The Observer crossword from June 9, 2019
This Everyman puzzle took me an hour to finish, which was about the same amount of time that I spent on the Guardian’s Prize from Paul.
Perhaps, I wasn’t in the right mindset but my conclusion must be ‘this was quite hard’.
For example, ‘grown up’ for GROWN* (25ac) is not something you’d expect in a crossword of which some think it should be at the lower end of the spectrum.
Our setter has clearly, um, grown into his role and, as in recent weeks, produced a fine crossword.
Well, that’s what I think. But I am aware that not everyone agreed with my recent verdicts.
The only slightly odd thing was that we had no less than 7 anagram clues in the Down section, even 5 in a row. (Sorry, 6 and 4, respectively)
Lots of famous people from Past & Present making an appearance today.
Since we had ninas round the perimeter on previous occasions, I was on the lookout but I didn’t get any further than that the long ones at the bottom
and the top might be closely related. Cookie @11 is probably right that the long one at 4d is also part of it.
| Across | ||
| 1 | SELF-CRITICISM | Novelist reviewing The Role of the Superego (4-9) |
| SELF (novelist, Will Self) + CRITICISM (reviewing) This refers to Freud’s psychoanalytic theory of personality in which there are three components: Id, Ego, Superego. The role of the Superego is to suppress the Id (‘instincts’), hence ‘self-criticism’. And more about Will Self here. |
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| 8 | CHIC | Pulse half missing, getting terribly cool (4) |
| CHICKPEA (pulse) minus its second half It took me a while to see the ‘chickpea’, although the answer was clear enough after I found out that it had to end in a C. Not terribly convinced that ‘cool’ needed strengthening. |
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| 9 | OUTER SPACE | Europe cast unfairly as ‘place lacking atmosphere’ (5,5) |
| Anagram [unfairly] of EUROPE CAST | ||
| 10 | BREAST | French city declared bust (6) |
| Homophone [declared] of BREST (French city) With the indicator in the middle I am always a bit confused where the definition is. I didn’t know any French cities with a ?R?A?T pattern and so I went for ‘bust’. |
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| 11 | NOSERING | What one familiar with Wagner does in audition, offering ornamentation (8) |
| Another homophone [in audition], this time of KNOWS RING (what one familiar with Wagner does) | ||
| 12 | IN SILENCE | Dumbly disrespect, ignoring old in favour of oneself (2,7) |
| INSOLENCE (disrespect) with O (old) replaced by I (oneself) | ||
| 14 | TINY | Slight: ‘Trust in you? Not entirely’ (4) |
| Hidden answer [not entirely]: Trust in you | ||
| 15 | BUFF | Enthusiast with excellent muscle tone (4) |
| Double definition | ||
| 16 | FRYING PAN | Spooner’s curious admirer delivers a kitchen utensil (6,3) |
| Spoonerism of PRYING (curious) FAN (admirer) I’d seen this particular one before, making it my FOI. |
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| 20 | FLORENCE | Nightingale in the city? (8) |
| Double definition Here’s more about Florence Nightingale . |
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| 21 | SAYERS | Writer‘s voice has sounds of hesitation (6) |
| SAY (voice) + ERS (plural of ER, which is a ‘sound of hesitation’) The writer is Dorothy Sayers . |
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| 23 | HORIZONTAL | Drunken harlot embraceth corrupted Zion, even (10) |
| Anagram [drunken] of HARLOT around an anagram [corrupted] of ZION Everyman gives us a sort of biblical surface by using ’embraceth’ instead of ’embraces’. |
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| 24 | AS IF | I doubt that easy life is without limits (2,2) |
| The limits i.e. the first and last letters removed from: easy life , so from both | ||
| 25 | RIGHTED WRONG | Conservative journalist, grown up with Sun, made restitution (7,6) |
| RIGHT (conservative) + ED (journalist, editor) + an anagram [up] of GROWN + S (Sun, abbreviated) | ||
| Down | ||
| 1 | SAHARAN | Baking has a sickly spread (7) |
| Anagram [sickly] of HAS A, followed by RAN (spread) My LOI. ‘Baking’ as in ‘baking hot’. |
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| 2 | LYCRA | Unlovely cravat, in part-synthetic fibre (5) |
| Hidden answer [in part]: Unlovely cravat One has to ignore the linking function of the hyphen. |
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| 3 | CHORTLE | Time learner’s invested in task? It’s a laugh (7) |
| T (time) + L (learner), together inside CHORE (task) | ||
| 4 | I STAND CORRECTED | I’ll give you that note (credit card’s declined) (1,5,9) |
| Anagram [declined] of NOTE CREDIT CARD’S Very good clue but I had to think hard about the anagram indicator. It’s fine as it can mean ‘deteriorated’ or ‘gone to pieces’ and it serves the surface extremely well. |
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| 5 | INRUSH | Crowd invasion when area lost by Liverpool striker (6) |
| IAN RUSH (Liverpool striker) minus A (area) Last week we had the sports commentator Jimmy Hill, this week there’s another icon from days gone by: Ian Rush . Nowadays we think of Salah, Mane or Firmino but Rush is still the club’s all-time leading goalscorer. |
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| 6 | IMPARTING | That’s me off making a contribution (9) |
| That’s me off, in other words: I’m off, and so: I’m parting | ||
| 7 | MOCKNEY | Monkey around, affectedly impersonating Danny Dyer? (7) |
| Anagram [affectedly] of {MONKEY + C (around)} Some might say that this is an indirect anagram (as ‘around’ has to be replaced by C). We had a similar discussion here (and elsewhere) before. I think it’s all right because I cannot think of any other one-letter ‘word’ meaning ‘around’. Another problem here, especially for non-Brits, may be the possible unfamiliarity with the phenomenon that is Danny Dyer . |
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| 13 | INFORMING | Doomed to receive porcelain that’s leaking (9) |
| IN FOR (doomed to receive) + MING (porcelain) | ||
| 15 | BALFOUR | Labour: ‘Foot could be PM‘ (7) |
| Anagram [could be] of {LABOUR + F (foot)} Brilliant surface featuring Labour politician Michael Foot (1913-2010) and Arthur Balfour, 1st Earl of Balfour (1848-1930), who served as PM between 1902 and 1905. Again the sort of indirect anagram that’s acceptable in my book of crosswords. BTW, if you want to see a real indirect anagram, look at Friday’s Guardian where Paul gives us in 28ac: “After conversion, 1 x 500” = (1 x 500)* = (ONE TIMES D)* = ….. |
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| 17 | INSULAR | Shunning company around urinals (7) |
| Another anagram [around], this time of URINALS | ||
| 18 | AIR-KISS | Tentatively ask Iris to show affection (3-4) |
| And another one [tentatively], of ASK IRIS | ||
| 19 | UNBOLT | Open, concealing nothing, unusually blunt (6) |
| Anagram [unusually] of BLUNT, going around O (nothing) | ||
| 22 | YEARN | At end of twelvemonth, Norse pine (5) |
| YEAR (twelvemonth) followed by N (Norse) | ||
Leaving aside ‘up’ in 25a, which is a bit of a stretch, I thought this was a good puzzle, and the clues for the most part fair, but not write-ins. I was pleased to see fewer multi-word answers. All in all, enjoyable.
Thanks to Sil and Everyman
I was struck not so much by the number of anagrams as the somewhat strange selection of words used to indicate them. The blogger has already suggested an explanation of ‘declined’ at 4dn but I also wondered about ‘tentatively’ at 18dn, ‘up’ at 25ac and ‘unfairly’ at 9ac. I have since found the last of these (or at least ‘unfair’) in the long list of anagram indicators in Chambers 12th edition, but it still seems a bit strange to me.
Sticking to what I have taken to calling for ease of reference ‘the usual sources’ by which I mean Collins, Chambers and the various Oxfords (COED, SOED ODE) in both their printed and on-line incarnations, it was hard to track down ‘f’ as a valid abbreviation for ‘foot’ (15dn) but I found it eventually in Chambers (again the 12th edition). But only there; it’s not in their free on-line version. The usual abbreviation is ‘ft’. Investigating a little further I discovered the 12 edition also has ‘y’ for ‘yard’ which seems logical if one accepts ‘f’ for ‘foot’, but it doesn’t have ‘i’ for ‘inch’, which by the same logic seems inconsistent.
Having said that, today’s is not good at all – the loose clueing really grates, and there’s a lot of it. I’ll wait till next week to comment further.
I cannot say that I “enjoyed” this puzzle. I found it more difficult than most of the recent Prize puzzles, all of which I have solved complerely and more easily. In the end, I gave up and left 9 clues unsolved here. I had never heard of Danny Dyer, nor any Liverpool strikers past or present, and would have struggled to get Balfour. (Yes, I am a non-Brit.)
Of the ones I solved, my favourites were OUTER SPACE, FRYING PAN, YEARN.
In contrast, I really enjoyed yesterday’s Prize by Picaroon 🙂
Thank you B+S.
I’m something of a newbie in this forum and am wondering what your policy is on spoilers? Naturally I assume one isn’t allowed to give away answers to future puzzles but I for one would prefer not to read comments about the level of difficulty, perceived problems (etc) with a puzzle that’s not due to be blogged until next Sunday and I haven’t even looked at yet. If they must be made, is there any means of hiding them behind a ‘spoiler’ warning?
jackkt1!%
do you refer to my comment @ 4?
All I said was that I really enjoyed it. I think you might be reading too much into an innocent comment. Or is that considered to be a spoiler? If yes, I apologise.
Thanks for responding, Michelle, but no, I wasn’t referring to your comment.
jackkt1@7
thanks
Can I just endorse the comment by jackkt1 about spoilers? I did make a request in my last blog that no comments be made about current puzzles. So please, don’t mention anything at all about the current Everyman, not even the fact that you’ve attempted it. This lets everyone have a go without preconceptions about difficulty levels or content. And to answer the question directly: yes, this is site policy, as Gaufrid will confirm.
I also found this more of a challenge than recent Everyman offerings and was unsure of ‘up’ as an anagrind in 25a.
Sorry to hear about the slightly parochial terms not being in daily usage for you michelle@4, they are all too familiar here to a lot of us alas (Danny Dire, Liverpool strikers etc – no offence).
Thanks Sil for the great blog and to the setter for an unfamiliar-feeling puzzle which had some cracking clues. The BALFOUR clue has already been called out by Sil and was really tickled by the surface for INFORMING.
Enjoy your Sunday all. Hopefully won’t be too wet for whatever you’re up to.
Thank you Everyman and Sil.
Very enjoyable, but quite hard going for me not knowing the footballer or Danny Dyer. I agree with jackkt1 @2 as regards ‘f’ for foot.
The PRYING FAN made me laugh, perhaps, like Sil, I have seen it before, but do not remember having done so.
“I stand corrected” down the centre of the puzzle could be part of the ‘theme’ Sil suspects?
The most difficult yet from this compiler and I didn’t think I would finish it. I sat there for ages with only six solutions written in but I don’t give up and made very slow progress until I had broken the back of it. I never do the puzzle at one sitting anyway. My last one in was NOSERING which was a good clue I thought. So despite some loose constructions (SAHARAN) and dodgy anagram indicators (declined), I enjoyed this puzzle which was quite a challenge for me. I’m not a big footie fan but I remember loads of names from the past like Ian Rush who made a good clue.
Many thanks to Sil and new style Everyman.
I knew IaN RUSH but I didn’t remember him until quite a long time after putting the answer in. I’d stopped doing the Everyman crosswords because I’d stopped enjoying them but I thought I’d give this a whirl and,while I wouldn’t call it a fine crossword,I didn’t think it a bad one. So let’s see what today’s offering is like.
Ps. I forgot to say how much I liked NOSERING!
As the sun is now (here in the UK) well over the yardarm, I’m going to get a plug in for my new and still-developing Wordsmith blog at https://wordsmith.blog, which I hope will be of interest to cruciverbalists. I’d welcome suggestions for further content – gw@geoffwilkins.net
4D. Decline as anagram indicator. I thought of declension as the noun form of decline and in that case decline should be acceptable as anagrind. Am I right?
VDS Prasad, that’s what I more or less thought.
Collins has as one of the meanings of ‘decline’: “to deteriorate, as in quality, health or character”.
I agree with those who think this indicator is a bit of a stretch but I accepted it, purely on intuition. As something that was close enough.
Ever since this Everyman joined the club, we have seen quite a few, let’s say, original anagram indicators.
Like, for example today, also ‘tentatively’. But I think if ‘unsettled’ is one or ‘uncertain’, ‘tentative’ is fine too.
And, by the way, ‘up’ has been discussed on several occasions but is a valid one as in ‘what’s up Doc?’. It’s an indicator quite frequently used in The Independent.
Thanks to both. This was harder than expected and turned into a three country effort. I started it at home in NZ, dipped into it again in Singapore and finally finished it in Bangkok. Oh and I am reading the blog in Dubai. I too found the Danny Dyer clue a bit much of a stretch although I did get the answer – eventually. But I spent too long getting an answer and then justifying it. A case of getting used to the new setter I suppose as he does tax the mind in new ways. That is probably good but it means Sunday lunch is not quite the same. I now know I am in for a decent workout.
Guessed MOCKNEY, my LOI which l presumed was a ‘spoonerism’ of MONKEY.As a Kenyan, never heard of Dyer.
Defeated by a handful, and didn’t parse a few more. 1 5 and 7 d were unsolved as was 11a and most of the SW corner. Since when did Buff mean to tone muscles?
Didn’t enjoy this at all. Found it hard going.
like Barrie and Audrey this Kiwi found too many references to things over my head. I had never heard of Mockney and don’t know who Danny Dyer is. I found Self criticism too hard to find, never heard of Will Self. Found this really hard and Nosering evaded me too. I did like Buff tho! We can talk of a ( usually male) physique being buff which I take to mean easy on the eye with good abs. Not Pc to objectify I realise.
ght be a recent term, not sure.
Liked Breast, I stand Corrected, Frying pan, Florence but found too many too hard. I laughed to read that Sil finished in an hour and found it hard. I am obviously still in a D grade league as I browse over it for a whole day…..doing other things in between of course.
Enjoyed this puzzle a great deal. Struggled a long while, but got it all out. Lots of forehead-slapper clues and lots of chortles. ( 🙂 ).
Never heard of Danny Dyer nor of Ian Rush, but got the anwers anyway from cross letters, and other bits of the clues.
I agree that some of the anagrinds are rather obscure.
All in all I think that the new Everyman has hit his/her stride.
Yes, again a step up in difficulty. But 24ac made me laugh out loud, so it can’t be bad can it. I don’t get nose ring / knows ring in 11ac. Many thanks Everyman and Sil.
After 2 days effort this was too tough for me. Glad I didn’t persevere any longer as I don’t think I would have got much further. Thanks Sil & Everyman.