A pretty standard sort of Everyman, I thought …
… and, let’s face it, we Everyman fans wouldn’t really have it any other way. The grid was as solver-friendly as they come, and there were some very nice surfaces. I particularly enjoyed the elite soldier’s hissy fit and the idea of Hamlet as the Love Prince.
It took me a while to twig the anagram in 2d (my LOI), as I’d convinced myself there must be some reference to either the English Civil War Siege of Chester or the 7th-century face-off between Britons and Anglo-Saxons. Totally wrong. And I’m not 100% happy about 6d – either the cluing is a bit loose or my parsing is. Or possibly both. Please feel free to set me straight.
Elsewhere, I became intrigued by the wordplay for 10d. Why Claude, I wondered, when surely any name ending in E would do? Turns out there was a Belgian biologist called Albert Claude who won a Nobel prize in 1974 for work largely carried out at the Rockefeller Institute in New York in the 1930s and 40s. He was a friend of Diego Rivera, among others, and sounds like quite a character. Amazing what you learn from doing crosswords. Edit: thanks to beaulieu in the comments who points out that the names Claude and Hewer in the clue are undoubtedly a reference to The Apprentice, a show I’ve managed to avoid thus far.
Thanks to Everyman.
MOH’s entirely subjective hardness scale rating: Fluorite
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | OTTO |
Serving of risotto’s for German lad (4)
|
| Hidden (serving of) in risOTTO’s | ||
| 4 | PRAT |
Nitwit in protective cover taken aback (4)
|
| Reversal (taken aback) of TARP (protective cover) Edit: I’m told the printed version of the puzzle had the word “snare” rather than “protective cover”, which would yield PART instead of PRAT | ||
| 8 | REFRESHER COURSE |
Rescuers here for nonsensical update (9,6)
|
| Anag (nonsensical) of RESCUERS HERE FOR | ||
| 11 | OWN GOAL |
In which defence alas is best form of attack? (3,4)
|
| Cryptic definition, with “alas” being the giveaway word, as far as the defending team is concerned | ||
| 12 | PANACEA |
Loudly criticise a prophet’s cure-all (7)
|
| Homophone (loudly) of “pan a seer”. It only works for those with non-rhotic accents, of course | ||
| 13 | FLIP CHART |
Facetious chat overcoming resistance; it helps the presentation (4,5)
|
| FLIP (facetious) + insertion (overcoming) into CHAT of R | ||
| 14 | BREAK |
You can hear part of car stop working (5)
|
| Homophone (You can hear) of “brake” | ||
| 15 | SAGAS |
Epic tales whichever way you look at it (5)
|
| A palindrome, whichever way you look at it ti ta kool uoy yaw revehcihw ,emordnilap A | ||
| 16 | JET STREAM |
Time invested in joke by paper that affects current events (3,6)
|
| Envelope (invested in) of T inside JEST + REAM | ||
| 19 | ICELAND |
Some chic élan demonstrated in Northern location (7)
|
| Hidden (some) in chIC ELAN Demonstrated | ||
| 21 | YULE LOG |
Christmas list – piece of cake (4,3)
|
| Charade of YULE + LOG (a list of sorts) for the festive arboreal-themed treat | ||
| 22 | FLOGS A DEAD HORSE | Pursues lost cause – seeks money at proverbial glue factory?
(5,1,4,5) |
| Double definition, the second of which is somewhat cryptic | ||
| 23 | ENVY |
Begrudge diplomat wanting nothing (4)
|
| ENV(o)Y without the O | ||
| 24 | DAME |
Woman starts to drowse alongside Everyman (4)
|
| Charade of first letters (starts) of D(rowse) + A(longside) + ME (Everyman) | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 2 | THE FORCES |
Combatants of Chester mustered (3,6)
|
| Anag (mustered) of OF CHESTER | ||
| 3 | OPHELIA |
Love Prince? He will get love interest afflicted principally: her (7)
|
| O (love) + P (prince) + HE (from surface) + LIA (first letters of Love Interest Afflicted). “Her” being the love interest of the Danish prince, of course | ||
| 4 | PARAPET |
Elite soldier having hissy fit in defensive structure (7)
|
| Charade of PARA (elite soldier) + PET (hissy fit) | ||
| 5 | ACORN |
Something unpleasant afoot? No, a treat for Piglet (5)
|
| Double definition, I think, the first being cryptic-ish | ||
| 6 | CRY OFF |
Decide against show of emotion: that’s rotten (3,3)
|
| CRY (as a noun, a show of emotion) + OFF (rotten). Or maybe the definition is “decide against show” (as in showing up) with “cry” as simply “emotion”. I’m not entirely convinced by either of these parsings though | ||
| 7 | REMARK |
Give another grade to statement (6)
|
| Double definition | ||
| 9 | FINDING NEMO |
OK? Not quite: demon gin drunk in children’s film (7,4)
|
| Charade of of FINe (not quite OK, appropriately for a film about fish) + anag (drunk) of DEMON GIN | ||
| 10 | ROCKEFELLER |
Wealthy businessman to surprise, finally, Claude and Hewer (11)
|
| Charade of ROCK (surprise) + E (ClaudE finally) + FELLER (hewer, feller of trees) | ||
| 14 | BETHLEHEM |
Liz refurbished helmet endlessly in ancient town (9)
|
| BETH (Liz) + anag (refurbished) of HELMEt (endlessly) | ||
| 15 | SNIFFY |
Disdainful son humming (6)
|
| Charade of S + NIFFY (smelly, humming, in British slang – not sure whether this is familiar in other parts of the anglophone world) | ||
| 16 | JADEDLY |
Justice terribly delayed – energy dropping – without enthusiasm (7)
|
| Anag (terribly) of J + DELAY(e)D (dropping an E) | ||
| 17 | TOYLAND |
Told any cobblers in realm of children’s tales? (7)
|
| Anag (cobblers) of TOLD ANY for the setting of Enid Blyton’s Noddy books. And also, apparently, of The Adventures of Pinocchio by Carlo Collodi | ||
| 18 | MAGNET |
10am, rising, embracing German that’s attractive (6)
|
| Reversal (rising, in a down clue) of TEN AM around (embracing) G | ||
| 20 | ARSON |
Arouse radiant smouldering – only, naughtily, primarily? (5)
|
| The inevitable “primarily” clue, though I don’t think the surface definition is as felicitous as might be wished. “Prisoner at the bar, you stand accused of naughtily arousing radiant smouldering…” which sounds to me like a trailer for some sort of Victorian smut-fest |
Thanks Everyman and MOH
I didn’t see the paper, but apparently the clue for 4a was a mistake, using a reversal of “snare” (TRAP). Oddly there wasn’t a “Special Instructions online that it had been changed.
CRY OFF
CRY for show of emotion seems to work all right.
ARSON
Liked the comment in the blog.
Thanks Everyman and MOH.
Enjoyable except 4A (in the printed Observer) had the clue as “Nitwit in snare taaken aback”
The “protective cover” certainly works better but why on line and print differ?
Thanks Everyman and MOH
[Without discussing today’s puzzle in any way, please note that special instructions have been added to the online version to amend one clue]
Typical Everyman.
I took the clue to 10d to be referring to ‘The Apprentice’ (UK version) – not a show I’m much interested in, but I vaguely knew that Claude and Hewer were names of Sugar’s associates who help in the evaluation of candidates.
Somewhere between gypsum and fluorite for me (by the way, the originator of the scale was Mohs, not Moh).
Thanks both.
I’d agree with beaulieu @5 regarding the Apprentice link being the intention, but very interesting research on the Rockefeller fella.
As a newbie, pet as a hissy fit was new to me, as was niffy for ponging, even as a Brit (whiffy would be my go to) – but both gettable.
Thanks Everyman & MOH!
cosmic @3
The printed clue doesn’t actually work at all, because the reversal of TRAP gives PART, not PRAT.
Jay@4, Muffin@7 – this is the third online clue correction in recent weeks. The question has to be asked – how many more do we have to suffer before Everyman is asked to improve the editorship of his puzzles? We know that Everyman himself is the Guardian crossword editor, so who is editing the editor?
This was an enjoyable Everyman. I was somewhat held up by bunging in an unparsed OTHELLO in place of OPHELIA, but the error soon became obvious.
And I was pleased that my username here reminded me that pet apparently means tantrum/hissy fit in some parts of the country 🙂
Thanks to MOH (especially for the palindrome in the blog) and Everyman
Thanks to all who have pointed out the discrepancy between printed and online clues for 4a. I only saw the online version so was unaware of it. But clearly a reversal of TRAP for “snare” wouldn’t yield the correct answer. I will add a note to the blog accordingly.
And thanks to beaulieu @5 for the Apprentice reference. Not a show I’ve ever seen but I’m sure you must be correct, though I’ve become rather attached to Albert Claude now. (And yes, the real thing is indeed the Mohs scale, but since my moniker abbreviates to MOH my version is MOH’s.)
Indeed, Hadrian @8 – quis custodiet ipsos custodes? I wonder how many of Everyman’s sometimes ropy clues, not to mention those needing mid-course corrections, would survive the scrutiny of a disinterested, gimlet-eyed editor.
muffin@7 Indeed. That was a reason I had waited all week to see it decoded, only to discover the printed clue had been overwritten!
Thanks for the blog , love the MOH’s scale , I will adopt this in future . Gypsum for me but it should really be Talc every week to give beginners a fair chance .
Could someone just put the clue NUMBER for the correction today ? This would not be a spoiler .
I have told KenMac that I will not criticise the editor anymore but I do agree with points raised above . Just an experienced test-solver would spot a lot of issues in advance . We all make mistakes and hard to spot our own , I know this from writing exam papers .
Roz@13 – 23ac has become “Everyman endlessly late: fancy!”
Thank you Hadrian , hmmm I will say more next week .
Saw minimal WP – just a space – in 5d A CORN. And just a hyphen in 7d RE-MARK. — [16d JADEDLY: J + Anag (terribly) of DELAY(e)D (dropping an E)]
The App version also had time incorrect 4a, and still does. Really annoying.
Pet for hissy fit had me baffled. I eventually got the answer from the crossers.
This was a lot of fun and indeed learner-friendly. Thanks Everyman and MOH.
First parsing of 6d is the correct one IMO. Obviously “cry off” has a more nuanced definition but it does involve deciding not to do something.
Enjoyed “something unpleasant afoot” as a definition for a corn. Reminds me of “the game is a itchy foot” from House and the damn things really are unpleasant.
American television is getting to me as I couldn’t get past “beats” a dead horse rather than flogs, and I’ve never heard “niffy” – though of course it is now squirreled away in my crossword vocabulary vault.
Very fun explanations! Thank you moh
I must have done the online puzzle early on, because my printed version of 4ac has the “snare” text. It must have been corrected later.
I think this was the first time I thought of the rhyming pair early enough for it to be of help. I had the dead horse and started thinking of what might rhyme with it in 8ac.
Thanks Everyman, and welcome to bloggerdom to MOH,
OTHELLO (Love + ? + He’ll + Love) so very nearly fits the clue for OPHELIA… I bet TanTrumPet@9 and I won’t have been the only ones to try it.
MOH says that the homophone at 12a PANACEA only works for non-rhotic speakers. As a rhotic speaker, I disagree. This aural wordplay works for anyone who has ever watched British films, theatre productions or television shows. Just because I’m a rhotician, that doesn’t mean I can’t recognize non-rhotic speech when I hear it.
Thanks Everyman for the puzzle, and MOH for the excellent blog, especially for the link to Albert Claude. Our society’s obsession with credentialism would have made it impossible for this genius (who left school at age 10) to make the mark that he did on 20th century science.
Cellomaniac @24 a very good final point and I do agree with the sentiment but on the whole it is probably better not to have world wars and concentration camps and allow children to finish their schooling . Also I know that society and dictionaries get this all wrong but to be clear – All science is Particle Physics the rest is just colouring-in .
Finally a film you might like – Through a Glass Darkly (1961) , if only for the sound track .
Cellomaniac @24, you’re right of course, and I’d hope that rhotic speakers would be able to make the imaginative aural leap in consideration that this is a puzzle published in a British paper, but I also know that this is can be an issue for some who feel that they are being excluded by the assumption of non-rhoticity, hence my comment. But thank you for your kind comment on this, my very first Everyman blog!
A yule log is a, er, log.
You can get cakes shaped like a whole range of things (as we see on hen nights), but that doesn’t make them that thing.
Apart from that, this was fine fare as an Everyman puzzle, I’d say.
Thanks everyone.
Etu @27 – in the UK Yule log cakes are a standard at Christmas, sold everywhere, made at home if that’s your thing. You can even buy gluten-free versions. There’s also a traditional French Christmas cake that’s similar.
I didn’t find this Everyman particularly challenging, judging from the app.
Welcome and thank you to miserableoldhack.
28, Shanne,
Yes, and you can topiary a privet bush into the shape of Michael Gove’s head, but that does not make privet = tory ex-minister.
Etu @29
Your are missing Shanne’s point. If you go into a cake shop, or indeed most supermarkets, in the run-up to Christmas and ask for a Yule Log. they will sell you a log-shaped decorated chocolate cake.
Re 15d – I remember “niffy” mostly from the Beano comic back in the 60s, a stink bomb or whatever would be accompanied by the words “nasty niff “ and some squiggly lines. Great stuff!
Re Roz@25
Thanks for getting the essence of science right! Appreciated. (Though some [subsidiary] parts of science are perhaps less colouring-in and more stamp collecting.)
30, muffin,
Yes, but only because they don’t stock actual wooden ones.
If I asked for a Santa Claus, then they’d also sell me a chocolate one – if they had one.
Etu@33, you seem to be grasping at chocolate straws (available at most candy stores). 🙂
My Chambers (1998) has: “Yule log – a cake shaped and decorated to resemble a log, eaten at Christmas time; orig a log cut down in the forest, dragged to the house and set alight in celebration of Christmas”. (I especially like the detail of the original definition – “cut down in the forest, dragged to the house”!)
Yule log refers to the log, or the cake in the shape of a log. If one of those meanings is no longer valid, I don’t think it’s the cake! Good clue. Good crossword and very clear blog, thanks both.
Well, the medieval Yule log was a log big enough to burn for the 12 days of Christmas (or from the winter solstice until the sun looked to return again, which is pretty much why Christmas has its date). so it wasn’t necessary to break from the festivities to go chopping down trees again. In the days of gas and electricity we recognise the folk memory in cake. And have done since the 19th century.
Confused – I did Evetyman puzzle No. 4095 on 13 April. This blog post is for the week before.
Matthew@38 , Everyman is still a Prize puzzle with a week for entry so 4095 will be blogged next Sunday .
“Flying saucer” refers to either a reported UFO, or the rice paper container filled with sherbet.
I’d like to read a crossword clue, which has the the latter meaning as its solution, but a fair one.
Piglet actually called them “Haycorns”, so I feel a bit short changed. Liked the forces, toyland, own goal, magnet and sniffy.
Solved in two sittings, like last week’s I thought this would be hard but when I revisited an hour later it fell into place.
Agree with Duane @41 though, Piglet wouldn’t have been seen dead eating any old acorn.
No standout clues, Panacea was probably the only one to raise a small chuckle.
Got it all out and found it to be basically satisfying. There were several answers that I could not completely parse, e.g. Ophelia. And Rockefeller. I would never in a million years think of “feller” as a synonym for “hewer”. Moreover I would not be caught dead watching “The Apprentice”.
Didn’t like “sniffy”; niffy meaning smelling bad (and humming meaning smelling bad) are too obscure.
I was lucky that “flog a dead horse” flashed into my head. I liked “refresher course” and “panacea”
I did know “humming” but whether it’s current in. NZ I’m not sure. Got yule log from the letters but never thought of it a cake. OTTO is getting a bit hackneyed – I thought better of Everyman.
A good Sunday morning ‘s entertainment
Lots to challenge this solver until Sunday. Never heard of Pet for hissy fit or Niffy, must be northern hemisphere popular words not used down here? My only gripe is that shouldn’t ‘Hewer’ H be lower case hewer in 10d? Otherwise it infers it is a proper noun. Liked Yuke Log even tho a bit tricky and took me ages, and don’t mind about the accuracy of it being a piece or a whole entity. Just a crossword.