Logodaedalus makes only rare appearances in the Guardian – his last puzzle was in July (he also appears as a setter of the Quiptic under his real name of Don Putnam). This one is typical of his style – very easy indeed, with a lot of obvious anagrams, and a tendency for words in the clue to appear unchanged in the answers. This would be a good introductory puzzle for beginners, but for anyone else it’s very lean fare.
| Across | ||||||||
| 8. | MADRIGAL | (GIRL ADAM)* | ||||||
| 9. | ABRUPT | A BR + UP + T | ||||||
| 10. | DISH | SID< + H | ||||||
| 11. | INEVITABLE | IN + I’VE< + TABLE | ||||||
| 12. | BEDLAM | BED + LAM[p] | ||||||
| 14. | LIMASSOL | (MISS LOLA)* | ||||||
| 15. | STENCIL | CLIENTS* | ||||||
| 17. | INHUMAN | HUM + A (first) in INN | ||||||
| 20. | MOT JUSTE | I’m not sure about this – it means “the right word”, of course: maybe “unspoken in this country” just means that it’s a French phrase. | ||||||
| 22. | BREAST | R in BEAST | ||||||
| 23. | STIMULATED | (I MUST)* + LATE D | ||||||
| 24. | BARD | R in BAD | ||||||
| 25. | ASTERN | AS TERN | ||||||
| 26. | ANGELICO | ANGEL + I + CO, the painter being Fra Angelico | ||||||
| . | ||||||||
| Down | ||||||||
| 1. | MANIFEST | MANIFESTO less O | ||||||
| 2. | ARCH | [m]ARCH | ||||||
| 3. | AGEISM | (GAME IS)* | ||||||
| 4. | SLEEKLY | LEEk in SLY | ||||||
| 5. | TALISMAN | (ATM NAILS)* | ||||||
| 6. | BREAD SAUCE | BREAD (money) + SAUCE (cheek) | ||||||
| 7. | APOLLO | A + POLL + O | ||||||
| 13. | LONG JUMPER | Double definition – a long jumper might keep you warm | ||||||
| 16. | INSOLENT | IN + SO + LENT (fast) | ||||||
| 18. | ABSTRACT | AB’S TRACT | ||||||
| 19. | BESTIAL | (IT’S ABLE)* | ||||||
| 21. | OBTUSE | O.B. + SUET* | ||||||
| 22. | BODEGA | AGE + DOB, all reversed | ||||||
| 24. | BILL | Double definition | ||||||
Hi Andrew
Thanks for the blog.
It’s not often that I would keep you company at this hour [and I’ve no idea how you do the blogs so quickly!] but I’m up late tonight and off out early in the morning, so did this very easy puzzle before going to bed and just happened to see your blog.
Before doing so, I’d looked up blogs of Logodaedalus’s puzzles and noted your previous comments on “a tendency for words in the clue to appear unchanged in the answers”.
This is the one thing that characterises Logodaedalus’s puzzles for me and I will quote, yet again ;-), what I think is one of the worst examples I have come across: 24,591: ‘clumsy when giving ring to fish [6]
Sorry – ” ring to a fish”!
Andrew – thanks for the blog. I’m with you one 20A. The promptness os the blog must surely explain the obvious slips in 23A and 24A.
12:33AM – good show, Andrew! The cryptic… not so much.
Cheers…
Thanks, Andrew. Agree with all the above but have to say that I did like the surface of 2!
PeterO @3, I think Andrew in his parsing of 23 and 24 was just subconsciously echoing Eileen’s comments @1! 🙂
Thanks, PeterO – typos corrected. (Actually, 23ac was less of a typo and more of a not-checking-properly..)
Alas couldn’t finish.
17a Got fixated on “bus”=buzz and therefore had ?nbus?a?.
26a Hadn’t heard of Angelico and didn’t think of angel =kind person. Aren’t angels in crosswordland backers of plays?
2d Didn’t realise that arch =playful. Thought that arch was sworn as in Moriarty being Sherlock Holmes arch enemy
4d With ?l?e?l?, I simply couldn’t see it
24d Never heard of Bill Sikes (thought it was Eric as in Hattie Jacques) -but don’t see why bill=notice. Surely a bill is either something you have to pay or something that goes through Parliament?
At least it didn’t take long for me to reach the stuck and give up point.
Bamberger #8
Re Bill = notice, surely you’ve come across this oldie:-
“Bill stickers will be presecuted – Bill Stickers is innocent!”
Sorry, that should be PROSECUTED!!! Blame the new contact lenses!
Pommers
Your ‘Bill Stickers’ reminded me of the newspaper headline ‘Homosexual Bill in Parliament today’.
(That noise is me getting my coat.)
Thanks all
I had a little trouble with “Evidence of pregnancy – knock (into) (4)”.
Ooops – sorry! That’s the Quick Crossword.
Bamberer @8
Arch in ‘arch-enemy- means chief or main as in archbishop.
“arch” is an arch little word.
20ac
In many cryptics I would have looked for something really clever (mow juiced) but not here.
Bamberger,sorry for omission.
Thanks Andrew and Logodaedalus
I was a bit taken aback by 12a (but typical it seems – thanks Eileen).
I quite liked 3d, 24a, and 13d.
ps 2d reminded me of Paul’s onth/arch clue last week.
Not too taxing after the festivities.
Thanks Andrew; as you say, I don’t understand why ‘bed’ has to be in the clue and answer of 12. The clue could perfectly well have had ‘cot’ or somesuch, which would give an alternative surface. I thought 13 might have been ‘s hot putter at the beginning.
And the prize for the most old chestnuts in one cryptic puzzle goes to….. As you say, Andrew, one for the beginners today.
Eileen @1 “24,591: ‘clumsy when giving ring to fish [6]”
I’ve stared at it on and off all day -please put me out of my considerable misery!
oafish …. o a fish
Drew@19 -oh dear as simple as that -and here was me thinking that it was an anagram of when with o giving the name of a fish! -and couldn’t come up with such a fish -how oafish of me.
Bamberger
I also couldn’t solve Eileen’s clue until I read her correction @2, whereupon I solved it instantly.
Which illustrates just how precisely significant are the words in a clue.
I agree with Andrew that this would be ‘a good introductory puzzle for beginners’, but there is no harm in that; we were all beginners once.
Hmm. Seems to me more like a desire knock the setter than a genuine short coming. Short words get used all over the place in both clue and solution without comment, so why start sniping here?
For example, for those who don’t understand the language, A is both a word and a letter and is frequently to be transfered directly from the clue to the answer. If there was bitching every time that happened we’d never talk about anything else.
In any case, the posts of Bamberger show clearly that the puzzle was too hard for some, so lay off the intellectual snobbery chaps and realise these things are meant for a wider readership than just yourselves.
Andrew, you have a talent for being inconsistent. You can’t call a crossword a beginner’s puzzle and then say you don’t fully understand one of the clues. You are invalidating your own statement. Perhaps you meant “mainly a beginner’s puzzle”?
I think he means that he could write in ‘mot juste’ with hardly any thought (like all the solutions here) but did not fully understand the parsing. Perhaps because it was a rather weak clue.
No contradiction to me.
RCW at 24,
If you wrote in all the solutions with hardly any thought, then you must have finished this in about two minutes. My, aren’t you clever !.