Quite a good crossword from whichever version of Everyman produced this one. I don’t want to be seen as damning it with faint praise, but after the past few weeks, when there has been some criticism of the crossword, this comes as a pleasant surprise. Recent surfaces have been a bit meaningless, but here Everyman seems to be making an effort. There are a few little points which I make in the blog, but on the whole it was all very enjoyable.
Indicators (anagram, hidden, reversal etc) in italics. Anagrams indicated (like this)* or *(this). Definitions in crimson, underlined.
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | SCREWDRIVER |
In South Germany, sailors on Rhine perhaps delivering drink (11)
|
| S (crew) D river — S = south, D = Germany, crew = sailors, Rhine, perhaps = river — a screwdriver is a type of cocktail | ||
| 9 | INBUILT |
Endless nubility vigorously essential (7)
|
| (nubilit[y])* | ||
| 10 | ALLEGRO |
Primarily, a Latinate locution expressly gainsaying ritenuto, orchestrally! (7)
|
| The first letters clue that we always see in the Everyman; the definition isn’t really of allegro, which is generally taken to mean fast (although not as fast as vivace or presto) so what about largo or lento? But we are on the lookout for these clues nowadays. | ||
| 11 | ERRED |
Sinned a little, altogether redeemable (5)
|
| Hidden in altogethER REDeemable | ||
| 12 | CONSUMES |
Disposes of Tories with hesitant utterances about Europe (8)
|
| Cons um(E)s — Cons = Tories, ums = hesitant utterances, E = Europe — disposes of in the slang-ish sense of eating | ||
| 14 | NEAPOLITAN |
Ice-cream option, on plate, in a shambles (10)
|
| (on plate in a)* — nice coincidence that it looks as if ‘option’ is part of the anagram, |
||
| 15 | INFO |
Data derived from rainforests (4)
|
| Hidden in raINFOrests — I always feel we are being short-changed when a hidden is entirely within a single word, but it’s perfectly sound | ||
| 17 | CO-OP |
Workers get benefits in this cage (2-2)
|
| coop — coop = cage, as in ‘hen coop’ | ||
| 19 | DEALERSHIP |
Dutch society procuring English beer runs joint franchise (10)
|
| D (E ale r) S hip — D = Dutch, E = English, ale = beer, r = runs, S = society, hip = joint | ||
| 21 | ETHIOPIA |
Country‘s leaderless state shown in film; not, oddly, optimal (8)
|
| ET ([O]hio) [o]p[t]i[m]a[l] — the state is Ohio and this is shown in a combination of the film ET (Extra-terrestrial) and not oddly, ie the even letters of the word, ‘optimal’ — ET often appears in crosswords because the letters ‘et’ often appear in words — one disregards the commas near the end, which are only there for the surface (although perhaps they don’t improve it much) | ||
| 23 | PER SE |
In itself, Money Bag #1, so to speak! (3,2)
|
| “purse” — |
||
| 25 | SULLIED |
Ill-used, warped, depraved (7)
|
| (Ill-used)* | ||
| 26 | GARBLES |
Makes corrupt run for money in sweepstakes? (7)
|
| gambles with its m replaced by r — m = money, r = run | ||
| 27 | OVERDRESSED |
Prepared salad to follow balls – too fancy? (11)
|
| over dressed — ‘over’ as in cricket, six balls, ‘dressed’ = ‘prepared salad’ | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 1 | SIBERIA |
South European peninsula where it snows a lot (7)
|
| S Iberia — Iberia is a south European peninsula, but it’s also simply a European peninsula: the S is needed for South | ||
| 2 | RAINDROP |
A little water moving penny down drain, runs over penny (8)
|
| drain with its d moved to the end, then r o p — ‘moving penny down’ means putting the ‘d’ further down the word, in this case all the way to the bottom of it, then r = runs, o = over, p = penny — those younger than a certain age may not be familiar with the fact that the old penny was abbreviated to ‘d’ (because it stood for ‘denarius’), although the new penny (post-1971) is abbreviated to ‘p’ — they’re both pennies | ||
| 3 | WETS |
Raising fuss, namby-pambies (4)
|
| (stew)rev. — stew = fuss | ||
| 4 | REASONABLE |
About A Boy: accomplished, wise (10)
|
| re a son able — re = about, a = A, son = Boy, able = accomplished | ||
| 5 | VALES |
On radio, covers glens (5)
|
| “veils” — “on radio” indicates the homophone | ||
| 6 | REGIMEN |
Most of wine and spirits Everyman imbibed, needing healthier routine (7)
|
| re[d] gi(me)n round I — the wine is red, a common type of wine in crosswords, the spirits are gin — Everyman (me) puts in an appearance, as he always does although nobody seems to comment on this — the definition doesn’t seem quite right, as a regimen is just a course of treatment; OK it’s intended to make you healthier, but is it a healthier routine? | ||
| 7 | WINE AND CHEESE |
Chinese weaned off dairy and booze (4,3,6)
|
| (Chinese weaned)* — since it’s wine and cheese then you could argue the clue ought to have said booze and dairy, but perhaps the setter thought that ‘booze’ was a better possible definition than ‘dairy’, not that either of them are in fact the definition | ||
| 8 | DO AS YOU PLEASE |
Invitation to gratification in seedy São Paulo resort (2,2,3,6)
|
| (seedy Sao Paulo)* — I can’t find this phrase in Chambers or Collins, but I’m surprised about that — same remarks about the nounal anagram indicator as in 14ac, although perhaps it’s not a noun and is to be read as the verb ‘re-sort’ | ||
| 13 | LIKE-MINDED |
Agreeing it’s dear to acquire distressed denim (4-6)
|
| like(*(denim))d — liked = dear | ||
| 16 | PREPARES |
Quiet Greek regularly strips off, gets ready (8)
|
| p {G}r{e}e{k} pares — p = piano = quiet, pares = strips off | ||
| 18 | OTHELLO |
Bit of drama in early part of Bible: well, well! (7)
|
| OT hello! — OT = Old Testament, hello! = well, well — why it says ‘Bit of’ I’m not quite sure: isn’t Othello just a Shakespearean drama? Perhaps the surface reading is improved slightly by ‘Bit of’, but I can’t see that it makes all that much difference | ||
| 20 | HURDLED |
With time being taken, dashed over hazard, ultimately! (7)
|
| hur[t]led round [hazar]d — a CAD (clue as definition) or, as some people call it, an &lit. (and literally) — a good clue spoilt for me because of my dislike of ‘over’ as a word meaning ’round’, and a slightly weak definition: OK an athlete has the time taken, but one can also hurdle things without time being involved | ||
| 22 | OLIVE |
Part of nibbles: I’m surprised the French including starters of inedible veloutés (5)
|
| o l(i[ncredible] v[elouté])e — I initially wrote a whole lot of rubbish about olé and oh-la-la but I think it’s ‘o’ for ‘I’m surprised’ and ‘the French’ is ‘le’, although I’d have thought that o = I’m surprised was a bit odd: surely it should be ‘oh’ | ||
| 24 | OGRE |
Then going in Jack’s direction, finding giant (4)
|
| (ergo)rev. — ergo = then, going in Jack’s direction is going backwards … although Chambers has many senses of ‘jack’, the only one I can find is the Australian ‘fed up’, so if ‘ergo’ is fed up(wards) then it becomes ‘ogre’; is it really this? I’m sure people will come up with something more likely [Yes they did: ‘going in Jack’s direction’ refers either to ‘Jack and Jill/went up the hill etc’ or to Jack and the Beanstalk, in either case going upwards] |
“Money bag #1” = PURSE A, whimsically.
Re NEAPOLITAN, I don’t particularly like noun anagrinds, but I don’t think that’s the case here because ‘a shambles’ is adjectival. ‘Shambles’ on its own would have been a noun.
Enjoyed this but did not get PER SE, GARBLES or HURDLED despite staring at them for ages.
Thought WINE AND CHEESE was strange – cheese and wine is surely the phrase.
Favourites were CONSUMES, DEALERSHIP, OVERDRESSED, VALES, ETHIOPIA (FOI after the primarily clue – and been a while since I have seen ET in a clue)
Thanks Everyman and John
I thought *going in Jack’s direction* in 24 down might refer to Jack and Jill going up the hill to fetch a pail of water.
Definitely WINE AND CHEESE in our neck of the wood, Fiona Anne @2. As John said, very enjoyable with little to complain about. Jack’s direction is surely Jack climbing up the beanstalk, where he found a giant/OGRE. I agree with Blorenge @1 about “purse A”. Thanks, Eveyman and John.
Thanks John and Everyman. I enjoyed this week.
Agree Blorenge@1 with PURSE A., but disagree with ‘a shambles’, not that I mind nouns operating as indicators, but the ‘a’ is part of the anagrist.
John, I think the italics need to be amended.
I liked that clue for the image of icecream wobbling and melting on a plate.
Fiona Anne @3. I thought it was Jack going up the beanstalk.
Sorry Tassie Tim. You’d know what direction’s up coming from down there. 🙂
Paddymelon, you’re right about the second ‘a’ – thanks, and apologies. I’m pretty sure I didn’t notice that last week either.
Blorenge @8. You’re in good company. I don’t think John did either 🙂
Some advice re. Everyman 3898 — there are three incomplete clues in the online version (11ac, 12ac and 17dn), all of them missing text that starts with an italicised word. See the PDF version for the complete clues.
Thought of both Jill and beanstalk for ‘up’ but, given the ogre, the beanstalk gets it, as TT @4 et al have said. Had the same mer as John about ‘o’ for ‘I’m surprised’ in 23d. Haven’t looked at my filled grid, but pretty sure I carelessly bunged in ‘hurtled’ at 20d … bit of a stuff-up there. No doubt John will pop back and unitalicise the a in 14ac, as paddymelon @5 points out. Thanks E and J, now for a look at today’s.
Oh, thanks for the heads-up about the missing bits in today’s, John E. I’ll give it a crack online anyway.
Nice Everyman. Agree about 24. I could not parse it then, but agree with the beanstalk idea.
Super blog thank you, very comprehensive and an excellent and fair initial summary.
Fiona Anne@2 has picked my favourites again, I will add INBUILT for the endless nubility in the clue and OGRE for the reason explained by Tassie Tim @4.
Good morning John and all solvers!
Lovely parsing, much appreciated John, terse annotations afore I go:
? allegro contradicts ritenuto
? ‘shambles’ and ‘resort’ indeed both included in their rôle as handy verbs
? seconded re: hiddens & we could have split ‘rainforest’ into its constituent parts but I think we’d all generally rather not?
? as others have noted, “purse A” (groan) & Jack’s going up: O!
? ‘regimen’: Chambers 3 ‘(medicine) a prescribed combination of… [etc]’
? perhaps I meant to put ‘booze and dairy’ as you say; the memory is not so sharp!
Stay safe everyone.
-Everyman
Thank you Everyman , always nice to hear from the setter. PURSE A is pretty good now I know what the strange symbol means.
WINE AND CHEESE gives our almost traditional rhyme with 8D.
Ah, didn’t think of ‘shambles’ as a verb. That makes sense and the clue even better in hindsight. I thought there was double duty going on.
Thanks Everyman/people for dropping in.
Thanks, John
But for
14a Neapolitan : should the explanation be
(on plate in a )* shambles
?
[Just a note re earlier comments on this week’s puzzle… the online version (not the app) has now been corrected]
5 down had me stumped and I eventually guessed vales thinking that the radio was referring to valves with the v removed somehow. I now know that “on radio” is a homophone indicator. Thanks John. And, of course, thanks to Everyman. Always enjoyable.
This felt much more like the Everyman we know and love (or, at least, remember fondly).
But which Everyman was it? It seems like pass the parcel
I liked OTHELLO
Thanks to Everyman @15. To compound my earlier misinterpretation of 14a I didn’t spot ‘shambles’ as a verb either.
Great crossword. Thanks John & Everyman.
Thanks to the many commenters who pointed out my shortcomings. Blog amended.
On Jack’s direction, I was also thinking that when you jack up a car you raise it. Thank you to Everyman and to John.
Thank you, John @25. I must say that there was never any doubt in my mind, in solving, that the Jack in 24D’s clue was he of the beanstalk, whose prodigious growth, as Tassie Tim @ 4 reminds us, he ascended vertically to discover a giant at the top. This made for an elegantly knowing bit of cluing, whereas I don’t feel that the other Jack’s accompanied ascent towards a well, which he may or may not have reached before losing his footing and his dignity, fitted the bill to nearly the same extent. However, your amended blog diplomatically accommodates the latter’s adherents.
Thank you for all the comments. I found it a harder solve in the SE corner. The #1 in 23 across completely floored me!
John E @10 I’ve checked the pdf, and the two across clues you mention are the same as the ones I had on the online version, and there is no 17d.
23a Once again, # for “number.” It looks so normal to me that I don’t register it until others comment, Roz@16 in this case. If Everyman is using it it must be part of UK speech, but still questioned by others. We had a bit of a discussion about it a few days ago.
I’m surprised John didn’t comment on the transgression against crosswording norms at 1 across.
I definitely parsed the direction of a jack
as that of one which raises a car up, rather than any beanstalk-related definitions.
Valentine @29 the symbol was in the Everyman a few weeks ago and you are correct , it was discussed and the American use as a number symbol was mentioned. I will remember it next time.
Valentine@29 — my comment @10 concerned the latest crossword as it originally appeared on the Guardian website earlier today. See also the comment by Jay@19 for an update on this.
Oh dear. I’d assumed the jack thing was a drugs reference as in “jack up”
Definitely getting the feeling that the difficulty dial has been turned down a couple of notches
Gosh, Bodycheetah, I suddenly feel I have lived a very sheltered life, never having jacked up either a car or myself in that sense. I’d better stick with fairy tales; too late at my time of life for those alternative jackings.
I imagine paul b@30 that the crosswording norms you’re referring to are the fact that we have, in an across clue, A on B = AB rather than BA (if it’s anything else I’m afraid I can’t see it). Certainly in The Times you’d never see it. Eimi has said that in The Independent he’d have BA (although The Indy doesn’t always stick to this). Maybe various writers on crosswords have said we shouldn’t do it.
‘Crosswording norms’: we get it in language too. If enough people use something that has been condemned in the past, it becomes OK. Once it was considered a great sin to say ‘it is me’, but so many people have said this that usage has made it acceptable. There are some (but not me, really) who feel that if enough people break the ‘rules’ laid down by people like Ximenes and Azed then it will be OK to ‘break’ them. I’m unaware of them ever pronouncing on the AB/BA matter. Perhaps they have. I’m sure you’ll be able to say.
My feeling on crosswording norms is that if the solvers can solve it, and if it was fun to solve, it’s fair game. The “rules” were set up in the first place to make the puzzle fair. But if most of us could eventually solve it, it was perforce fair.
And anyway, why can’t you have A on B in an across clue? When I put a bumper sticker on my car, I don’t mean I put it on the roof just because I said “on” rather than “behind.”
I agree with the blog with the eye-raise for O as an exclamation of surprise instead of Oh. O without the h, I had always learned, was reserved for the strophic O, addressing an object or person or deity that can’t talk back. Two canonical examples: “O, for a muse of fire, that would ascend / The brightest heaven of invention!” “O Christmas tree, o Christmas tree…”
[Also, happy Pride to those who would be celebrating if we weren’t still fighting the tail end of a pandemic. I offer “Refuse to talk about gay bar in Jackson (9)” for a clue with maybe some US-specific GK.]
No, and unfortunately not, as I’d love to have the dope on the history of the pronouncements of the puzzling patriarchs. But as I like to keep things simple, if there’s a convention to be observed in one paper (or, as in this case, at least two) I’ll observe it in every puzzle I set.
I was thinking that as there seems to be some sort of ongoing and slightly rancorous comparison going on between Old Everyman (generally a Ximenean creation from Scott or Gumbrell) and New Everyman (apparently a libertarian, and for some reason anonymously published item), you would have jumped on that one. I think in my early days (before the likes of Roddy and Don gave me of their wisdom) you had me up once or twice for it on Indy blogs.
No doubt I did mention it when young and vibrant. In my old age I’ve become a bit more relaxed about these things. Actually I agree with mrpenney@37: if A is on B then B is on A; they are next to each other.
So how about the down version then: A on B = AB. Is that interchangeable too?
Paul, not so long ago you were arguing that the front and back of words were indistinguishable.
Unfortunately I have a tendency to be facetious around these topics. But I am serious about the conventions in relation to ‘New Everyman’ puzzles, as to ignore them (and they do seem to be being ignored) would be quite some departure.
In some contexts, “on” does of course mean “on top of” – if you asked for beans on toast you’d be a bit surprised to get the beans underneath the toast. But in perfectly normal English usage, “on” can also mean attached to or in contact with any surface of something. “There’s a spider on the ceiling” is an example previously mentioned (by Sil I think). Others might be: “egg on one’s face”, “a pat on the back”, “the writing on the wall”, “Diamonds on the soles of her shoes” (Paul Simon) and “The wheels on the bus (go round and round)”.
I understand that there was (and probably still is) a house rule for Times crosswords that “on” should only mean “after” in an across clue and “on top of” in a down clue. I’m afraid I can’t see any logic behind this restriction, and I don’t see any reason why setters for other publications should be expected to follow it.
Except where, in certain of these other publications, their predecessors have always followed these conventions?
It’s not the publication. Azed uses A on B for AB and most Guardian setters do the same, including, notably, since he writes for the Times too, Paul, Paul. The Times convention is, if anything, an exception. It seems an odd thing to suddenly get serious about.
I was referring to the Everyman puzzle, as I’d hoped people might realise. In point of fact, I’m not sure that these AB conventions have always (or ever) been observed in it, but I am sure it has been pretty good for e.g. cryptic grammar over the years. I’m not sure I’m ever really ‘serious’ about these things these days (and my original comment was one in the ribs for John, who always provides an excellent set of explanations for the puzzles he blogs), but I am a pragmatist, as I suggested above.
Paul as in John Halpern is a brilliant setter and a mate of mine, but even though he is my mate, he is no fool, and uses Guardianisms along with the best (or worst) of ’em. He even in-deeded the other day, which caused me almost to choke on my MacNutt cutlets.
In reply to you @40, Paul, of course all this AB stuff only applies with across clues. Eimi himself has said what is really fairly obvious I think (despite the diamonds on the soles of her shoes etc.), that in a down clue A on B = AB.
But I do agree with you that to ignore the conventions in the New Everyman puzzles would be a mistake. I question, though, what the conventions are. After all, if Azed accepts A on B = AB in an across clue then is The Times an outlier?
mrpenny@37 – triple def: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0114550/
mrpenney@37 if you read this, what is the gay bar ? I do know about the Stonewall pressure group but is there a link to gay bar ? Stonewall Jackson is actually quite well known here I think.
John E @10 – thanks for the pointer to the problems with Everyman 3898. Was really annoyed at myself for not being able to fill in 11ac & 12ac… although I did manage to come up with what I assume to be the correct solution for 17dn – the clue still kind of works even with most of it missing!
Nothing to add to what has already been said on 3897 though, but thanks John for the blog. I put in the answer for 1ac without thinking twice about whether or not it complies with the conventions. Obviously more of a libertarian than I realised.
Roz@50 Stonewall is the gay bar, one where the patrons responded forcefully after one too many pointless police raids.
Thank you Valentine, I never knew that Stonewall was named after a bar originally.
A much better crossword than of late, thank you. Ticks to 7 and 8D.
Definitely ‘wine and cheese’ parties here, although they are more creatures of yesteryear. If you invite people round, even just for drinks, and cheese is the only tucker on offer your guests are apt to feel shortchanged. Or cheesed off, even.
Yes. Much better this week even though I didn’t get them all. Liked 24 d. Definitely Jack going up the beanstalk and finding the ogre.
Thanks Everyman. More like this please.
Thanks for your excellent comments John.