Guardian Cryptic 26656 Paul

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(Please click here for this same blog but with a picture quiz added. Please do NOT post hereinbelow any comment relating to the picture quiz. Thank you.)   An enjoyable puzzle from Paul. Thanks to him. Definitions are underlined in the clues.

Across

1    Shape metal as the Rubicon crossed? (3-4)

DIE-CAST : Cryptic defn: When you commit to an irrevocable course of action, you’re said to have crossed the Rubicon, or, the die is cast.

Defn: As a verb.

5    Lithuanian capital providing dandy start to long journey (4-3)

LIFT-OFF : The 1st letter of(… capital) “Lithuanian ” + IF(providing;on condition) + TOFF(a dandy;someone elegantly dressed).

Defn: …, especially into outer space.

9    Wine staying dry then? (5)

MACON : Cryptic defn: If you have your mac (short for the mackintosh;a raincoat) on, you would stay dry.

Answer: … or Mâcon, wine named after the Burgundy region where it is made.

10    Telescope seeing far on the periphery in nuclear device (9)

REFRACTOR : The 1st and last letters of(seeing … on the periphery) “far” contained in(in) REACTOR(short for “nuclear reactor”).

Defn:  … that uses lenses instead of mirrors.

11    Winning team losing? That’s muddled (6,4)

UPSIDE DOWN : UP(winning, as in a competition;leading) + SIDE(a team in a match) + DOWN(losing, converse of “up”).

12    Old South American driving endlessly? (4)

INCA : [“in car”](driving in a car) minus its last letter(endlessly).

14    Make the truth available to all, probing organic waste (11)

MANUFACTURE : [ U(short for “universal”, the classification of a film suitable or available for anyone to view) qualifying FACT(the truth) ] contained in(probing) MANURE(organic waste, used as a fertiliser).

18    All left-hand pages are still to go on book (4,7)

EVEN NUMBERS : EVEN(still;calm) plus(to go on) NUMBERS(a book in the bibe).

Defn: …, in a book that is.

21    Noble almost abandoning extremes (4)

EARL : “nearly”(almost) minus(abandoning) its 1st and last letters(extremes).

22    Train in a particular area requiring less pace, one twice derailed (10)

SPECIALISE : Anagram of(… derailed) [LESS PACE + 2x(…twice) I(Roman numeral for “one”) ].

25    In time, malfunctioning coils put out of place (9)

DISLOCATE : DATE(the time, say, of an event happening) containing(In …, …) anagram of(malfunctioning) COILS.

26    Author elected to keep a tragedy in stock? (5)

IBSEN : IN(elected into Parliament, say) containing(to keep) BSE(abbrev. for “bovine spongiform encephalopathy”, aka mad cow disease, a tragic and fatal disease in livestock).

Answer: Henrik, Norwegian author and playwright.

27    Pink bottom breaking eggs (7)

ROSEATE : SEAT(the buttocks;one’s bottom) contained in(breaking) ROE(eggs of fish, lobsters, sea urchins, and the like).

28    Hollow cut in back for uniform (7)

REGULAR : “gulf”(a deep hollow;a chasm) minus its last letter(cut) contained in(in) REAR(the back part).

Down

1    Terrible killer, an idiot (6)

DUMDUM : Double defn: 1st: A hollow-point bullet that expands on impact, inflicting a terrible, messy wound with extensive laceration.

2    Too much for two characters, say? (6)

EXCESS : Pronunciation;say of the characters “X” and “S”.

3    Old lady of Turin turns up with car after arrival of the Messiah (4,6)

ANNO DOMINI : Reversal of(… turns up, in a down clue) [ O(abbrev. for “old”) + DONNA(term of address for a lady in Italian-speaking areas, Turin included) ] plus(with) MINI(the small car originally made by the British Motor Corporation.

Defn: Term used to denote the years after the supposed year in which Christ was born, ie. after arrival of the Messiah.

4    Stale when married? That’s about right (5)

TIRED : TIED(married;hitched) containing(That’s about) R(abbrev. for “right”).

5    Foreign fliers beginning to fly at heads of untold falcons, flew madly (9)

LUFTWAFFE : Anagram of(… madly) [ the 1st letter of(beginning to)” fly” + AT + the 1st letters, respectively, of(heads of) “untold falcons” + FLEW].

Defn:  …, unless you’re German, of course.

6    Weary signal (4)

FLAG : Double defn.

7    Meat giving one gout unfortunately, if unknown amount’s consumed (8)

OXTONGUE : Anagram of(… unfortunately) ONE GOUT containing(if … consumed) X(symbol for an unknown quantity in maths).

8    Japanese vessel may be heading to Newcastle, abandoned (8)

FORSAKEN : [ FOR SAKE ](describing a vessel that may be used to contain the Japanese drink, sake) + the 1st letter of(heading to) “Newcastle“.

13    Sticking a blade nethermost – sliding around, is it? (3,7)

ICE SKATING : Anagram of(… – sliding around) [STICKING A + the last letter of(… nethermost) “blade“].

Answer: .., involving use of skates with blades and lots of sliding around. A WIWD (wordplay intertwined with defn.) clue.

15    Ornate enamel apt for sign (9)

NAMEPLATE : Anagram of(Ornate) ENAMEL APT.

16    Back Duke Ellington for a start, on guitar (8)

DEFENDER : The 1st letters, respectively, of(… for a start) “Duke Ellington” placed above(on, in a down clue) FENDER(a famous make of solid-body electric guitars).

Defn: …, a player whose responsibility is to guard the goal in a team game like football.

17    Emotional disorder ending in Britain with relative in Brussels? (8)

NEUROSIS : The last letter of(ending in) “Britain” plus(with) [ EURO SIS](whimsically, a term for one’s sister;a relative in Brussels, the de facto capital of the European Union).

19    Neglect a line in book of prayer (6)

MISSAL : MISS(to neglect;to bypass) + A + L(abbrev. for “line”).

20    Note of course, heard (6)

TENNER : Homophone of(…, heard) “tenor”(a settled course of progress).

Defn: A £10 note.

23    Seeing revolutionary monarch, shout “hooray” (5)

CHEER : CHE(Guevara, Argentinian Marxist revolutionary) + ER(abbrev. for “Elizabeth Regina”, English monarch).

24    One’s sat upon in non-U America, as an American might say? (4)

SOFA : “U S of A”(as an American might refer to his/her country) minus(non-) “U“.

(Please do NOT post hereinbelow any comment relating to the picture quiz. Thank you.)

48 comments on “Guardian Cryptic 26656 Paul”

  1. Thanks Paul and sccua. Loved this one, as is normal with Paul, and we finished in the morning. Very unusual for us!

  2. I enjoyed all of the anagrams, and my other favourites were FLAG, FORSAKEN, EVEN NUMBERS, MANUFACTURE & UPSIDE DOWN.

    New for me was DUMDUM bullet, and I needed help to parse 27a and 9a.

    28a – i was thinking of gully = hollow – but i guess there can be some ambiguity with the clues that include the word “cut”

    Thanks Paul and scchua

  3. Thanks Paul and scchua
    Lots to enjoy here. I started in the SW, then moved E, N and finished, with some difficulty, in the NW. Favourites 1a, 26a, 8d, and 17d.
    I had trouble seeing DUMDUM as an idiot, though I knew the bullet (from Catch-22, I think). I don’t see what “seeing” is doing in 23d. I play the guitar, so was familiar with Fender, but I wonder how generally known it would be?

  6. Thanks Paul & scchua.

    I think Fender is pretty well-known. The other one in Bradford’s is Dobro.

    Got a bit stuck in the NW corner – DUMDUM as a stupid person is hyphenated in Chambers and Oxford, and I can’t find that meaning in Collins, at least online.

    Japanese vessel = FOR SAKE is pretty loose, maybe something like ‘use of Japanese vessel’ would be better. I liked MACON and ANNO DOMINI among others.

  7. [Interesting to hear if non-guitarists are familiar with Fender. I would guess that the specific model Stratocaster would be better known (everyone would recognise one if they saw it, at least).]

  8. hi muffin@ 5

    i was talking about crosswordland not the real world

    i imagine it is quite difficult to work “les paul” into a solution but i am sure someone here will prove me wrong!

  9. I hadn’t correctly parsed 24dn, so thanks for that blogger!

    Robi, FOR SAKE is indicated by “Japanese vessel may be”.

  11. Thanks scchua, including for explaining SOFA which I had early but never fathomed. There were brilliant surfaces here, and buried treasures. I loved the old lady of Turin. Bravo Paul

  12. ‘The old lady’ (of Turin) is actually the nickname of Juventus, so I toyed with Juve for a while.
    But it turned out to be a more general name.
    Good puzzle, one that I solved the way muffin @3 did.
    1ac/1d were the last ones in but I needed some help for that – ah, those double and cryptic definitions …

  13. Specifically, “the die is cast” is what Julius Caesar said when, entering Rome to face charges, he crossed the River Rubicon, which marked the border between Italy proper and Cisalpine Gaul. For a provincial governor to cross into Italy with his troops was a capital offense for him and for the troops under his command, so once he had done it he had to fight a war or be executed.

  16. Michelle @8 [Guitar of the French Pope]?

    Loads to like here, but then I’m an incurable halpernophile.

    Favourites were EVEN NUMBERS & NEUROSIS.

    On the other hand, I thought maybe more could have been done with LUFTWAFFE. Uncharacteristically clunky clue, I thought.

    I wonder if Señor Guevara is aware of how indispensable he remains to crossword setters?

    Thanks for the fun, Paul.

    Nice weekend all.

  17. [William @16
    Would “Guitar of the French Popes” be better? There were lots called Paul, and it gives the plural form for “the”.

    Did you notice my go @10? Can’t resist a challenge like that!]

  19. One of Paul’s trickier offerings, but still enjoyable. Last in was DUMDUM

    Thanks to Paul and scchua

  20. stumped by IBSEN – I’d got ISSUE stuck in my head as the answer (to issue = to author? issue = stock?). kicking myself that I missed TENNER, must have seen that clue dozens of times before.

    agree that the LUFTWAFFE clue was clunky. I parsed it as “beginning [t]o [f]ly [a]t” = T F A but the reading suggested above is better and slightly less awkward.

    ROSEATE and ANNO DOMINI were my favourites.

  21. Great fun – got stuck with 1 across trying to make an anagram out of ‘metal as’, until the penny dropped. Favourites were LUFTWAFFE, FORSAKEN and EXCESS. Many thanks to Paul as always, and to scchua.

  22. Paul on great form today. He really sets the bar high. My only, small question: I can’t see how to make ‘weary’ mean flag. Isn’t it flagging? Thanks Paul and sschua.

  23. The “Terrible” in 1d is what hampered me- Ivan the Terrible died from a stroke during a chess match, I thought this was a cruel misdirect- which made me double dum)b)

  24. Thanks to Paul and scchua. I got a kick out of NEUROSIS but had trouble parsing SOFA (US of A is not part of my working vocabulary) and MAC-ON and took a while before seeing OXTONGUE (even after getting the crossers) and EVEN NUMBERS. A good workout.

  26. @25 Thanks for the blog, and to Paul for another peach. Surely ‘weary’ is a transitive verb as in ‘I weary you’, but flag is intransitive, as in ‘you flag’. It’s possible to say ‘I weary of nitpickers’ but not ‘I flag of nitpickers’. All of which is to say I have yet to come up with usages where ‘flag’ can be a direct replacement for ‘weary’. But as ever, and all too frequently, I’m open to correction.

  28. Muffin @17 Missed you first stab – like it!

    Re Popes/Pope, not sure…I think the French would want Les Pauls from that, wouldn’t they?

  30. I didn’t really understand either IBSEN or SOFA and had to guess them and surely OX TONGUE isn’t one word? Not as satisfying a solve as Paul’s puzzles usually are but it’s hard to dislike anything by him. Liked DUM DUM and DEFENDER.
    Thanks Paul.

  31. I thought DIE-CAST is particularly bad. In Julius Caesar crossing the Rubicon the die was cast or so he is supposed to have said, but the two are not really the same, and it’s a very obscure classical reference in any case. I had to get it from crossing-letters, which as you know I think is out of court.

    HH

  32. Thanks. Solid puzzle from my favorite setter.

    I think the last time an American was actually heard saying “The U.S. of A.” was, like, 1962.

    I’m not a guitarist, but I know Fender quite well. I’d guess that even casual fans of rock music have heard the name.

    Just yesterday, my husband and I had brought up Australian band INXS (best known on these shores for this song ; looking at their Wikipedia page, it looks like they were never as big in the UK as the US (or in the US as in Australia, of course). Anyway, for that reason the clue for EXCESS came pretty much instantly for me.

  33. Nice one.

    OXTONGUE looks odd (? two words) and I was surprised to see IBSEN clued as an author but I suppose the five-letter combination of playwright plus tragedy would have been too easy – great clue! (I missed the significance of “stock”)

  34. Thanks scchua@25. I’m rather with Tyngewick@26. Unless William@27 is correct. But can one say ‘I weary’?

  35. [Is there any connection between the “die” in “die-cast” (the mould) and the “die” in “the die is cast” (presumably the singular form of “dice”)?]

  36. Jovis @33: Playwrights are authors (of plays), so it’s all good. Plus, “author” in crossword puzzles is often meant to be I or ME, so there’s greater chance of misdirection that way.

    Muffin @35: My dictionary says that the two uses are indeed etymologically related, but doesn’t really spell out how they evolved. I don’t have access to an OED right now, so I can’t get a full answer.

  37. I enjoyed this, as I do almost all Paul’s puzzles, and I thought the clue for FORSAKEN was a belter. It took me longer than it should have done to see SPECIALISE, and the DUMDUM/MACON crossers were my last two in.

  38. mrpenney @36
    Thanks. My etymological dictionary doesn’t mention the mould; SOED has die pl. dice for the gaming cube, but also die pl. dies for the stamp and also a cubical base of a pedestal – so perhaps there is some cubic link?

  39. Thanks Paul and scchua.

    I do not know any makes of guitar, so needed help in parsing DEFENDER. I did like ANNO DOMINI, MACON, DIE-CAST, IBSEN, NEUROSIS and UPSIDE DOWN.

  40. [hh @15: I don’t know. But I have a feeling that Paul (who is a football fan) used ‘The old lady of Turin’ deliberately. For me, however, Donna will always be my beautiful ex-colleague who changed my life and lost hers in an awful plane crash in Kazan in November 2013.]
    [mrpenney @32: INXS was huge in Holland. I was lucky enough to see them live at a relatively small venue during their Kick-days. One of two concerts I attended in which the audience sang along with every single song (the other one being a gig by Deacon Blue (at the same venue which made Ricky Ross say: ‘I want to take you all with me to Glasgow’).]

  43. Hello all. Long-time lurker, first-time poster.

    Given the back and forth about Caesar and dice, I thought I’d share that I arrived at 1a without making any historical connection between the two definitions at all. I saw “the die is cast” and “crossing the Rubicon” as two loosely equivalent phrases, regardless of their origin. How nice that they also originated from a single event!

    My favourites were FORSAKEN and NEUROSIS. Good enough clues to draw a lurker out of the woodwork.

    Thanks for the blog scchua, which I needed for the last couple.

  44. Codswallop @43 – Welcome to the club. I think the idea that this involves obscure general knowledge is ludicrous, but what do I know 🙂

  45. mrpenney@36

    Sorry for late acknowledgement (other things going on in one’s life, etc) – thanks for the useful tip. I shall remember it!

  46. Enjoyed this one and finished it in two one hour commutes, could not parse 5,9 and 26 ac, though and as a Juventus supporter was sidetracked for a bit too long on 3 down.

  47. Thanks Paul and scchua

    Finished this one last week and only just checked it off. Needed help to fix up the parsing of REGULAR (didn’t spot the truncated GULF going back) and the US of A trick for SOFA. Also had not seen the ‘die is cast’ equivalence to ‘Cross the Rubicon’ – now it makes much more sense.

    Typically good challenge from Paul with lots of other interesting clues, including EVEN NUMBERS, ANNO DOMINI and FORSAKEN. Finished up in the NW corner with MACON, DUMDUM and DIE CAST the last few in.

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