Friday, July 25, 2014 — DT 27436

Puzzle at a Glance

Puzzle Number in The Daily Telegraph DT 27436
Publication Date in The Daily Telegraph Thursday, March 13, 2014
Setter Shamus (Philip Marlow)
Link to Full Review Big Dave's Crossword Blog [DT 27436]
Big Dave's Crossword Blog Review Written By archy and mehitabel
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

During the first solving session, I completed that northwest and southeast quadrants. The remaining quadrants fell during the second session.

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.

Primary indications (definitions) are marked with a solid underline in the clue; subsidiary indications (be they wordplay or other) are marked with a dashed underline in all-in-one (& lit.) clues, semi-all-in-one (semi-& lit.) clues and cryptic definitions.

Across

1a   Memorial to encapsulate drinking venue in Ireland, say (8)

5a   Message given after departure cancelled? A swindle (3-3)

10a   Unconventional place to go at this medical institution (7,8)

Cottage hospital^[5] is a British term for a small hospital in a country area.

11a   Tinker adjusted front of tatty small ornament (7)

12a   Comfort achieved in Switzerland with soup on reflection (5,2)

The International Vehicle Registration (IVR) code for Switzerland is CH^[5] [from French Confédération Helvétique 'Swiss Confederation'].

13a   French city largely developed by titled figure (8)

Developed is used in the sense of became larger.

Grenoble^[7] is a city in southeastern France, at the foot of the French Alps where the river Drac joins the Isère. It was the site of the 1968 Winter Olympic Games.

15a   In which one might see hairdressers alone? On the contrary (5)

This is a bit of a tricky clue. I would say that one might think of it as a variant of a semi-all-in-one clue. If you recall, in a semi-all-in-one clue, the entire clue usually forms the definition while a portion of the clue serves as the wordplay. Here the setter has turned the tables (in more ways than one) by letting the entire clue be the wordplay while only a portion of it forms the definition.

The solution is SALON, a place where one might see hairdressers alone (if business were slow). The phrase "on the contrary" in the wordplay tells us that we must invert the sense of the preceding statement, making it read "Which one might see in hairdresserS ALONe".

18a   English people objectively missing at end distinctive character (5)

I don't understand why THOSE should be "people objectively" any more than "people subjectively". Grammatically speaking, the pronoun "those" can surely be used either as an object or a subject.

20a   Writer in work left a note describing modern offices? (4-4)

23a   Severe figure when with football team league’s dropped (7)

Celtic Football Club^[7] is a football [soccer] club in Glasgow, Scotland which plays in the Scottish Premiership. The Scottish Premiership^[7] is the top division of the Scottish Professional Football League, the league competition for professional football clubs in Scotland.

25a   Legal officer concerned with the military we hear (7)

26a   Tradesmen potter about in large retail site (10,5)

Potter^[3,4,11] (the chiefly British counterpart to the North American term putter) means to move with little energy or direction ⇒ to potter about town.

27a   Watford player, one with a buzz? (6)

This was not difficult — once I had the checking letters and remembered that bees are not the only insects that buzz.

Watford Football Club^[7] is an English professional football [soccer] club based in Hertfordshire, England that is nicknamed the Hornets. Watford competes in the Football League Championship – the second highest level of English football.

28a   Miserable place around North Elizabeth’s found showing huge determination (4-4)

I thought that North Elizabeth might be a community in the UK, but that does not seem to be the case. Aside from a "lightly used" transit station in Elizabeth, New Jersey, North Elizabeth^[7] seems to exist only in Crosswordland.

Bet is a shortened form of Betty^[7], a common diminutive for the name Elizabeth.

The clue parses as HELL (miserable place) + {BET ([diminutive for] Elizabeth containing N (north)}.

As is often the case, one must read some implicit punctuation into the wordplay, making it "around North, Elizabeth is found".

Down

1d   Repeat aloud name supporting engineers (6)

The Corps of Royal Engineers^[7], usually just called the Royal Engineers (abbreviation RE), and commonly known as the Sappers^[7], is a corps of the British Army that provides military engineering and other technical support to the British Armed Forces.

2d   Irishman and Arab entertained by wealthy venerable figure (9)

Most of the Irishmen whom one encounter's in Crosswordland seem to be named Pat.

Collins English Dictionary shows Ar.^[10] as being the abbreviation for Arabia, Arabian, and Arabic. The Chambers Dictionary adds Arab to this list^[1].

3d   Banker abroad taking in cold hillside feature? (7)

4d   Stupid piece of abject penitence brought up (5)

6d   Grab young offender on ship (7)

"On" is used in the sense of "on the subject of".

In Crosswordland, you will find that a ship is almost invariably a steamship, the abbreviation for which is SS^[10].

7d   Aquatic creature is more animated? Not initially (5)

The phrase "more animated" is likely intended to clue HOTTER, where hot^[5] might be used in the sense of involving much activity, debate, or interest ⇒ the environment has become a very hot issue.

8d   Asian type of pastry I secure inside (8)

Filo^[5] (also phyllo) is a kind of dough that can be stretched into very thin sheets, used in layers to make both sweet and savoury pastries, especially in eastern Mediterranean cookery.

9d   Solid Tory found on island (8)

A Tory^[4] is a member or supporter of the Conservative Party in Great Britain [or Canada]. Historically, a Tory was a member of the English political party that opposed the exclusion of James, Duke of York from the royal succession (1679-80). Tory remained the label for subsequent major conservative interests until they gave birth to the Conservative Party in the 1830s.

The abbreviation for Conservative may be either C. or Con.

Crete^[5] is a Greek island in the eastern Mediterranean; population 630,000 (est. 2009); capital, Heraklion. It is noted for the remains of the Minoan civilization which flourished there in the 2nd millennium BC. It fell to Rome in 67 BC and was subsequently ruled by Byzantines, Venetians, and Turks. Crete played an important role in the Greek struggle for independence from the Turks in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, becoming administratively part of an independent Greece in 1913.

14d   Car’s back by river overlooking quiet military establishment (4,4)

Boot^[5] is the British term for the trunk^[5] of a car.

The Cam^[10] is a river in eastern England, in Cambridgeshire, flowing through Cambridge to the Great Ouse (river). Length: about 64 km (40 miles).

Piano^[3,5] (abbreviation p^[5]), is a musical direction meaning either (as an adjective) soft or quiet or (as an adverb) softly or quietly.

16d   Hateful motel has collapsed with nothing in it (9)

17d   Woman shaking hand in roofed terrace (8)

19d   Release second film without a charge (3,4)

E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial^[7] (often referred to simply as E.T.) is a 1982 American science fiction film co-produced and directed by Steven Spielberg. It tells the story of a lonely boy who befriends an extraterrestrial, dubbed "E.T.", who is stranded on Earth. He and his siblings help the extraterrestrial return home while attempting to keep it hidden from their mother and the government.

21d   Study country with society above a lake (7)

22d   Patron having small change (about pound I detected) (6)

In the cryptic analysis, I suspect that we are expected to interpret "having ... detected" as a "split link phrase" (analogous to a "split infinitive"). The clue could be rephrased to express this idea more clearly — however, at the expense of destroying the surface reading.

• 22d   Patron having detected small change (about pound I) (6)

A cent^[5] is a monetary unit in various countries, equal to one hundredth of a dollar, euro, or other decimal currency unit. However, in Britain — despite having adopted a decimal currency — one hundredth of a pound is known as a penny (plural pence) rather than a cent.

Collins English Dictionary circumvents this complication by exhaustively defining cent^[10] as a monetary unit of American Samoa, Andorra, Antigua and Barbuda, Aruba, Australia, Austria, the Bahamas, Barbados, Belgium, Belize, Bermuda, Bosnia-Hercegovina, Brunei, Canada, the Cayman Islands, Cyprus, Dominica, East Timor, Ecuador, El Salvador, Ethiopia, Fiji, Finland, France, French Guiana, Germany, Greece, Grenada, Guadeloupe, Guam, Guyana, Hong Kong, Ireland, Italy, Jamaica, Kenya, Kiribati, Kosovo, Liberia, Luxembourg, Malaysia, Malta, the Marshall Islands, Martinique, Mauritius, Mayotte, Micronesia, Monaco, Montenegro, Namibia, Nauru, the Netherlands, the Netherlands Antilles, New Zealand, the Northern Mariana Islands, Palau, Portugal, Puerto Rico, Réunion, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, San Marino, the Seychelles, Sierra Leone, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, the Solomon Islands, Somalia, South Africa, Spain, Sri Lanka, Surinam, Swaziland, Taiwan, Tanzania, Trinidad and Tobago, Tuvalu, Uganda, the United States, the Vatican City, the Virgin Islands, and Zimbabwe. It is worth one hundredth of their respective standard units.

The pound^[5] (also pound sterling) is the basic monetary unit of the UK, equal to 100 pence. While the symbol for pound is £, it is often written as L^[10].

24d   Prank produced by person in temporary site miles away (5)

25d   Cut rodents besetting bottom of garden (5)

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