Thursday, March 22, 2012 - DT 26755

Puzzle at a Glance

Daily Telegraph Puzzle Number DT 26755
Publication Date in The Daily Telegraph Friday, January 6, 2012
Setter Giovanni
Link to Full Review Big Dave's Crossword Blog [DT 26755]
Big Dave's Review Written By Gazza
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 Giovanni is a bit more challenging than most of the fare provided so far this week.

Meet the Setter

Here is what Crossword Who's Who and Wikipedia have to say about today's setter:

Don Manley (born 2 June 1945), a physics graduate from Bristol, now lives in Oxford where he worked as an editor for OUP [Oxford University Press].

Don has been setting crosswords since 1963. He has supplied puzzles for the Radio Times, The Spectator, The Independent, The Times, The Daily Telegraph, The Guardian, and the Financial Times among others. He is crossword editor of Church Times.

His various pseudonyms - Duck, Pasquale, Quixote, Bradman, and Giovanni - are all punningly connected with the name Don or Donald.

He has also written what is widely regarded as the standard book on setting and solving crosswords: Chambers Crossword Manual (1986, 4th edition October 2006).

He has appeared on the BBC Radio 4 panel game, Puzzle Panel, and anchored the BBC4 documentary "How to Solve a Cryptic Crossword".

Don Manley was brought up in Cullompton, Devon, attending local state schools and Blundell's School, Tiverton as a Foundation Scholar. He read [studied] physics at Bristol University. After a short spell in a telecommunications laboratory he worked in academic and educational publishing at The Institute of Physics, Stanley Thornes, Basil Blackwell, and Oxford University Press, which he left in 2002, when crosswords took over as his sole paid occupation. He is married to Dr Susan Manley, a clinical biochemist. They have two married children and two grandsons.

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.

9a   Country singer gets about, with woman and son providing backing (6)

The setter may have intended this clue to refer to American country singer Del Reeves^[7] (1932 – 2007) but it is far more likely that he was thinking of "Gentleman Jim" Reeves^[7] (1923 – 1964) who died in the crash of of a private plane at age 40.

11a   Female writer to head for Gretna Green? (8)

Gretna Green^[7], a village in the south of Scotland famous for runaway weddings, is one of the world's most popular wedding destinations, hosting over 5000 weddings each year in the area, and one of every six Scottish weddings.

Gretna's famous "runaway marriages" began in 1753 when Lord Hardwicke's Marriage Act was passed in England; it stated that if both parties to a marriage were not at least 21 years old, then parents had to consent to the marriage. The Act did not apply in Scotland, where it was possible for boys to marry at 14 and girls at 12 years old with or without parental consent. Many elopers fled England, and the first Scottish village they encountered was Gretna Green.

The local blacksmith and his anvil have become the lasting symbols of Gretna Green weddings. Scottish law allowed for "irregular marriages", meaning that if a declaration was made before two witnesses, almost anybody had the authority to conduct the marriage ceremony. The blacksmiths in Gretna became known as "anvil priests".

Today there are several wedding venues in and around Gretna Green, from former churches to purpose-built chapels. The services at all the venues are always performed over an iconic blacksmith's anvil. Gretna Green endures as one of the world's most popular wedding venues, and thousands of couples come from around the world to be married 'over the anvil' at Gretna Green.

15a   Defect in fine Scottish footballer of yesteryear (4)

Denis Law^[7] is a retired Scottish football player, who enjoyed a long and successful career as a striker from the 1950s to the 1970s.

17a   European Society repeatedly restricting organisation for women? (5)

The Women's Institute (WI)^[5] is an organization of women, especially in rural areas, who meet regularly and participate in crafts, cultural activities, and social work. Now worldwide, it was first set up in Ontario, Canada, in 1897, and in Britain in 1915. Interestingly, Oxford  Dictionaries shows the abbreviation for this organization with Canadian origins as being "British".

1d   German city where b-bigwig turns up (4)

Nob is chiefly British slang for a person of wealth or social standing^[3] or a person of social distinction^[4]. It also turns up in the name of Nob Hill^[7], a neighbourhood in San Francisco, California which - prior to the earthquake of 1906 - was an exclusive enclave of the rich and famous who built large mansions in the neighborhood. The neighborhood was largely destroyed in the 1906 earthquake and fire. While the neighborhood was able to maintain its affluence following the quake, every mansion owner moved or rebuilt elsewhere.Today, Nob Hill is an affluent district, home to many of the city's upper class families as well as a large young urban professional population, and a growing Chinese immigrant population from a slowly encroaching Chinatown to the east.

3d   Omit to provide something for the rubbish? (4)

In Britain, a large transportable open-topped container for building and other refuse is known as a skip^[5] [called a dumpster^[5] in North America] : I’ve salvaged a carpet from a skip.

8d   Mythological male trapped in forest escapes (7)

In Greek mythology, Orestes^[5] was the son of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra. He killed his mother and her lover Aegisthus to avenge his father’s murder.

13d   New UK dealer that is to be found in a capital city (4,6)

Auld Reekie^[5] is a nickname for Edinburgh, Scotland. It literally means 'old smoky' from reek^[5], which in the Scottish dialect means smoke.

16d   Huge site for newspapers from what we hear (8)

Wapping^[7] (English pronunciation: WOP-ing) is a place in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets which forms part of the Docklands to the east of the City of London. As the London Docklands declined after the Second World War, the area became run down, with the great warehouses left empty. The area's fortunes were transformed during the 1980s when the warehouses started to be converted into luxury flats. Rupert Murdoch moved his News International printing and publishing works into Wapping in 1986, resulting in a trade union dispute that became known as the "Battle of Wapping".

24d   Cleric idle, vain, regularly absent (4)

A dean^[10] may be the head of a chapter of canons and administrator of a cathedral or collegiate church (Church of England) or the cardinal bishop senior by consecration and head of the college of cardinals (Roman Catholic Church).

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