It doesn’t seem that long ago since we blogged the last Bluth – not that we are complaining!
We did groan somewhat at the parsing of 15ac – no doubt it will be one of those clues that polarises opinion. Some good misdirection and humour as we have come to expect from Bluth. It’s Joyce’s turn to write the blog this week and her favourite clue is 7d for its succinctness.
U (posh) in or ‘amongst’ EROS (26d) on TUB (clumsy ship)
A RR (bishop) with priEST (‘half-cut’)
BO (Body Odour – ‘smelly problem’) + EGG reversed or ‘flipped’ + D (first letter or ‘ingredient’ in drink) DOWN (not working)
DR (medic) before OP (surgery)
U R – sounds like (‘heard’) ‘you are’ inside or ‘invested in’ BEAU (escort)
C (Corps) inside or ‘invading’ INDIA (eastern country) before TE (as in TE Lawrence)
SPY (secret agent) around or ‘receiving’ CRAP (discharge). We have to confess that we both thought “Oh dear!’ when we realised the parsing for this clue.
UND (German for and) around WIN (victory) S (last letter of success)
An anagram of OP EDS – anagrind is ‘blasted’ + TIC (jerk)
RE (Engineers) and an anagram of FREE – anagrind is ‘up’
Double definition
CO (firm) L L (fifty fifty) around or ‘about’ LATE (dead) RA (gunmen as in Royal Artillery)
S (special) CY (first and last letter or ‘case’ to carry) THE
An anagram of WON’T – anagrind is ‘cast’ with DOZE (sleep) inside
A reversal (about) of exODUS (withdrawal) with UK (United Kingdom) replacing EX (old)
Hidden in (‘some’) plumBER Grouts
WOO (court) D (department) UP reversed or ‘turning’ LP (record)
Alternate letters (‘regularly’) of gOd SaM wOrShIpS
Hidden or ‘buried’ and reversed or ‘back’ in garDEN NATurally
An anagram of TRUmP without m (first letter or ‘hint’ of mask), COVID and E (last or ‘ultimate’ letter of acolyte – 19down) – anagrind is ‘riddled’
AS (arsenic) SORTED (classified)
An anagram of PESTER A EX (former) and A ( first letter or ‘start’ of associate)
REDdEN (embarrass – with only one ‘d’ or ‘half-heartedly’) C (Catholic) in CE (Church)
AR AR (two artists) with the second reversed or ‘back to back’ on TOR (hill) with N (last letter or ‘closer’ to Penn) at the beginning or ‘first’. Joyce had never heard of the two American comic magic duo Penn and Teller.
A ‘cycling’ of TEA COsY with the ‘s’ (section) becoming L (middle or ‘essential’ letter of gilet)
TICK (correct) ET (film)
EggshelL (first and last letters or ‘coat’) around NAME (handle)
A reversal or ‘upset’ of SORE (angry)
Took me far too long to parse SUDOKU but got there in the end. My favourites were TWO DOZEN for the misdirection and PRODUCTIVE for the surface. I parsed 13d as in the blog but did wonder if “former associate at the start” was signifying the initial EX and the anagram was missing an A. Given the precision of this setter, I feel the parsing as given is correct.
Thanks to Bluth and Bertandjoyce.
Well, I couldn’t parse Sudoku so thanks for the explanation. Bluth has settled in to become a very accomplished setter, so thanks to him and B&J.
I took the parsing of 13d to be an anagram of PESTER A with EX A (former associate) at the start, which avoids a partial indirect anagram.
“Oh dear!” is very much an understatement for 15a. How can a supposed quality newspaper sink so low?
Thanks to B&J.
Tatrasman @2. I forgot that A could stand for Associate, so I think you must be correct.
As for 15a, I never took that particular C word as being particularly strong and, indeed, have been known to say it fairly often. The surface did cry out for the double meaning of “discharge” which did make it hard to resist.
I’m another ‘oh dear’ at 15a but I did like 28a with the sneaky ’24’
Thanks to Bluth and B&J
Like Hovis, we use the C word as well using it as Chambers defines it in terms of 2. Rubbish, dirt 3. Worthless, nonsense and 4. Unpleasant or petty behaviour. Maybe those of us who said – Oh Dear – didn’t like the fact that in the clue Bluth was using it as 1. Excrement. Strange though that we don’t object to PEE being used in a clue. Why is that?
B&J @6 I too use the word to mean rubbish. My oh dear was more concerned with the reaction to the clue we’d get from the usual suspects
It was partly that as well Crypticsue.
as Bertandjoyce said…lifes too short to worry about crap in general, I feel… so much more going on here to be very happy with..
thanks Bluth n Bertandjoyce
Lots of ‘oh dear’s (and one on the Guardian blog too!) but the word in question is fairly mild these days and is my 17 year old’s ejaculation of choice. Which, somehow, actually sounds quite comical when one considers what some of his pals might be saying in similar circumstances. I interpreted it as a verb rather than a noun though it makes no difference.
Some lovely clueing from Bluth today with several double ticks: COLLATERAL was beautifully constructed – once I’d got Securicor out of my head, TWO DOZEN is a cunning misdirect (and I wondered at first if it was going to be THE PLOUGH as in the Great BEAR constellation), WOOD PULP is very clever – surface and construction, and OSMOSIS may not be the most challenging device but the surface made up for it. I agree with Joyce that ASSORTED is delightfully pithy and NARRATOR makes clever use of the US magic duo [Joyce – I have to admit to rather enjoying their stuff. Magicians do very different work these days, compared with those I knew as a child, but, if you approach them with an open mind, both the way they interact as a double act and the ingenuity of their stunts can make them well worth watching.]
I totally failed to parse SUDOKU, I wasn’t entirely sure about TUBEROUS = bumpy (I think Bluth must have less success with his root crops than some of my allotment neighbours!) ASPEROUS – which actually means rough, uneven and bumpy might have fitted which caused confusion for a while. Finally, though I got PRODUCTIVE in almost the right way, I couldn’t explain the E having interpreted “19 ultimately” as N.
Thanks Bluth and B&J
Thank you Bert and Joyce, I am in good company in failing to parse SUDOKU but nor could I fully reconcile CREDENCE with a jumble of RED CH CE RC etc on my rough paper – but in both cases the answer was clear once I had crossers.
Agree with others that this has lots of good snappy clues in the first Bluth I have attempted, I thought PRODUCTIVE very cleverly constructed especially that final E, but (after the recent Picaroon Guardian) I have to make TWO DOZEN my favourite, many thanks Bluth.
[PS and slightly off-topic but in 1982 I nonchalantly repeated some playground gossip to my dad that Brazil wouldn’t win the world cup because their goalie was C**P, and got a proper, er, b*ll*cking in return – so it was clearly out of bounds for a schoolboy back then! Even though I was right…]
So many ways in which our setter could have clued 15a but he had to opt for the cheap laugh route.
That, plus the unnecessary wordiness of some clues and odd surface reads, has finally convinced me to leave his future puzzles alone.
Thanks to B&J for the review, particularly the parsing of SUDOKU which had defeated me.
Hmm horses for courses Jane I guess, a workout with laughs works for me every time over a workmanlike dull drudge of a technically correct but drear puzzle.
Thanks B&J and Bluth of course
Chacun a son gout, I suppose. I don’t find Bluth particularly more wordy than many another setter. There are some clues here positively pithy and anyway I do rather like piecing together the long clues. As for 15a I’m sure a cleverer person than I am could come up t a reference to an American game of dice. Any offers?
Jayjay@15: I’ll bite (but making no great intellectual claims) – how about “Disorganised secret agent hosts pointless dice game” – though I think the word “dice” makes it a bit too easy, and maybe could be ditched.
Somebody cleverer than me could turn “Secret agent around, turned: French park in disarray” into a smooth sentence, perhaps. While I didn’t think the original was great I think it beats either of mine, at least for originality!
Sorry, Bluth; on your last published offering, I more or less promised to keep nit-picking, but I can’t find any nits this time. Thanks, and to B&J as well.
Gazzh @16 and Jayjay @15: Now Gazzh has risen to the challenge, “Fragmentary computer program in attempt to see future”
Thanks Bertandjoyce – and thanks more generally for the kind words. I’ve lost track at how many of the ‘oh dears’ were based on genuine upset, irony or just ‘uh oh… we know what’ll happen next’ anticipation but I’m very much with undrell @9 in thinking life’s too short to be worried by such trifles.
Postmark @10, I’m sure I can help settle you with the idea that tuberous = bumpy.
Tuber = 1: a swelling, 2: a lump, 3: a rounded swelling, 4: a knob, 5: a protuberance
And Tuberous = 1: having tubers.
I don’t think there’s much controversy in the idea that something having multiple tubers – defined any way from 1 through 5 – would be bumpy.
Jane @13: so many ways in which the commenter could have registered her dislike for the word ‘crap’ but she had to opt for the, perhaps patronising assumption – that everyone who is untroubled by mildly rude words is giggling like schoolboys at them.
I’m afraid, Jane, the more prosaic truth is that many people don’t find the word ‘crap’ neither offensive nor funny. It is just a word. Your assumption that we do, does you no favours. It is entirely possible to react to discharge = crap in the same way as one does to handle = name. They’re synonyms, but very different ones to those the surface at first suggests.
For what it’s worth, the reason I prefer ‘discharge’ is simply because, unlike the dice game or the computer program mooted by others, a discharge – in the military sense – belongs in the same world as a spy, which means it helps to create a surface that tells a story. I imagine a disorganised spy would quite quickly receive a not-too-honourable discharge.
My intended parsing for 13D was as suggested by Rabbit Dave @3.
Ian SW3 @17. I’m sure I will produce nits for you to pick in the future. As it goes, I can pick some nits with this one myself.
I think my clue for 24A should have been: Suffer to be 6 and I’m slightly niggled that both 1D and 13D use ‘ex’ in similar ways. (‘old’ in one and ‘former’ in the other). But, as I’m typing this there are 18 comments and nobody else has pulled me up on those so I think I got away with it!
Happy new year all… and to those who, like me, are home-schooling… good luck!
While I’m here, I hope nobody will mind if I mention this charitable endeavour. (If this is in the wrong place, Gaufrid please do feel free to delete and shove it somewhere more appropriate.)
In February I will be joining the remarkable John Halpern for a couple of hours on a zoom event where we – the two of us and those in attendance – will construct a crossword on the theme of Madness. (The band, not the current malaise). It’s a free event but we hope people will feel moved to donate to Great Ormond Street Hospital.
If that’s of interest to any of you, you can sign up for it via John’s website here -> https://johnhalpern.co.uk/dave-gorman
I just noticed @4 that I referenced Tatrasman@2 instead of Rabbit Dave @3 for which I apologise.
Part way through this I thought “Either Bluth’s getting easier or I’m getting better!” which turned out to be hubris as I then hit serveral I struggled with. (Couldn’t see the start of 8A, took a while to parse 25A and never got the right parsing of 28A even with TWO and crossing O and E.) However it was a really enjoyable puzzle with some lovely surfaces. 1D, 18D and particularly 6D were favourite challenges.
I enjoyed this but at first my “it couldn’t be?!” filter made 15A a bit more difficult. Some intricate constructions but all very precise, making it quite satisfying. Surfaces of 1D and 9A a bit bizarre, but I never notice this until finished.
Very much enjoyed this. Favourite clue 18D.
Thanks to Bluth and B&J.
Bluth @19
I liked 15a, but in the part of your comment between ‘I’m afraid, Jane, …’ and
‘… at first suggests’ I think you’re unfairly dismissive of Jane and kidding yourself into the bargain:
You have deliberately isolated the word crap in scrappy.
You have deliberately used its scatological meaning, where you could have said, for example, ‘..collects worthless nonsense’ or something similar.
The unexpectedness of the leap from discharge as in dismissal to crap as in shit is humorous. You did it for a laugh. The same thing applies to handle/name, but the effect is amplified for discharge/crap because there is an element of taboo about shit. Not in all circumstances, and to different degrees for different people, but I suspect even you wouldn’t make a scatological joke when receiving your OBE, or at parents’ evening at school. For many people, crosswords should be (and traditionally have been) one of those polite environments.
To say ‘it is just a word’ is disingenuous. A Scrabble player who memorises lists and treats the whole thing as a mathematical exercise might get away with that argument, but not a crossword compiler. Crosswords are all about meanings, and clues, as you say yourself, create pictures. You have made your solvers think about crap. They can’t leave the clue alone until they have worked out that because crap is discharge, crap = shit. The very thing that makes the clue work well – the unexpected leap – actually forces it into our brains. For many people, such clues are tiresome. You can’t make them like it by pretending there’s nothing to dislike.
ooph. not in the least worried about crap. more worried about 3rd person singular verbs before fodder where possibly the imperative would be neater (17a, 3d). I enjoyed the puzzle immensely, as i normally do with Bluth. many thanks Bluth & J&B
Thanks Alliacol and DSQ. I chuckled at your suggestion that the surfaces were a bit bizarre, Alliacol – particularly on 9a as I received a tweet from a lay-preacher yesterday suggesting that stopping bishop and a drunk priest was a pretty common occurrence!
James @25. Thank you for that thoughtful comment, much of which I agree with. I _was_ being dismissive – but then so was Jane which was really the point I was trying to illustrate, I think words can be taboo – the word ‘shit’ in your comment causes a reaction in me that the word crap does not. I think the point that it is possible to respond to ‘discharge = crap’ in the same way as ‘handle = name’ is valid. Where there is a laugh in it, it is to do with the perceived gap between the definition suggested by the surface and that required by the wordplay. And yes, many people would think the gap bigger between discharge and crap than between handle and name. But the suggestion that it is a cheap laugh is the suggestion that we are schoolchildren laughing at bums and willies simply because they are taboo… which I do not consider to be the case and which I do find extremely dismissive and patronising.
For what it’s worth, I would absolutely make a scatalogical joke at a parents evening o while collecting an OBE (fingers crossed!) I wouldn’t go out of my way to do so, but if a teacher or Her Maj delivered the set up and the language required was inoffensive… I can’t see a reason not to. I do not consider the very subject to be taboo.
I do completely understand that some people think such topics are taboo… and I think that when they assume that other people are chuckling at it *because* of that taboo-ness it leads them to feel the offence doubled because in some small way it then feels that their sensitivity is being mocked. Rather than simply-not-shared.
It is also hard to gauge where someone’s boundaries lie when they positively enjoy clues about sexually assaulting geese and clergy partaking in orgies etc etc, Jane and I have had many discussions on here and I’ve always been perfectly comfortable and respectful of her dislike for what I do. I do not seek to persuade her to like what she doesn’t like… only accept the intention is not as she perceives it.
But it is quite unreasonable (apart from too late) to expect your solvers to take any account of your unknown intentions. On the other hand, there is no reason for you not to accept without demur what the effect was.
I agree James. And I’m not asking solvers to account for unknown intentions. Just requesting that they don’t assume the intentions are lowly. I quite accept that Jane (and no doubt, others) don’t like it. But they can say so without assuming the intent was to giggle at poos.