Guardian Quiptic 1,148/Hectence

by

Always a smile on my face when I see Hectence’s name come up on my watch. A pleasing puzzle with her trademark twist.

The twist is that it’s a pangram – all 26 letters of the alphabet appear. And in fact today, I followed the advice I have been known to give beginners: if you suspect near the end of the solve that it is a pangram because many of the unusual letters – W, K, X, Q, for example – have already appeared, then look for the one that’s missing. This worked perfectly for my last one in: with the unhelpful ?I?E at 5dn, I realised I was short of a Z, so SIZE became the obvious answer. Hectence has form with pangrams – many of her Quiptics contain them.

Unless I am missing something, I think we are short of an anagrind in 6dn.

Abbreviations
cd cryptic definition
dd double definition
cad clue as definition
(xxxx)* anagram
anagrind = anagram indicator
[x] letter(s) removed

definitions are underlined

Across

8 Onesie‘s bound to fit
JUMPSUIT
A charade of JUMP and SUIT gives you the item of clothing.

9 Pub hosts fellow with ukulele, initially as a joke
IN FUN
An insertion of F and U for the initial letter of ‘ukulele’ in INN. The insertion indicator is ‘hosts’.

10 Sad face reflected jealous heart inside
GLUM
An insertion of L for the middle, or ‘heart’ of ‘jealous’ in MUG reversed. The insertion indicator is ‘inside’ and the reversal indicator is ‘reflected’.

11 Sailor’s fallen into the sea — not entirely sober, to be honest
ABOVE BOARD
A charade of AB for ‘sailor’ and OVE[R]BOARD. Some might argue that the ‘not entirely’ doesn’t precisely define the removal of the R, but I personally am fine with it, particularly in light of the compelling surface reading.

12 Democrat finally able to recognise tyrant
DESPOT
A charade of D, E for the final letter of ‘able’ and SPOT.

14 Queen covered by favourite band is more than fair
PRETTIER
An insertion of R for Regina or ‘Queen’ in PET and TIER.

16 Tiny amount of money for exercise area’s crazy
PEANUTS
A charade of PE, A and NUTS.

18 Fooled by belt pinching Nike design
TAKEN IN
An insertion of (NIKE)* in TAN. The insertion indicator is ‘pinching’ and the anagrind is ‘design’.

21 Suspicious at Iron Man going in with bad guy
ANTI-HERO
An insertion of HE in (AT IRON)* with ‘suspicious’ as the anagrind.

23 Hurry, having let out large vehicle in front
BUSTLE
A charade of BUS and (LET)* with ‘out’ as the anagrind.

24 Living with difficulties from dodgy repairs?
QUICK FIXES
A charade of QUICK and FIXES. The first particle is perhaps best known from the phrase ‘the quick and the dead’, which is seen more than once in the Bible and has been used as the title of several films. Its use as ‘living’ is also seen in ‘quicksand’: the sand is moving, or ‘living’.

26 Al Pacino’s beginning comeback with new project
PLAN
A reversal of P for the initial letter of ‘Pacino’ and LA followed by N.

27 Hatches plan to skip church expedition
HASTE
(HAT[CH]ES)* The removal indicator is ‘to skip’ and the anagrind is ‘plan’.

28 Example of animated epic with humans chasing monsters, ultimately
SPECIMEN
A charade of S for the final letter of ‘monsters’, (EPIC)* and MEN. You have to read ‘chasing’ as ‘coming after’and the anagrind is ‘animated’.

Down

1 Sweet animals to look at
BULLS-EYE
A charade of BULLS and EYE.

2 Mother’s knocked up top pancetta stuffing for meat
SPAM
An insertion of P for the first letter of ‘pancetta’ in MAS, all reversed. The insertion indicator is ‘stuffing’ and the reversal indicator is ‘knocked up’.

3 State this country rejected Remain
KUWAIT
A charade of UK reversed and WAIT.

4 Watch drinking: wine knocked back’s not easy to deal with
STROPPY
An insertion of PORT reversed in SPY. The insertion indicator is ‘drinking’ and the reversal indicator is ‘knocked back’.

5 Volume of whispers picked up
SIZE
A homophone (‘picked up’) of SIGHS.

6 Keep blocking selfies I deleted; it’s easy
EFFORTLESS
An insertion of FORT in (SELF[I]ES)* The insertion indicator is ‘blocking’; the removal indicator is ‘deleted’; but we are lacking an anagrind, aren’t we?

7 False regret after relative’s guillotined
UNTRUE
A charade of [A]UNT and RUE.

13 Small change (1.50 approximately) son put in box with writing things
PENCIL CASE
An insertion of I, L, CA and S in PENCE. The insertion indicator is ‘put in’.

15 Upset about advanced age
ERA
A charade of RE reversed and A.

17 Extract from psychotherapist’s article
THE
Hidden in psychoTHErapist.

19 One condemned lad felt unlucky
ILL-FATED
A charade of I and (LAD FELT)* with ‘condemned’ as the anagrind.

20 Live alongside former lover on island, splitting expenses
COEXIST
An insertion of EX and I in COST with ‘splitting’ as the insertion indicator.

22 End of equation should = 0
NOUGHT
A charade of N for the last letter of ‘equation’ and OUGHT.

23 Hamper for when royalty’s aboard punt
BASKET
An insertion of AS and K for ‘king’ or ‘royalty’ in BET. The insertion indicator is ‘aboard’.

25 Undercharge daughter for fuel
FEED
You need to do a lift-and-separate’ procedure on ‘undercharge’ to get you ‘under charge’; then, because it’s a down clue, you need to put D under FEE.

26 Relief after penny spent
PAID
A charade of P and AID.

Many thanks to Hectence as always for this morning’s Quiptic.

41 comments on “Guardian Quiptic 1,148/Hectence”

  2. Thanks both. Excellent stuff apart from 11a, which I remain unconvinced about. Is it the last letter of “sober” to be removed, with the definition “to be honest”?

  3. Yes, Pierre, the pangram helped me with loi, JUMPSUIT. Pretty challenging I thought but some lovely surfaces. Agree with your query about EFFORTLESS; my take is that ‘blocked’ is doing double duty as it can also mean drunk and therefore an acceptable anagrind. Will be interested to hear other views. FEED was neat

    Ta Hectence & Pierre

  5. Thanks Hectence and Pierre. Completely agree with you on 11a, the liberty is excused by the wonderful surface. Also enjoyed GLUM and UNTRUE. Completely missed the pangram.

    I couldn’t parse 6d satisfactorily, glad to see it’s not me that’s missing something. Not massively keen on ‘undercharge’ either.

    Today’s earworm: Ian Dury – You’re More Than Fair

  6. Shirl @2 – the definition is just ‘honest’, Pierre has gone overboard with the underlining. ‘Not entirely sober’ is a very loose way of clueing ‘remove the letter R’, to put it mildly.

  7. I found that quite hard, neither EFFORTLESS nor aquick fix, but I think that’s my fault. It wasn’t the most helpful of grids, though. Perhaps selfies are by their nature reversed and confused?

  8. Thanks Hectence and Pierre
    I was not on Hectence’s wavelength and found this very difficult. I slowly worked up from bottom to top. I did spot the potential pangram, which helped me with KUWAIT and ABOVE BOARD (W and V).
    I thought there was something wrong with 6d as well.

  9. A fun Quiptic, with the clever 3d KUWAIT being my favourite.

    I was a bit puzzled by the same two as everyone else:

    11a ABOVE BOARD. Sorry widdersbel @6, I don’t see how “not entirely sober” could mean “remove the letter R”. Would you care to explain? I think Pierre must be right that “sober” is part of the definition, so we’ve effectively got a double definition, “sober” and “to be honest”. But does ABOVE BOARD mean sober? Well I suppose it’s sort of the opposite of “under the table”. Does that work?

    6d EFFORTLESS. AlanC @3 and 4: can “blocking” mean drunk? Even if it can, it would, as you say, have to be doing double duty. I think Hectence has just forgotten to put in an anagram indicator.

    Thanks Hectence and Pierre.

  10. Too tough for a Quiptic in my opinion. Solved only 2 clues on my first pass. I think that the editor got confused and switched the Cryptic and Quiptic puzzles by mistake today. I was tempted to give up on this puzzle which I think could easily scare beginners away!

    Finished the top half first.

    Favourites: NOUGHT, ANOVE BOARD.

    New for me: BULL’S EYE = peppermint sweet.

    Thanks, both.

  11. I had the same misgivings as others re: EFFORTLESS and ABOVE BOARD. The thing is, even if we know the setters intentions, which may be the ideas mentioned here or something else entirely, the fact that experienced solvers are having trouble with these two means they are inappropriate for a Quiptic. Some other clues were not that easy either. (And many were straightforward and fun, too, to be sure). I think we would not be having this discussion if the editor had several people give puzzles a test drive before publication.

  12. Lord Jim @9 – your guess is as good as mine. Literally.

    I mean, we’re all just guessing here, aren’t we? (And as Dr W says, that does make the clue rather inappropriate for a Quiptic, which should have as its most basic requirement that all the clues are sound, and I really shouldn’t allow myself to be swayed by an amusing surface into accepting a duff clue.)

    My rationale for my parsing, and the thought process I went through when solving the clue, is simply that’s what’s left when everything else is taken away:
    Sailor = AB
    ‘s = has? (A has B = A+B)
    Fallen into the sea = OVERBOARD
    …
    to be = link words?
    honest (definition) = ABOVE BOARD

    The missing step in the clue is removing the letter R, and ‘not entirely sober’ are the only words we have left to give us this instruction. The best interpretation that I can come up with is ‘not all the letters of the word SOBER’, but I’m far from convinced of this.

    ‘Sober, to be honest’ doesn’t work for me as a definition, although I do like your ‘not under the table’ interpretation!

  13. PS: I’m assuming Pierre has marked ‘sober, to be honest’ as the definition for similar reasons, ie ‘that’s what’s left’, and I agree that ‘not entirely’ does work better as an indicator for removing the R from OVERBOARD.

    Neither option is entirely satisfactory.

  16. I think, after reading the comments above, we know by now that 11ac is clumsy and the lack of an anagrind in 6dn is a mistake.
    No need to try and find any justification.
    I shrug my shoulders and move on.
    I am more sort of worried when someone calls 25dn (FEED) very neat.
    The lift-and-separate device is totally unnecessary and over-complicating things for the less experienced.
    Just “Charge daughter for fuel” is enough to give one FEED.
    This is a Quiptic!
    Many thanks to Pierre & Hectence.

  18. This was interesting. A first Hectence for me. I didn’t find it difficult and while I enjoyed most of the clues a few were a bit unsatisfactory imo. I too thought honest must be the definition for 11A. I didn’t include ‘to be’. And I couldn’t see where sober came into it. I took the ‘not entirely’ to refer to overboard.
    I also noticed the missing anagram indicator in 6D. Blocking has already done its duty as the insertion indicator.
    Are sighs whispers?
    The rest was enjoyable though, so many thanks for that

  20. Lord Jim @9: in Belfast and probably the rest of Ireland, getting blocked is common parlance for getting extremely drunk. I don’t think it works in this case for the anagrind, I was just trying to find a way through this clue. Ultimately, it looks like an unfortunate omission.

  21. I agree with Michelle@10 the cryptic was easier than the quiptic, I don’t always bother with the quiptic so may be wrong but seem to recall this happening on several occasions recently?

    Missing anagrind and confusing subtract ‘r’ instructions aside, I enjoyed this although I would like to know exactly how ‘not entirely sober’ works as I can’t see a convincing parsing. (If you’re there Hectence please enlighten us)

    Trishincharente (Lovely part of the world btw) that was exactly my thinking sighs = whispers? Then I thought of The Wind in the Willows and was satisfied.

    Lastly at risk of angering Sil I quite liked FEED, (we’ve disagreed before over ‘Philistine nonsense’ but in this case I agree with you about not necessary here)

    Thanks Hectence and two-blog Pierre.

  22. Blah @ 21, you’re not angering me at all, I can have the occasional lift-and-separate. The problem (if it is one) with it here is that ‘Under’ is totally superfluous and doesn’t add to a better surface either. So, why then? Just for the sake of having a lift-and-separate clue?
    [btw, this kind of lift-and-separate I do not file under “Philistine nonsense”]

  27. Petert @25
    I don’t think so. A “stanXYZ” has also made a similar post on the Guardian site, where, curiously, no-one has mentioned the apparent missing anagram indicator.

  28. Ouch, that was tough. Some nice clues, but took far too long getting there, hindered again by a very unhelpful grid. Not quiptic level in my view, not even close.

  29. About 6 down, I agree that Hectence is using easy as an anagram indicator as well as a solution. Vlad has also used easy, but I still don’t like it.
    And, yes, the cryptic was easier.

  30. A pleasing crossword, but I came here looking for explanations to 6 and 11, so agree with others who can’t see how they work.

    On 11, would it work as “Sailor’s fallen into the sea — not extremely sober, to be honest” – ABs overboard without the extremes of sober? I’m not convinced by anything more than “honest” as definition, but can’t see the wordplay as it stands.

  31. Oh Sil @16, I hope you didn’t worry too much that I called FEED neat (don’t remember the ‘very’ bit). Ridiculous comment

  32. Ridiculous comment?
    Why is that?
    A clue that uses lift-and-separate while it could have done without, is not wrong but surely not neat in my book of crosswords either.
    For that reason and that reason alone, I cannot understand (can’t do without ‘under’ here) that anyone sees this as a (really) good clue.
    Glad you liked it, though.

  34. HoofItYouDonkey@33: I’m with Michelle@10. A fine puzzle and kudos to Hectence (but also to Pierre for PENCIL CASE) but a mis-placed puzzle imho.

  36. Ongara @35
    Nice surface, indeed, but I was dubious enough about the definition to use the Check button. “Spent” and “paid” are obviously close to each other, but I wouldn’t use them interchangeably.

  38. Sil @ 16 Everyone seems to have a different opinion of what a Quiptic is (or should be). Personally I think that it’s primarily a limited amount of specialised general knowledge and advanced wordplay. Perhaps just me, but I think that it should be a place where solvers can be introduced to new mechanics mildly (such as the superfluous lift-and-separate in FEED).

    muffin @36: Many synonyms aren’t completely interchangeable, but there are contexts where they could be, is that not enough?

    I’m tempted to think GillGamesh @30 and ParadigmShifter @26 have the setter’s intentions for 11 and 6 respectively, but who knows?

  39. I enjoyed this puzzle, despite finding parts of it tough. I would not have enjoyed it had I been a beginner or in a rush.

    As regards 11A, I suspect GillGamesh@30 is on the right tracks with the hyphen/subtraction sign being the removal indicator.

    Thanks Hectence and Pierre.

  40. That’s certainly the best and most convincing interpretation I’ve seen so far Larry and RockLoi, well reasoned GilGamesh@30. The trouble with
    ParadigmShifter@26’s theory (also well reasoned btw) is that double duty like that really should be a no no – again especially I’m the quiptic.

Comments are closed.