Azed No. 2,762 – plain – Fifteensquared

Rather more than the usual quota of four letter words made this week’s plain puzzle more challenging than some (although it was particularly easy in another way…)

There were 8 four letter words in all, and while they all had three letters checked, there was still some ambiguity in a few cases to resolve. Apart from that I had difficulty in parsing SIPHONAGE (but was helped by my fellow bloggers) and I have a couple of queries relating to the wording of the clues for TASS and GLIFT.

It looks as though the new management at The Observer are getting over their initial teething problems, and it won’t be their fault that the results of this month’s competition have been delayed by a week.

Other than that, I simply draw your attention to the fact that fully half of the letters in the right hand column of the grid are Es (hence my reference above to the puzzle being particularly easy…)

I shall be out all day when this blog appears so may not be in a position to respond to comments until the evening.

picture of the completed grid

ACROSS
1	ASTACOLOGIST	Crustacean specialist is sat cooking round pancake with piece of firewood (12)
		TACO (pancake) LOG (piece of firewood) inside *(IS SAT).
11	POSEUR	One with affectations, upper-class, cracking puzzle? (6)
		U(pper-class) inside POSER.
13	ARIARY	What Malagasies spend, putting strain on railway (6)
		ARIA (an air or strain) RY.
14	COCA	Coloured type of sorrel, shrub with medicinal properties (4)
		C(oloured) OCA (a S American wood sorrel). The use of the abbreviation C to mean coloured is given in Chambers as a South African usage, presumably dating back to the apartheid era.
15	SIPHONAGE	Drawing off liquid to drink, ducks mature? (9)
		SIP (drink); HON (like “ducks”, a term of endearment), AGE (mature).
16	SHEWN	Axe opening tin once displayed (5)
		HEW (axe) inside SN (symbol for the element tin).
18	ON ORDER	Number in red or mottled awaited from supplier (7, 2 words)
		NO (number) inside *(RED OR).
19	SADE	Serious English letter from Tel Aviv marquis? (4)
		SAD (serious) E(nglish), plus two definitions.
20	SEMITE	English newspaper from the east for speaker of several languages (6)
		E TIMES (all rev).
22	TREBLE	Chorister, belter but unharmonious (6)
		*BELTER.
25	SNEE	Cut once expressing contempt? Ring off (4)
		SNEE(ring).
26	AEROSOL	See painful spot, one that’s returned? This may apply spray (7)
		LO (see) SORE A(rea) (all rev).
28	SLADE	Rock band in Scotland drifted downwards (5)
		Two definitions. The second one is a Scottish past participle of the verb “to slide”. I spent a long time looking for geological terms, particularly Scottish ones, before realising that the rock band was something quite different.
30	SANITATES	Supplies with loo etc, one I found in USA (9)
		AN I inside (United) STATES.
32	TECH	Busy with introduction to history in college (4)
		TEC (short for detective, or a “busy”), H(istory).
33	FLAIRS	Displays of panache in line within bazaars (6)
		L(ine) inside FAIRS (bazaars).
34	BESTIR	Incite tribes in revolt (6)
		*TRIBES.
35	PREHEMINENCE	Regarding edge in dividing money, this was outstanding quality (12)
		RE HEM IN inside PENCE. The “was” indicates that this is an obsolete spelling.
DOWN
2	SIRI	Flower pulled up – it’s chewed as stimulant (4)
		IRIS (rev); it’s another word for betel.
3	TRIPE DE ROCHE	Edible lichen in red pie mashed as filling for medicinal pill (12, 3 words)
		*(RED PIE) inside TROCHE (a round medicinal tablet).
4	CORONAL	Circlet, pink, worn inside (7)
		ON (worn) inside CORAL (pink).
5	LEMANS	Former sweethearts? Mum’s kept in contact (6)
		MA (mum) inside LENS (as in contact lens).
6	OUTGO	Ordinary troubled gut over, come to an end (5)
		O(rdinary) *GUT O(ver).
7	INORDINATION	Irregularity during admission as minister? (12)
		A simple charade of IN ORDINATION.
8	SECRETED	Hidden island once spoken about (8)
		CRETE (island) inside SED (Miltonic spelling of “said”).
9	TEA TREE	Manuka in scene of action without height and energy (7, 2 words)
		T(h)EATRE E(nergy).
10	TASS	Tot? Literally that renders one boozer! (4)
		T AS S; if you render TOT with the initial T as S, you get SOT, or a boozer. Azed is very fond of this device, but I don’t think it really works here, as surely TOT should become SOS?
12	SYNOD	Church council, fellows turning up about start of year (5)
		Y(ear) inside DONS (rev).
17	HARE’S-EAR	Umbellifer run dry (8, apostrophe)
		HARE (run), SEAR (dry).
19	START-UP	Beginning of business yielding winner of prize in farmers’ show? (7)
		A charade of STAR TUP (a ram that might be exhibited at an agricultural show).
21	EASTLIN	What sounds like Victorian bestseller, like Cold Wind in Scotland? (7)
		Sounds like the Victorian melodrama East Lynne.
23	EONISM	Cross-dressing indicating independence in men so arrayed (6)
		I(ndependence) inside *(MEN SO).
24	GLIFT	A wee time once north of the border causing grand boost (5)
		G(rand) LIFT. This is a Scottish term, which I think is adequately conveyed by “wee”, rendering “north of the border” unnecessary.
27	SAREE	Distinctive garment, look, clothing Arabian (5)
		AR(abian) inside SEE. An alternative spelling of the more familiar SARI.
29	ESSE	Being cinnamon stone, but not on it (4)
		ESS(on it)E. Essonite, or hessonite is known as cinnamon stone.
31	ERIC	Fine old part in Pericles (4)
		Hidden in Pericles.

9 comments on “Azed No. 2,762 – plain”

Thanks for the blog , puzzles like this make me wonder if a Special of some sort is coming soon . Never heard of East Lynne but had to be right . I agree for GLIFT , no need for a second Scottish indication . SADE does not need the marquis , it is not wrong but Azed himself says in his third rule – nothing else .

There’s a proliferation of question-marks in the clues, several of which don’t appear to be necessary: 11ac, 15ac, 26ac, 5dn. 7dn would also be ok without it, I think and, as Roz@1 says, 19ac doesn’t need “marquis”, in which case the question-mark is also unnecessary. I think question-marks are justified in 19dn and 21dn. Otherwise, fairly straightforward and no quibbles.

Roz@1: I knew of East Lynne because a stage adaptation of it was the origin of the line, “Gone! And never called me mother.”

Thanks for the blog, especially the explanation for TASS which had me flummoxed. Everything else seemd to parse ok. I’d not heard of “manuka” and then it appeared several times in “The Colour” by Rose Tremain which I was reading at the time. I love the new online interface which I find so much better than printing them off. I’m wondering whether there is still an AZED archive of the puzzles that have appeared since the change to the new management?

Thanks Dormouse@3 , I have heard of that line but never knew where it came from .

The reference to East Lynne led me to watch the 1916 Theda Bara silent movie version, apparently one of only a few of her performances to have survived. There were hardly any title cards, so at times, the plot was difficult for me to follow, even with the broad pantomime style of acting. Hard to comprehend that that was over a century ago now. Still worthwhile, IMHO.

Hello, DodgyProf. TASS is what I call one of Azed’s ‘charades.’ I thought it was all right this time but he’s often dodgy. A few years ago there was a lengthy and ridiculous STOA which led to a gruesome Azed turning Athens into Athena. So so clever—and almost unfathomably boring.

I’m coming to Azed’s defence again in 2762. ’T as S’ does not necesarily indicate T is S always.

I agree with MunroMaiden about unnecessary question marks. I am a book collector and Dickens must be one of my favourite authors. But even he wrote the unreadable. Mrs Henry Wood is the far side of unreadable Dickens and East Lynne is on my ‘life-is too-short’ list. (If you want something worse, try the translation from German of Theodore Fontane’s Frau Jenny Treibel. I had to read it at school. It will take you several weeks to struggle through but you will definitely be bonkers by the time you finish it.)

Double definitions, and sometimes double indicators, are entirely acceptible, especially if they lead to pleasing surface readings. This goes back before Azed.

I am still working on my submission re local/dialect/Scottish/foreign/etc indicators which I promised in 2760. I will post in the ‘General’ forum but I will let you know.

You can find a lot of old Azeds through the now defunct ‘andlit’ site. I don’t know how far they go back. You have to be a bit tricksy: it takes you to the guim site and you can change, say ‘AZ_2709_(19th_May).pdf’. You have to get the number right and you have to match the date. And sometimes guim (The Grauniad) decided Sunday was Monday. Even occasionally last week. Or even next week! No problem for Azed solvers… We’re clever.

Stefan

The complete misses this time were TASS, SAREE and PREHEMINENCE. I liked the STAR TUP.

I have just noticed that this week’s Observer has printed the wrong information for those wishing to submit entries to the monthly competition. Entries should in fact be sent to:

Azed 2,763
PO Box 518
Oxford
OX2 6WX

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