Thursday, April 3, 2014 — DT 27353

Puzzle at a Glance

Puzzle Number in The Daily Telegraph DT 27353
Publication Date in The Daily Telegraph Thursday, December 5, 2013
Setter RayT (Ray Terrell)
Link to Full Review Big Dave's Crossword Blog [DT 27353]
Big Dave's Crossword Blog Review Written By Big Dave
BD Rating
Difficulty - ★★ / ★★★	Enjoyment - ★★★★
Falcon's Experience ┌────┬────┬────┬────┬────┬────┬────┐ ███████████████████████████████████ └────┴────┴────┴────┴────┴────┴────┘ 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 █ - solved but without fully parsing the clue █ - unsolved or incorrect prior to visiting Big Dave's Crossword Blog █ - solved with aid of checking letters provided by solutions from Big Dave's Crossword Blog █ - reviewed by Falcon for Big Dave's Crossword Blog █ - yet to be solved

Introduction

We get a very entertaining puzzle from RayT today. I may have thrown in the towel too early today. With a bit more effort — and perhaps a couple of hours of cogitation while I attended to other matters — the last few clues might well have revealed themselves without the help of my electronic assistants. However, that would have also entailed a delay in writing this 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.

Definitions are underlined in the clue, with subsidiary indications being marked by means of a dashed underline in semi-all-in-one (semi-& lit.) clues and cryptic definitions.

Across

1a   Grub with rice all part boiled (11)

10a   Bloke’s retaining sweetheart from agency (5)

Bloke^[5] is British slang for a man ⇒ he’s a nice bloke.

Agency^[5] is used in the sense of an action or intervention producing a particular effect ⇒ canals carved by the agency of running water.

11a   Chest perhaps, or ancient bust (9)

12a   Send home former husband with sex in exchange (9)

It^[5] (usually written in quotation marks, 'it') is an informal [and euphemistic] term for sexual intercourse or sex appeal  ⇒ the only thing I knew nothing about was ‘it’.

13a   First of elite joining crack outfit (5)

Think of "outfit" being a verb ...

14a   Tent top’s tips pronounced (6)

16a   French resort’s about couple showing fine points (8)

... and "couple" also being a verb.

Nice^[5] is a resort city on the French Riviera, near the border with Italy; population 348,721 (2007).

18a   Place of record concerning soldiers shot (8)

A GI^[5] is a private soldier in the US army ⇒ she went off with a GI during the war. Contrary to popular belief, the term apparently is not an abbreviation for general infantryman, but rather of government (or general) issue (originally denoting equipment supplied to US forces).

20a   Astonished expression following a river’s highest point (6)

The Po^[7] is a river that arises in the Cottian Alps and flows eastward across northern Italy entering the Adriatic Sea through a delta near Venice.

23a   Trouble about gangs getting rudely obnoxious initially (5)

Aggro^[5] is British slang for (1) aggressive, violent behaviour ⇒ they do not usually become involved in aggro or (2) problems and difficulties ⇒ he didn’t have to deal with aggro from the desk clerk.

24a   Small and weak admitting run’s gruelling (9)

On cricket scorecards, the abbreviation R^[5] denotes run(s).

26a   Runaway daughter in end is all upset (9)

27a   Crammed for school, say (5)

Cram^[2] is used in the sense of to gorge oneself with food. 

28a   Time taken by ferryman, strangely, accepting silver in pieces (11)

Down

2d   Hamlet is in bits (5)

Hamlet is the title character in The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark^[7], a tragedy written by English playwright William Shakespeare (1564-1616) between 1599 and 1602.

3d   Warne ran sneakily up holding catch (7)

I suspect that the clue might allude to Shane Warne^[7], an Australian former international cricketer widely regarded as one of the greatest bowlers in the history of the game. On the other hand, the reference could be to retired English professional footballer [soccer player] Paul Warne^[7] — although he certainly would have had to have been exceedingly sneaky to get away with running holding a caught ball!

4d   Party leader in charge of endlessly pleasant outing (6)

The abbreviation i/c^[5] (especially in military contexts) is short for in charge of ⇒ the Quartermaster General is i/c rations.

5d   Take your time over ends of intimate frillies (8)

6d   Redeemed, a Cantabrigian embracing return of university life (7)

A Cantabrigian^[5] is a member of Cambridge University.

7d   Untroubled compiler’s cheeky ‘Blue bra undone’ (13)

It is a common cryptic crossword convention for the creator of the puzzle to use terms such as compiler, setter, (this) author, (this) writer, or this person to refer to himself or herself. To solve such a clue, one must generally substitute a first person pronoun (I or me) for whichever of these terms has been used in the clue. Today, the setter has made the scenario slightly more complicated by combining "compiler" with the verb "to be" producing "compiler's" (compiler is) which must be replaced by "I'm" (I am).

8d   Solid finale with ‘Posh’ leading group (8)

The clue may be a reference to Victoria Beckham^[7] (née Adams), a member of the the all-female 90s pop group Spice Girls, who was dubbed Posh Spice by the British pop music magazine Top of the Pops.

In Britain, U^[5] is used informally as an adjective (in respect to language or social behaviour) meaning characteristic of or appropriate to the upper social classes ⇒ U manners. The term, an abbreviation of  upper class, was coined in 1954 by Alan S. C. Ross, professor of linguistics, and popularized by its use in Nancy Mitford's Noblesse Oblige (1956). In Crosswordland, it is frequently clued by words denoting the upper class such as posh or superior.

9d   Vital to keep body attractive (13)

Historically, in the US, a posse^[5] was a body of men summoned by a sheriff to enforce the law.

Historically, in Britain, the posse^[5] (also posse comitatus) was the body of men above the age of fifteen in a county (excluding peers, the clergy, or the infirm), whom the sheriff could summon to repress a riot or for other purposes.

15d   Taking part and winning (8)

17d   Becoming corroded under carbon coating (8)

The symbol for the chemical element carbon is C^[5].

19d   Sopranos unfortunately lacking a godfather (7)

The Sopranos^[7] is an American television series revolving around the fictional New Jersey-based Italian-American mobster Tony Soprano.

21d   Sarcastic chap supports double entendre (7)

22d   Reportedly budding author (6)

Graham Greene^[5] (1904–1991) was an English novelist. The moral paradoxes he saw in his Roman Catholic faith underlie much of his work. Notable works: Brighton Rock (1938), The Power and the Glory (1940), and The Third Man (written as a screenplay, and filmed in 1949; novel 1950).

25d   Fur possibly extravagant crowning Queen (5)

OTT^[5] is British slang for over the top ⇒ presenting him as a goalscoring Superman seems a bit OTT.

The regnal ciphers (monograms) of British monarchs are initials formed from the Latin version of their first name followed by either Rex or Regina (Latin for king or queen, respectively). Thus, the regnal cipher of Queen Elizabeth is ER^[5] — from the Latin Elizabetha Regina.

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)
^[11] - TheFreeDictionary.com (Random House Kernerman Webster's College Dictionary)

Signing off for today — Falcon