank (8)
|
| A charade of PROVE (‘check’) plus RBS (Royal Bank of Scotland, ‘bank’). GNOMES as pithy sayings. | ||
| 5 | PHONIC |
Voiced foreign drama turned into film (6)
|
| An envelope (‘into’) of HON, a reversal (‘turned’) of NOH (Japanese ‘foreign drama’) in PIC (‘film’). | ||
| 9 | PANICKING |
Preparing a case to tour part of UK, but losing it completely (9)
|
| An envelope (‘to tour’) of NI (‘Northern Ireland, ‘part of UK’) in PACKING (‘preparing a case’). | ||
| 11 | ROUST |
Stir up nonsense about fellow compilers (5)
|
| An envelope (‘about’) of US (‘fellow compilers’) in ROT (‘nonsense’). | ||
| 12 | DENG XIAOPING |
One on march that was long ago ending with pix to be developed (4,8)
|
| An anagram (‘to be developed’) of ‘ago ending’ plus ‘pix’. The Long March was a retreat by the Chinese Red Army in 1934-35. | ||
| 15 | UPON |
Second word of fairy story you ponder somewhat (4)
|
| A hidden answer (‘somewhat’) in ‘yoU PONder’, for the second word of “Once upon a time”. | ||
| 16 | FOREFATHER |
In front, rich female relative (10)
|
| A charade of FORE (‘front’) plus FAT (‘rich’) plus HER (‘female’). | ||
| 18 | OLD PALS ACT |
Undue influence to get long-established group on the stage? (3,4,3)
|
| Definition and literal interpretation. | ||
| 19 | GNUS |
Information would give one traditional pronunciation of these creatures (4)
|
| Can sound like (‘one traditional pronunciation’) NEWS (‘information’). | ||
| 21 | SITTING DUCKS |
Committee meeting avoids addressing what should be easy to dispatch (7,5)
|
| A charade of SITTING (‘committee meeting’) plus DUCKS (‘avoids’). | ||
| 24 | ROAST |
Get very hot right in front of kiln (5)
|
| A charade of R (‘right’) plus (‘in front of’) OAST (‘kiln’ for drying hops). | ||
| 25 | SATELLITE |
Miranda, for one, such a dish (9)
|
| Double definition: a low-orbit artificial satellite, no longer active, and an antenna for receiving transmissions. | ||
| 26 | SENTRY |
Guardian’s small admission (6)
|
| A charade of S (‘small’) plus ENTRY (‘admission’). | ||
| 27 | GRAY’S INN |
Granny is moving in London society (5,3)
|
| An anagram (‘moving’) of ‘granny is’. Gray’s Inn, in addition to being a location in London, is an association of barristers and judges, one of four Inns of Court. | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 1 | PUPA |
Dog at a non-feeding stage (4)
|
| A charade of PUP (‘dog’) plus ‘a’. | ||
| 2 | OINK |
Circle something in pen, which sounds like this? (4)
|
| A charade of O (‘circle’) plus INK (‘something in pen’), with a definition which refers back to ‘something in pen’, with a different meaning of ‘pen’, namely a sty containing a pig. | ||
| 3 | ESCHEW |
Avoid getting key cut (6)
|
| A charade of ESC (‘key’ probably top left on your keyboard) plus HEW (‘cut’). | ||
| 4 | BRIDGE OF SIGHS |
Large-sounding cross, a tourist attraction (6,2,5)
|
| A charade of BRIDGE (‘cross’) plus OF SIGHS, sounding like (-‘sounding’) OF SIZE (‘large’); the original (and the most prominent ‘tourist atteaction’) is in Venice. | ||
| 6 | HORMONAL |
Initially happy over normal changes produced by chemicals in body (8)
|
| There are various essentially equivalent ways to identify the wordplay, such as: a charade of H (‘initially Happy’) plus O (‘over’) plus RMONAL, an anagram (‘changes’) of ‘normal’ | ||
| 7 | NOURISHING |
Wholesome common sense in short supply, old PM no good (10)
|
| A charade of NOU[s] (‘common sense’) minus its last letter (‘in short supply’) plus RISHI (Sunak, ‘old PM’) plus NG (‘no good’). | ||
| 8 | CATEGORISE |
Classify as Burmese, say? I rebel (10)
|
| A charade of CAT (‘Burmese, say’) plus EGO (‘I’) plus RISE (‘rebel’). | ||
| 10 | GEIGER COUNTER |
Rogue erecting false detector (6,7)
|
| An anagram (‘false’) of ‘rogue erecting’. | ||
| 13 | OUT OF SORTS |
Peaky, unable to make new arrangements? (3,2,5)
|
| Definition and literal interpretation. | ||
| 14 | GOODS TRAIN |
Transporter’s commendable exertion (5,5)
|
| A charade of GOOD (‘commendable’) plus STRAIN (‘exertion’). | ||
| 17 | CANISTER |
Perhaps tea here from American is terrible (8)
|
| A hidden answer (‘from’) in ‘AmeriCAN IS TERrible’. | ||
| 20 | SKILLY |
Thin gruel, bad to fill TV channel (6)
|
| An envelope (‘to fill’) of ILL (‘bad’) in SKY (‘TV channel’ – but Sky is much larger than just a channel). | ||
| 22 | WIFI |
Wife provided with one means of communication (4)
|
| A charade of W (‘wife’) plus IF (‘provided’) plus I (‘one’). It is unfortunate that the first word of the clue is so near the answer. | ||
| 23 | WEAN |
A new fancy to have a change from milk (4)
|
| An anagram (‘fancy’) of ‘a new’. |
Thanks, PeterO, for putting me back on the straight and narrow with some of my parsing. I was a little careless with some of the answers, using the check button after entering a word, without fully parsing. So, for example, with CAT EG _ RISE, I saw the CAT and EG and RISE and didn’t bother with the rest; now I see it should have been EGO. Perhaps I should go back to doing the paper version.
Thanks also Imogen: I was expecting a toughy, but it turned out to be easier, for me.
Thanks PeterO.
I liked the way Imogen clued the aural wordplay/homophone (for some) of NEWS/GNUS with one traditional pronunciation. It’s not in my dialect, but in several British and American ones. (The linguistic term for this is “yod-dropping”, where the “/j/” (y) sound is either included or omitted.)
I knew of SKY as a Channel, so that was helpful, as I’d didn’t know of SKILLY.
SITTING DUCKS my favourite for wordplay, definition and humour.
The UK clues held me up. I somehow managed GRAY’S INN from the deepest recesses of my memory (probably a previous crossword), although I couldn’t remember what it was. The Scottish bank was my downfall, leaving PROVERBS unsolved. Challenging too was the Miranda satellite, and I spent too long trying to justify ROUSE for 11a — I’ve never heard of ROUST. OLD PALS ACT and SKILLY were new to me too.
So a few speed humps, but generally good fun.
Paddymelon @2, 19a reminded me of a friend who told me he always set his clock radio to wake to the grieving wildebeest. It took me a while to realise he meant the morning news.
🙂 Geoff @4.
I thought Miranda was. a reference to a moon/satellite of Uranus. I didn’t parse PHONIC, thanks for the explanation and thanks to setter.
Quite a fun Imogen with the sighseable bridge winning the GoD (groan of the day), ta both.
Dod @6 – that was my thought too. The satellite of Uranus was discovered quite a bit earlier than the launch of the artificial satellite
thanks I and P! I thought that the DENG anagram was a remarkable – though it’s usually associated with our comrade Mao. (editorial comment: I find that Imogen’s surfaces are very pleasing, unlike our other comrade Paul)
Super puzzle which kept me awake for too long last night, but I was determined to finish it. Thought PROVERBS would be tricky for overseas friends as GDU confirmed @3. Favourites were DENG XIAOPING, OLD PALS ACT, SITTING DUCK, OINK, BRIDGE OF SIGHS, NOURISHING and GEIGER COUNTER. I agree with Dod @6 about the SATELLITE of Uranus.
Ta Imogen & PeterO.
SATELLITE was my LOI, after getting SKILLY, but I too thought of one of the moon’s of a planet rather than an artificial satellite. Initially dismissed the idea that 12 was a reference to The Long March since Mao obviously wasn’t part of the answer, and needed some crossers before I remembered DENG. Liked SITTING DUCKS and NOURISHING as well (once I had the ‘I’ as a crosser, there was only one possible old PM). Thanks to Imogen and PeterO.
Always love Imogen’s puzzles – for me DENG XIAOPING, OINK, PHONIC and GEIGER COUNTER were particularly entertaining. Many thanks to I & P.
Even with all the crossers and a guess at the words OLD and ACT, I failed to solve 18ac OLD PALS ACT – never heard this phrase before.
Favourites: BRIDGE OF SIGHS, PROVERBS, OINK.
New for me: MIRANDA = a satellite of Uranus, SKILLY.
I could not parse 5ac.
1d – not knowing much about pupa, I wondered about the ‘non-feeding stage’ – do pupa not eat?
I agree with PeterO about 22d, and I did the same as Dave Ellison@1 re parsing CATEGORISE.
Hahaha Geoff @4 🙂
dod@6 – that was my thought about Miranda too.
BRIDGE OF SIGHS – well,our local one is as much a traffic obstruction as a tourist site. Much ringing of bicycle bells does little to scatter the selfyong hordes. Very pleased to remember DENG. LOI was PROVERB, as I’d never seen that use of it before: though I have come across the occasional “gnomic utterance”, which most come from that usage rather than as “grumbling by garden ornaments”. Thanks to Imogen for the entertainment and PeterO for the explanations.
“Selfying” !
I thought this was great. I really liked OINK with its extended definition, and DENG XIAOPING was outstanding — the clever separation of “long ago” to give “One on march that was long” was simply brilliant. (Remember when he used to be Teng Hsiao-ping in English?)
Whenever GNU comes up there’s a discussion about the correct pronunciation and I can never remember what it is. Personally I would sound the G!
Many thanks Imogen and PeterO.
GNU
Chambers
gnu /noo, nū or (humorous) gnoo/
My faves included PACKING, DENG, B O SIGHS and O O SORTS.
Thanks Imogen and PeterO!
Had to reveal OLD PALS ACT even though I had all the crossers and OLD and ACT! Never heard the phrase. Never heard of SKILLY either although that was a (correct) guess. Otherwise enjoyable, NW corner last to fall also – the brilliant OINK gave me the way in. GEIGER COUNTER my favourite for the superb anagram. Thanks I and P.
Michael Flanders and Donald Swann wrote a song called “I’m a g-nu” in which they pronounced all the unpronounced consonants at the beginning of words which included the brilliant line “you really ought to k-now w-ho’s w-ho”.
Tough but fair as always with Imogen.
Liked SITTING DUCKS and PANICKING.
Liked GNUS as well. Not how I pronounce it but I remember it being clued as such a homophone in another puzzle. A classic crossword word.
Thanks PeterO and Imogen
Oink was my favourite. Instant joy.
Deng Xiaoping was the most satisfying. But not instant.
On Miranda, my thoughts went; Shakespeare character, islander, then “rights” – No. Must be the moon.
It was easier as a general knowledge question than the wordplay.
I don’t know if it counts as indirect misdirection but in the south-east corner, remembering SKY but not knowing SKILLY, I was thinking of THIN = SKINNY, and then remembered the poem that starts “Do you remember an INN, Miranda?”, which crossed with it. It took me ages to get the idea out of my head…
Slow but rewarding, with lots of GK to find. I remembered that Miranda was a moon of one of the outer planets, though I wasn’t sure which, so the artificial SATELLITE didn’t occur to me. I had OLD BOYS ACT for ages until I spotted the well-hidden CANISTER. I learned gnomes=sayings from crosswords, but it still took a while to sort out PROVERBS. DENG XIAOPING was a surprise, and I needed to check both his spelling and his presence on the Long March.
We seem to have had a lot of OINKs lately. I suppose it fills a useful gap.
If you’re a beginner or an intermediate solver like myself,stay away from this one.You’re likely to lose interest and get frustrated.
Thought this was a real tour de force from Imogen today. On the too difficult side for me, though I did enjoy the revealed ingenuity in so many of the clues, FOREFATHER, SITTING DUCKS and BRIDGE OF SIGHS. Of which last one we have a copy of the original in the city I live in now…
A difficult puzzle for midweek, but some satisfying solving in the end. Deng Xiaoping was a bit of a stretch, and we’d not encountered an OLD PALS ACT before now, but one lives to learn.
A slow start but I got there in the end, apart from OLD PALS ACT, which was an NHO. I was unaware of the artificial satellite MIRANDA, but that is also the name of a natural satellite of Uranus. And I was also unaware that there was any ambiguity over the pronunciation of GNUS.
Skilly was new to me, so this was a case of “construct and google”.
I found this quite tough but got most of it in the end. The DENG… Was very good, though I considered Hannibal as well as Mao along the way I was prepared to criticise the MIRANDA clue (a satellite dish is simply not a satellite) but I see how it works now. Very subtle.
Elegant crossword, thank you, Imogen,
Had to reveal DENG XIAOPING despite having all the crossers.
Took me a while to spot EGO instead of EG in CATEGORISING.
I recently clued OINK elsewhere as Noise coming from pen that won’t write.
Thanks for the excellent blog, PeterO.
I too had Tarantella flying round my brain, but I managed to ignore it. Skilly is new to me but I have heard of Skilligolee as thin porridge, from reading nautical books by Patrick O’Brian, so supposed Skilly to be a natural contraction.
Imogen and Eccles seem to be on the same wavelength today. See 6d in the Independent.
A bit of a struggle for me but finished eventually with lots of help. I liked PHONIC turned into film, the good anagrams for DENG and GEIGER COUNTER, the well-hidden CANISTER, the large BRIDGE OF SIGHS, and PANICKING after preparing a case.
Thanks Imogen and PeterO.
Too tough for me. I solved about ten clues then started revealing.
There was plenty I didn’t know here: gnomes for proverbs, noh (and hence the parsing of PHONIC), OLD PALS ACT, GRAY’S INN, SKILLY; but I only actually failed on one: GNUS – though I can quite believe what the surface says (and I liked the joke @4 😄).
Faves were DENG XIAOPING, OINK, PANICKING and NOURISHING.
I had question marks about “her” for “female”, and about the order of BRIDGE OF SIGHS: if “large-sounding cross” is split up in the cryptic reading then we get “of sighs bridge”, and if it’s kept together then we get “something of sighs” but I don’t think it gives us bridge because we need a synonym for cross that’s a noun not a verb (if the phrase is to mean anything, which it typically should if kept together). Pity really, since the idea is nice.
All good fun, and I learnt stuff. Thanks both!
Very enjoyable.
Thanks Imogen and Petero.
12a was the first one I looked at, spotting the long march ref. But beyond Chiang Kai Shek and Mao I couldn’t recall any other marchers’ by name. In the end it was my LOI when I had allthe crossers.
I liked PROVERBS and OINK – excellent clues.
Impeccably clued and thoroughly enjoyable. I loved OINK once the penny dropped (it took a while!) and BRIDGE OF SIGHS, SKILLY was new to me but fairly clued.
Thanks to Imogen and PeterO.
William@29, I had half-convinced myself that ORISE was a variant spelling of ARISE before I spotted EGO.
Another vote for MIRANDA as a satellite of Uranus.
Not easy, but not as difficult as Imogen can be.
My Miranda was the moon too.
Thank you Peter O for the parsing of PROVERBS and FOREFATHER and the great blog.
A very enjoyable puzzle, eventually completed though not fully parsed. A few words and phrases learned along the way: SKILLY, OLD PALS ACT, the bank RBS, Miranda as a moon or SATELLITE of Uranus.
My favourite was the brilliant DENG XIAOPENG, my last in. Ticks also for SITTING DUCKS, OINK, BRIDGE OF SIGHS and NOURISHING.
And now I have The Gnu Song as an earworm.
Thanks to Imogen and PeterO
AP@34: what if both bridge and cross were verbs?
William@40 but what does the phrase “large-sounding cross” mean when cross is a verb?
I’m another who assumed Miranda was a reference to the moon. I found this tough in places. Especially the NE. Much to admire. With thanks to Imogen and PeterO.
I’m with AP on this one too. If you want the phrase to be taken as one clause “large-sounding cross”, which in this case it has to be to allow for the ordering to be valid (otherwise “large-sounding” should some before “cross”, lacking any positional indicator), then it should be treatable as a single phrase in the answer too.
DENG was first in for me, which was a surprise. My GK fell short on a couple here (SKINNY for SKILLY, GRAYS INN, and OLD PALS ACT were all biffed then checked).
As usual though some great clues, and enjoyed the challenge. Thanks S&B
Thanks Imogen and PeterO
I remember a Punch cartoon which had a wildebeest in a cage papered with crossword puzzles. The keeper was explaining “we like to keep animals in their natural environments”.
A couple I didn’t like. I think the definition for HORMONAL should include “changes”, but that makes it do double duty. A satellite isn’t a dish; a satellite dish is a dish. Even if using the term metonymically, you would say “dish” rather than “satellite”. I suppose the “such a” gives a bit of wiggle room.
NHO of SKILLY either. Tried SKINNY and SKIMPY first, then needed a wordsearch.
AP@34, William@40: I, too, share AP’s view on the awkwardness of “large-sounding cross”; reworded as “Cross large-sounding tourist attraction”, the clue would have achieved a reasonably good surface and avoided the sequencing/part-of-speech problem.
Muffin@44: The grammar is convoluted, but it’s not suggesting that a satellite is a dish, rather that a satellite dish is a kind of dish, and Miranda is a satellite.
muffin@44, agree with you about HORMONAL. Now that I think back, my first thought was hormones just from the presumed H and the body chemicals. Then when I realised it needed to be an anagram of normal I quickly rescanned the clue and adjusted what I took to be the definition to include the word “changes”, without realising that I’d fallen foul of a double duty.
As a contribution to the GNU pronunciation debate, here’s Flanders and Swann’s take on it (as SimonC @19 mentioned).
I think that the definition for DUCKS isn’t “avoids” but “avoids addressing.”
WEAN doesn’t mean “have a change from milk.’ The baby has the change, the parent makes one, or weans the baby.
Michelle@13 pupae don’t eat because they’re in the chrysalis. A pupa can eat before and after being a pupa, as a larva and imago (adult) respectively.
Thanks to Imogen and PeterO.
Another great puzzle this week; I’ve been lucky to have a lot of time for it in a long train ride. Lots of magnificent clues: SITTING DUCKS, BRIDGE OF SIGHS, DENG XIAOPING, PROVERBS, GNUS, CATEGORISE, NOURISHING. Thanks a lot Imogen and PeterO!
I solved HORMONAL, having initially had HORMONES, so that probably doesn’t count.
In 21a, where does “addressing” fit into the clue?
Similarly, where does “at” fit into 1d?
Solved with lots of groans. NOH as foreign drama? really?
pserve_p2 @45: that’s what I meant when I suggested considering both as verbs, but you’ve phrased it better!
Steffen@51, “addressing” is actually part of the definition, which is “avoids addressing“; the blog doesn’t have it quite right.
And “at” can mean “by” (he’s at his desk / he’s [sitting] by his desk; no doubt more instructive examples exist). And of course “by” can mean “next to”, “adjacent to” – which is the required cryptic reading in this clue.
A similar trick that comes up all the time is “on” to mean the same thing, i.e. “next to”. I’ve never seen anyone explaining it, but I’ve always had things like Clacton-on-Sea and Burton-on-Trent as examples (they’re not literally on/in the sea/river) though that would suggest, via the alternative name Burton upon Trent, that “upon” can also mean “by”, though I don’t recall having seen that used. (Could be a nice deception, if it were ised in a down clue for letters that are underneath others rather than on top of them!)
* ised = used
Implicit to my last thought is that “on”, “at” in this cryptic reading doesn’t tell you in which order the two adjacent things need to be, and so “upon” (and for that matter “on”) could be used deceptively to mean immediately underneath (in a down clue) rather than their more obvious meaning of “on top of”!
Muffin@48: you could also consider P G Wodehouse: “When times are hard and days are black/How sweet it is to pot a yak/ Or puncture hare or grizzly bear/ Or others I might mention. But in my Animals’ Who’s Who/ No name stands higher than the Gnu/ And each new gnu/That comes in view/ Receives my prompt attention.” On the actual puzzle, I am interested that nobody else seems to been briefly seduced by a triple definition ESCAPE for 3 Down.
Thank you AP @44,45
Enjoyable, but failed (as did a few others, it seems) at the NHO OLD PALS ACT. Otherwise uncontentious, and COD to DENG XIAOPING.
Sagittarius @56 – I also spent too much time with escape though I was a bit uneasy about my parsing for it (with good reason)
[ Had the privilege of attending a wedding reception at Grays Inn — imagine the pomp of sorting in Harry Potter without the magic (instead twenty waiters placed plates along the long tables, in unison as conducted by a maitre d’ on the opposite side of the table)]
I also went down the escape route at first. It wouldn’t be a great clue as two of the three definitions would be more or less the same, but it does work.
Thanks to Imogen and PeterO
I also had skimpy for skilly. Kind of works….
I put in old boys act which held me up but I found it easier than Imogen’s usual fare. Thanks
We found this quicker than usual for Imogen. Very enjoyable with lots of great clues – favourite OINK. Like many others SKILLY was a new word for us. Thanks to Imogen and PeterO.
Conversely to some earlier advice, I would recommend attempting this puzzle to anyone for whom Imogen is usually on the “do not attempt list”. It made me smile that “NOH” was an “nho” for many of us. As was SKILLY for me, though in both cases fair clueing made them soluble – the hallmark of a class setter. Hard to pick a favourite in a puzzle that was a delight from start to finish, but OINK gets the nod.
muffin @44 and AP @47: sorry, I don’t follow you regarding HORMONAL. Surely if the definition were “changes produced by chemicals in body”, that would require the answer to be a (plural) noun. Whereas “produced by chemicals in body”, as identified in the blog, has the appropriate adjectival sense.
Lord Jim @65
Yes, but what is it “being produced by chemicals in the body”? There is no definition.
It’s as in “The condition was hormonal” = “The condition was produced by chemicals in (the) body”. That’s how I saw it.
William@29. I like your clue for OINK. “Noise coming from pen that won’t write.”
A truly lovely puzzle which raised a few smiles too. Like one or two previous posters, once I solved GNUS my mind immediately turned to the Flanders and Swann song of fond memory – in my case due to long-ago Saturday mornings spent listening to “Children’s Favourites” on the wireless. Thanks to PeterO and to Imogen
Ran out of time to pursue this one further. Like PeterO the NW was the most troublesome, and remained unfinished. 1a PROVERBS, didn’t know the definition or the bank. 18a nho OLD PALS ACT. I did solve 14d GOODS TRAIN even though I’d never heard of it — “Freight train” for me. I enjoyed putting 16a FOREFATHER together. A lot of great clues. I enjoyed the puzzle and the blog, so thanks both
Yes, the GNU song is one of Flanders and Swann’s best!
My Miranda was Carmen Miranda – a bit of a dish, with a fruity hat.
I tried meagre for thin porridge – which didn’t get me far.
Gnus came readily with familiar Radio Show in days of yore.
Couldn’t parse the majority today but some laughs with the reveals.
I agree with Mandarin@64 about difficult puzzles:
DO ATTEMPT THEM!
and for the ones you can’t solve look at the answers in this blog. That’s how you will learn.
Not attempting will teach you nothing.
For 25a, when the only crosser I had was the antepenultimate letter ‘I’, all I could think of was Miranda’s beauty and her island home, so I wrote in BERMUDIAN.
For me the traditional pronunciation of the wildebeest, thanks to F&S as others have mentioned, includes the hard G – it’s the only way our family pronounces it.
I’m a g’nu
I’m the ‘g-nicest work of g-nature in the g-zoo…
Valentine@49
Michelle@13 pupae don’t eat because they’re in the chrysalis. A pupa can eat before and after being a pupa, as a larva and imago (adult) respectively.
thanks for explaining this to me – I just looked up chrysalis, too. Obviously did not study about insects when I was at school many decades ago 😉
Quite a chore for me, thanks to Imogen’s usual obscure and tenuous references. NOH, SKILLY, OLD PALS ACT, GRAYS INN, Tea in a CANISTER, Fat = Rich, Noos. All these left me cold, and I didn’t even bother looking up Deng Whatever His Name is. I was surprised Paul got a negative comparison (#9) as he is possibly my favourite setter, Imogen being probably my least favourite.