Financial Times 17,974 by GUY

21 comments on “Financial Times 17,974 by GUY”

1. I managed to solve this but I agree it was hard. I had no idea that The Great Escape was an album by Blur.

   Thanks to Guy for a fun puzzle and to loonapick for an excellent blog,needed to clarify several clues.

2. Another very good puzzle from Guy which, like Loonapick, I found on the tougher side. Though most of the GK mentioned was fine, I didn’t know CHAMBERTIN and so I struggled with the last three letters and as a result, the Spoonerism, a device I usually look forward to. I just couldn’t shake thoughts of Bob Hoskins and hospice which clearly weren’t right.
   Still, I found it fun, enjoying COPS AND ROBBERS, ALDI and REMISS the most.
   Thanks Guy and Loonapick

3. I didn’t have the general knowledge to know that TUSCAN and BLUR were correct, but the wordplay was clear enough.

   I had trouble with the Spoonerism, thinking the answer must be the surname of someone called Bob.

   I think the intention of 28a is “dog in space” is LAIKA, and “bar left once” means “except for one L” (referring to the two Ls of BALL).

   Thanks Guy and loonapick.

4. My faves: COPS AND ROBBERS, HAIRCUT, BALALAIKA (agree with Matthew’s parsing) and REMISS.
   a metal potty could be a TIN CHAMBER but could it be called a CHAMBER TIN?
   Thanks Guy and loonapick

5. Laika was a female though, not that it matters, poor thing. Otherwise an excellent blog and puzzle, thank you both!

6. {My initial thought for 1a: TUrtle, but it wouldn’t parse.} — Had 28a BALALAIKA as Matthew@3; 7d BLADE with LADE and “put” both in the present tense.
   For 30a BREEZE compare Guardian Cryptic 29,406 by Paul: “Reportedly more than one cheese in piece of cake? (6)”
   People objected that brie shouldn’t be plural, and in any case the “s” would be silent.
   I found this in LeParisien: “Goûtez tous les bries à la Foire aux fromages” – Don’t the French pronounce the “s” before a vowel? — {typo 11à}

7. You’re right, Frankie, about ‘bries’ in the plural being silent. Right, too, about ‘s’ being pronounced before a vowel or sometimes at the end of a sentence (but not always). It has to do with avoiding a glottal stop which arrests the flow of a phrase and is considered unpleasant.
   That said, I’d hesitate to pronounce the ‘s’ in your example as it flows well enough without doing so. I guess then, the clue doesn’t really work but I still liked it and I guess everyone arrived at the required result.

8. Oh, and I also considered the Ninja turtle for 1a! 😆

9. [I was reminded of my French ‘O’ level Dictée, when the teacher tilted his head to his left and then to his right when pronouncing each syllable of the word “sévère“. None of us got what he was helpfully hinting at. We all wrote down “ses verres“, which made no sense at all.]

10. Thanks Guy for an excellent set of clues. I managed to solve all of this albeit with some parsing gaps. My top picks were SPACE BAR, ALARM, EDAMAME, THATCHER, STEERAGE, STADIA, and EXALT. I thought ‘Shakespeare’ as the definition of THE WINTERS TALE was somehow incomplete. Thanks loonapick for the blog.

11. I managed to solve this, but also found it difficult. I found it enjoyable in parts, no so in others.

    I ticked AERODROME and SPACE BAR

    I appreciated the variety in the puzzle, but I felt several clues went too far and there were many more “eh?” moments than “ah!” moments for me.

    Thanks Guy and loonapick

12. Thanks Guy and Loonapick

    28ac: I think Matthew@3 has the essential point that “bar” (from SPACE BAR) is the removal indicator. I think we can then read it simply (!) as removing one L from BALL A LAIKA.

    30ac: I can find no dictionary support for Brie in English to mean a piece of cheese rather than a type of cheese Therefore, provisionally at least, I have to agree with the first objection mentioned by Frankie@6, namely that there is no valid plural. The dictionaries give us no help as to how the plural would be pronounced in English, because they do not recognise that form, but I think it is reasonable to suppose that the final S would be sounded. How it is pronounced in French may be of some scholarly interest, but I do not see it as relevant to an English language crossword without a specific indicator that the French pronunciation is required. Compare adieu, which has been an English noun for centuries, rhyming with “you”. Collins 2023 p 23, Chambers 2016 p 18, and ODE 2010 p 20 all give the plural as either adieus or adieux and all have the pronunciation with a final voiced S (or Z) sound.

    [Frankie@9: Dictées were no longer part of French O level when I took it, but it was alleged that one of our teachers used to indicate the accents by raising appropriate eyebrows.]

13. PB @ 12 re Brie having a plural: since you can buy specific Brie de Meaux presumably there are other Bries?

14. I am not entirely convinced by TOWNIE but otherwise tough but fair. Thx Guy and Loonapick

15. Simon S @13 seems to have arrived at a phonetic ‘breeze’ with no problems at all… the rest I found tough
    Thanks Guy n loonapick

16. Simon@13: Thank you for that. I agree with Undrell@15 that you have given us a good reason to withdraw any objection on 30a.

17. My favourite today SPACE BAR, although I needed the blog to figure out 28a which references it. Makes sense now.

    Same quibbles as others about TOWNIE and CHAMBERTIN

18. Finished successfully but too many hmmms and gk and unparsed for my real pleasure.

    How many solvers got Balalaika from the cryptic? Impossible, I’d say. I put the answer in quickly – obviously an instrument – but had no clue to the parsing.

    Surely all clues should be reasonably solvable from the cryptic bit?

    “Ball a dog in 4 left once” (where 4 may or may not mean space bar or IV or four or …)

    Hmmmmmm

    Good blog thanks.

19. 28a: ball a dog in space bar left once = ball a laika, remove one of three letter L (once), gives balalaika.
    Thanks Guy for some great entertainment, and Loonapick for a terrrific blog.

20. Strip Mall? Strip Mall? Seriously?
    What the f**k!

21. SS@13: I noticed a sign in Marks & Spencer this morning advertising Mild Brie and Normandy Brie as well as Brie de Meaux, so yes there are other Bries.

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