Well, the heart of the blogger sinks a bit when the pseudonym (or, as Sam Costa used to say, peusodonym!) of our esteemed editor appears as the setter. I wasn’t disappointed.
No rubric to help. If this were an Azed crossword, “Plain” would indicate a bog-standard crossword containing unusual words but the first clue I solved disabused me of that possibility. It was 21D, ALIGNMENT which was an anagram, but the words net layout didn’t seem to be a satisfactory definition. Similarly at 14A, ARIES had an apparent definition of tars. I thought this might be something to do with Taurus, but eventually realised that it was the constellation, not the sign that was relevant. If there was a missing letter in most of the clues, then net could become neAt and tars could become Stars. These extra letters, I assumed, would send some sort of instruction or message.
The next problem arose in the answers which included the top row, as they all seemed too short for the space available. I didn’t realise that 1D and 11D were different from the other clues until Y?EC? yielded no possibilities. Having solved 12A TARRE I realised that the down answers 2 to 10 (possibly 1 to 10 if 1D was TAMPS!) had a blank at the top, and were one letter short of the space available. So RISING, RESIDENT and ESTATE all started one letter too low and similarly TRIERS, EON (which took a long time to parse, and I’m still not certain), ANTRA, RAIRD and WART, left spaces on the top row.
I soldiered on, encountering some pretty rare words including À TÂTONS, AGUE-CAKE, RYPECK, TEREFAH, RAIRD, ANCON and TARRE, and a couple of names RON (took a while to get the Harry Potter reference and even longer to find the bee) and OLEG.
Using my various aids extensively, I eventually solved enough of the “missing letter” clues to decipher the message from the inserted letters as INSERT WHAT’S MISSING, THEN NOTE ADVICE AT BASE, and was able to reverse engineer the rest.
I had to discover what was happening on the top row, and so far 1A and 8A had eluded me. 1D and 11D were “normal” missing letter clues and 1A appeared to be SO (just two letters not 4). I had noticed that the grid was symmetrical, so I tried looking for a symmetrical two letter solution to 8A and hit on AR. This left 9 spaces on the top row. To make real words (and it would have been totally unreasonable for them not to be) they had to be [A/P]P[GRT]E?[MT]B?? showing some of the possibilities for the first letters of real words. The most likely were APRE?MB?? and after staring at this for some time, I realised that “what’s missing” is A PREAMBLE. This fitted with real words for the remaining three down entries, though the E for Gladstone’s middle name EWART caused me a problem, as the only possibility had seemed to be SWART. The advice at the base? HIGHLIGHT IT! In addition the full answers at 1A and 8A are also real words – SOAP and BLEAR respectively.
Cor Nimrod, couldn’t you have made it a bit more difficult? What a workout! Now, of course, I have to parse everything fully in order to write this blog and there is some difficult clueing, as you would expect from this setter. Still some work to do then, but a stunning construction and a major challenge for those of you who were thinking that the Inquisitor had got simpler recently!
Two outstanding matters. Does the title have any extra significance that I have not noticed and is the appearance of ANTRA twice, symmetrically, more than a coincidence?
| Across | ||||
| No. | Clue: definition insert | Ins | Answer | Wordplay |
| 1 | Note in case (4) | SO | Double definition | |
| 8 | I omitted to display letter (5) | AR | AIR (display) minus I | |
| 12 | Took main part of film to lay bare Will’s urge for action (5) | I | TARRE | (s)TARRE(d) “laid bare” |
| 13 | Perhaps rash teen shot at Hoylake’s last, alas to right of green (8) | N | TEARAWAY | [AT (Hoylak)E]* AY (alas) to right of RAW (green) |
| 14 | STars regularly found aboard airliners (5) | S | ARIES | A(i)R(l)I(n)E(r)S |
| 15 | When those around go missing, bee Harry’s friend (3) | E | RON | Reference to Ron Weasley, Harry Potter’s friend: (d)RON(e) (a bee missing those around) |
| 17 | What’s in Tommy’s kit? Compiler half of list in error (7) | R | MESS-TIN | ME (compiler!) + SIN (error) round half of (li)ST |
| 18 | Its leaves assist with thatching birds (6, 2 words) | T | TI TREE | TIT + REE (birds) |
| 20 | WIndy Car catches the person being chased on reversing (7) | W | ERRATIC | CAR round IT (the person being chased) + RE (on) all reversed |
| 22 | Linesman’s shame, knocking out hour forward (4) | H | SEND | SHEND (Poetic shame) minus H(our) |
| 23 | Person making roof slabs read for one machinist (8) | A | TREADLER | TILER (person making roof slabs) replace I (one) with READ |
| 25 | Rant with case of earless food-grains (6) | T | RAGEES | RAGE (rant) + E(arles)S |
| 26 | Beaten, Times accepts this newspaper’s stop (6) | S | STIMIE | [TIMES + i]* |
| 30 | Roll Butcombe’s head in to make us brown male: enjoy it on the beach in August! (8) | M | SUNBATHE | TAN (brown) + US reversed (roll) round B(utcombe) + HE (male) |
| 33 | Spirit unships one carrier for the line? (4) | I | GENE | GEN(i)E – minus I (one) |
| 35 | As one inexpertly handling a tit (missing it), not as cuckoo (7, 2 words) | S | À TÂTONS | [A T(it) NOT AS]* |
| 37 | Part of the news eastern harbour runs to the west (6) | S | REPORT | R(uns) to the west (left) of E(astern) PORT (harbour) |
| 39 | Outward for one, Truro to Pair (7) | I | SEEMING | SEE (Truro, say) + MING (old word for to couple) |
| 40 | Of course Even will overturn this criminal charge (3) | N | RAP | PAR (even on golf course) reversed |
| 41 | Gathering for songs, maybe attended by English clown (5) | G | FESTE | Feste is the jester in Twelfth Night: FEST (gathering for songs) + E(nglish) |
| 42 | Not the first general top on case: before long, old organ’s swelling (8) | T | AGUE-CAKE | (v)AGUE (general) + C(ase) + AKE (old spelling of ache) |
| 43 | At intervals, lawns do sheep (5) | H | ANCON | (l)A(w)N(s) + CON (swindle or do) |
| 44 | Cut from front edge of the steep (5) | E | THIGH | Cut (of meat?): T (front edge of The) + HIGH (steep) |
| 45 | Well linked on the radio, but quickly forgotten (4) | N | TITE | Old term for quickly: sounds like TIGHT (well linked) |
| Down | ||||
| No. | Clue: definition insert | Ins | Answer | Wordplay |
| 1 | Disagreements about accepting master grinds (6) | N | STAMPS | SPATS (disagreements) reversed round M(aster) |
| 2 | Source is encircled? (7) | RISING | IS in RING | |
| 3 | Bank cuts regular payment for lodger? (9) | RESIDENT | SIDE (bank) in RENT (regular payment) | |
| 4 | Property to develop slowly without government’s supervision (7) | ESTATE | GESTATE (develop slowly) minus G(overnment) | |
| 5 | We’ll not submit slapdash rewrites: one by one, we would be fired … (7) | TRIERS | [R(ew)RITES]* (WE is removed). | |
| 6 | … and that would take a long time! (4) | EON | The italic that and the ellipsis make this refer to the previous clue for wordplay. Here are two possibilities: a) one by one is 1×1 which equals ONE and slapdash [ONE]* is EON, or b) put ONEONE (one by one) and remove the outer one (fire the royal we?) leaves (on)EON(e). I’m open to other explanations! | |
| 7 | Toothed snare parliamentarian prised off leaves cavities in bone (6) | ANTRA | (m)ANTRA(p) (toothed snare minus MP) | |
| 8 | What Stenhousemuir/Airdrieonians would give for the roar of Hampden! (6) | RAIRD | Hidden in StenhousemuiR/AIRDrieonians | |
| 9 | Soldier’s doing without knight (4) | ANT | AT (doing) outside (without) N (chess knight) | |
| 10 | Ugly growth a __hog displays? (5) | WART | Clever &lit-ish clue WARThog = [GROWTH A]* | |
| 11 | Pole used to moor by local on vacation: riverway and gym about end of bank (6) | O | RYPECK | R(iverwa)Y (vacated) + PE (gym) + C(irca) + (ban)K |
| 16 | Glaswegian guarding that is about to appear in Press (7) | T | WEIRING | IE reversed (about) in WRING (cider, wine or cheese press) |
| 19 | Lucky seagull following trawler, say, partaking of scoff Eastern? (7) | E | FEASTER | Hidden in scofF EASTERn |
| 21 | Maiden in terrible tangle in neat layout (9) | A | ALIGNMENT | M(aiden) in [TANGLE IN]* |
| 24 | Deserted topless dated again (3) | D | EFT | Obsolete word for again: (l)EFT (deserted topless) |
| 26 | Seven stirring hope, like one providing security at last? (7, 2 words) | V | SHOE-PEG | S (7 as a Mediaeval Roman numeral) + [HOPE]* + E.G. (like) |
| 27 | Ruin the fare away from the rabbi’s table? (7) | I | TEREFAH | Forbidden Jewish food: [THE FARE]* |
| 28 | Mass since waves, one figures (7) | C | MENISCI | M(ass) + [SINCE]* + I (one) |
| 29 | Pub singer of old, second nature to cheat? (6) | E | BARRAT | An obsolete word for deceit which would be second nature to a cheat: BAR (pub) + RAT (singer = informer = rat) |
| 31 | East European soup recipe secreted by Painter in the Netherlands (6) | A | BORSCH | R(ecipe) in BOSCH (Dutch painter) |
| 32 | Out of hollow meant RA looted boxes (6) | T | ANTRAL | Hidden in meaANT RA Looted |
| 34 | Rubles discarded, go back on promise to climb man (6) | B | EUGENE | R(ubles) removed from (R)ENEGUE reversed – my favourite clue! |
| 36 | Support one aloft each year from below (5) | A | APPUI | I (one) UP (aloft) + PA (per annum) all reversed |
| 38 | East European cove’s fish, topped with a touch of garnish (4) | S | OLEG | (s)OLE (fish topped) + G(arnish) |
| 39 | Rudely ask to get one monkey (4) | E | SAKI | [ASK]* + I (one) |
One of the best, I thought. I spotted pretty early the missing letters, but it took a lot longer to work out that blank spaces needed to be left at the top of the grid. Pretty tricky as you say, but very rewarding to finish.
My favourite of the year so far. A tough workout but really neat and clanging PDM when I realised it was A PREAMBLE. I too suspect there’s something going on with the ANTRA repetition but not sure what. Thanks to Nimrod and Hihoba
An excellent puzzle with a cunning design.
‘Plain’ was of course a title and not an indicator of a themeless puzzle, and I duly set out from the start to find out what was wrong with the clues! It took me a while to get ALIGNMENT, my (and others’) first answer, but APPUI, STIMIE and ANCON followed soon after, and that was when I was sure that some, most or all of the clues would be missing a letter and that I needed to collect those letters.
The clues were challenging but rewarding to solve, and the puzzle held my attention throughout. I was unsure of SO because SLIP also fits the clue, IRISING is a word and PREAMBLE is intact. EUGENE worked with or without the omitted letter (B) in the clue, but the message clearly needed that letter.
The time and effort I put into this puzzle paid off There was much to appreciate in clues such as MESS-TIN, ERRATIC, TREADLER, SEEMING, SUNBATHE, FEASTER and À TÂTONS, the last of these raising a smile. I first encountered TI TREE in a crossword more than a year ago (IQ 1613 by Stuball), and the memory of that made the answer easier to get this time.
I left as many as four clues not fully parsed (RON, SHOEPEG, TITE and BARRAT). A friend put me right on the first two of these, and the blog has come to my aid for the other two. (I guessed TIDE rather than TITE.)
Thanks to Nimrod and Hihoba.
Wonderful puzzle.
I got to the end and wished:
a) I was wearing a hat
b) Nimrod was in the room
For I wanted to take my hat off to him!
After 48 hours (on and off) staring at the puzzle and having only four answers, I wheeled in my secret weapon – my daughter. And between us we polished off in a couple of hours!
Thanks Nimrod and great blog, hihoba
kenmac @4 Alas my daughter is in NZ (I’m in tropical QLD)
so i was stumped-great blog and puzzle but out of my league
Thanks
A stonking good puzzle, and I’m amazed nobody’s used this idea before. Perhaps they have? Once I finally twigged what was going on, I found this to be on the more gentle end of the scale by Nimrod’s standards. It still wasn’t easy of course.
I assumed the title to mean simply that there was no preamble, but I have form for misunderstanding titles.
Our first thoughts were …… a plain Nimrod? No way and it wasn’t long before we realised that we were correct.
An interesting puzzle to solve – we won’t mention the somewhat ‘clunky surfaces – with a few off the wall definitions! All expected in a Nimrod.
The denouement was original and overall we had a great time solving and were glad to finish it before the next IQ was published.
We wondered about the title – we still feel that we are missing something there.
Thanks Nimrod and Hihoba.
Initially, this felt like catching balls in an unlit room at night, blindfolded. But there were just enough lobs to keep one’s hopes up, and the game became clearer (though for a short time, I thought the ‘tars’ defining Aries must become ‘star-sign’, therefore ‘unsigned’, therefore plain).
It’s very clever. Sadly I never did work out what to insert, partly because ‘swart’ seemed the only possible 10d. Thanks to Nimrod and Hihoba, for helping with the clutch of clues I couldn’t parse.
I love Bertandjoyce’s method of not mentioning something.
I found this very tough and never did decipher all the extra letters, although I got PREAMBLE and the instruction to highlight it. I wondered about the lack of spacing in the title (it’s PlainbyNimrod) – perhaps that’s connected to the two ANTRAs? Incidentally, I think that 45 across is a homophone of WELL INKED (Aussie slang for drunk).
I loved this, put a big smile on my face. My first thought on seeing Plain as the title was it is not going to be plain then! Thanks to Nimrod and Hihoba.
The gentleman at #2 above had to be asked to point out the endgame, since I was so obsessed with trying to fit Steppe (it’s a plain, innit) plus something else at the top that I couldn’t unsee it, even though it wouldn’t go in with a sledgehammer.
I had a free Saturday so went knees deep into this. First pass of clue yielded nothing…then, like Hihoba, alignment dropped. Which led to the SE corner becoming the way in. Gosh, this was tough. My grid fill was bottom up. A tough work out. Classic Nimrod in style. I’m also wondering about the pair of symmetrical Antra answers but can’t see it … maybe JH will come on here to clarify. Thanks to him and Hihoba for the fun and the blog.
My solving document started: “no preamble… I wonder if we have to work it out ourselves. Title is “plain” but is it really?” We certainly did have to work it out.
Interestingly, messed up 34D — came up with E as the missing letter which led to the message ending: “A TEASE” which seemed to me to be quite thematically consistent!
The title seemed straightforward to me. As Alan B points out it is a title not an instruction.
What is a plain crossword?
A plain crossword is one with no special instructions.
A (lone?) dissenting voice here. I didn’t get on at all with this puzzle. I was in contact with Hi (blogger) who had a few words of encouragement. I did get there in the end, but was it worth it? Probably not.
There are a few clues I still don’t really get: 44a “cut” for THIGH; 6d …; 29d what role is “second nature” playing? Very relieved it wasn’t my turn to blog.
I’m another one of the few dissenters, Holy Ghost. Despite reading through the clues several times, I just couldn’t get a handle on any of them. Mind you I did write down Ron, very faintly, next to 14 across, but had absolutely no idea how to parse it!
The end result was a completely blank grid and a feeling of inadequacy.