The Monthly Digest

There are usually one or two points of interest in an Azed puzzle, and here we pick them out for comment. Please feel free to add your own questions or observations on any aspect of the puzzle (including clues not listed below) either by using the comment form at the bottom of the page or, if would prefer that your question/comment is not publicly visible, by email.

Azed 2,685 Plain

Difficulty rating: (3.5 / 5)

Definitely one towards the upper end of the difficulty scale, with some nice clues as well as a wordplay or two which stretched the English language to its limits.

Setters’ Corner: This week I’m going to look at clue 22d, “Grass, coarse and long (not on) Titchmarsh cuts? (6)”. The wordplay has LONG without the letters ON (‘not on’) containing ALAN, indicated by ‘Titchmarsh’. But is ‘Titchmarsh’ not a definition by example, which would normally be indicated as such, eg ‘Johnson, perhaps’ or ‘Johnson?’ for BORIS? One argument would be that the question mark at the end of the clue ‘belongs’ to ‘Titchmarsh’ and should be mentally attached to it by solvers. I’m not convinced by this – if the question mark qualifies anything, it must surely be ‘cuts’; were we to accept this concept, tacking a question mark on the end of any clue would justify a DBE, no matter where the defining word(s) appeared. However, the rationale behind a DBE using a surname or forename to indicate the other half of the combination is that (thankfully) not all Johnsons, for instance, are BORIS, but what about Titchmarshes? How many really famous people are called Titchmarsh. Well, yes, none. How many quite well-known people have that name? I can think of just the sole example, so while it is still technically a DBE, the required name must in practice be selected from a list of one, and I have no problem with the clue at all.

Across

1a Missing the cooler theatre garb (6)
There really ought to be a comma here between ‘the’ and ‘cooler’, because what the wordplay is telling us is that the two-word nickname of a specific prison (ie ‘cooler’) in London must be deprived of its first word, namely ‘The’.

11a A workshop plant, showy: it has ornamental use (9)
A 1+3+5 charade of A (from the clue), a familiar contraction of the term applied to the sort of workshop used by scientists, and a plant, some forms of which are commonly called Michaelmas daisies.

15a Once smitten, is briefly captivated about Romeo (6)
A shortened (about as short as it could get without disappearing completely) version of ‘is’ (‘is briefly’) and a four-letter word meaning ‘captivated’ (in this sense typically seen in the five-letter passive form, eg ‘I was much ????? by it’) are put around the letter represented in the NATO phonetic alphabet by ‘Romeo’. The solution is an obsolete (hence the ‘once’) past participle of a familiar word which is accurately defined by ‘smite’ in the sense of ‘whack’.

27a Amateur non-professional clubs accepted, such as Horace often (6)
The usual single-letter abbreviation for ‘amateur’ is followed by a four-letter word for ‘non-professional’ (or ‘not belonging to the clergy’) into which the standard abbreviation for ‘clubs’ has been inserted (ie ‘clubs accepted’). I think that it is perhaps Horace’s verses to which this term could often be applied, rather than Horace himself.

29a Foreign vehicle making sign when reversing about parking (4)
One of the signs of the Zodiac is reversed around the usual abbreviation for ‘parking’, producing the name of a German car manufacturer. After starting out by making sewing machines, the company produced its first car in 1899, and from 1929 to 2017 was owned by General Motors. For a numbers of years the models of these cars were almost identical to the Vauxhall versions sold in the UK, so one incarnation of the Kadett bore a striking similarity to the Vauxhall Chevette. I have a feeling that my I-SPY book of cars included the Kadett, although it didn’t score many points; I particularly remember two cars from the book which I never spotted during journeys with my parents – the top-tariff Jensen Interceptor, and the DAF Daffodil, which I don’t think to this day I’ve ever knowingly seen ‘in the actual’. 

30a One of oracular pair having half of us on edge (4)
Half of the word US is followed by a three-letter word for an edge, giving a solution that, after last week’s MARAH, takes us back into OT territory. The word, sometimes taken to mean ‘lights’, is invariably found in collocation with thummim (the plural of the Hebrew word for integrity) and used to describe certain objects, the nature of which is not known, worn in or upon the ‘breast-plate’ of the Jewish high-priest, by means of which the will of Jehovah was held to be declared. Their names have in the past been used figuratively, as in WB Robertson’s Dream of the Foolish Virgin (1898):

And stars repeat it‥, The ???? and the Thummim on the breastplate of the night.

32a Target of pussyfoot, using more than half vigour in pursuit of society cupbearer (9)
‘Pussyfoot’ was the name given to American prohibitionist WE Johnson, and his ‘target’ is produced by putting the first four letters of a six-letter word for ‘vigour’ (‘more than half vigour’) after the standard one-letter abbreviation for ‘society’ and the name of the Olympian cupbearer (also a genus of shrubs). Early in his career, Johnson joined the temperance forces and sneakily posed as a brewer of “Johnson’s Pale Ale”, writing to ‘wets’ and asking them how best to defeat prohibition. He received lengthy incriminating replies which he then published. In 1906,  President Roosevelt appointed him special officer in the Indian Service to enforce the law in Oklahoma. Using a hand-picked group of deputies to aid him in stopping the liquor traffic, on one occasion he dumped 25,000 bottles of liquor into the Arkansas River (to the delight of its newt population). His success earned him dangerous enemies among gangs of rum-runners and 7downs. Despite attempts being made on his life and some of his deputies being killed, his crusade continued, with the president extending his remit to all the Indian territories. Having thus added a whole new bunch of barbarous enemies to the ones he already had, Johnson took to conducting his work at night in a very stealthy manner, and was said to ‘pussyfoot’ around under cover of darkness. He subsequently worked for the Anti-Saloon League and the World League Against Alcoholism before eventually retiring in 1930.

33a This crate with lid we’ll get adapted for older wines (5)
A composite anagram, where the letters of the solution (‘this crate’) plus LID WE can be rearranged (‘adapted’) to produce OLDER WINES.

Down

1d In due course composer skewered tasty dish (7)
A two-letter word meaning ‘in due course’ is followed by the surname of the French modernist composer (and author) Erik who influenced the likes of Debussy and Ravel.

2d Fellow taking the waters abroad in local headgear? (8)
A four-letter fellow and the word for ‘waters’ associated with a particular European country make up the word for certain items of headgear in that same country, ie ‘local headgear’. 

4d One involved in unsubtle end suffering relentless force (12, 3 words)
The Roman numeral representing ‘one’ is contained by an anagram (‘suffering’) of UNSUBTLE END, the result being the (4,3,5) name given to the speech made by Otto von Bismarck in September 1862 about the unification of the German territories, after which he became known as the ‘Man of Blood and Iron’.

5d Helmet like this at Bannockburn, say, protects youth (6)
The Scots (‘at Bannockburn, say’) form of a familiar word meaning ‘like this’ (seen in its usual guise at 1d and 25d) contains (‘protects’) a three-letter word for a youth.

6d Bird revered in Egypt raised hiss, not recently (4)
An eight-letter word meaning ‘[to] hiss’ has a four-letter word meaning ‘recently’ removed from it (‘not recently’) before being reversed (‘raised’).

9d Large mollusc from Mediterranean isle yielding form of oil (6)
A nine-letter Mediterranean island famous for playing host to one of Italy’s four active volcanoes (which gives the island its nickname, ‘The Lighthouse of the Mediterranean’) is deprived of (‘yielding’) an anagram (‘form’) of  OIL, the result being a generously-proportioned gastropod.

10d Sound like hoodie from e.g. Dundee retaining right (5)
The definition here leads to a verb, meaning ‘[to make a] sound like a hoodie (ie a hooded crow)’. I was dubious about the wordplay, since I think of ‘Dundee’ as the word prefixed to a particular sort of food item (a round and fruity version), rather than having such a meaning when seen on its own, but it would seem that the term can be used in an absolute sense. Who am I to argue with Graham Greene, who wrote in The Ministry of Fear:

He had always liked ????s, especially rich Dundees.

23d Decoys run over individual on leaving (6)
The usual abbreviations for ‘run’ and ‘over’ (both from the world of cricket) are followed by a six-letter word for an individual, from which the consecutive letters ON have been removed (‘on leaving’).

24d Mathematician enveloping us in boastful talk (5)
I can’t help feeling that some of Azed’s recent links between wordplay and definition have tested the boundaries of acceptability a little, and here we have to read ‘enveloping’ as something along the lines of ‘is the result of enveloping’. It is the US from the clue which must be enveloped by a word for boastful talk or bombast.

25d Grappling like this involves a medical man (5)
That two-letter word for ‘like this’ appears again, and here it contains (‘involves’) A (from the clue) and a two-letter letter abbreviation for an undergraduate degree awarded in the field of medicine, though not just to men.

(definitions are underlined)

There are usually one or two points of interest in an Azed puzzle, and here we pick them out for comment. Please feel free to add your own questions or observations on any aspect of the puzzle (including clues not listed below) either by using the comment form at the bottom of the page or, if would prefer that your question/comment is not publicly visible, by email.

Azed 2,684 Plain

Difficulty rating: (3 / 5)

This puzzle, which struck me as being slightly above the middle of the difficulty range, contained considerably more than the usual number of clues with which I could take issue, albeit my gripes were for the most part minor (some might even say trivial). There were some very nice surface readings (eg 17a), along with one or two slightly disappointing ones (eg 27d)

Setters’ Corner: This week I’m going to look at clue 18d, “Weather’s dull, penetrating wild lilac (8)”. A three-letter word for ‘dull’ is contained by (‘penetrating’) an anagram  (‘wild’) of LILAC, producing an adjective listed without definition under the headword for a familiar noun. There are many adjectives like this, so setters are often called upon to come up with plausible definitions, and it can be very difficult to find one that can be worked into an interesting – or deceptive – clue. OED is rarely helpful, usually falling back on ‘of or pertaining to x’, where x is the relevant noun. So the uncontentious definition of, say, AORTAL (‘Of, pertaining to, or of the nature of, an aorta’), would be ‘of main blood vessel’. However, this is not very promising for the clue writer. Something like ‘of large vessel’ would offer more scope, but what about “large vessel’s”? Well, the apostrophe-s specifically indicates possession – ‘of the king’ and “the king’s” can mean exactly the same thing, and where we’re talking about something tangible (like an aorta), ‘of the aorta’ and “aorta’s” seem pretty similar. Because it is concrete, an aorta can have, for example, a width; however, when it comes to abstract nouns, that isn’t true – but an abstract noun can possess an abstract quality. ‘The fickleness of the English weather’ is the same as “the English weather’s fickleness”, and “x’s” in general is valid for any adjective with the meaning ‘of x’, which is good news for setters.

Across

1a Males round Germany after greens getting bad indigestion (13, 2 words)
A five-letter word for the sort of males that might be seen rutting or partying is put round the three-letter abbreviation for ‘Germany’, with the combination following a five-letter word indicated by ‘greens’. The answer is a (5,8) disease of cattle caused by magnesium deficiency, likely to be  familiar not just to cattle farmers but also to anyone who watched the original series of All Creatures Great and Small and witnessed cows making a remarkable recovery after receiving a magnesium injection from Uncle Herriot. I was dubious about the ‘greens’, but, while there is nothing convincing in Chambers, OED gives a slang meaning of the five-letter word as ‘green vegetables’.

12a Speed trap, one assumes, offering a bunch of tickets (6)
A combination of two three-letter words which might whimsically represent a ‘speed trap’ , or at least a trap for motor vehicles, results in the sort of ‘bunch of tickets’ (albeit now electronic) that one might purchase for travel on the Paris Métro.

16a Trotter, crude fellow occupying centre of scene (7)
A four-letter word for a country bumpkin or an uncouth fellow is contained by (‘occupying’) the three letters at the centre of SCENE. The bumpkin is shown by Chambers as being North American slang, and while including a geographical qualifier would have moved the scene of the surface reading closer to Only Doofuses and Mustangs territory, I do think that one should be there.

19a Versatile tool spread variously to open rotating display stand (13, 2 words)
An anagram (‘variously’) of SPREAD is to be inserted into (‘to open’) a seven-letter rotating display stand (for books or greetings cards in a shop, say), producing a (6,7) term for a  tool that is fairly versatile, though no match for a Swiss Army Knife.

23a Ripple that’s turned land surface as of old (4)
Once again, we have a reversal clue where either element could be the one that needs to be ‘turned’ – it looks more likely to be the ripple, but actually it’s the Miltonian spelling of a word for ‘the surface of land matted with the roots of grass, etc’ which must be reversed to give us a word which can describe agitation on the surface of a liquid, but more commonly means ‘to worry’ or ‘to chafe’.

25a Scoundrel making woman throw up (6)
Every so often, Azed uses ‘woman’ in a clue under the misapprehension that it can be abbreviated to W; in this instance, the clue could be made sound simply by replacing ‘woman’ with ‘women’, thus supplying the W which is followed by a word meaning ‘throw up’.

28a Top-class star group earning ticks and suchlike (7)
A charade of the single letter indicating ‘top-class’ and the name  of a constellation which was also a model of Toyota car lead to a term for an order of Arachnida which includes ticks and mites.

31a One quoted as authority giving famous sign including old cameo (7)
The three-letter name for a sign made using the fingers contains (‘including’) an archaic word for a brooch (‘old cameo’) – a different word with the same spelling is often indicated by ‘that hurts’. The sign was made famous by Winston Churchill in the early 1940s and perhaps even more so by Harvey Smith in August 1971 when he won a second successive Hickstead Derby. As he later observed:

Basically, I had an argument with Douglas Bunn, the owner of Hickstead and one of the judges. I’d won the previous year and I was supposed to have brought back the trophy, but I left it at home. I said it didn’t matter because I’d only win it again. He reckoned I couldn’t. So I went and did it and when I did I turned to him and went: “Up yours.” Because of the incident they wouldn’t give me my £2,000 prize money. But a solicitor wrote to me and said: “You won it, you fight for it.” And I thought, why not? It’s all part of life, isn’t it? It’s talking points. So I brought in photos of Winston Churchill doing the V-sign with his fingers facing both ways, to prove that I could have been showing a V for Victory. And that was it. I was never in trouble. Nothing happened. I got my prize money. Everybody was happy.

32a Being gripped by pain as before granny must (6)
A three-letter pet name for a grandmother is ‘gripped’ by an old (‘as before’) three-letter spelling of a familiar four-letter word for a pain. Unfortunately, Chambers makes it clear that this is a variant spelling only of the verb; since this verb is intransitive, and the verb ‘pain’ is transitive, it can’t legitimately be indicated by ‘pain’.

34a Heading from cover, kestrel flies in confusion (13)
A seven-letter word for ‘cover’, from which the first letter has been removed (ie ‘Heading from cover’), is followed by anagram (‘flies’) of KESTREL. I’m not totally convinced that ‘heading from cover’ can reasonably mean ‘Take the heading from a word for cover’, but even if it can the second element, ‘kestrel flies’, renders the clue unsound. I think I could just about accept “Heading from cover, kestrel flying…”, in other words ‘Remove the first letter from [a word for cover plus an anagram of KESTREL]’.

Down

1d Finding one’s way without pin in brickie’s rubble (4)
A seven-letter word for “finding one’s way” (probably in the dark) has the consecutive letters PIN removed (‘without pin’).

2d Touchdown in Eton footie making one turn red in the face (5)
A double definition clue, the latter word (at least as a noun) probably being considerably more familiar to those of us who didn’t attend Eton College than the former. But what about those words ‘making one’ in the middle? I think that ‘making one’ (‘one’ being the solver) is perfectly ok when a charade, say, is ‘making one’ the solution, but here the two words are the same – 2+2 can ‘make one’ 4, but can 4 ‘make one’ 4? I know my view…

5d Stove got going with charts, or old cresset-holders (11)
An anagram (‘got going’) of STOVE and CHARTS produces a (5-6) Shakespearean term for poles on which torches were mounted. Azed doesn’t explicitly indicate that the word is obsolete, but the term ‘cresset’ is shown by Chambers as ‘historical’, and in Henry IV, part 1, Glendower says to Hotspur:

I cannot blame him: at my nativity
The front of heaven was full of fiery shapes,
Of burning cressets; and at my birth
The frame and huge foundation of the earth
Shaked like a coward

20d Confused state of film, flicker-like? (6)
A two-letter word for a confused state (considered by mathematicians to be of the transcendental kind) and an adjective meaning ‘relating to moving pictures’ (‘of film’) combine to make a word which could accurately be applied to a ‘flicker’, this being ‘the popular name of various American species of woodpecker’.

22d Sarcasm? A cheer follows its conclusion (5)
The last letter of SARCASM (ie ‘its conclusion’) is followed by A (from the clue) and the short form of a six-letter word for a cheer.

24d Harry embraces king as author of poetical pieces (5)
I can’t help feeling that the four-letter word which embraces the usual (chess and cards) abbreviation for ‘king’ means something closer to ‘annoy’ than ‘harry’, but who am I to stand in the way of a good surface? The Austrian poet in question had the forenames René Karl Wilhelm Johann Josef Maria (actually that’s more than fore), but thankfully for those writing out party invitations etc he was usually known just as Rainer Maria.

26d To become leader in Times Chancellor appearing in twelfth letter (5)
The single letter representing ‘multiplied by’ (‘Times’) and the two-letter abbreviation for ‘Chancellor of the Exchequer’ are contained by the name of the twelfth letter of the alphabet.

27d Louis’s beloved, a female’s central to his this (5)
A three-letter word for “female’s” is contained by the two-letter French (‘his’, ie “Louis’s”) word for ‘this’, producing the feminine form of the French word for ‘dear’ or ‘beloved’. But while I’ve no problem with “that female’s” or even “female’s” for HER, I draw the line at “a female’s” – it surely has to refer to a specific female. On reflection, I think Azed intended HER to be a noun, so the wordplay translates as “a female is central to…”, but while a ‘she’ can be a noun, this doesn’t change in the objective form (Fielding: “The domino began to make very fervent love to the she”), so ‘her’ is no good as a noun.

(definitions are underlined)

There are usually one or two points of interest in an Azed puzzle, and here we pick them out for comment. Please feel free to add your own questions or observations on any aspect of the puzzle (including clues not listed below) either by using the comment form at the bottom of the page or, if would prefer that your question/comment is not publicly visible, by email.

Azed 2,683 Plain

Difficulty rating: (2 / 5)

I suppose we’d had a pretty good run of puzzles being published on the Guardian web site in a timely manner, so a glitch was probably due; I am indebted to Roslyn, who provided me with a scan of the puzzle (as of 20/11, finally available on the Guardian site). The number of today’s crossword has a certain significance to me in that our telephone number at home was for many years Redditch 2683 (until it was extended to five digits and became 62683). In the early days it was a party line, something which might sound like fun to those unfamiliar with the term, but actually meant that you would not infrequently pick up the receiver to make a call and find that the Marstons next door were already using the line.

 I did rather rush through it, but I’d probably say that the puzzle was slightly below the middle of the difficulty spectrum, the thirteen anagrams being a big help.

Setters’ Corner: This week I’m going to look at clue 18d, “Riverside plant? See me cutting bract (7)”. The wordplay has MI inside (‘cutting’) a term for a bract of a grass-flower, which could also have been indicated cryptically by ‘wan time’. I once submitted a clue for a puzzle in which ‘a’ in the clue had to be translated by the solver into AN; I wasn’t entirely happy about it myself, and I was unsurprised when the editor rejected it. Of course, the two words mean the same thing, but it is rather like using ‘raze’ to indicate RASE – they are actually the same word, so one cannot legitimately be used to indicate the other. I feel that ME and MI fall into the same category, since ME is simply an anglicized spelling of MI, and therefore I don’t feel that this clue really works.

Across

1a Does one summon diners? Chorister’s good for starters (8)
An eight-letter word for a chorister (or, in truth, a singer generally) has its first letter replaced by the usual abbreviation for ‘good’ (ie ‘good for starters’). Incidentally, before Azed became, well, Azed he had sixteen Listener crosswords published under the pseudonym Gong, apparently a family nickname.

7a Sounds like murder? Motive, we hear (4)
A homophone for the sort of motive that is on occasion linked with impediment, and just the sort of definition you’d expect from Azed.

10a Company of folk came without morning legume (9)
A seven-letter word for a company of people or something in which to take a holiday (although ever since the one that my parents rented in Borth many years ago was overrun by ants I’m less than keen to do so myself) is followed by the word CAME (from the clue) missing the two-letter abbreviation for ‘[in the] morning]’ (‘without morning’).

12a Pick up fish, exchanging parts (5)
The last three letters of a word meaning ‘[to] fish’ are moved ahead of its first two (‘exchanging parts’).

15a Composer losing yen to compose (4)
The composer is Jean-Baptiste (formerly Giovanni Battista, with a slightly different surname), who was born in Florence in 1632 but came to Paris as a boy. A skilled composer, musician and dancer,  after much scheming he was eventually appointed operatic director by Louis XIV, and provided the scores for almost a score of operas.

20a Wagon in bend roars terribly, about to get stuck reversing (9, 2 words)
A one-letter ‘bend’, of the type often found under a sink or basin, is followed by an anagram (‘terribly’) of ROARS, containing (‘about’) the reversed form of a three-letter word meaning ‘to get stuck’ (or a product often associated with the Women’s Institute). The solution is (4,5) and describes something also seen as a bear or a ladle.

23a Local wanton aforetimes having fun a great deal (6)
A three-letter dialect term for ‘sport’ or ‘fun’ is followed by a familiar word meaning ‘a great deal’. The solution is shown by Chambers as ‘obsolete’, hence the ‘aforetimes’, although I think Azed meant ‘aforetime’, since ‘aforetimes’ isn’t, as far as I can establish, a real word.

29a Shame or pity enveloping what mercy conveyed? (5)
A three-letter informal word for a pity (“Azed not available online? Oh, it’s a ???”) is put around (‘enveloping’) an informal modern equivalent of the obsolete interjection ‘mercy’, expressing thanks (‘what mercy conveyed’).

31a One putting up with canon concerned with a great deal circulating (9)
The wordplay here involves the reversal of a 4+2+3 charade, comprising a canon in the sense of a rondo, that ubiquitous bit of commercial jargon meaning ‘concerned with’, and the same word for ‘a great deal’ that we had in 23a. I try to avoid using phrasal verbs that include a preposition to define agent nouns, and I leave it to the reader to decide whether ‘with’ is part of the definition.

Down

4d Laplanders afflicted with onset of ailment internally (5)
A four-letter ‘obs or poetic‘ past tense of a verb meaning ‘to afflict’ contains (‘with…internally’) the first letter (‘onset’) of AILMENT.

6d Gross sporty type, head down somewhat (6)
A six-letter word for a sporty type (or the singular form of a term once used to address fellow sailors) has it’s first letter moved downwards a few places (‘head down somewhat’).

8d A goose, almost dead, heading straight for vessel at sea (5)
The letter A (from the clue) is followed by another name for the Hawaiian goose, from which the last letter has been omitted (‘almost’), and the usual abbreviation for ‘dead’. The solution is a 2-3 hyphenated nautical term, and I rather like the definition.

17d Clown, one known for his positive philosophy? (7)
The clown is, according to Chambers, one ‘of the white-faced, bungling type’, while the second definition refers to the forename by which Isidore Marie ??????? François Xavier Comte, the originator of the doctrine of positivism, is known.

19d Spotty and miserable, typical of self-absorbed generation, a drag (7)
A two-letter word which, when applied to ‘generation’ describes ‘the generation either of the 1970s, typically self-absorbed, or of the 1980s, typically greedy and materialistic’ precedes the letter A (from the clue);  the ‘drag’ which follows is an overland conveyance without wheels that would be pulled along.

21d Skunk, one left without offspring (6)
It seems a long time since this skunk, a favourite of a former correspondent and sometimes spelt with a C on the end rather than a K, has made an appearance – usually it is the solution, but here it forms part of the wordplay, being followed by a one-letter word for ‘one’ and the usual abbreviation for ‘left’. The answer is an odd sort of word, and I’m not sure whether the Chambers definition is correct; OED gives ‘non-sexual; producing only asexual progeny’, which sounds more likely.

22d I’ll follow Pakistani about to climb palm tree (6)
The letter I (from the clue) comes after (‘[will] follow’) a three-letter word for a member of a people inhabiting NW India and Pakistan, containing (‘about’) a two-letter verb meaning ‘to climb’ (in the sense of ‘rise’).

27d Romanovs primarily as covered in TASS possibly? (5)
I can’t help thinking that this &lit could have been phrased more appealingly, but anyway the first letter (‘primarily’) of ROMANOVS is contained by (‘covered by’) an anagram (‘possibly’) of TASS.  The whole clue serves as an indication of the solution.

(definitions are underlined)

Many thanks to Roslyn, who has kindly provided me with a scan of the puzzle, enabling me to produce the notes, which are now available,

I have uploaded a copy of the scan here.

There are usually one or two points of interest in an Azed puzzle, and here we pick them out for comment. Please feel free to add your own questions or observations on any aspect of the puzzle (including clues not listed below) either by using the comment form at the bottom of the page or, if would prefer that your question/comment is not publicly visible, by email.

Azed 2,682 Plain

Difficulty rating: (2.5 / 5)

I found the difficulty of this one quite hard to assess – there weren’t too many ‘gimmes’, and a certain amount of general knowledge was required, but there weren’t too many tough clues either. All in all, I’m inclined to place it smack in the middle of the spectrum. The note regarding the verb form at 17a not being in Chambers puzzled me a little, since it’s in my copy of Chambers (2016), as well as being in all of the (several) electronic versions of Chambers which I have.

Setters’ Corner: This week I’m going to look at clue 22a, “Loop of thread reflected whiff (4)”. In basic reversal clues where a word read forwards is the same as another read backwards, it is important to tell the solver which part of the clue is the wordplay, usually by putting the reversal indicator at one end of the clue so that it can only apply to the word or words next to it. Hence rather than ‘Finish returning receptacles’ for POTS, which could equally well be a clue for STOP, one would write something like ‘Returning to intercept vessels’ [STOP< = POTS]. For STOP, the clue could be ‘Prevent vessels returning’ [POTS< = STOP]. Here the ‘reflected’ could equally well affect the ‘loop of thread’ or the ‘whiff’, and the clue is therefore ambiguous. Although moving the indicator to one end of the clue wouldn’t work well, the alternative approach of using a ‘one-way link’ could have been employed, eg ‘Whiff reflected in loop of thread’. Incidentally, the whiff word is shown by Chambers as a ‘rare variant’, and it really should have been indicated as such.

Across

1a Outhouse deserted in cut-price holiday giving bank protection? (12)
This one took me longer than it should have – I was thinking along the wrong lines for that ‘cut-price holiday’, a seven-letter noun which contains a four-letter word for an outhouse and the usual abbreviation for ‘deserted’. The solution  is hyphenated, 4-8.

13a An Irish girl admits touching former sweetheart (6)
The indefinite article and a three-letter Irish slang term for a girlfriend (who, after three years, presumably gets inspected annually for defects) which contains (‘admits’) that ubiquitous piece of commercial jargon meaning ‘concerning’ (‘touching’).

15a Not exactly a trans, offering list in exchange? (7)
I am much happier to accept ‘offering’ as a link between definition and wordplay than ‘requiring’ in the reverse direction (see 4d). The ‘list’ refers to list² in Chambers, and the four-letter ‘exchange’ within which it is contained involves something being exchanged for money. I wonder if Azed considered other slightly more risqué definitions? Probably best not to think about it.

20a Chinese idol he omitted from jokes (4)
A six-letter word for ‘jokes’ or ‘teases’ has the consecutive letters HE omitted.

24a Wooded vale, gloomy – complain at leaves (6)
A three-letter word meaning ‘gloomy’ is followed by a five-letter word for ‘complain’ missing the consecutive letters AT (‘at leaves’).

30a Part of dog’s home is entertaining – look around (5)
If one reads this clue in the conventional definition plus wordplay way then the definition doesn’t seem right – the word that is formed by putting a three-letter word meaning ‘is entertaining’ inside an interjection meaning ‘look!’ is the full name of the place where a particular breed of dog was originally developed, so “dog’s home” is sufficient as the definition (or perhaps “Part of dog’s name”). It did then strike me that the clue could be read as saying that part of the name of the dog’s home is the three-letter word, and that it is completed by putting the two-letter word around it, ie the definition is indeed just “dog’s home”. This would be an extremely unusual way to phrase a clue, but you never know…

32a Hebridean location wherein you’ll find wood pigeon? No question (4)
When a Scottish (not stated, but loosely implied by the clue) word for a wood pigeon has the single-letter abbreviation for ‘question’ removed (‘no question’) it produces the name given to a group of six islands in the Outer Hebrides.

33a Course eaten, I’ll be puzzled about recipe (7)
An anagram (“‘ll be puzzled”) of EATEN I containing the usual abbreviation for ‘recipe’ produces the the name of a course which becomes a focus of the nation’s attention around the end of March/beginning of April. “Course eaten, I’m puzzled about recipe” would seem much more natural, but this would fail when it came to the wordplay, which would require “Course eaten, I are puzzled about recipe”.

Down

4d Vac being over, most of what follows requiring special case (7)
The wordplay here involves a four-letter informal word for ‘holidays’ (‘vac’) preceding (‘being over’) the word for what comes between one vac and the next, from which the last letter has been removed (‘most of’). Some time ago a correspondent asked if I would provide a list of ‘link words’ that can be used to join the wordplay and definition parts of a clue, eg ‘producing’. Although I very rarely such words (or phrases) in my own clues, I do plan to create such a list at some point. The problem, as this clue demonstrates, is that one setter’s view of what is acceptable will not accord with another’s, and the issue is exacerbated by the fact that Chambers gives so many meanings for prepositions such as ‘of’ that there is almost certainly to be one which can be chosen to justify its use as a link word. Considering the use of ‘requiring’ (‘calling for’, ‘necessitating’), I am prepared to accept that ‘<solution> requiring <wordplay>’ is just about ok, but I can’t see how ‘<wordplay> requiring <solution>’ (as here) can be valid – 4+(4-1) ‘equals’, ‘is’ or ‘produces’ 7, but it doesn’t ‘require’ 7 in any sense that I understand.

8d Youngster? That’s one so run wild, the noo (4)
This would be a very neat composite anagram &lit were it not for the need to indicate that the solution is a Scots word, hence ‘the noo’ being tacked on the end. The letters of the solution (‘one’) and SO RUN can be rearranged (‘wild’) to form YOUNGSTER, and the whole clue serves as an indication of the answer. Another approach would have been to use a Scots word as the anagram indicator – something like “Youngster? That’s one so run red-mad”.

10d What’s in a shambles unless cold and bust, to consume (11, 2 words)
A four-part charade consisting of a three-letter word for ‘unless’, the standard abbreviation for ‘cold’, a four-letter word for a bust in the sculptural sense, and a familiar word meaning ‘to consume’. The solution is (7,4).

19d Glandular substance revealed by study inside senior (7)
If ‘study in a wordplay doesn’t deliver CON it usually leads to the three-letter word which here is contained by a French adjective meaning ‘elder’ or ‘senior’.

21d Drugs? One of them is found in rising sports venues (7)
The single-letter drug of choice for setters and ravers is here contained by a reversal (‘rising’) of a word for sports venues usually seen in a different form which shares the same first four letters.

23d 50% ill on the briny – suffering this? (6)
You may, like me, find yourself working back from the answer to determine what the six-letter word of which 50% forms its first half is. It probably more often appears in its sense (albeit archaic)  of ‘nothing’.

25d Ease like this is showing as tenant (6)
If you replace ‘like this’ in the clue with the solution (split up 4+2) then the wordplay will make more sense.

27d Jock’s mood almost completely rising and falling (5)
The three-letter Scots word for a mood will be more familiar to former Ingres database administrators (ok, that’s just me then) as the abbreviation for a ‘tuple id’. It is followed by a word meaning ‘completely’ from which the last letter has been omitted (‘almost’).

28d Human resources regularly alternating with university independence (5)
Not one, not two, but three ‘universities’ are alternating with the standard abbreviation for ‘human resources’.

29d Old flirt that is expelled from club (4)
The club is not a niblick, nor is it a brassie, although like the latter it contains the usual abbreviation for ‘that is’, and it is this abbreviation which must be ‘expelled’.

(definitions are underlined)

There are usually one or two points of interest in an Azed puzzle, and here we pick them out for comment. Please feel free to add your own questions or observations on any aspect of the puzzle (including clues not listed below) either by using the comment form at the bottom of the page or, if would prefer that your question/comment is not publicly visible, by email.

Azed 2,681 Plain

Difficulty rating: (2.5 / 5)

When I started on these notes, I realized that the single ‘hidden’ and most of the anagrams were in the down clues, with the across clues being quite a bit trickier (and quite a bit longer as well). I’d say that the acrosses were somewhat above mid-range difficulty and the downs somewhat below, so that overall the difficulty was pretty close to the middle of the spectrum. The clues were generally entertaining, although a couple struck me as slightly unsatisfactory.

Setters’ Corner: This week I’m going to look at clue 27a, “Group poetical effort created by children gathering (5)”. The answer is concealed within the last two words of the clue, being a Japanese verse form where successive half-tankas (full tankas being too heavy to turn around quickly) are contributed by different poets. The ‘hidden’ is potentially the easiest type of clue to solve, the answer being in plain view, which is why setters are always on the lookout for ways to make them less obvious. One way is to use an indicative verb following the hiding place, as in ‘Giant dog removes sandwiches’ for OGRE, another is to use a less common selection indicator such as ‘quantity of’. A further approach is to separate the two words in the clue, as in ‘Libertine trapped between table and chair’ for LECH. Here Azed has tried something different again, suggesting that placing the words CHILDREN and GATHERING next to each other ‘creates’ the solution. Is that true? Not strictly, perhaps, but I think for this type of clue the setter can be given a fair bit of cruciverbal licence.

Across

12a Grumbles when having to return nosh (5)
The solution (a favourite word of mine, along with ‘snap’) has two alternative spellings, but the word meaning ‘grumbles’ which must be reversed (‘having to return’) has only one. Azed’s occasionally verbose linkage between definition and wordplay would have allowed room for ambiguity had it not been for the inclusion of the word ‘when’, which makes it clear that it is the grumbles rather than the nosh which must return.

13a Grand foreign lady (with no trace of accent) very much withdrawn in Geneva (6)
Azed is a lexicographer by profession, so I’ll take his word for it that an umlaut can be described as an accent. A three-letter word for ‘very much’ is reversed (‘withdrawn’) inside the name of a drink – the last word of the clue has been deceptively capitalized to suit the needs of the surface.

14a Get high round hostelry with wife in light jumper (9)
A three-letter word meaning ‘to hit high into the air’, for which I suppose ‘get high’ is just about ok, is put round a three-letter word for a hostelry, and the combination is followed by a facetious term for a wife, the reference being to the origin of Adam’s good (for a while anyway) lady. The solution is hyphenated, 6-3, and sounds rather American, although the example of its use in the OED taken from the Tucson Daily Citizen is balanced by one from the Milton Keynes Express.

15a Maiden, one responding to appeal, displaying sulk (4)
A cricketing theme runs through the wordplay, the usual abbreviation for ‘[a] maiden [over]’ being followed by an informal shortening of the name given to a person to whom appeals relating to potential dismissals on the cricket field are directed.

16a Intimidating display from African chief once, not his first (4)
The African chief who must lose the first letter of his name (‘not his first’) is ????? Zulu, the most powerful king in southern Africa in the early nineteenth century. Having orchestrated the assassination of his half-brother, he took over from him as leader of the Zulu clan, and proved himself a ruthless leader and skilled tactician as he expanded his kingdom. Demonstrating that what goes round comes round, he was eventually himself assassinated by a couple of other half-brothers.

19a Set of principles Liz admitted, marked with notches? (9)
A five-letter word for a set of principles or a system of belief has a four-letter word inserted (‘admitted’) that is indicated by…well, surely not Liz? Ellen, Helen or Eleanor, yes. Even Gwyn, though ‘famous Eskimo’ might be a step too far in these enlightened times. But I don’t see how ‘Liz’ works.

24a Bantu speaker, last to establish settlement (4)
One of those clues where you either need to know the answer or the name for the Maori settlement which is to be put after the last letter of ESTABLISH. Otherwise, having got the checked letters, you will (like me) need to refer to the dictionary to confirm your suspicions.

26a Put up with wind as unseen nuisance (4)
Two definitions sandwich a wordplay which has the the Greek name for the north wind losing the consecutive letters AS (‘as unseen’).

30a I’ll be involved in 50% of bunkum, being crowned as Pope (6)
The letter I (from the clue) is contained by (‘involved in’) a ten-letter word (also spelt on occasion with eleven letters) for ‘nonsense’ from which the last five letters have been lost (ie ‘50% of bunkum’). The answer contains an apostrophe.

31a Complex organic compound – it’s stupidity disposing of outer elements (5)
A nine-letter word for ‘stupidity’ loses its first two and last two letters (‘disposing of outer elements’) to produce the name given to a particular class of organic compounds. Whilst there is room for debate about precisely what constitutes a member of this class, they are very definitely not complex compounds, the key feature of which is a central metal atom.

32a Was at table in e.g. Oxford and dined, with room for more? (9)
A three-letter word meaning ‘was at table’ is contained by a three-letter informal term for the sort of thing exemplified by the seat of learning at Oxford (where they “know all there is to be knowed”), with a word meaning ‘dined’ bringing up the rear. As Richard III has it:

Tell them, when that my mother went with child
Of that ????????? Edward, noble York

Down

2d Short poem, endless claptrap king penned (5)
A five-letter North American slang word for pretentious rubbish or claptrap without its last letter (‘endless’) has the chess or card player’s abbreviation for ‘king’ inserted (‘penned’).

5d Multiplex, showing such as the Hydra (10)
Unless I’m missing something, this is a strange sort of clue, where the two definitions lead to the same (4-6) word. Incidentally, the 2009 low-budget horror film Hydra gets a rating of 3.1/10 of IMDb, which is impressive, but not in a good way.

8d Dried salt-free meat hung by way of being stuffed with egg-free food (5)
The Latin word meaning ‘by way of’ is put around (‘stuffed with’) FOOD from which the letters shaped like hen’s eggs have been removed. The answer is one of those rather unlikely words brought to us from Shetland.

10d Granted bit of cash in eastern Europe (4)
I don’t immediately associate ‘grant’ with the verb that appears in the past tense here, but it’s there in Chambers and relates to things granted as from a distant place – as Sir Walter wrote: “I‥.appoint thee to be kept in ward in the western tower, till God ???? us relief.” The solution is a former currency unit of Estonia (one hundredth of a kroon), now superseded by the euro cent.

22d Fancy fish tasted for supper (6)
There was a time when this fish, in both its two and three letter guises, appeared more often in crosswords than Alan Titchmarsh appeared on TV. It seems to have suffered a decline in recent times, perhaps as a result of overfishing, but here its longer embodiment is followed by the same three-letter word that popped up in 32a (indicated by ‘tasted for supper’, which probably ought to be followed by a question mark).

25d Treat changes to seat with this cement (5)
Those who recall Azed’s classic “My letters could make lad sad” for LASS (LAD with L AS S being SAD) will not have had much trouble with this rather more explicit variation on the theme.

(definitions are underlined)

There are usually one or two points of interest in an Azed puzzle, and here we pick them out for comment. Please feel free to add your own questions or observations on any aspect of the puzzle (including clues not listed below) either by using the comment form at the bottom of the page or, if would prefer that your question/comment is not publicly visible, by email.

Azed 2,680 Plain

Difficulty rating: (1.5 / 5)

Even with a false start at 1a, I found this a very straightforward solve – plenty of anagrams (twelve) and four ‘hiddens’ helped to ensure steady progress. Another bonus was that most of the obscurities had links to more familiar words.

Setters’ Corner: This week I’m going to look at clue 33a, “Gains yard, feeling very smooth (7)”. A six-letter slang term meaning ‘gains’ or ‘winnings’ is followed by the usual abbreviation for ‘yard’, producing a word meaning ‘soft and smooth’. Just a few days ago, a correspondent (Dr Daniel Price) posted a question on the Feedback page about what he termed the use of ‘divergent definitions’ in a double definition clue, such as in ‘Crash party’ for BASH, where the two meanings are quite different but have evolved from the same root and appear under the same headword in Chambers. Here we have a near relative, the divergent wordplay/definition, the solution appearing under the headword for the six-letter word in the wordplay. I’ve no problem with this sort of thing when the meanings have truly diverged, but here they are quite close and therefore whilst the clue is neither unsound nor unfair it is certainly rather weak.

Across

1a Cup brewed, chat freely to exchange latest news? (7)
I always start a plain puzzle at the beginning, and here I was pleased to be able to quickly and confidently write in CATCHUP. I admit to a a few qualms around the enumeration (I circled the ‘(7)’, thus marking it out for subsequent comment), and would have been happier had the definition been of a noun (which could have been hyphenated) rather than a phrasal verb, but what else could the answer be? However, a C at the start of 1d didn’t feel quite right, and the A at the top of 2d was clearly wrong. I then realized my error, though in my defence the actual answer has nothing to do with exchanging news, relating instead to things being caught up on the wind or suchlike. The definition in Chambers doesn’t make that clear, though, and at least Azed has put a question mark at the end to suggest that the definition could be slightly fanciful. The actual answer served to put me in mind of the short-lived 1970s comedy series The Upchat Line, where John Alderton played Mike Upchat (one of his many pseudonyms), who lived out of a railway station locker and, appropriately, had very much a one-track mind.

11a Rough sound, one stirring in mud? That was river fish (10)
A four-letter ‘rough sound’ (usually applied to utterances, especially ones characteristic of a particular locality) is followed by a single-letter word meaning ‘one’ and an anagram (‘stirring’) of IN MUD.

12a Pastry, its middle roughly left unfinished (7)
The two central letters of PASTRY (ie ‘its middle’) are followed by a six-letter word meaning ‘roughly’ or ‘coarsely’ from which the last letter has been omitted (‘left unfinished’).

13a Ball entering landed back in net (4)
The single letter that resembles a ball in shape is contained by (‘entering’) a reversal (‘back’) of a word meaning ‘landed’, in the sense that a bird might have landed on a branch. In recent times I have only ever seen the word for a net used figuratively and in the plural form, as in ‘I was in the ????? of a particularly tricky Azed and desperately needed another biscuit (or two)’.

18a Stamp collecting – it brought back glimpses of my boyhood somewhere in E.Europe (11)
They say ‘philately will get you nowhere’, and that is true when it comes to this clue – I don’t recall ever coming across the solution here before, and I think I might well have remembered it if I had. It comprises a reversal (‘brought back’) of IT (from the clue), the first letters (‘glimpses’) of MY BOYHOOD, and the name of a country in eastern Europe.

27a Smart thief, one likely to succeed pinching shimmering set (7)
The four-letter word which describes someone who is in line to succeed (eg to an estate) contains an anagram (‘shimmering’) of SET; the ‘smart’ in the definition refers to the Chambers entry for the noun from which is derives, “a particularly clever or spectacular theft”.

Down

1d Verbal jokes, top to bottom, I had not noticed in Milton (6)
A four-letter word for ‘verbal jokes’ has its first letter moved to the end (‘top to bottom’) before the shortened form of ‘I had’ is tacked on the end. The Miltonian word contains an apostrophe, something which Azed tends not to mention in enumerations, particularly if they simply represent the omission of a letter from a single word, as in fo’c’sle.

2d Appoint world leader? Responsibility of No. 9 (5)
An unusual clue, in that the three definitions lead to a two-word phrase, a proper noun, and a hyphenated word. The last of these is defined by Chambers as “the act of throwing the ball into a set scrum”, but from what I saw of the Rugby Union World Cup it seemed to be more about the number 9 (the scrum half) placing the ball at the feet of their own forwards.

5d Part of play (not amateur) including performance pieces moved slowly (5)
A three-letter ‘part of [a] play’ having had the usual abbreviation for ‘amateur’ removed (‘not amateur’) contains the abbreviated term for “a stock of pieces that a person or company is prepared to perform”.

6d Pain when taken in by old dandy, artless crooked politician (6)
A four-letter word for a pain is contained by a five-letter slang meaning of the adjective ‘dandy’, from which the consecutive letters ART have been omitted (‘artless’); I’m not sure why ‘old’ is there, because there is no suggestion in Chambers that the required sense of ‘dandy’ is obsolete. The solution was originally the name given to certain native American chiefs, then (jocularly) to a ‘chief’ of any sort, and then specifically to any one of the twelve high officials in the Tammany Society of New York

9d Reichenbach’s theory, nothing depressingly avoided by ally (5)
The single letter representing ‘nothing’ is followed by an eight-letter word for ‘depressingly’ lacking the consecutive letters ALLY (‘avoided by ally’).

10d He may be seen in Roman units (marching) (5)
The Roman units here are the sort by which their marches were measured, but I suspect that Azed has added the last word to avoid any potential ambiguity with a word sharing the first four letters but ending in an R, and for which ‘running’ would have been appropriate. The defined solution appears in Chambers only in the form of a two-word Latin term for a vainglorious soldier.

19d Layout to do with strong hand makes this difficult (6)
A four-letter word for “the layout of cards” is followed by that familiar piece of commercial jargon for ‘concerning’ or ‘to do with’, the result being a contract in a card game such as solo whist which would be stupid to attempt and well-nigh impossible to fulfil with a strong hand. Incidentally, the ‘layout’ sense seems to be restricted to Chambers – it’s not in OED, and the only reference I can find in the context of card games is to tontine, but there it describes the initial distribution of the ‘chips’, not the cards.

20d Like Sandy’s stubborn mount, no longer sluggish around race’s end (6)
A Shakespearean word meaning ‘sluggish’ containing (‘around’) the last letter of RACE (“race’s end”) produces a Scots adjective (indicated by “Sandy’s”) used to describe a horse which is inclined to stop suddenly and refuse to go on. As the Scottish Gallovidian Encyclopaedia has it:

A horse is ??????? when it stands fast, and will not move for the whip.  

23d What’s confused with goral, emitting e.g. slow roar? (5)
A composite anagram &lit, where the letters of the solution (‘What’) when mixed up (‘confused’) together with GORAL can produce EG SLOW ROAR. The whole clue provides a loose definition of the answer, based on one goat-antelope being very much like another.

25d Bar – not a beautiful place for alcohol moderation (5)
A ten-letter word for alcohol moderation has the name of a valley in Thessaly praised by ancient poets for its extraordinary beauty, and thus a term applied to any rural spot deemed to be of similar charm, omitted in order to produce the solution.

(definitions are underlined)

There are usually one or two points of interest in an Azed puzzle, and here we pick them out for comment. Please feel free to add your own questions or observations on any aspect of the puzzle (including clues not listed below) either by using the comment form at the bottom of the page or, if would prefer that your question/comment is not publicly visible, by email.

Azed 2,679 ‘Right and Left’

Difficulty rating: (3.5 / 10)

This week we have a non-competition ‘special’, probably one of the most straightforward of Azed’s variations to deal with (he ‘inherited’ the format from Ximenes, who introduced it in the 1940s). The key is to focus on the twelve-letter entry across the top, as without this you cannot enter any solutions into the grid; bear in mind that it invariably has some connection to the forma of the puzzle – in recent times we’ve had DOUBLE-DEALER, DOUBLE-FORMED and HITHER AND YON – and the definition usually makes reference to that fact, eg “Greetings to those who are excited about how remaining clue answers are distributed?” for the last of these. Having entered that solution, you then have the initial letters of both the solutions for the first five down clues, so if you can solve either half of one of these clues there’s every chance that the answer will only fit in one half of the grid, so you can confidently write it in and move on from there. The second challenge that solvers face is progressing from the top half of the grid to the bottom, as only the four eight-letter entries protrude from one half into the other – I’ve provided hints on the relevant clues.

It’s an interesting variation on the standard puzzle, the only difference being that all but one of the clues are presented as pairs. It made for an enjoyable solve, the clues being generally very friendly, although there were a few mildly jarring repetitions (‘alongside’, ‘the French’). I have provided notes on selected clues, below which I have put a checklist of where the breaks in the clues come.

Setters’ Corner: This week I’m going to look at clue 13d, “Woman boarding coach for plane parking exactly on the hour may have featured in dance? (6, 6)”. The wordplay for the second part of the clue has the usual abbreviation for ‘parking’ being followed by a (2,3) phrase which one might associate with ITV’s late evening news programme, complete with bongs, but the point of interest is the definition, ‘may have featured in dance?’. This would appear to define the past tense of a verb, but in fact the answer is a noun. This is in line with Azed’s own ‘rules’, made clear in a slip from 1979:

I’ve said before that an adjective is an inaccurate (because unfairly misleading) way of indicating a noun (and vice versa of course). I do accept however that a verb (in the appropriate person) can indicate a noun. ‘Barks and is man’s best friend’ defines DOG far more clearly than, say, ‘Furry and domesticated’.

I’m not entirely convinced, and I think the definition here is a lot less explicit than the example Azed gives above, but had such indications been disallowed we would have been deprived of JPH Hirst’s classic clue for VINEGAR (AZ 27), “Given unconventionally for Jack’s head”.

Across

1a What’s going on here? Low dive put on enterprise (but without ad) (12, 2 words)
As I mentioned, the one normal clue always has a link to the nature of the puzzle, and so it proves here. The wordplay has a five-letter word for a ‘low dive’ being followed by a nine-letter word for an enterprise, from which the consecutive letters AD have been removed (‘but without ad’).

11a Chap to glug sauce, wine from pubs, cases turned over (6, 6)
The three-letter ‘chap’, who might well be a jazz fan (perhaps of the ‘hep’ variety), is followed by a three-letter word meaning ‘to drink’. The second subclue has a word for ‘pubs’ being followed by a reversal (‘turned over’) of the usual abbreviation for ‘cases’.

15a The French backs in control making their (narrow) way, confusion fills crowd, hoarse, round Murrayfield? (6, 6)
In part one, a French word for ‘the’ is reversed (‘backs’) into a word for ‘control’. Then a two-letter word for confusion, a regular visitor to crosswords as well as being a Greek letter, is put inside (‘fills’) a word for a tumultuous crowd or the sort of defeat England’s cricketers suffered at the hands (or should I say bats?) of South Africa. The solution is a Scottish word, hence the ’round Murrayfield?’.

18a Those driving e.g. tumbril for tragic heroine the French held loved, one in business? (6, 6)
In the past Azed has indicated the first answer by ‘RAC?’ or the like; here it is the plural of an archaic (implied by the archaic ‘tumbril’, a military cart) word which provides the name of the ‘heroine’ who was, frankly, a bit of a schemer. The second wordplay needs to be interpreted as ‘the French held by loved’ (ie with a comma between ‘held’ and ‘loved’).

Down

1d Swamp dweller from a bog in Jamaica cowers trembling, put into computer system, encoded (6, 6)
In the first part of this clue, the letter A (from the clue) and a word for a bog in the ‘bogs and basins’ sense are inserted into the IVR code for Jamaica.

2d Very cruel, not old, brandished an iron chopper, with old father on scent (8, 8)
Initially, a two-letter, obsolete form of the word ‘not’ (‘not old’) is followed by an anagram (‘brandished’) of AN IRON. The second part of the clue could be interpreted in two ways – it starts with the usual single-letter abbreviation for ‘old’ and a three-letter informal word for ‘father’ (or a fizzy drink) and ends with a two-letter word meaning ‘chopper’. The fifth and sixth letters could either be the indefinite article (so the chopper is AN ??, and has the old father on top) or an obsolete form of ‘on’ (so the chopper is with the ‘old father on’). For the former it really should be ‘a chopper’ (but that wouldn’t work in the surface reading), and for the latter it ought to be ‘once on’ or the like – since Azed could easily have worked this into the clue, I am confident that the intended reading is the first one.

5d Wise maybe at length, having time with high flyers, in part gives selectively for plate (6, 6)
The ‘with’ in the first part of this clue is used (as would be required by 2d-II if the second interpretation is chosen) to indicate that the usual abbreviation for ‘time’ follows the five-letter ‘flyers’ (large birds also known as fish eagles). The ‘at length’ indicates that the answer is the full version of a diminutive name associated with a famous person of like stature.

9d Marsh plant, albeit wild in south-east, churned up with olives in rainy month (8, 8)
A pair of anagrams here – the first (‘wild’) of ALBEIT, contained by the standard abbreviation for ‘south-east’, the second (‘churned’) of UP and OLIVES.

11d One that’s conscientious with car’s dodging fox, wounding part of gate underside (6, 6)
The abbreviated form of ‘conscientious objector’ is followed by an anagram (‘dodging’) of CARS. A three-letter part of a gate (there are often five of them) then precedes a word for an underside or bottom.

12d Treat for budgie, see, almost given fly without limit in large tree or ericaceous shrub (6, 6)
Probably the trickiest clue of the lot. The word SEE (from the clue) without its last letter (‘almost’) is followed by the name of ‘a small but very troublesome Brazilian biting fly’ (a samba-loving version of the midge, I assume), while a three-letter word meaning ‘without limit’ or ‘completely’ is contained by the name of a large northern Indian tree.

(definitions are underlined)

Breaks in clues occur at:

Across

6: river/rock; 7: cabbage/inclined; 8: varied/eggs; 10: innings/can; 11: sauce/wine; 15: way/confusion; 16: Siam/carriage; 17: shifting/artist; 18: heroine/the.

Down

1: Jamaica/cowers; 2: iron/chopper; 3: clip/I; 4: church/free; 5: flyers/in; 9: south-east/churned; 11: fox/wounding; 12: fly/without; 13: plane/parking; 14: US/check.