Lato usually packs a lot of thematic material into his puzzles.
Preamble: Fifteen thematic entries are evenly divided between two categories, spelt out by corrections to single letter definition misprints in thirteen otherwise normal clues (though corrections generally spoil the surface sense of the clue). Entries in one category are defined by an extra one or two words in eight other clues. Solvers should highlight in any colour the solution which belongs to both categories; single (non-extraneous) words from two clues, correctly paired, might help with this. Three answers are abbreviations.
I was doing OK with the ordinary clues, and found a few of the corrections and a couple of the extraneous words: COPIERS and COULOMB in the first and third rows defined by they reproduce in 1d and charge unit in 21d, but not much else thematically. Sometime later I solved 26a HAGEN with an extraneous career and now had enough letters to enter the intersecting HURTLE in the first column. Knowing Lato’s fondness for anagrams, I thought straightaway of LUTHER (the Diet of Worms one). I laboured on and was on my way to bed, musing on the puzzle, when it came to me that COULOMB was an anagram of COLUMBO, and the aforementioned LUTHER was also a TV detective, as was GENTLY (not an anagram) running down from the G of HAGEN. Just as I was drifting off to sleep, I thought “Aha! PERSICO is an anagram of COPIERS.”
Almost my first waking thought on Sunday morning was “Don’t be silly. It’s SERPICO.” So, the theme is detectives, mainly TV (not Serpico), mainly fictional (again not Serpico). Things went more quickly after that, and the corrections spelt GOOD COP, BAD COP, i.e. entered as is, or as anagrams. I must admit that I found it a bit tedious to dig out some of the scrambled detectives, for example the one that became ANGER: (i) think of anagrams that could be surnames; (ii) type surname into Google; (iii) ignore Lear’s daughter and head for Wiki’s disambiguation page; (iv) locate Jack REGAN from The Sweeney.
Anyway, the good cops are DIXON, FROST, GENTLY, HOLE, HUNT, MORSE, TENNISON.
And the bad cops:
COLUMBO [COULOMB]* 21d Charge unit,
LESTRADE [TREADLES]* 33a pedals,
LUTHER [HURTLE]* 26a career,
MAIGRET [RAGTIME]* 17d jazz,
REBUS [SUBER]* 39a bark,
REGAN [ANGER]* 5d displeasure,
SERPICO [COPIERS]* 1d (they reproduce).
Just the double-duty one to sort out, defined by Ed’s defeat at 2d. I had been thinking DOYLE (possibly because that’s another character played by the actor playing Gently), but it turns out to be FOYLE, and another (i)-(ii)-(iii) anagram-Google-Wiki hunt leads me to FOLEY, the Beverly Hills Cop (from 5a & 24a).
Not a big fan of “sweetheart” clueing E – fine for the Guardian daily but not for a weekend advanced cryptic in my book. A couple of other bits too, but there you go – a matter of taste. Thanks Lato, see you the other side of #1600 probably.
| Across | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| No. | Clue [✗] ✓ {extraneous word(s)} | ✓ | Answer | Wordplay |
| 6 | Forbidden to eat mash after swallowing tablet (6) | TEREFA | [AFTER]* around E (tablet) | |
| 10 | Address in Purley (3) | URL | (P)URL(ey) | |
| 12 | Ancient shaving first with blades (4) | OARY | (h)OARY (ancient) | |
| 13 | Fit for power, re[w]garding intelligence (5, 2 words) | G | UP TOP | UP TO (fit for) P(ower) |
| 14 | Children’s day out ultimately hits sn[a]og (4) | O | KISS | KIDS (children’s) ¬ D(ay) (hit)S |
| 15 | Cr[a]oft, perhaps, sea swept back? (4) | O | LARA | ARAL< (sea, Kazakhstan/Uzbekistan) {ref: Lara Croft, pneumatic Tomb Raider} |
| 18 | Put on coat half-cut – out of date primer (5) | DONAT | DON (put on) (co)AT | |
| 19 | Writer left party to collect money (4) | LAMB | LAB (Labour, left party) around M(oney) | |
| 20 | Short discussion on Spain and elsewhere (4, 2 words) | ET AL | E (Spain) TAL(k) (discussion) | |
| 26 | After {career} change, hang round East German city (5) | HAGEN | [HANG]* around E(ast) | |
| 27 | Foo[l]d in drama’s special (4) | D | NOSH | NOH (drama) around S(pecial) |
| 28 | Force losing prince to give as[s]cent (4) | C | RISE | PRISE (force) ¬ P(rince) |
| 29 | Deceived the French fellow (5, 2 words) | LED ON | LE (the, Fr) DON (fellow) | |
| 32 | Revive Frenchman and wife (5) | RENEW | RENÉ (Frenchman) W(ife) | |
| 33 | {Pedals} home with Italian enjoying success (4, 2 words) | IN IT | IN (home) IT(alian) | |
| 34 | Hearing sounds of uncertainty but makes a bo[m]ob (4) | O | ERRS | homophone: ERS (sounds of uncertainty) |
| 35 | S[t]pud’s worry about sex in retirement (5) | P | TATIE | EAT (worry) around IT (sex) all< |
| 36 | Axes 37, 31 without a struggle (7) | GUITARS | [USA (37d) TRAGI (31d) ¬ A]* | |
| 38 | Heartless idiots causing ro[w]bs (4) | B | DOES | DO(p)ES (idiots) |
| 39 | Animal’s {bark} set off gun (3) | GNU | [GUN]* | |
| 40 | Original root of French name recalled, yet uncertain earlier (6) | ETYMON | NOM< (name, Fr) after [YET]* | |
| Down | No. | Clue [✗] ✓ {extraneous word(s)} | ✓ | Answer | Wordplay |
| 1 | Throw husband out – with ex he’s horny {(they reproduce)} (7) | CUCKOLD | CHUCK (throw) ¬ H(usband) OLD (ex) | |
| 2 | {Ed’s defeat} added to Henry’s material (5) | PLUSH | PLUS (added) H(enry) | |
| 3 | Bridge player’s leaving Prince problems (4) | ILLS | WILLS (minor royal) ¬ W (West, bridge player) | |
| 4 | Gypsy m[e]an (not English) increasingly upset (3) | A | ROM | MORE< (increasingly) ¬ E(nglish) |
| 5 | ‘Arse!’ Beverly’s {displeasure} originally upset cavalryman (5) | SABRE | [ARSE B(everly)]* | |
| 7 | Rent applied to place near [W]Dales (5) | D | RIPON | RIP (rent) ON (applied to) |
| 8 | Wandering beast is French, look! (6) | ESTRAY | EST (is, Fr) RAY (look) | |
| 9 | A politician finally spoke on current measure (6) | AMPERE | A MP (politician) (spok)E RE (on) | |
| 11 | Humourless shop girl lifting fertiliser (6) | POLLEN | PO (humourless) NELL< (girl, The Old Curiosity Shop) | |
| 16 | Earth road in Georgia (4) | GAIA | A1 (road) in GA (Georgia) | |
| 17 | Old tenor’s {jazz} instrument (4) | OBOE | O(ld) BOE (tenor, ref: Alfie B.) | |
| 21 | {Charge unit} before work is back (3) | AGO | A (ante, before) GO (work) | |
| 22 | Some mourning for us but not everywhere (4) | OURN | (m)OURN(ing) | |
| 23 | Allow to keep snowdrops initially in [v]case (4) | C | LEST | LET (allow) around S(nowdrops) |
| 24 | Enclosed revamped ‘Deserted Hills’ unit (6, 2 words) | SHUT IN | [H(ill)S UNIT]* | |
| 25 | Flighty sweetheart is sure to put out again (7) | REISSUE | [(sw)E(et) IS SURE]* | |
| 29 | M[u]ost opposite number in Rome point? (5) | O | LEAST | L (50, Roman numeral) EAST (point) |
| 30 | Belief in revolutionary medicine saving lives (5) | DEISM | MED(icine)< around IS (lives) | |
| 31 | Like Hamlet, about to split hairs (5) | TRAGI | TRAGIC (like Hamlet) ¬ C (circa, about) | |
| 34 | Arty place turned over is rank (4) | ÉTAT | TATE< (one of four art museums) | |
| 37 | One useless at the outset, [h]Pence in office here (3) | P | USA | A (one) after U/S (unserviceable, useless) {ref: Mike Pence, current VP} |
|
|
||||
My way in was slightly different from yours, HG. I got the first category from GENTLY and some letters that could make TENNISON. The other category took a little longer, the penny dropping with RAGTIME (‘jazz’). I had jotted down Maigret in case it came up in the first category, and it fortuitously helped me with the second.
COP appeared twice in my incomplete set of corrected letters, and the phrase ‘good cop bad cop’ suggested itself, confirming the two categories. Considering how many ‘cops’ there are in books and films, I was relieved, in the end, that there were only four names in total (two in each category) that I didn’t know.
I found the eight definitions easily enough, having excluded ‘left’ from 19a which might have counted. However, I couldn’t find a match for the definition “Ed’s defeat” because I had (Popeye) DOYLE instead of (Christopher) FOYLE in my set of ‘good cops’. What got me on the right path was looking through all the clues for two words that would go together to make something meaningful. ‘Beverly’ and ‘Hills’ stood out, and, when I looked up the famous ‘Cop’ series, (Axel) FOLEY pointed me to FOYLE in place of DOYLE. The dual DOYLE/FOYLE with the unchecked letter was a mean trick to play on solvers, I thought, but I now say that tongue-in-cheek as I appreciated it in the end.
Completing this took longer than other recent puzzles, but I enjoyed it very much. The clues were excellent, and as usual I liked most of all the ones that stumped me: UP TOP, KISS, RIPON and USA. To my credit, that last one didn’t stump me for long – a great clue, but I wonder for how many days or weeks it will remain current, ‘Pence in office’ being subject surely to the whims and tweets of the boss of that office.
Thanks to Lato for a brilliant concept and design and to HolyGhost for an interesting blog.
GOOD COPS… I spotted pretty quickly, but BAD COPS took a while longer, struggling as I was with the misprints (and not knowing where Ripon is. You mean it really is nowhere Wales?:-) )
Regarding the good cops, really it was a matter of lobbing in the ones I knew, and googling the others. The only one I couldn’t find was HOLE, HOL? not being much help. Unfortunately I stumbled on a series of books starring DCI HOLT, so lobbed that in. He’s just as obscure as the correct answer, anyway… Never mind…
I had Holt, too (from Brooklyn 99, no less!). I’ve never heard of Mr Hole. I got delayed changing “rewArding intelligence” to “rewOrding intelligence” since I thought this was such a lovely definition for SEX UP.
One thing that I forgot to include when I got round to writing the blog:
many puzzles with a lot of unclued entries would have something like “Unchecked/mutually checked letters of thematic answers can make …” – that would have certainly helped here.
I entered DOYLE, thinking Martin Shaw rather than Gene Hackman. 200+ words in the clues gives 40,000+ possible word pairings so the Beverley Hills thing didn’t really help. Also, I was also left with HOL- not knowing if this was a good or bad cop. Nevermind, still enjoyed it.
I’m afraid this was another DNF for me. I completed most of the grid, and got Tennison, which enabled me to enter Frost and Morse, so I had an idea of the theme, even though I hadn’t spotted all the misprints. But it never occurred to me that you had to make anagrams of the second group, and there’s nothing in the preamble to suggest it. Clearly, experienced solvers who are familiar with this setter’s work are at an advantage here. Is that fair (he asked rhetorically)?
I’m currently waiting for Jo Nesbo’s book no 4, Nemesis, at the library, so I had no problem with Harry Hole.
Gene Hunt from Ashes to Ashes was the one I hadn’t heard of.
Coulomb to Columbo was my way in.
I enjoyed this up to a point.
I had DOYLE (The Professionals), never heard of FOYLE though I have heard of FOLEY, thus I couldn’t finish the last step.
Never heard of HOLT or HOLE either.
A disappointing end to an otherwise excellent puzzle.
I enjoyed this but didn’t finish – my knowledge of TV detectives is sadly lacking. I managed all the bad cops, the clues to the anagrams help greatly. I imagine I was supposed to find the others easy.
Thank you Lato and HG.
I tried to free-solve this and enjoyed the first phase, getting as far as identifying the GOOD COP BAD COP theme and a handful of both types. But ‘TV cops’ is not an area of expertise and I had to concede defeat and turned to this list from Wikipedia, which, whilst it helped me to correct (?) DOYLE to FOYLE, unfortunately misses out the rather vital FOLEY, so I remained baffled by the endgame. It didn’t help that I hadn’t properly parsed 2D, assuming, I think, that PLUS was probably some kind of Spenserian term for defeat, and somehow failed to check this later on. I’ve also just noticed that I hadn’t parsed USA at 37D properly, or, to be honest, at all, which also left me an unnoticed floating P. The Beverly Hills hint seems barely a hint – I’d guessed that ‘Forbidden here’ (first and last words) was the most likely candidate, but I can’t see how anyone was going to spot and use the pairing.
In the end a bit unsatisfying, but plenty to enjoy on the way. I agree that something to tell us what the unchecked letters were would have improved the experience.
HG @4
Good point. Knowing the unchecked and mutually checked letters of the thematic entries would have forced not only HOLE in favour of HOLT (both of them valid names for that unclued entry) but also FOYLE (which for me was hard to find) in favour of the incorrect answer DOYLE.
Having said that, I rather enjoyed the hunt for FOYLE after initially seeing it as a ridiculously wide search for a matching pair of words that would stand out from 40,000+ other possible pairs of words (as estimated by StainesJunction @5)! In fact, on my first and only pass through all the clues I picked out only about 15 words that were ‘significant’ or ‘interesting’ enough to make a noteworthy pair with another word, and Beverly and Hills stood out like beacons. In retrospect, it was good of Lato to capitalise Hills.
For those who want to know: the unchecked and mutually checked letters of the thematic entries make HUMBLE OX EMERGES FOR SALE. If you favour HOLT over HOLE, change the phrase to …FOR SALT, but that doesn’t read so well.
There was a TV series about Serpico, so if they are all TV cops, it should be Holt from Brooklyn 99 rather than Hole .
Enjoyed this for the most part: seeing JAZZ = RAGTIME for MAIGRET was a delightful moment, and I was pleased to remember quite a few old tv cops if not the newer ones. Mark me down as another sucker who got stuck on the HOLT/HOLE question. My possibly inept Google searches suggested that Holt was a tv cop and Hole, though very much more famous, wasn’t; and so the first went in. I too longed for an unchecked letter guide.
Thanks to Lato and HG.
We couldn’t decide between HOLE or HOLT and having entered DOYLE we were flummoxed! Looking through all the clues for two words wasn’t really going to help us unfortunately. So a DNF for us this week.
Overall an enjoyable solve but not a satisfying ending.
Thanks to Lato and HG.
Many thanks to HG for the blog and to others who commented.
Must admit I was unaware of Brooklyn 99 so apologies but would have thought Harry Hole was much better known.
I’m surprised at how many found this hard, as I found it welcomingly accesible, without the usual inclusion of, e.g. Spenserianisms and obscure Scottish dialect words. After almost discarding the puzzle, I managed to get into it and finish it apart from identifying Foyle/Foley and putting Holt not Hole (hadn’t heard of either).An enjoyable solve, that took me nearly the full fortnight – good value!
I too definitely would have liked to have seen the additional help “Unchecked/mutually checked letters of thematic answers can make …”
There are so many detectives out there. As well as DOYLE and HOLT mentioned above, I actually had GRANE (not REGAN) as the cop that produced ANGER, and note that as well as FOYLE/FOLEY being both good cop & bad cop, so is TREADLES/LESTRADE (although less satisfying as obviously a deliberate anagram in the Charlotte Holmes books).