The puzzle may be found at https://www.theguardian.com/crosswords/cryptic/29587.
A mixture of easy clues and some which use uncommon quirks (some of which I find more successful than others), with enough of the former to help things along.
| ACROSS | ||
| 6 | WEAR |
Sport, an energy-filled fight (4)
|
| An envelope (-‘filled’) of E (‘energy’) in WAR (‘fight’). | ||
| 7 | CRAMP |
Jam pot’s first in hamper (5)
|
| A charade of CRAM (‘jam’) plus P (‘Pot’s first’). | ||
| 8 | TEST |
Half a ball missing in match (4)
|
| TEST[icle] (‘ball’) with ‘half … missing’. | ||
| 9 | BLOOMERS |
Postwar children pack large underclothes (8)
|
| An envelope (‘pck’) of L (‘large’) in BOOMERS (in full baby boomers, ‘postwar children’ ). | ||
| 10 | EYELID |
Festival you will shortly open getting closer (6)
|
| An envelope (‘open’) of YE’L[l] (‘you will’ – some setters indicate the antique YE) minus the last letter (‘shortly’) in EID (Muslim ‘festival’). | ||
| 11 | GOATEE |
I’m surprised, eating cereal, it sticks to the chin (6)
|
| An envelope (‘eating’) of OAT (‘cereal’) in GEE (‘I’m surprised’). | ||
| 13 | SCENARIO |
I censor a depraved plot summary (8)
|
| An anagram (‘depraved’) of ‘I censor a’. | ||
| 14 | REPRIMAND |
Lecturer gives this pain, to secure first in Italian (9)
|
| An envelope (‘to secure’) of PRIMA (‘first in Italian’, feminine) in REND (‘pain’? – as a verb it is perhaps close, but IMO not a good definition). | ||
| 18 | BOTANIST |
For Linnaeus, say, maggot active isn’t bad (8)
|
| A charade of BOT (‘maggot’) plus A (‘active’) plus NIST, an anagram (‘bad’) of ‘isn’t’. | ||
| 19 | RENTAL |
Learnt about income from property (6)
|
| An anagram (‘about’) of ‘learnt’. | ||
| 20 | OCTAVO |
Book Month: nothing surpasses a good book (6)
|
| A charade of OCT (October, ‘month’) plus AV (Authorised Version of the Bible, ‘good book’) plus O (‘nothing’), with ‘surpasses’ indicating the order of the particles. | ||
| 21 | NARCOTIC |
New love in the far north for a number? (8)
|
| A charade of N (‘new’) plus ARCOTIC, an envelope (‘in’) of O (‘love’) in ARCTIC (‘the far north’). | ||
| 23 | SMUT |
Turning stomachs, dirty talk (4)
|
| A reversal (‘turning’) of TUMS (‘stomachs’). | ||
| 24 | ELVER |
Young swimmer constantly circling lake (5)
|
| An envelope (‘circling’) of L (‘lake’) in EVER (‘constantly’). An elver is a young eel. | ||
| 25 | AMEN |
Answer by half the people, or all of them (4)
|
| A charade of A (‘answer’) plus MEN (‘half the people’, the other half being women), with ‘answer’ bein carried over to the definition – ‘answer by … all of them ‘ in church. | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 1 | BERLIOZ |
One composer and another shortly visiting down under (7)
|
| A charade of BERLI[n] (Irving, ‘another’ compiser) minus the last letter (‘shortly’) plus (‘visiting’) OZ (‘down under’). | ||
| 2 | BRIO |
In life, king’s vigour (4)
|
| An envelope (‘in’) of R (Rex, ‘king’) in BIO (biography, ‘life’). | ||
| 3 | DAIS |
Not happy about one having to mount platform (4)
|
| A reversal (‘having to mount’) of an envelope (‘about’) of I (‘one’) in SAD (‘not happy’). | ||
| 4 | EPHEMERA |
Mayfly makes border in record time (8)
|
| An envelope (‘in’) of HEM (‘border’) in EP (‘record’) plus ERA (‘time’). Ephemera may be plural, but here is a genus of mayfly. | ||
| 5 | ASPIRIN |
A short whisky say at noon that dulls the pain (7)
|
| A charade of ‘a’ plus SPIRI[t] (‘whisky, say’) minus its last letter (‘short’) plus N (‘noon’). | ||
| 7 | CRETE |
Taking afternoon off, make for island (5)
|
| A subtraction: CRE[a]TE (‘make’) minus the A (‘taking afternoon off’ – A as an abbreviation for ‘afternoon’ is in Chambers). | ||
| 8 | THE WARDEN |
Time to cut down forest for first book in series (3,6)
|
| A charade of T (‘time’) plus HEW (‘cut down’) plus ARDEN (‘forest’), for the firsr book in the Chronicles of Barsetshire series by Anthony Trollope | ||
| 12 | TERMAGANT |
Scold shedding a tear over Trump’s policy, something biblical (9)
|
| A charade of ‘te[a]r’ minus the A (‘shedding a’) plus MAGA (‘Trump’s policy’) plus NT (‘New Testament, ‘something biblical’). | ||
| 13 | STILT |
Shorebird from the pole (5)
|
| Double definition. | ||
| 15 | PRISONER |
Attempted murderer maybe has a bit of respect for one old lag (8)
|
| POISONER (‘attempted murderer maybe’) with the first O (‘one old’ – one of the two) replaced by R (‘a bit of Respect’). | ||
| 16 | COXCOMB |
Vain man from Apple for one with tidy hair (7)
|
| A charade of COX (‘apple for one’) plus COMB (‘tidy hair’). | ||
| 17 | GALILEO |
Scientist forced to lie long ago: no good coming out of that (7)
|
| An anagram (‘forced’) of ‘lie lo[ng] ag[o]’ minus the letters of ‘no’ plus G (‘good’), with an extended definition. | ||
| 19 | RARER |
For Aristotle and Euclid to appear from the start among elements of basic education is not so normal (5)
|
| An interweaving (‘to appear … among’) of A and E (‘Aristotle and Euclid … from the start’) in RRR (the three Rs, ‘elemnts of basic education’). At best, an awkward construction. | ||
| 21 | NEVA |
Its journey being through Russian city, one van avoiding periphery (4)
|
| A subtraction: ‘[o]ne va[n]’ minus the outer letters (‘avoiding periphery’). The ‘Russian city’ is Saint Petersburg. | ||
| 22 | OLAV |
Why Norwegian king can’t relieve himself? (4)
|
| O LAV (no lavatory). The most recent was Olav V. |
There’s something going on here (a theme) of which the Nina is (probably) a part.
I agree with you about REND for ‘pain’. Favourite was TERMAGANT.
For me, challenging and satisfying to solve.
Thanks to PeterO and Imogen
Not Imogen at his toughest, but no walk in the park either!
Some clunky surfaces – “maggot active”? Also puzzled about rend/pain, and the “to” in GALILEO; otherwise I rather liked that clue.
I think there are rivers in the final grid, Mersey (9a/10a), Tees (11a/13a), Trent (19a/19a), Avon (20a/21a), maybe others.
Collins has rend = to pain or distress (the heart, conscience etc).
PeterO, this blog appears without a title on the main page.
Also WEAR, TEST, RIO BRAVO
Well, it all came together in the end and everything was parsed. I didn’t spot the rivers, though. Imogen for me is a wavelength compiler and I never felt completely on it today. I also felt there were some slightly strange word orderings and scatterings of extra words (‘For’s in particular) that complicated the cryptic grammar. OLAV sort of doesn’t have a definition and I do not like EYELID with its use of ‘ye’l’ and for using ‘open’ instead of ‘opens’. On the other hand, PRISONER is a delightful construction and as precise as you could ask for.
Thanks Imogen and PeterO
Tough and enjoyable to unravel the answers.
Favourites: GALILEO, NARCOTIC, TERMAGANT, TEST, PRISONER, EYELID (loi).
New for me THE WARDEN by Trollope, first book in the Chronicles of Barsetshire series; STILT bird; BOT = the larva of the botfly (18ac); EPHEMERA = mayfly (Order Ephemeroptera); Cox’s Orange Pippin / COX apple (for 16d)
Re REND = pain, I found this in my online dictionary so I was okay with it:
literary cause great emotional pain to: you tell me this in order to make me able to betray you without rending/paining my heart.
Tim C@4 has found the definition in Collins that is similar.
I totally missed the river theme!
REPRIMAND was one of my last in, and I came here for the parsing, but I wrote in THE WARDEN from the clue, have even tried to read the book having enjoyed radio adaptations of the Barsetshire Chronicles, (something I must revisit), EPHEMERA for mayfly and STILT I also knew. BOTANIST needed all the crossers, I was thinking of classifications.
As well as rivers, there are a few scientists here, BERLIOZ, several different men, GALILEO, BOTANIST.
Thank you to PeterO and Imogen.
Thanks PeterO, for clearing up a few of my unparsed ones (similar to other commenters). Also confused myself because October is Book Month, so I thought the definition was the second “book” in the clue…
Didn’t spot the rivers (I’m usually poor at seeing Easter eggs like this).
Thanks to PeterO and Imogen
A few clues I really liked (Prisoner etc) but a few I am still unconvinced by (eyelid). Will go back and relook at grid with theme/Nina in mind. Bravo to start eith
PeterO – not sure how much this matters, but the heading in large font and bold “Guardian 29,587 / Imogen” is missing for this blog on the Home list.
oed.com: “In medieval Latin EPHEMERA (4d) was neuter plural, < Greek ἐϕήμερα used in this sense by Aristotle (see ephemeron n.). The earlier English instances are possibly due to the common practice of treating plurals in ‑a as singular. Linnæus (18a) however used the word as feminine, making it the name of a genus (of much wider extent than the genus now so called.)”
17d GALILEO was “forced to lie” (about heliocentricity) to the Spanish Inquisition.
I couldn’t get on the setter’s wavelength today. Other than that, some abbreviations may be justified by dictionaries but I can’t consider them good style. A for active and for afternoon felt like a double whammy to me. Also, “first book in series” is just impossibly vague as a definition. Would “first film in series” be considered a reasonable definition for “Dr No”? I suspect not, but I dare say that more people have heard of that than “The Warden”. The surface was good though.
Thanks Imogen and PeterO
Several unparsed – REPRIMAND, STILT (I tried STINT first), and PRISONER.
I didn’t like the “in” in 7a, or the “for” in 18a.
The missing L (“ye’ll”) in 10a isn’t clued.
I knew THE WARDEN, but the clue would be pretty impenetrable for anyone who didn’t, I expect.
Favourite NARCOTIC.
muffin @14: I indicated I’m not a fan of that particular clue but the missing L is clued, as per the blog, by shortly. I think Imogen is taking ‘you will’ = ‘YE’LL’ as a given and then ‘shortening’ that to YE’L. You might be applying the ‘shortly’ to ‘you will’ to get YE’LL?
PM @15
Yes, that’s what I took the “shortly” as referring to.
It’s interesting, because I built THE WARDEN from the clue. I thought T = time, HEW for cut would give me THE and a W. And, oh yes, ARDEN is a forest and that makes THE WARDEN, the first of the Barsetshire Chronicles and moved swiftly on. But I guess I had the General Knowledge to know that THE WARDEN is the first of the series.
It is clear that Imogen enjoys being free of the shackles that the editorship of the Times crossword imposed on him, as there are always some liberties taken with the conventions in his Guardian puzzles.
‘Rend’ for ‘pain’ is rather a stretch, despite what the dictionaries may say, and ‘ye’ll’ sounds odd. The clue for OLAV could have been reworded as ‘Norwegian king, unable to relieve himself?’ and thereby provide a bona fide definition.
Lots of good clues. I particularly liked OCTAVO, EPHEMERA, THE WARDEN, TERMAGANT and GALILEO (Dr WhatsOn @2: the ‘to’ works as ‘(added) to’).
Thanks to Imogen and PeterO
Shanne@17 Even though I have never heard of THE WARDEN as a book, I thought the parsing was a write-in and got that clue on a first reading. It just needed a quick google to confirm there was a book of that name!
A slow solve for me. Like @19, I got The Warden without having heard of the series, and failed to find the river theme because someone on the Guardian blog said Same to you Imogen which made me look for a Nina and all I found was Bravo, which kind of made sense! But some great clues, and I’m glad to have completed it. Thanks to Imogen, PeterO and you bloggers.
Andy@19 and Shanne@17: I had the same experience as Andy – got “time” and “hew” and built it from there, lacking the GK which Google confirmed. Other than that I agree with others, thinking “rend” a bit of a reach, “ye” unindicated as archaic, a few unnecessary linking words actively got in the way of solving and a couple of abbreviations (a for afternoon, n for noon) which may exist in Chambers but feel off to me.
Gervase @18: I don’t think “to” can be “added to” in 17D as it lies between the anagrind and the fodder, which I suspect is Muffin’s objection. It was certainly mine.
I thought the unusual pain (rend) was worth it for first in Italian being Prima rather than I. I enjoyed the mix of easier and trickier clues
[Alan Plater adapted 8d THE WARDEN and Barchester Towers for the BBC’s Barchester Chronicles (1982), with Alan Rickman unforgettable as Obadiah Slope. Highly recommended.]
I saw BRAVO but missed the rivers so well done to those who spotted them. I found this remarkably straightforward, despite a couple of difficult words, only because I thought the clues were so precise. I laughed at COXCOMB and OLAV. Thoroughly enjoyable.
Ta Imogen & PeterO.
JoFT @21: Quite so. Silly me. ‘Scientist forced INTO lie long ago….’ would work (at least for yrs truly 🙂 ). BTW the rivers washed past me.
No-one in the history of the universe has ever asked for an example of a ‘COX’ and received the answer ‘APPLE, for one’.
Surprisingly tractable for an Imogen, although I failed to see the rivers – no BRAVO for me. Luckily I had recently read THE WARDEN for a book club, so that went in quite easily.
I liked EYELID, where I think one can separate the you [YE] from ‘L(l) [will shortly], the OCTAVO good book, TERMAGANT, PRISONER with the good instruction to replace only one old, and the lying GALILEO [I don’t think the ‘to’ is a cardinal sin].
Thanks Imogen and PeterO.
Me@2: Gervase@18 what JOFT@21 said, regarding the “to”.
I really enjoyed this puzzle.
Thank you PeterO for clearing up some parsing: EYELID, Authorised Version in OCTAVO, REND = Pain, BOT = maggot. THE WARDEN was new as well.
Despite deficiencies in my parsing for some, I found those solutions could be worked out from wordplay and crossers.
Favourites included GALILEO, BERLIOZ, TERMAGANT, PRISONER, NARCOTIC.
Saw the Nina but missed the hidden rivers – well done those who noticed this theme. NEVA is another river. And I have learnt that Rio Bravo is the Mexican name for Rio Grande.
Thanks Imogen and PeterO
Tim C @4 and Crossbar @11
It took a moment to locate the button which I must have accidentally pressed to suppress the banner; now corrected.
Thanks PeterO@30 and apologies to you and Tim@4 for repeating what he’d already said. I should pay more attention to previous comments.
A mixed bag for me. I was defeated by the parsing of 10A, and not surprised after reading the blog. I also shrugged at REND in 14A. BOT for maggot escapes me still. The AV in 20A went unparsed, but makes sense in hindsight. I had a question mark against 21A: I have only heard “number” as drug slang for pot specifically, which I would not call a narcotic, but perhaps my upbringing was sheltered.
NHO The Warden but the cluing was clear enough, so no complaint there. Also NHO of stilt as a bird, but birds and fish are a blind spot of mine and I’m sure many others had no such difficulty.
Overall, lots of good clues but a bit scrappy around the edges.
FrankieG@12 Thanks for the link to the brilliant Python sketch. Galileo was finally pardoned in 1992 for his “heresy” (that the earth orbits the sun), a mere 359 years after he was sentenced to house arrest.
Odd that today’s crossword has ‘bravo’ at the bottom where Ludwig’s the other day had ‘well done’.
Jacob @32 – “numb-er” 🙂
For me, a mixture of some great clues and others that had me scratching my head. My favourites were THE WARDEN, partly because I’m a fan of that book (and its successors), and OLAV, partly because my school was St Olave’s. I don’t understand why people are saying that the latter doesn’t have a definition, which is “Norwegian king”. Ok, the clue is not quite in the more normal order of wordplay = definition or definition = wordplay, but personally I don’t think that matters – it’s more of an allusive clue.
I completely missed the rivers.
Many thanks Imogen and PeterO.
Didn’t like this much. REND is absurd as a synonym for pain when other alternatives are available. I was pleased to spot THE WARDEN all the same.
Thought it might have been Paul setting the clue for TEST. Didn’t know THE WARDEN but the clueing there as sharp as a pin. The overused and personally much disliked word SCENARIO nicely put together, as was EPHEMERA and NARCOTIC. When is “number” not this nowadays in cryptic crosswordland? Loi COXCOMB. Many thanks for the enjoyment I got our of this, Nutmeg, and to Peter O for the clarity with a few…
Imogen, even…
Dr WhatsOn @28: Did you not see my recantation @25? And I have no desire to mutter ‘eppur si muove’ 🙂
Gervase@40 no, sorry, missed it. I do try to read everything that precedes my posts but somehow skipped this. Apologies again.
Regarding THE WARDEN, which I didn’t know. I put it together from the wordplay then looked it up to verify. I know everyone has their own idea of what constitutes cheating or DNF, but to me this is fair play.
Dr.W @41
That’s a classic jorum!
Thanks Immy for reminding me of Donald Pleasence playing the stubbornly incorruptible cello-playing Septimus Harding, one of my favourite TV roles.
I’m currently working my way through the Barsetshire books (up to Framley Parsonage so far) so The Warden was a gimmee for me. The series remarked upon by grantonfreo @43 was an absolute triumph, not only for Donald Pleasance’s portrayal of Septimus Harding, but for the whole cast, including Susan Hampshire and the late lamented Nigel Hawthorne and Alan Rickman.
Imogen as ever too hard for me. Liked BERLIOZ.
Bingy@26. That’s only because they’ve never asked me. We had a tree in the garden when I was a child, and the real article (i.e. when the pips rattle when you shake the apple) remains my favourite variety. Very hard to come by nowadays though.
Zoot@46
I currently buy them from Sainsbury’s every week and will do so until they go out of season. They sometimes sell them from New Zealand later in the year.
Very clever, very hard IMO (hence post no one will ever read!) For ages I was sure 8ac (‘half a ball missing in match’) was TWIN : TWO = half, as in ‘cut that in two’, missing O (a ball) makes TW, + IN makes TWIN=match..) . Thanks Imogen and congrats PeterO on great blog.
A@48 very creative! Maybe a bit nuts 🙂
I think ye’ll is reasonably common Scottish phrase. As in Ye’ll tak the high road….
And ‘ye’ll have had your tea’.
When I looked up Mayfly, I got Ephemeroptera, not Ephemera, and no dictionary definition I found of Ephemera had Mayfly as a meaning.
Thanks Imogen for interesting but difficult construction. And PeterO for the blog
R Srivatsan @51
Try Chambers, Wikipedia or Collins online.
Adrian@48: Yes, I recoiled from TEST until I had to put my hands up.
Thanks PeterO @52. I seem to have missed them in the way I looked for them. Especially the Wiki entry. I wonder how!
I really struggled with this – I only managed 13 answers – some terms I simply didn’t know and others where I struggled to decide where the definition appeared in the clue.
Good learning experience though
I managed to complete about half of this one, mostly in the top half
The SCENARIO anagram eluded me for far too long. What a relief when it finally fell!
GALILEO was very clever for the extended definition
Like others, it was lovely to be reminded of the wonderful BARCHESTER CHRONICLES TV miniseries. Due for a re-watch
I see Paul is up next — wish me luck!