Guardian Cryptic 27,611 by Picaroon

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Really enjoyed this, with the theme present throughout. Favourites were 24ac, 25ac, 4dn and 7dn. Thanks to Picaroon.

Across
8 LONESOME See setter embracing individuals lacking love (8)
LO=”See” plus ME=”setter”; all around ONES=”individuals”
9 LOATH Reluctant lover’s initial vow (5)
Lover + OATH=”vow”
10 TRIO Funny person brings forward time for threesome (4)
RIOT=”Funny person” with Time brought “forward” before the other letters
11 IDOLATRESS Lover’s vow shocked artless female lover (10)
I DO=”Lover’s vow” + (artless)*
12 LAD MAG Playboy or Spooner’s certifiable criminal? (3,3)
‘mad lag’=”Spooner’s certifiable criminal”
14 ENDANGER Risk passion, following break-up (8)
ANGER=”passion” after END=”break-up”
15 ABELARD Japanese leader with fat lover (7)
=known for his love for Héloïse [wiki]
Shinzo ABE=”Japanese leader” [wiki] plus LARD=”fat”
17 TRISTAN Lover in transit, on the move (7)
=lover of Iseult [wiki]
(transit)*
20 CICISBEO Italian lover: see one repeatedly be so frisky (8)
=the acknowledged lover of a married woman
C=letter pronounced “see” + I=”one”, both repeated; plus (be so)*
22 DESIRE Drugs blocking awful feeling of lover (6)
Ecstacy-S=”Drugs”, inside DIRE=”awful”
23 HEART-THROB Try dry fleece worn by hot, dishy type (5-5)
HEAR=”Try” in court + TeeTotal=”dry” + ROB=”fleece”, around Hot
24 BUFF Attractive Polish lover (4)
triple def: =well muscled; =polish; =enthusiast e.g. ‘film buff’
25 LIMBO Endless waiting to get 4? (5)
solution to 4 is “LEG OVER” => LIMB=’leg’ + Over
26 LOTHARIO Lover in group styled hair before ball (8)
LOT=”group” + (hair)* + O=”ball”
Down
1 DOORJAMB Entrance part of party crowd in gilded ball (8)
DO=”party” plus: JAM=”crowd”=fill up, inside ORB=”gilded ball”
2 HERO Lover‘s part in Swedish erotica (4)
=Lover of Leander [wiki]
hidden in SwedisH EROtica
3 DOTING Follow around flipping idiot in love (6)
DOG=”Follow” around reversal/”flipping” of NIT=”idiot”
4 LEG-OVER Suitor admitting, say, what he wants? (3-4)
LOVER=”Suitor” around E.G.=”say”
5 OLEANDER Lover with nothing on makes a bloomer (8)
LEANDER, lover of Hero, with O=”nothing” on top
6 PATRONISES Supports two boys one dates half-heartedly (10)
PAT and RON=”two boys” + I=”one” + SE[e]S=”dates half-heartedly”
7 THISBE Lover introducing the verse from Larkin? (6)
=Lover of Pyramus [wiki]
This Be The Verse is a famous poem of Philip Larkin [poetry foundation]
13 MILLIGRAMS Married slim girl with a fluctuating weight (10)
Married + (slim girl a)*
16 REBUTTON Again, do up rogue’s clothing, about to pinch bum (8)
RoguE‘s clothing outer letters + ON=”about”; around BUTT=”bum”
18 AEROFOIL A warning about lubricant: it gives you a lift (8)
A + FORE=golf “warning” reversed/”about” + OIL=”lubricant”
19 COURTLY Shortly accepting ordinary kind of love (7)
CURTLY=”Shortly” around Ordinary
21 ISEULT One playing lute’s a lover (6)
=lover of Tristan
I=”one” + (lute’s)*
22 DEBATE Maybe sleeping around leads to tense, edgy argument (6)
ABED=”Maybe sleeping” reversed/”around” + edge letters of TensE
24 BEAU Lover picked up ribbon (4)
homophone/”picked up” of ‘bow’=”ribbon”

50 comments on “Guardian Cryptic 27,611 by Picaroon”

  1. This was difficult but very satisfying to almost finish it. The one I failed on was the Spoonerism, LAD MAG. The lovers’ theme helped a lot with the other clues.

    New words for me were AEROFOIL, CICISBEO.

    My favourite was IDOLATRESS (loi).

    Thanks manehi and Picaroon.

  2. What a difference a day makes–that was tough, me having the merest ad hoc smattering of the classics. Thisbe, and cicisbeo were dnks and needed help, but my dnf errors were more mundane: I had beam for 24d and rebutter for 16d, both not really parseable, not feeling right, and in retrospect stupid. Just needed a bit more patient contemplation. Ah well.

    Terrific puzzle all the same. Thanks Picaroon and Manehi.

  3. I loved the lovers theme. I agree with you re 4d LEG-OVER, manehi, it was my absolute favourite lol moment, as “suitor” sounds so old school and “proper”, while “leg-over” is pretty crass. The BUFF Polish lover at 24 was also pretty funny. I also ticked 15a ABELARD the “fat lover” and the “BUFF” Polish lover at 24a. The “flipping idiot in love”, DOTING at 3d, was my LOI.

    I had to look up CISISBEO to check that I had cracked the word-play at 20a correctly, as for michelle@1 and grantinfreo@2, this was an unfamiliar word.

    Lots of fun. Thank to Picaroon and manehi.

  6. I did not enjoy this as much as I usually do with Picaroon’s puzzles but, as always, there were top class clues. I did not know the Larkin poem, but deduced the answer from knowing Midsummer Night’s Dream: however, I came a cropper with cicisbeo: it did cross my mind, but ‘vivisbeo’ looked more plausible and I opted for that.

  7. Wasted a lot of time trying to parse doorknob before the penny dropped. (Have not found door jamb spelled as a single word though). Great puzzle nevertheless. Thanks to Picaroon and Manehi

  8. JinA, while leg-over is very public bar, hence the contrast with the formality of suitor, it’s pretty old-school too. I haven’t heard it for decades, which is part of the pleasure of solving: the nostalgia and the sweep of language and culture.

  10. LOL (in the Cameron sense, too) for 4d.

     

    I wonder if muffin will be querying ‘bow’=”ribbon”; the only one I couldn’t parse.

     

    Thanks manehi and Picaroon

  13. Thanks, Manehi.

    Absolutely loved the theme and agree with all  the favourites. A superb puzzle all round. Huge thanks, Picaroon.

    Re 4dn: I can’t resist giving the link to this classic – surprised no one else has done so. 😉

  14. Thank you Manehi and Picaroon.
    I often feel as if I’m in the company of a benevolent
    old schoolmaster with Picaroon. (“Did you really not
    know that, young man?”)It had to be Thisbe, but I had
    no idea of Larkin’s title.
    Cicisbeo I should have worked out earlier but threw
    it out on grounds of pronunciation. Chi-chi-s-b-eh-o.
    (“Word play in English, answer may be completely different,
    young man.”)I should have known it, as I’ve lost a few
    students as a result of jealous partners suspecting I
    might be one.

  15. Eileen: thanks for the Brian Johnson nostalgia.
    David and Copmus @10 and 11 – Cameron and bike sheds ?

  16. Wow – that was hard. As gratinfreo@2 says, what a difference a day makes! LOI was CICISBEO, which I had to guess, but all in all a wonderful puzzle. My favourite was LIMBO, with the reference to LEG-OVER (not so old-fashioned if you read Private Eye). Many thanks to Picaroon and manehi.

  18. Eileen, second il principe’s thanks for the link; wormhole in spacetime, I couldn’t stop watching Johnners, Aggers, Geoff B and Fiery Fred. Characters!

  22. Thanks Picaroon; amazingly I knew most of the lovers but not the Italian one. I was a bit grumpy about this, thinking that CEE was ‘C’ but I ‘C’ Chambers has both cee and see for ‘C’.

    Thanks manehi for a good blog. I loved the LEG-OVER/LIMBO combination, and thanks to Eileen for the link – very timely after my day at The Oval yesterday.

  23. [drofle, love Private Eye ever since a couple of post-grad uncles smuggled copies back to Oz in the ’60s; maybe I should subscribe to the e-edition]

  24. Excellent! All but one. I couldn’t get courtly.
    Speaking of which, I’m always amazed by the lack of words in english to describe all the different types of love, or being in love. There are many more to describe being drunk. What does this say about us?!

  25. Thank you David; I’m glad misunderstanding of text-speak
    goes to the top. Lots of love xx
    But BIKE SHEDS ??

  26. I managed a few successful guesses eg 20a but my luck ran out with the Larkin introduction.

    Hard, but I enjoyed the tussle, which was rewarded by some excellent clues including AEROFOIL and ABELARD. LEG-OVER was the best of the lot and almost as good as the Johnners and Aggers ‘skit’ – thanks Eileen.

    Thanks also to Picaroon and manehi

  27. Thanks to Picaroon and manehi. I struggled with CICISBEO and ribbon=bow for BEAU (my LOI) and was looking for LOTHARIO and found it. Very enjoyable.

  28. Thank you Picaroon and manehi.

    Rewolf’s post @24 gives food for thought …

    A most enjoyable puzzle.  I failed to parse THISBE, but on googling recognised the verse!

    CICISBEO was a new word for me, but not a new ‘practice’, my mother and my ‘aunts’ had an erudite attendant (in the escort sense) who arranged their flowers, accompanied them to the theatre etc. etc., my father and ‘uncles’ never criticised him, he was highly respected and always present at their dinner parties.

    Here is another meaning for CICISBEO from the alphaDictionary    “Meaning: 1. (Obsolete but still fun) A knotted, decorative ribbon attached to the handle of a sword, walking cane, umbrella, fan, etc.” – it ties in with 24d.

  31. Thanks to Picaroon and manehi. I found this really tough and nearly packed in a few times. However, glad I persevered. Eventually got most, but was held up in the SW for ages. Last two were cicisbeo (new word for me) and courtly. The two I liked most have been mentioned ( leg over and limbo). However Abelard raised a smile because he was one person I used to talk about in my history of philosophy lectures. There is nothing like a gruesome love story to attract the attention of students. Thanks again to Picaroon and manehi.

  32. The upper case P in Polish in the middle of the phrase means that it is the proper noun and therefore not a synonym for BUFF.

  34. A slight step up in both quality and difficulty from yesterday! This was a very fine puzzle that might have been better suited to the prize slot. As it was I succumbed to the temptation of the check button a few times and had to Google CICISBEO. All very entertaining.

    Thanks to Picaroon and manehi

  35. I loved this; it took me ages to see limbo, but I laughed out loud when I did. It took even longer to see cicisbeo, but then I actually remembered it from Georgette Heyer’s novels, where it turns up quite often. Excellent puzzle.

  36. Oh well. I gave up with the bottom half almost completely empty and am not disappointed to have done so. The theme was all a bit musty for my interests, and the only attempt to bring a bit of modernity to it was actually incorrect – Playboy is not a lad mag.  Lad mags were a British phenomenon, comprising such titles as Nuts, FHM and Loaded, against which Playboy would probably be assessed as something relatively classy and sophisticated. So I am told.

  38. An excellent puzzle.  It took me ages to get started, so much so that, at one point I was wondering if there was a word THEYFU (7d).  Eventually limped home this evening feeling battleworn but satisfied.

    Many thanks to Picaroon and manehi.

  39. Extremely difficult and I came close to abandoning it. I realise that many of you admire this setter but I do find his puzzles hard to get into and I thought this harder than usual. Some goodies though. I liked LEG OVER,LAD MAG- took ages to see- and LIMBO.
    Thanks Picaroon.

  40. Thanks Picaroon and manehi

    I probably shouldn’t have attempted this after a tiring day, but I didn’t enjoy it as much as most seemed to – I used wordsearches far too much in order to get it out of the way!

    I didn’t know CICISBEO, but it was clued precisely and I was surprised that it was right. I did know THISBE (from A midsummer night’s dream), but had no idea of the parsing.

    I felt sorry for the unpaired lovers, and had spent some time trying to see where I could fit Heloise and Pyramus.

    LEG-OVER also reminded me of a great Jasper Carrottt sketch (think before you dring before you get your leg over), but, strangely, Youtube doesn’t seem to have it.

    Favourites were LIMBO and LEG-OVER.

    (No more than an eyebrow raise at “bow” = “ribbon”, David Ellison!)

  42. HERO and LEANDER were my first theme answers, so I was expecting all of the lovers to be paired, and like muffin @40, I was looking for Heloise and Pyramus.

    I had the same favorites as some other commenters, particularly 4d,  24a, 25a.

    I’d never heard of the Larking poem, and Cicisbeo was new to me. And as happens all too often, I failed to get one (BEAU) that seems embarrassingly easy in hindsight.

     

     

  45. After a slow start this fell into place more quickly as the crossers arrived. DNF as I got stuck with picked up meaning reversed at 24. Not very clever of me as we’ve had this usage before.
    Thanks to Picaroon and manehi.
    PS. At 76 I had to buy a bike without a crossbar because I could no longer get my 4d.

  46. I found this extremely challenging but in a good way.  My only quibble was with bow=ribbon although leg-over and lad mag were new to me and it took me a while to remember to change “air” to “aero”.  The Iseult spelling was new to me as well and it defeated me even though I had been actively searching for Isolde.

  47. Now, that was rather different from yesterday’s puzzle, wasn’t it?

    At first, we thought that it would be not too difficult, making steady progress. But then, it all became really challenging.

    This was a really good crossword in which Picaroon put a lot of thought.

    We failed on 20ac and 21d, unfortunately crossing each other. We guessed the right answer for 20ac but as ‘see’ can also be V, there was a moment of doubt. Very surprised to see that only BlueDot @46 wasn’t familiar with ISEULT. It was clearly I (because of 20ac) + an anagram of “lute’s” but there were no bells ringing. The two clues intersecting each other, well, wasn’t the setter’s greatest moment, in my opinion.

    All in all, excellent (with an asterisk) but not a typical Tuesday puzzle.

    Many thanks to manehi & Picaroon.

     

  48. Finally a theme with references this American could catch! (Cicisbeo excepted, new to me.) With thanks to my English professors.

    The Larkin poem is a fun one, I recommend solvers look it up if it’s not yet familiar:)

  49. This was great fun and gently educational; a bit like the benevolent, schoolmasterly Picaroon.
    I love to learn something new (SHOJI, VIS), or dredge up something from the memory’s
    dusty attic (PHRYGIAN).
    Thank you Manehi and Picaroon.
    Can anyone give me an example of VIS in a sentence.
    I’m beginning to think Collins online uses a dreadful algorithm
    to find its examples. It gives power as a definition of VIS
    on its own, and then gives an example with vis-à-vis.

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