Daily Telegraph Puzzle Number DT 26360 | |
Publication Date in The Daily Telegraph Friday, October 1, 2010 | |
Setter Giovanni | |
Link to Full Review Big Dave's Crossword Blog [DT 26360] | |
Big Dave's Review Written By Gazza | |
Big Dave's Rating | |
| Difficulty - **** | Enjoyment - *** |
Falcon's Performance ***** | |
Introduction
Although I completed the puzzle without the aid of my Tool Chest, I did have to check in the dictionary to confirm that one entry (12a) truly exists. After reaching an impasse (with some half dozen clues yet to be solved), I set the puzzle aside and occupied myself with other things. When I returned to the puzzle, the remaining solutions quickly fell into place. I was pleasantly surprised to see that the puzzle merited four stars for difficulty from Gazza.
Today's Glossary
Selected abbreviations, people, places, words and expressions appearing in today's puzzle
Appearing in Clues:
bloomer2 - noun British informal, dated a serious or stupid mistake.
grass - verb 2 British informal inform the police of someone's criminal activities or plans: [no object]: someone had grassed on the thieves; [with object]: she threatened to grass me up
leg - noun 5 (also leg side) Cricket the half of the field (as divided lengthways through the pitch) away from which the batsman's feet are pointed when standing to receive the ball. The opposite of off.
Appearing in Solutions:
cascara sagrada - [Collins English Dictionary] noun the dried bark of the cascara buckthorn, used as a stimulant and laxative Often shortened to cascara.
consulting room - noun U.K. doctor's room, the room in which a doctor sees patients, mainly in a hospital.
D (3) - abbreviation 8. Director
FL - abbreviation 1 US state Florida. Also written Fla.
Galatea - Greek Mythology 2 the name given to the statue fashioned by Pygmalion and brought to life.
Pygmalion1 - Greek Mythology a king of Cyprus who fashioned an ivory statue of a beautiful woman and loved it so deeply that in answer to his prayer Aphrodite gave it life. The woman (at some point named Galatea) bore him a daughter, Paphos.on - noun (also on side) Cricket the leg side. [see definition for leg above]
tin - noun 1 [3rd entry] British informal, dated money.
U3 - adjective British informal (of language or social behaviour) characteristic of or appropriate to the upper social classes: U manners. [consequently superior]
Commentary on Today's Puzzle
This commentary should be read in conjunction with the review at Big Dave's Crossword Blog, to which a link is provided in the table above.
25a Bloomer made by girl meeting American friend (7)
... however, the American friend is unlikely to refer to this girl's 'serious or stupid mistake' as a bloomer. This is an instance where the intended misdirection is apt to miss its mark on the majority of North Americans, who may well think immediately of a flower (and then puzzle over the incongruous surface reading).
29a Some biography - phenomenal bit of writing! (6)
There is a rule in cryptic crosswords that one should ignore punctuation - except in cases where one should not ignore it. With this clue (for which the solution is HYPHEN), one might think that there is a choice (of whether to ignore the punctuation or not). In fact, Gazza says, "hidden (some) in the clue are both the actual and the spelled-out versions of a sign used in writing". However, I believe that the punctuation mark used in the clue is technically a dash, not a hyphen. Therefore I would suggest that we must ignore the dash and find the solution hidden in "biograpHY PHENomenal".
8d Spotting pony with leg hidden in grass (6)
This clue packs a bit of a triple-whammy. Not only is it a deletion type clue (which, it seems, many find particularly difficult), it contains a Briticism as well as a cricket reference.
The definition is "spotting" for which the solution is SPYING. The wordplay is PY {P(ON)Y without (hidden) ON (leg)}contained in (in) SING (grass).
Leg and on are both cricket terms referring to 'the half of the field (as divided lengthways through the pitch) away from which the batsman's feet are pointed when standing to receive the ball'. Grass is British slang meaning to inform on someone to the police.
24d Modern device - one not working well, we hear? (5)
Yet another homophone that does not transport well across the Atlantic. However, if you listen to the British pronunciation of laser at TheFreeDictionary.com, one can appreciate that it does sound a bit like lazier. The pronunciation is sort of LAYS-yer as compared to the American lay-SER.
Signing off for today - Falcon
Falcon,
ReplyDeleteOn 29a I take your point about hyphen/dash.
On 24d I think that the sound-alike is meant to be LAZER (i.e. one who lazes) rather than LAZIER. I'm sure that an attempt to make LASER a homophone of LAZIER would have brought forth howls of protest on this side of the pond!
Regards
Gazza
Hi Gazza,
ReplyDeleteThank you for clearing this up. In fact, my initial thought had been that the homophone might have been intended to be LAZER. However, a quite extensive search failed to produce any evidence that such a word even exists - so I reverted to Plan B. It looks like I should have stuck with my initial instinct.
Falcon