Financial Times 17,985 by GUY

21 comments on “Financial Times 17,985 by GUY”

1. For 1a I had the definition as “show behind” = “appear at the back”

2. Another super puzzle from Guy, full of wit and smart wordplay. I had too many ticks so I’ll nominate my last one in, RESPECT, which neatly sums up my thoughts here.
   Thanks to Guy and Oriel.

3. [Liked the capitalization misdirection in 6d’s Zippy — LOi 29a – guessed she’d be one of George’s.]

4. For 25a oed.com attributes “props” to an unnamed female rapper in 1990. Google says it was Roxanne Shanté. It’s short for propers, first heard in Aretha’s
   version of Otis’ RESPECT: “1967 I’m out to give you all of my money, And all I’m askin’ in return, Honey, Is to give me my propers when you get home.”
   A. Franklin, Respect (transcribed from song) ” [Unfortunately they misquote her. – It’s “about“, not “out“.]

5. FrankieG @1: I think you’re right. I had thought ‘show’ to be a link word but that would need to be ‘shows’ or ‘showing’ and the solution is a verbal phrase so can’t really be defined by the adjective ‘behind’. ‘Show behind’ in the sense you give it just about works though it’s not the smoothest of the definitions here.

   MAGENTA, NIGHTSPOT, CHAMP, LEARN, RECONDITE, REDRAFT, GASTROPUB and SALVO my faves today.

   Thanks Guy and Oriel

6. A nicely compiled puzzle, though 23(d) defeated me…I stuck in a nonsense word, after failing with “crush”.
   I also failed to spot the full parsing for 1(ac), and just took it as a double definition. My bad.
   I see that GOOD=USE has reared its ugly head again: (MOUSETRAP). It’s no good – I have no use for it, but I will have to retire gracefully, and accept it.
   A bit like Frenchman = RENE ( 6d)…. why Rene? Well it is, because it is, because it is.
   Re “props”, in 25(ac)…could it be one of those Essex yoof abbreviations? That’s proper = respect = props?
   If so, I shall use it every day from now on.

   Nice puzzle + blog, ta Guy & Oriel

7. Great puzzle – thanks Guy. I particularly liked WINDSOR, REDRAFT and PATINA. The surface for PATINA is beautiful.

8. ‘Props’ is dropped lots in hip hop, e.g. ‘Props Over Here’ by The Beatnuts.

9. Thanks Guy and Oriel

   27ac: The relevant definition of good from Collins 2023 p 842 is n 38 moral or material advantage or use: benefit or profit”, with a very similar usage example to that given by Oriel: Collins has what is the good of worrying?

10. Thanks for the blog , I was expecting IO Wednesday but this was an excellent alternative .
    Bill @7 I thought the clue for PATINA could have done with a bit less polish .

11. Pelham Barton@9
    I suppose nearly every word can be equivalenced, in a certain context, but it’s not fair setting for me.

    “PACK UP YOUR TROUBLES IN YOUR OLD KIT BAG”

    “What’s the use of worrying, it never was worthwhile”
    “What’s the point of worrying, it never was worthwhile”
    “What’s the good of worrying, it never was worthwhile”

    So, does USE = POINT= GOOD ?
    Some dictionary, somewhere, will doubtless make the chain work, but it’s a bit of a stretch for solvers.

    I fully expect to get panned on this!

12. Apart from never having heard of ‘props’ for RESPECT (or knowing which Bond film was referred to) we found this not too challenging and solved everything else unaided apart from using an anagram solver for 29ac. TORMENTED and GASTROPUB were our favourites.
    Thanks, Guy and Oriel.

13. I am going to buck the trend. Perhaps I did not approach this with the right mindset, as I did not have much time available, but I did not enjoy this much. Reviewing the puzzle in the blog, I am not sure why. I still find some of the cryptic definitions annoying, so perhaps it is just that I do not share the same sense of humour as our setter.

    Thanks Guy and Oriel

14. Never having read George Eliot, 29a was a guess ‘n google, but inferrable from the crossers. I loved the def for GASTROPUB!
    CHURR was my jorum for today. Thank you Guy and Oriel.

15. Roz @10. Did you try the Enigmatist Prize crossword? I only got a handful and packed it in. I talked to a friend and he didn’t even get that far.

16. [ Hovis I did finish it but on my fifth go , 20 minutes each time . I have been doing Enigmatist for 30 years and it was the hardest , but I am very stubborn . ]

17. 27ac: I quoted the relevant definition of good from Collins in comment 9. Unfortunately I made two typos: I neglected to include an opening quotation mark, and (perhaps more importantly) put a colon not a semi-colon after the word “use”. I do not think it is quoting out of context to say that Collins is giving “use” as a valid definition of good as a noun. While I do not claim that dictionaries are infallible, I maintain that the balance of probabilities is overwhelmingly in favour of the validity of any definition contained in any of the standard dictionaries against an unsupported challenge from any commenter. Further, as a matter of practical necessity, I believe that a setter is entitled to treat any such definition as valid.

    I included the usage example for further information for anyone who wishes to know how the particular meaning works: I did not set it up to be shot at.

18. The final statement of comment 17 was unfortunately worded, for which I apologise. I meant to say that the usage example was not an essential part of the reason that I am happy with USE in the answer defined by “good” in the clue.

19. Fun puzzle with enough meat to be entertaining. I was also wondering if we’d have an Io today.

    [Hovis @15 I’ve finished the Enigmatist prize too, but it took me to yesterday/Tuesday – going back and solving a bit more when I had a few minutes here and there.]

    Thank you to Guy and Oriel

20. PB@18
    I was not shooting at you!
    Nothing personal. Anything but.

    It’s just that I get frustrated at “the degrees of separation” between words that setters can use as equivalents, when they are anything but, in 99% normal usage.
    Recently, I disliked, SAT = HELD.
    The justification, I think, was …..”the stadium sat 50,000″/ “the stadium held 50,000”.
    When one has crossers, the clue might well be solvable, but when taken on its own merits, such very stretched synonyms would defeat me.
    It’s a game of opinions….and all the better for it.
    Sorry for any unintended offence.

    ENB

21. Sorry for v late comment. I catch up with old crosswords when i can find time. I liked this one but was stumped by 25ac as i never expected an actual Bond film title- too literal! And this meant i missed 21d as would have needed the crossing letter to get me to the T of patina- no one seems to have queried TA for “you shouldn’t have” – seems very obscure to me.

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