Prize puzzle from the Weekend FT of February 29, 2020
For Leap Day, we get a special puzzle from Gozo. It must have taken him some struggle to fit this together and have the edge cells spell out TODAY TWENTY-TWENTY LEAP DAY. I found it more appealing than most extra-puzzlely puzzles although there are two obscure references, one to a Czech composer by the name of Dussek and one to a piece of land in Ireland called The Pale.
My favourite clue is the one for YELP.
Here are the clues, with answers and explanations, in the order published:
A Poor Luigi in the drink at his peak! (8)
AIGUILLE – anagram (poor) of LUIGI in ALE (drink). I fail to see the purpose of ‘his’ here.
A Call up during match on opponents’ ground where Tom might be (8)
ALLEYWAY – YELL (call) backwards (up) in AWAY (match on opponents’ grounds)
A Hails singletons out throughout the dark? (3-5,7)
ALL-NIGHT SESSION – anagram (out) of HAILS SINGLETONS
A Aspiring starlet losing her head about model in poem (7,3)
ANNABEL LEE – ELLE (model) in (about) [w]ANNA BE (aspiring starlet losing her her head). “Annabel Lee” is a poem by Edgar Allan Poe.
C Party leader at new New Town first (6)
CORBYN – CORBY (new town) + N (new)
D Weaken the spirit? (6)
DILUTE – cryptic definition
D Composer brakes suddenly a little, on the way back (6)
DUSSEK – reverse hidden word. Jan Ladislav Dussek (1760-1812) was a Czech composer.
E A setter’s problematical checkups (3,5)
EAR TESTS – anagram (pr0blematical) of A SETTERS
E Stays home for a meal, pouring tisane (4,2)
EATS IN – anagram (pouring) of TISANE
E Do well on borders of Essex – three of the first four at Chelmsford (5)
EXCEL – E[sse]X + C[h]EL
G Commando short of experience with engineers in punt (5,5)
GREEN BERET – GREEN (short of experience) + RE (engineers) in (in) BET (punt)
L Releases — so we’ll set off! (4,2)
LETS GO – double definition
N German flower you once sent back to capital (6)
NIAMEY – YE (you once) + MAIN (German flower, i.e. river) all backwards (sent back). Niamey is the capital of Niger.
O Hot cakes ruined substantial wooden container (3,5)
OAK CHEST – anagram (ruined) of HOT CAKES
P Not having been in the sun in the Dublin area? (4)
PALE – double definition. The Pale was a strip of land, centred on Dublin, that stretched from Dundalk in Louth to Bray in Wicklow and became the base of English rule in Ireland.
P Rush to purchase a nice pub (not English), before start of year (5-3)
PANIC -BUY – anagram of A NIC[e] PUB + Y[ear]. With no anagram indicator? Or is ‘purchase’ intended to do double duty?
P The very worst place for theatre bands? (4)
PITS – double definition. I originally had this as a cryptic definition but the consensus seems to be that it is a double.
P Die-hard gentleman is back in place (6)
PURIST – SIR (gentleman) backwards (is back) in PUT (place)
R It varies resistance about those in desert (8)
RHEOSTAT – anagram (about) of THOSE in (in) RAT (those in desert)
R Pasta from capital not prepared before one (8)
RIGATONI – RIGA (capital) + anagram (prepared) of NOT + I (one)
S Being so brainy, I left the sugar-coated confections with teacher first (8)
SMARTEST – SMART[i]ES + T[eacher]. In the UK, Smarties are a type of sweet/candy.
S Upset love, irritated (4)
SORE – EROS (love) backwards (upset)
T Bound by discretion, one is silent (5)
TACIT – I (one) in (bound by) TACT (discretion)
T What about the sign of approaching spring? (4)
THAW – anagram (about) of WHAT
T Exacting payment when assembling a cabinet? (7,3,5)
TURNING THE SCREW – double definition
U Film removed from unfamiliar worried muse (6)
URANIA – anagram (worried) of UN[f]A[mil]IAR. I once knew a woman named Urania.
Y What you expect little puppies to do, at first? (4)
YELP – Y[ou] E[xpect] L[ittle] P[uppies] &Lit.
Y Dismiss royal house (4)
YORK – double definition. ‘York’ can mean to dismiss a batsman in cricket (in a particular way).
Thanks Gozo and Pete
An unusual alphabetical in that it was the first one that I’d done without the full A-Z being used. -was also the first one to have a nina around the perimeter which probably explains why – a great job to be able to just get the nina around the grid. Having said that I forgot that the rubric mentioned that there would be one.
I think that the Luigi involved with AIGUILLE was Luigi di Savoia, an Italian mountaineer who was the first to scale and name Arguille Petigax in Mont Blanc – or so said some reference !!
Couldn’t find the ELLE part of ANNABELLE LEE – my second unpatriotic miss for the week – got fixated with [W]ANNABE being the first part and trying to deal with LLEE. So thanks for setting that right for me.
Had PITS as a double definition – as it being ‘the very worst place’ and the part of the theatre where the orchestra sits.
Got a start with YELP and YORK, GREEN BERET was the first one to enter the grid and finished with DILUTE, PURIST and CORBYN.
Loved this: like Christmas all over again! Highly absorbing and I was surprused to get through it at (for me) reasonable speed. Only defeated by the capital of Niger and the parsing of Annabel Lee (missed “Elle” as the model). I parsed PITS slightly differently as a double definition: “The very worst” (as in “this is the …”) and “place for theatre bands?”
I was satisfied to finish this and enjoyed most of the clues and the perimeter Nina, but an egregious error like the one in P2 is always going to take something away from the enjoyment I’m afraid. That it was allowed into a prize puzzle no less was frankly beyond the P1.
Thanks to all.
Oh and I thought YELP was a bit sketchy too. Having the acrostic indicator separated from the fodder seemed rather unfair to me.
Thanks to Gozo and Pete. I struggled with this puzzle for a week. GREEN BERET got me into the grid and the leap year nina helped, but even with a lot of help from Google, I did not get NIAMEY.
Probably too late for anyone to see, but I don’t think PALE is particularly obscure. It’s where the phrase “beyond the pale” comes from.
Bruce, Thank you for identifying that Luigi for us. It did not occur to me that an actual Luigi might have been involved.
Fluffikins, Thanks for commenting. I have revised PITS to be a double definition.
Angstony, I think you make a good point about the YELP clue. Thanks.
Simon S, Thank you for clearing that up. I had suspected that “beyond the pale” came from the Irish place.
Nobody criticised the Niamey clue. It seems unsound: it leads to MAINEY. Gozo intends that (ye Main) is reversed but how does it say that? Or he intends that both the river and ye are reversed separately, but ‘sent back’ doesn’t do this.
As Angstony@3 says in referring to another dreadful error, how this got into a prize puzzle is incomprehensible.
Extremely late but at least you’ll see this, Pete.
This is a good point about the NIAMEY clue. And one I totally missed. So thanks for pointing it out.