Moley has produced a fine Quiptic for us this morning. Plenty of Easy Annies to get us going, then the rest clearly clued with some lovely surfaces. And as we have remarked many times before, that’s not an easy thing to do when you’re compiling a puzzle for beginners. Well done to her.
Abbreviations
cd cryptic definition
dd double definition
(xxxx)* anagram
anagrind = anagram indicator
[x] letter(s) missing
definitions are underlined
Across
1 Wicked kinsmen use boys for making mischief
MONKEY BUSINESS
(KINSMEN USE BOYS)*
9 State of novel woollen garment
NEW JERSEY
A charade of NEW and JERSEY for the small northeastern US state.
10 Metal by empty garage in the shade
TINGE
A charade of TIN and GE for the outside letters of ‘garage’.
11 Observes journalists following man
HEEDS
A charade of HE and EDS.
12 Defensive construction is world’s task
EARTHWORK
A charade of EARTH and WORK. You have to take the apostrophe s as ‘has’ rather than ‘is’.
13 Offences relating to charges covering lion’s replacement
FELONIES
An insertion of (LION)* in FEES.
14 Exist partially for the sake of another
BEHALF
A charade of BE and HALF.
17 Posh wines spilt: it’s not clever
UNWISE
(U WINES)* The anagrind is ‘spilt’ and the U bit (‘posh’) is referring to Nancy Mitford’s U and non-U classification of aristocratic language. She was definitely U.
19 Face tyranny
CHUTZPAH
Well, it must be a dd, but I can’t see the ‘tyranny’ bit. Anyway, it comes from a Yiddish word.
22 Appear casual in gown with soft texture
DRESS DOWN
A charade of DRESS and DOWN in its feathery sense.
24 Live down under
BELOW
A charade of BE and LOW.
25 Warble a greeting, when led back
YODEL
A charade of YO! and a reversal of LED. As George Dubya famously said to Blair: ‘Yo, Blair!’ Allegedly.
26 Finger wagging lecture
TALKING TO
A rather weak cd.
27 Small change for old bikes
PENNY-FARTHINGS
Old currency: if you’re as old as I am, you will just about remember farthings.
Down
1 Fun days Thomson managed but never in this time
MONTH OF SUNDAYS
(FUN DAYS THOMSON)*
2 Recently created town based on old president’s initiative
NEW DEAL
Referring to President Roosevelt’s post-depression initiative in the 1930s. A charade of NEW and DEAL for the town in Kent.
3 Boy at good point after smooth services
EVENSONGS
A charade of EVEN, SON and G, then S for South or ‘point’ of the compass.
4 Squint, when the chief looked
BOSS-EYED
A charade of BOSS and EYED.
5 Those who speak with utter hesitation at one point
SAYERS
A charade of SAY, ER for ‘hesitation’ and S for South or ‘point’ of the compass (again).
6 Nick‘s name’s on the club house, primarily
NOTCH
The first letters of the middle five words of the clue.
7 Portuguese lady hears no disturbance
SENHORA
(HEARS NO)*
8 Kiss in this part of the forest?
NECK OF THE WOODS
A cd, which made me smile.
15 Install his tables incorrectly
ESTABLISH
(HIS TABLES)*
16 Friends’ character as retail merchant
CHANDLER
This is where it helps if you have children who, in default/bored mode, watch endless repeats of the US comedy Friends on the telly. CHANDLER was one of the main characters, portrayed by Matthew Perry.
18 We led; he prepared to sweet-talk
WHEEDLE
(WE LED HE)*
20 Reportedly, parrot’s lost shape
POLYGON
A homophone of POLLY GONE. Might have seen this one before, but hey, it’s a Quiptic.
21 To some extent soft or ill-formed
SORT OF
(SOFT OR)*
23 Son embraces Capone in the drawing room
SALON
An insertion of AL, the setters’ favourite gangster, in SON.
Many thanks to Moley for today’s Quiptic.
Thanks Moley and Pierre
New words for me were CHANDLER (retail pharmacy in the UK) & BOSS-EYED.
My favourites were EARTHWORK, MONKEY BUSINESS & EVENSONGS.
I thought that 26a was rather weak as a CD, and I think that chutzpah is stretching it for “tyranny”.
Thanks Moley and Pierre
I hoped to find an explanation of CHUTZPAH for tyranny – oh well!
Entertaining, but I thought CHANDLER was a bit unfair – the primary definition isn’t all that well-known, and the TV one is very “general knowledge”.
Same as Muffin. I’ve no idea what the tyranny was about, and although I could guess that CHANDLER was a probable name for a character in a sitcom, I object to being expected to know it.
Lovely surfaces, just right for the Quiptic. Only guessed 19 from the crossers, last in – 19 at odds with the rest of the puzzle, didn’t understand the dd at all.
On reflection, while it is too much of a stretch for the quiptic, there are various shades of meaning of chutzpah, ranging from cheeky impudence to arrogant rudeness – the later being tyranny in the context of bullying behaviour. Possibly.
Thanks Moley and Pierre. Good level for a Quiptic.
I think CHUTZPAH must be a cd – as it can mean audacity, I guess it might be against (face) tyranny. Otherwise, there are a lot of face parts in synonyms e.g. cheek, lip, mouth etc.
I think this is mostly an ideal Quiptic, but you can count me as another who doesn’t know how the “tyranny” element of CHUTZPAH works, and my Chambers is no help. I have no problem with CHANDLER because I know of the retail merchant, although I only remembered the character from Friends as I was writing it in.
Thanks Moley and Pierre.
I enjoyed this, but found it a little harder than today’s Rufus. The parsing of CHANDLER had me foxed.
CHUTZPAH / tyranny, in the old sense of ‘seizing of power without legal right’ is ‘a bit of a cheek’.
TINGE, NEW DEAL, NEW JERSEY, BOSS EYED and NECK OF THE WOODS among others were fun.
Chandler is a very old name for a merchant, as in ship’s chandler and corn chandler – I think originally they were candle makers.
I still don’t really see ‘Neck of the Woods’ – is ‘kiss’ part of the CD, or part of a charade? I don;t think it can be both.
As a relative beginner I thought there were a few too many anagrams, and no hidden words, but apart from 8D and 19A enjoyable.
Brian
Since nobody mentioned it, I think the super-economical 24ac (BELOW) is a sleek gem in all its simplicity.
Completely agree, Sil – and proof that an effective Quiptic can still contain stylish clues.
Well I thought this was it at last – the first genuine Quiptic I have seen. So, many congratulations to Moley. Many have tried and failed (usually by a long way).
But there still hasn’t been a perfect Quiptic, because the CHUTZPAH clue is just so bizarre. There is no way tyranny can define chutzpah. Can anyone get hold of Moley to ask her?
I’m baffled.
Limeni @10, I think one must have extreme self confidence or audacity to seize absolute power without legal right, which is one of the definitions of ‘tyranny’.
Moley has posted an explanation for CHUTZPAH on the Guardian site.
Cookie – good try, but crossword synonyms don’t quite work like that. You need to be rich to become a US President, but that doesn’t mean ‘rich’ is a synonym for ‘president’.
Thanks muffin – a charming attempt at an explanation she makes, but to interpret ‘chutzpah’ as having anything to do with ‘bossiness’ or ‘tyranny’ is to completely miss the unique nuance of the word. If Roget’s have made that comparison then they too are clearly in error.
The other point is that even if she had found some legitimate, but obscure, backwater definition for the word (which she has not), in using it she has besmirched an otherwise perfect beginner’s crossword…which is sad, and odd.
The classic definition of chutzpah is the lovely (if oft repeated): “that quality enshrined in a man who, having killed his mother and father, throws himself on the mercy of the court because he is an orphan”.
According to WIKI, contemporary usage of ‘chutzpah’ is demonstrated in the film Haider, a modern-day interpretation of Hamlet set against the back-drop of Kashmir in the midst of political conflict. The protagonist uses the word chutzpah to describe India and Pakistan’s way of treating the people of Kashmir since the beginning of the conflict. That sounds like bossiness, or tyranny, to me.
Cookie, as ever you seem desperate to make this work…but if you can’t cite anything more convincing than the word’s (mis)use in one ‘foreign-language’ (Hindi) film, then I’m afraid your argument somewhat lacks clout.
Also you didn’t quote the next sentence from your extract, that it “sounds more like Indian slang.”
Limeni @15, if you search the sites for the film Haider, you will see that they mispronounced the word on purpose, that is I why I did not mention it. I do not have time at the moment to go into that, perhaps tomorrow.
I can’t believe this means so much to you. Chutzpah does not mean tyranny, however one Hindi film uses it. Let’s leave it at that and move on.
Limeni
I Emailed the crossword editor about the chutzpah clue. I received a reply today in which he added his apology to that of Moley.