Monday, August 18, 2014 — DT 27447 (Bonus Puzzle)

Prologue

For those who are suffering from CCWS (Cryptic Crossword Withdrawal Syndrome), I present your Monday fix — namely, the puzzle that the National Post skipped one week ago.

During July and August, the National Post does not publish an edition on Monday. In years past, a Monday Diversions page has sometimes been printed in either a preceding or subsequent edition of the paper. However, that practice appears to have been discontinued. In order to afford readers the opportunity to tackle the puzzles that the National Post has skipped, throughout the summer I will be posting (with a one week delay) the puzzles that would normally have appeared on Monday.

Enjoy solving the puzzle. The review follows.

Review

Puzzle at a Glance

Puzzle Number in The Daily Telegraph DT 27447
Publication Date in The Daily Telegraph Wednesday, March 26, 2014
Setter Jay (Jeremy Mutch)
Link to Full Review Big Dave's Crossword Blog [DT 27447]
Big Dave's Crossword Blog Review Written By scchua
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
Notes
The National Post skipped this puzzle which — under its regular publication schedule — would have appeared on Monday, August 11, 2014.

Introduction

This is an enjoyable offering from Jay. However, there is a tricky bit of wordplay in 9a.

I invite you to leave a comment to let us know how you fared with the puzzle.

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   A lot of covering left spread on garden? (5)

In the definition, "spread" is used as an noun. The definition could be interpreted as "spread [that might be found] on garden".

4a   Being arrogant, I'm up to changing in public transport (9)

9a   What makes unusual plot visible? (9)

I confess that I failed to sort out the wordplay in this clue and relied on scchua's explanation.

I would say that this is an &lit. (all-in-one) clue. The entire clue constitutes the definition; a SPOTLIGHT would make an unusual plot — or, for that matter, virtually anything else — visible. The entire clue also serves as the wordplay. However, it is a rather devious bit of wordplay in that we have to replace "visible" with its synonym "in sight" where "in" serves as a containment indicator and "sight" as the container. The clue then can be deciphered as 'what makes an anagram (unusual) of PLOT contained in (in) SIGHT'.

10a   Wild tree -- a sort of apple (5)

Eater^[5] is an informal British term for an eating apple.

11a   Nouveau riche's leading way with skill (7)

12a   A place for thinking about deal (7)

13a   Heartily ate a macho dish (6)

"Heartily ate" signifies the heart (middle letter) of the word 'aTe'.

A tamale^[5] is a Mexican dish of seasoned meat and maize [corn] flour steamed or baked in maize husks.

15a   Charge for spice is steep (8)

Another way of expressing "charge for spice" would be 'spice charge'. From this, we get MACE (spice) + RATE (charge).

18a   Mix-up in rush for planes (8)

20a   Dispatch a letter reserving holiday accommodation (6)

23a   Time trains breaking down and pass through (7)

24a   Counsellor's face-saver after a dodgy start (7)

26a   Feature leader of African country (5)

27a   Unusual amount wasted for a spare part? (3,3,3)

My initial attempt at explaining this clue differed markedly from that of scchua. This prompted me to undertake some further research following which I concluded that the setter is likely using the first definition from The Chambers Dictionary which defines odd man out^[1] (or odd one out) as (1) a person who is left out when numbers are made up [e.g., teams being chosen from a pool of potential players] or (2) a person who, whether through personal inclination or rejection by others, gets set apart from the group to which he or she belongs, because of e.g. a difference interests, behaviour, etc.

I had initially started with the definition found at Oxford Dictionaries Online which defines odd one (or man) out^[5] as a person or thing differing from all other members of a particular group or set in some way ⇒ I hate being the odd one out among friends who are all couples. As the usage example illustrates, this expression may sometimes be applied to a situation of a lone, unaccompanied person in the presence of one or more couples.

Working from this basis, I thought perhaps "spare part" might be a British expression equivalent to the North American term fifth wheel^[5], meaning a superfluous person or thing. However, I was unable to find this specific term in any British dictionary. I did find the rather crude British expression spare prick at a wedding meaning a useless or unwanted person (usually heard in the expression 'like a spare prick at a wedding'). I surmised that the setter might have used the term "spare part" as a polite allusion to what the Brits would term a "naughty bit".

28a   Firm dates fixed before Lent, perhaps (9)

This puzzle would have appeared in the UK during Lent which likely explains the recent spate of references to Lent in the puzzles.

In the Christian Church, Lent^[5] is the period preceding Easter, which is devoted to fasting, abstinence, and penitence in commemoration of Christ’s fasting in the wilderness. In the Western Church [with the exception of the Roman Catholic Church^[7]] it runs from Ash Wednesday to Holy Saturday, and so includes forty weekdays [excluding the six Sundays that fall during this period].

29a   Promises nothing and trails, having lost leader (5)

Down

1d   Unfinished place of prayer -- it's full of love, and flies (9)

As scchua points out in his review, most people would differentiate between flies and mosquitos. However, Oxford Dictionaries Online defines mosquito^[5] as a slender long-legged fly with aquatic larvae. Oxford does, however, specify that the plural is mosquitoes although Chambers 21st Century Dictionary^[2] and Collins English Dictionary^[10] both also allow mosquitos.

In tennis, squash, and some other sports, love^[5] is a score of zero or nil ⇒ love fifteen. The resemblance of a zero written as a numeral (0) to the letter O leads to the cryptic crossword convention of the word "love" being used to clue this letter.

2d   Ladies perhaps note curls (5)

In Britain, the Ladies^[5] is another name for a women’s public toilet. Loo^[5] is an informal British term for a toilet.

3d   Receptacle for antique found in lobby (7)

Holdall^[5] is a British term for a large rectangular bag with handles and a shoulder strap, used for carrying clothes and other personal belongings [possibly similar to a North American carryall^[5]].

4d   Important books on southern fanatics (6)

In Crosswordland, the word "books" is often used to clue either the Old Testament (OT) or the New Testament (NT). As is often case, the clue does not specify whether the reference is to the former or the latter.

5d   Relevant stuff (8)

6d   Discovered in Goethe a treasure house (7)

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe^[5] (1749–1832) was a German poet, dramatist, and scholar. Involved at first with the Sturm und Drang movement, Goethe changed to a more measured and classical style, as in the ‘Wilhelm Meister’ novels (1796–1829). Notable dramas: Götz von Berlichingen (1773), Tasso (1790), and Faust (1808–32).

7d   Immediately working, and consequently suffer (2,3,4)

The phrase on the nail^[10] means (with respect to payments) at once (especially in the phrase pay on the nail).

8d   Fish quietly netted by sailors turning up (5)

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.

The sprat^[3,4]is a small marine food fish, Clupea sprattus, of the northeast Atlantic Ocean and North Sea that is eaten fresh or smoked and is often canned in oil as a sardine; also called brisling.

14d   Spread Madge mostly eats at home (9)

Madge^[7] is a female given name, a short form of Madeline (itself an anglicised version of 'Magdalene'), Marjorie, and Margaret.

16d   Register it with one's gut reaction (9)

17d   The polar orbits creating abundance (8)

19d   Leading actor in the mire might not cut it! (7)

In his review, scchua indicates that the definition is merely the word "it". While the pronoun "it" does represent the solution in the clue, I don't think that it can be considered to be the definition [try solving the clue on the basis of the word "it" alone]. Therefore, I have chosen to classify this as a semi-&lit. clue.

21d   Try bear -- once! (4,1,2)

22d   Criminal ring riots regularly (6)

"Regularly" indicates that a regular sequence of letters is required. As is the case today, this usually means every second letter — although I recall at least one occasion where the required sequence was every third letter. As is customarily the situation, the setter does not specify whether we need the odd sequence or the even sequence — which we must figure out by trial and error.

23d   Fixes duty for the audience (5)

The definition "fixes" is used in the sense of affixes.

25d   Police informer exposed after vacating salon (5)

Snout^[5] is an informal British term for a police informer ⇒ his arrest had been the work of some anonymous snout.

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