I was pleased when I saw Raich’s name at the top of the grid this morning, because I enjoy having a go at his puzzles. I liked this one, except for two intersecting clues in the SE corner which I felt were a bit iffy and which held me up in completing that quadrant.
The top row reads RAICH L, so I am guessing that this is Raich’s fiftieth crossword in The Independent. If so, congratulations to him on the half century, and we look forward to many more.
Abbreviations
cd cryptic definition
dd double definition
(xxxx)* anagram
anagrind = anagram indicator
[x] letter(s) removed
definitions are underlined
Across
7 Substitute joiner impressed by introduction of serious money
STAND-IN
An insertion of AND, a ‘joiner’ in S for the first letter of ‘serious’ and TIN for ‘money’. The insertion indicator is ‘impressed’, which I wondered about; but one of its meanings is ‘commandeer’, so all is well.
8 Instrument needed by radio car in Australia
OCARINA
Hidden in radiO CAR IN Australia. An instrument found much more often in a crossword than in real life, I fancy.
10 Mammal with energy doing for duck in water?
RHINE
Raich is asking us to take the O out of RHIN[O] and replace it with E for ‘energy’.
11 Cutting corners, old dodgy pet ID in from France accepted
EXPEDIENT
EX for ‘old’ (as in ex-wife) followed by an insertion of EN, one of the French words for ‘in’ in (PET ID)*
12 Emergency move up?
AIRLIFT
A cd.
13 Specially likes extremely newsworthy Horizon
SKYLINE
(LIKES NY)* The NY bit is the outside letters of ‘newsworthy’.
14 Remedies all working in poet’s place
EMERALD ISLE
(REMEDIES ALL)* Pretty obvious anagram, but why is the EMERALD ISLE a ‘poet’s place’? The answer, it seems, is that the phrase was first coined in a poem by William Drennan, When Erin First Rose, the first four lines of which are:
When Erin first rose from the dark swelling flood,
God bless’d the green island and saw it was good;
The em’rald of Europe, it sparkled and shone,
In the ring of the world the most precious stone.
Without intending any slight towards our Irish readers – or towards Raich of course – the complete poem is pretty turgid. But I’ve learnt something.
19 Visionary (?) work, Italian recalled, with unlimited scale
OPTICAL
A charade of OP, a reversal of IT and the three inner letters of sCALe. What the question mark in brackets is doing in the clue I have no idea, since it works perfectly well for me without it.
21 Holiday-maker after second run
SCAMPER
A charade of S and CAMPER.
23 Like some places to stay? Start here strangely
THREE-STAR
(START HERE)* Took me ages to see this, despite it being a clearly indicated anagram.
24 Offence seen by church for a reason?
SINCE
A charade of SIN and CE.
25 Language after drink dire, discourteous, vile in the end?
MALTESE
A charade of MALT for a ‘drink’ of whisky, and ESE for the final letters of ‘dire, discourteous, vile’. A tricky clue. It’s enough to make a Maltese cross.
26 Achievement – girl reaches shelter
EVEREST
This was my last one in, and I didn’t like it very much. E?E?E?T can be lots of things; EVEREST is an ‘achievement’, I suppose, but so are lots of other things; and ‘girl’ certainly could be lots of things. Whatever, it’s EVE and REST.
Down
1 Artist covering seaside feature and weapon of old
RAPIER
A charade of RA for ‘artist’ and PIER.
2 Clingy guy’s entering a seedy joint
ADHESIVE
An insertion of HE’S in A DIVE.
3 Aim to provide home, temporary one maybe
INTENT
A charade of IN and TENT.
4 What Mozart did, unruffled
COMPOSED
A dd.
5 Writer has room for learner? Only just
HARDLY
Raich is inviting you to insert L in Thomas HARDY, whose heroine TESS crops up regularly in cryptics. It’s also one of my favourite books.
So the baby … was buried … in that shabby corner of God’s allotment where He lets the nettles grow.
6 Cradle to grave fee limit reviewed
LIFETIME
(FEE LIMIT)* with ‘reviewed’ as the anagrind.
7 Master organised pupils
STREAM
(MASTER)* with ‘organised’ as the anagrind. Nice surface, but perhaps ‘pupils’ for STREAM is a bit of a stretch. A stream, B stream …
9 Two articles on maiden song
ANTHEM
A charade of two articles, AN and THE and M for a cricket ‘maiden’.
14 Charms the snarl away?
ENTHRALS
(THE SNARL)* with ‘away’ as the anagrind.
15 Answer ‘Florida: state’ when excited
AFLUTTER
A charade of A, FL and UTTER giving us a slightly old-fashioned word for ‘excited’.
16 Travelling from here said Poles must be allowed in?
STANSTED
I didn’t really warm to this clue. It’s NS for two ‘poles’ in STATED, but I don’t really see where the precise definition is.
17 Seat of Bishop going too far with award
BOTTOM
A charade of B, OTT for over the top or ‘going too far’ and OM for Order of Merit or ‘award’.
18 Eager Forest start to train
ARDENT
They’ll need to be eager if they’re ever going to get out of the Championship. A charade of ARDEN for Shakespeare’s forest and T for the first letter of ‘train’.
20 Long uprising in support of revolutionary US politician
CHENEY
Since it’s a down clue, it’s a reversal (‘uprising’) of YEN for ‘long’ supporting the setters’ favourite revolutionary, CHE Guevara. Dick CHENEY is the US politician that Raich is referring to.
21 Singular statement of beliefs in long document
SCREED
A charade of S and CREED for religious ‘beliefs’.
22 Boatman, he bets
PUNTER
A dd. I put in BANKER to begin with, because they’ve been gambling with our money for long enough.
Thank you to Raich for compiling this one.
Thanks, Pierre. Like you, I enjoyed this puzzle [but not the poem!].
Also like you, I didn’t care for EVEREST but it was the REST = shelter that bothered me. Collins has ‘any high point of ambition or achievement’ and Chambers ‘anything extremely difficult to accomplish or conquer, the height of ambition’, so Raich is in the clear there.
In 16dn, I took the definition as ‘[there is] travelling from here’ – but it took me a while.
Re 19ac: I’d be questioning this if it didn’t have a question mark! ‘Visual’ = optical would be OK but ‘visionary’ refers to visions, not vision. I smiled at this one, imagining Raich with tongue in cheek: as the clue stands, he gets away with it, for me.
As usual, I didn’t see the Nina. Congratulations to Raich and thanks for an enjoyable puzzle.
Thank you, Raich – and congratulations on the half-century! Quite enjoyed this moderate workout after the gentle warm-up with Rufus.
Thanks to Pierre for the blog. I couldn’t parse BOTTOM fully, but it seems so obvious in retrospect! I agree with Eileen that the question mark is necessary after “Visionary” – without it, the definition would be quite a stretch.
Slightly disappointed with 4d – it’s barely even cryptic and felt out of place in an otherwise well-clued puzzle.
I enjoyed the puzzle simply enough because I could do it! Thanks, Raich!
I found this an enjoyable puzzle, and congrats to Raich on #50.
I parsed the clue for STANSTED in a similar manner to Eileen. As far as the “rest” in EVEREST is concerned, it works for me if you think of “Traveller’s Rest”. RHINE was my LOI after the MALTESE/CHENEY crossers.
Very enjoyable thank you Raich although I didn’t get STANSTED which is really annoying as I printed off Stansted boarding passes for flights on Friday at the same time as printing out the crossword. Thanks to Pierre too.
Before I had a chance to buy a Guardian I picked up an Indy on the train, so I’m a refugee from Rufus today. No bad thing either, as there will have been a dd in there somewhere today that I would have found impenetrable. No such problems today, and fairly clued throughout. CHENEY and SKYLINE favourites.
STANSTED was OK for me. I pass it often enough on the M11 and it’s a place where Poles might fly to (I checked, Ryanair from Wroclaw), though the clue’s grammar is not fantastic.
I found the SE corner a bit tricky after filling the rest of the grid quite quickly. With STAND-IN, EXPEDIENT and AIRLIFT I wondered if there was going to be a theme of stop-gaps or similar, but it looks as if their appearance together was just coincidence.
Thanks, Raich and Pierre (and congrats too to Raich).
Many thanks for the blog, Pierre, and to all who commented. I think those comments have cleared up the queries. The puzzle did mark the 50th Raich Indy puzzle (many thanks, eimi!).
I’ll admit that I was not aware till today of the provenance of “Emerald Isle” and had never heard of the poem or, indeed, the poet.
Thanks Raich, spotted the Nina early not that it really helped. Rhine took me an age to spot, but the other qualms folks had didn’t bother me.
merci Pierre for both of the blogs.
Our experience was much like Pierre’s. We started off very quickly, spotted the nina and then came to a halt with our LOI. We’d entered EVEREST but then began to doubt it because we couldn’t solve 16d.
Actually we thought it was quite fair once we’d come here.
Congratulations Raich and merci Pierre!
2018 very good alround crossword