Tuesday, November 4, 2014 — DT 27512

Puzzle at a Glance

Puzzle Number in The Daily Telegraph DT 27512
Publication Date in The Daily Telegraph Tuesday, June 10, 2014
Setter Unknown
Link to Full Review Big Dave's Crossword Blog [DT 27512]
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 is not much about this puzzle to cause one to work up a sweat — aside from trying to sort out the spelling of the Wagner opera.

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   Sparks flying across centre in Montgenevre, before one // social event there? (5-3)

Montgenèvre^[7], a commune of the Hautes-Alpes department in southeastern France, is a ski resort located in in the French Cottian Alps on the Franco-Italian border.

5a   Notice only // change (6)

9a   Yellow // invertebrate? (9)

11a   Composer: // he wrote nonsense about Hungary's capital (5)

Edward Lear^[5] (1812–88) was an English humorist and illustrator. He wrote A Book of Nonsense (1845) and Laughable Lyrics (1877). He also published illustrations of birds and of his travels around the Mediterranean.

Franz Lehár^[5] (1870–1948) was a Hungarian composer. He is chiefly known for his operettas, of which the most famous is The Merry Widow (1905).

12a   Bad // storm around northern end of Quebec (6)

13a   Healing ointment said /to come from/ a royal residence (8)

Balmoral Castle^[5] is a holiday residence of the British royal family, on the River Dee in Scotland.

15a   English inside eat hot scones prepared /as/ a snack (6,2,5)

18a   Threaten // to turn up with broken nose and choppers (4,4,5)

22a   One may help you along the way (8)

23a   Caught, sadly, bringing in illegal, originally /from/ ferry port (6)

On cricket scorecards, the abbreviation c^[5] denotes caught (by).

 Calais^[5] is a ferry port in northern France; population 75,790 (2006). Captured by Edward III in 1347 after a long siege, it remained an English possession until it was retaken by the French in 1558.

26a   Join // one by end of esplanade (5)

27a   Wagner opera // long confused with Rhine (9)

Richard Wagner^[5] (1813–1883) was a German composer who developed an operatic genre which he called music drama, synthesizing music, drama, verse, legend, and spectacle. Notable works: The Flying Dutchman (opera, 1841), Der Ring des Nibelungen (a cycle of four operas, 1847–74), Tristan and Isolde (music drama, 1859), and the Siegfried Idyll (1870).

Lohengrin^[5] is a Romantic opera in three acts composed and written by Richard Wagner, first performed in 1850.

The Rhine^[5] is a river in western Europe which rises in the Swiss Alps and flows for 1,320 km (820 miles) to the North Sea. It forms the border between Germany and Switzerland in the south, then Germany and France, before flowing north through Germany and westwards through the Netherlands to empty into the North Sea near Rotterdam.

28a   Synopsis // to think over (6)

29a   Budding // team up in hospital unit (8)

In my experience, the busiest section — by far — of the Crosswordland Hospital is the ear, nose and throat (ENT^[2]) department.

Down

1d   Summary // difficult to understand (8)

2d   Rule, /then/ abdicate, not having son (5)

Then^[5], as a link word, might be used in the sense of also or in addition ⇒ I’m paid a generous salary, and then there’s the money I’ve made at the races.

3d   Description of a design that is second // class (7)

The setter uses species and class in a general sense with species^[5] meaning simply a kind or sort ⇒ a species of invective at once tough and suave.

As Gazza points out in his review, "In non-scientific terms [species] and class may be synonyms but in the hierarchy of biological classification the two are quite distinct."

There are seven main taxonomic ranks^[7] defined by the international nomenclature codes for biological classification: kingdom, phylum/division, class, order, family, genus, species.

In biology, a species^[5] (plural same; abbreviation sp. [singular], spp. [plural]) is a group of living organisms consisting of similar individuals capable of exchanging genes or interbreeding. The species is the principal natural taxonomic unit, ranking below a genus and denoted by a Latin binomial, e.g. Homo sapiens.

In biology, a class^[5] is a principal taxonomic grouping that ranks above order and below phylum or division, such as Mammalia or Insecta.

4d   Hold // the fort? (4)

A keep^[5] is the strongest or central tower of a castle, acting as a final refuge.

6d   Cover that's turned up on Austen novel /causes/ a quandary (7)

Jane Austen^[5] (1775–1817) was an English novelist. Her major novels are Sense and Sensibility (1811), Pride and Prejudice (1813), Mansfield Park (1814), Emma (1815), Northanger Abbey (1818), and Persuasion (1818). They are notable for skilful characterization, dry wit, and penetrating social observation.

7d   Cinema worker /is/ lax he utters -- energy needs to be conserved (9)

8d   Reptile // to go off, briefly let out (6)

10d   Jumped across opening in lane /and/ caused a surprise (8)

14d   Great // local's so in need of renovation (8)

16d   Relaxed, /getting/ simple summons to meal about lunchtime? (4-5)

I find that the denizens of Crosswordland prefer a rather late lunch — at least by my standards.

17d   The sort of stale joke that might get a roasting! (8)

19d   Her opus excited // entrancing poet (7)

In Greek mythology, Orpheus^[5] was a poet who could entrance wild beasts with the beauty of his singing and lyre playing. He went to the underworld after the death of his wife Eurydice and secured her release from the dead, but lost her because he failed to obey the condition that he must not look back at her until they had reached the world of the living.

20d   Rough terrain /for/ a coach (7)

21d   Published, /and/ gets prosecuted? (6)

24d   A nearly new // suit (5)

25d   First to sell meat // paste? (4)

Paste^[5] is a hard vitreous composition used in making imitation gems ⇒ paste brooches.

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