Friday, November 28, 2014 — DT 27530

Puzzle at a Glance

Puzzle Number in The Daily Telegraph DT 27530
Publication Date in The Daily Telegraph Tuesday, July 1, 2014
Setter Unknown
Link to Full Review Big Dave's Crossword Blog [DT 27530]
Big Dave's Crossword Blog Review Written By Gazza
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

There was not much to hold one up in this puzzle. However, I did fail to comprehend one of the definitions in 16d — despite having watched a fair amount of wrestling growing up. As I recall, the wrestlers in those days bore no resemblance whatsoever to those pictured by Gazza in his review.

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. Explicit link words and phrases are enclosed in forward slashes (/link/) and implicit links are shown as double forward slashes (//).

Across

1a   Flipping calculation! I almost shout /for/ Annie, perhaps (7)

Annie^[7] is a Broadway musical based upon the popular comic strip Little Orphan Annie created by American cartoonist Harold Gray (1894–1968). The original Broadway production, which opened in 1977, ran for nearly six years and won the Tony Award for Best Musical.

5a   Silenced outside entrance to prison after one /is/ charged (7)

9a   Wedding // ring (5)

In his review, Gazza comments "The second definition is a bit tenuous unless I’ve missed something." I could find no source showing ring^{[Chambers Thesaurus]} and union^{[Chambers Thesaurus]} as being synonymous but they do have the following synonyms in common: alliance, association, club, and league.

10a   Tow mayor's wheels /on/ these roads? (9)

Motorway^[5] is a British term for a dual-carriageway road [divided highway] designed for fast traffic, with relatively few places for joining or leaving [controlled access].

11a   Reference book/'s/ style half-dreary (10)

Diction^[5] is the style of enunciation in speaking or singing ⇒ she began imitating his careful diction.

12a   Crew erratically anchored // vessel (4)

If we thought we had a tenuous definition at 9a, we appear to have an even more tenuous hidden word indicator here. My best guess is that anchor^[5] is being used in the sense of to provide with a firm basis or foundation ⇒ it is important that policy be anchored to some acceptable theoretical basis.

14a   Degrees of warmth // are returning in half-cut tree stump (12)

Half-cut^[5] is an informal British term meaning drunk. However, despite being characterised as British, it is a term that is commonly used in at least some parts of Canada.

18a   Almost buy in remorse // something to be given (12)

21a   Shouted, 'Go away, // you put your foot in it!' (4)

22a   Excited, pa's despair // fades away (10)

25a   Possession // wins her top novel -- not Byatt's last (9)

Dame A. S. Byatt^[5] is an English novelist and literary critic; born Antonia Susan Byatt. Notable novels: The Virgin in the Garden (1978) and Possession (1990, Booker Prize).

26a   Bird // dog with no lead (5)

27a   'Dandy' editor // got fatter (7)

Swell^[5] is dated slang for a fashionable or stylish person of wealth or high social position ⇒ a crowd of city swells.

In the surface reading, The Dandy was a long-running children's comic published in the United Kingdom from 1937 to 2012, at which time The Dandy relaunched as an online comic, The Digital Dandy. The digital relaunch was not successful and the comic ended just six months later.

28a   Spain allowed to capture soldiers, /creating/ suspicion (7)

The International Vehicle Registration (IVR) code for Spain is E^[5] [from Spanish España].

Suspicion^[5] means a very slight trace ⇒ a suspicion of a smile.

Element^[5] means a small but significant amount of a feeling or quality ⇒ it was the element of danger he loved in flying.

Down

1d   My loud mobile /could be/ going off (6)

2d   Sorceress is after small // wand (6)

3d   Measure // recent time changes (10)

4d   Fruit // turns up in an omelette (5)

5d   Read // Pinter beginning to end -- starts to realise everything's threatening (9)

Harold Pinter^[5] (1930–2008) was an English dramatist, actor, and director. His plays are associated with the Theatre of the Absurd and are typically marked by a sense of menace. Notable plays: The Birthday Party (1958), The Caretaker (1960), and Party Time (1991). Nobel Prize for Literature (2005).

6d   Almost do // role in a play (4)

Knees-up^[5] [used by Gazza in his review]  is British slang for a lively party or gathering ⇒ we had a bit of a knees-up last night.

7d   Sounds like rain -- calling /for/ co-operation (8)

8d   Vicious, punk rocker, pulled up hair, /creating/ anguish (8)

Sid Vicious^[5], born John Simon Ritchie, later named John Beverley (1957–1979), was an English bass guitarist and vocalist, most famous as a member of the influential English punk group the Sex Pistols.

During the brief and chaotic ascendancy of the Sex Pistols, Vicious met eventual girlfriend and manager Nancy Spungen. Spungen and Vicious entered a destructive codependent relationship based on drug use. This culminated in Spungen's death from an apparent stab wound, while staying in the Hotel Chelsea, Manhattan, with Vicious. Under suspicion of having committed Spungen's murder, Vicious was arrested and released on bail; he was later arrested again for assaulting Todd Smith, brother of American singer-songwriter Patti Smith (the "Godmother of Punk"), at a night club, and underwent drug rehabilitation on Rikers Island. In celebration of Vicious' release from prison, his mother hosted a party for him (at his girlfriend's residence in Greenwich Village). Vicious' mother had been supplying him with drugs and paraphernalia since he was young, and assisted him in procuring heroin late that night. Vicious died in his sleep, age 22, having overdosed on the heroin his mother had procured.

13d   Feeling // it's all around us (10)

15d   Local is held wrongly, /and/ released (9)

In Britain, a local^[7] is a pub convenient to a person’s home ⇒ a pint in the local.

16d   Cutters // hold in ring (8)

I totally failed to pick up on the wrestling connection in the second definition.

17d   Report // woman with wild cat (8)

Ounce^[5] is another term for snow leopard.

19d   Time to suppress point of view /causing/ confusion (6)

20d   Look /from/ a page in party (6)

23d   Fruit // very softly dropped into alcoholic drink (5)

Pianissimo (abbreviation pp)^[5] is a direction used in music to mean either (as an adjective) very soft or very quiet or (as an adverb) very softly or very quietly.

24d   Test // on a regular basis -- not really (4)

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