Wednesday, October 3, 2012 - DT 26922

Puzzle at a Glance

Daily Telegraph Puzzle Number DT 26922
Publication Date in The Daily Telegraph Thursday, July 19, 2012
Setter Ray T (Ray Terrell)
Link to Full Review Big Dave's Crossword Blog [DT 26922]
Big Dave's Review Written By Big Dave
Big Dave's Rating
Difficulty - ★★★	Enjoyment - ★★★★
Falcon's Performance ┌────┬────┬────┬────┬────┬────┬────┐ ███████████████████████████████████ └────┴────┴────┴────┴────┴────┴────┘ Legend: █ - solved without assistance █ - incorrect prior to use of puzzle solving tools █ - solved with assistance from puzzle solving tools █ - solved with aid of checking letters provided by puzzle solving tools █ - unsolved or incorrect prior to visiting Big Dave's blog █ - reviewed by Falcon for Big Dave's blog

Introduction

Today's offering from Ray T is a bit less difficult than usual, but has the trademark reference to the Queen a bit of mild innuendo.

Yesterday, I posted a review of Monday's puzzle (in addition to one for Tuesday's puzzle). You can be forgiven it you had difficulty with clue 27a in Monday's puzzle, as there was an error in the clue that was published in The National Post.

Notes on Today's Puzzle

This commentary is intended to serve as a supplement to the review of this puzzle found at Big Dave's Crossword Blog, to which a link is provided in the table above.

10a   Tea around one for lounger, perhaps (5)

In Britain, char^[5] (or cha or chai) is an informal name for tea.

11a   Grand talent by Queen’s supporting band? (6)

Queen Elizabeth uses the initials ER^[5] — from the Latin version of her name and title, Elizabetha Regina.

13a   In bathroom, female with a hard sponge (6)

Loo^[5] is an informal British term for a toilet.  H^[5] is the abbreviation for hard, as used in describing grades of pencil lead ⇒ a 2H pencil.

21a   Turn gay in seaside town, say (8)

Brighton^[5] is a resort on the south coast of England, in East Sussex.

23a   Mine includes endless wine, cheers! (6)

Anyone who has been to Oktoberfest will know that prosit^[5] is a German expression used in drinking a person’s health.

26a   Revolutionary Labour leader with odd number returned (5)

Ray T doesn't specify which four-letter odd number to use — but it would seem that there are only two to choose from.

27a   One can cry about sweetheart’s wandering (9)

This is the first of two instances in today's puzzle where a single word in the surface reading must be split into two words in the cryptic reading. Here, "sweetheart" must be interpreted as 'sweet heart' (i.e., the heart — or middle letter — of swEet).

1d   Criminal, wicked convict brought up possessing Ecstasy (7)

In British slang, a lag^[5] is a person who has been frequently convicted and sent to prison ⇒ both old lags were sentenced to ten years' imprisonment.

2d   Discourage the German and French in embrace (5)

Der^[8] is a form of the German definite article (used in any of several declensions). Et^[8] is a French conjunction meaning and.

6d   Restricted Liberal leader over state (5)

An over (abbreviation O)^[5] is a division of play in cricket consisting of a sequence of six balls bowled by a bowler from one end of the pitch, after which another bowler takes over from the other end.

7d   Country’s Government leader trapping Opposition leader (8)

David Cameron^[7] is the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, First Lord of the Treasury, Minister for the Civil Service and Leader of the British Conservative Party.

14d   Speeches over budgets (8)

The setter delivers the second over of today's match (see comment for 6d) ...

16d   End of testing finished head teacher (9)

... and yet another over — but this one has nothing to do with cricket.

17d   Metamorphosis of larvae in plant (8)

Valerian^[5] is a Eurasian plant of the family Valerianaceae which typically bears clusters of small pink or white flowers. There are several species, in particular common valerian (Valeriana officinalis), a valued medicinal herb, and the Mediterranean red valerian (Centranthus ruber), grown for its spurred flowers which attract butterflies.

18d   Sculpting bust, the French getting artful (6)

Le^[8] is the masculine singular form of the French definite article.

22d   Person of faith in Durgapur? (5)

In this semi-all-in-one clue, the entire clue constitutes the definition. The solution is hidden in the last three words of the clue, but there is no explicit hidden word indicator. Rather the setter uses the question mark to imply that the clue is a bit quirky — leaving us to infer the nature of that quirkiness.

Key to Reference Sources: 

^[1]   - The Chambers Dictionary, 11th Edition
^[2]   - Search Chambers - (Chambers 21st Century Dictionary)
^[3]   - TheFreeDictionary.com (American Heritage Dictionary)
^[4]   - TheFreeDictionary.com (Collins English Dictionary)
^[5]   - Oxford Dictionaries (Oxford Dictionary of English)
^[6]   - Oxford Dictionaries (Oxford American Dictionary)
^[7]   - Wikipedia
^[8]   - Reverso Online Dictionary (Collins French-English Dictionary)
^[9]   - Infoplease (Random House Unabridged Dictionary)
^[10] - CollinsDictionary.com (Collins English Dictionary)

Signing off for today — Falcon