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 2,691 Plain

Difficulty rating: (3 / 5)

An entertaining puzzle, but not a simple one. The number of clues which I picked out as being worthy of comment was well above average (I have not included them all below, so do ask if there are any others which you would like me to expand on), so I reckon that the difficulty is definitely a little past the halfway mark. 

Setters’ Corner: This week I’m going to look at clue 27d, “Drunk, having imbibed gallon, sky high (5)”. The usual abbreviation for ‘gallon’ is contained by a four-letter adjective meaning ‘intoxicated’ derived directly from the familiar word for a grape-based alcoholic beverage; the answer means ‘lofty’. So all good. Except that the required sense of the aforementioned adjective is shown by Chambers as ‘obsolete’. Convention (and fairness to solvers) demands that obsolete and archaic words, whether answers or elements of wordplay, are flagged as such – in 28a, 32a, 2d, 3d, 7d and 16d Azed has done exactly that, using qualifiers such as ‘old’ and ‘no longer’. Although it means adding a word or two into a clue, it’s important that obsolete and archaic terms are signposted – beyond the obvious adjectives and adverbs like ‘old’ and ‘once’, there are plenty of others to choose from, such as ‘discarded’, ‘dated’ or ‘forgotten’. Here Azed could have written ‘Dead drunk, having imbibed gallon, sky high’.

Across

11a Cluster of cells, type wherein time’s passed, American (5)
A four-letter word for a ‘type’ which has been deprived of the usual abbreviation for ‘time’ (ie “wherein time’s passed”) is followed by a two-letter abbreviation for a country which is often used attributively.

14a Fine wastage? (5)
A very brief &lit, though not as succinct as TE Sanders’ clue for PADDY-WHACK in Azed comp 221, “Ire-lander?’. Here the usual abbreviation for ‘fine’ is followed by a word meaning ‘wastage’, the entire clue (including the question mark) being a pretty fair indication of the answer.

19a Fair component of some resins, not mine (4)
An eight-letter word for a component of certain resins, which immediately brings to my mind the tops of kitchen tables, has the consecutive letters MINE removed (‘not mine’).

25a A wee bittie whiskey imbibed by soak? (4)
The spelling of ‘whiskey’ makes it clear that it is the letter which it represents in the NATO phonetic alphabet that must be placed inside (‘imbibed by’) a word meaning ‘soak’ – not (on this occasion) SOT, but a word meaning ‘to soak’ or ‘to steep in alcohol’. This is more commonly seen as a noun having the sense of ‘a propitiatory gift or concession’, originally a drugged cake given by Aeneas to Cerberus and nowadays frequently, and figuratively, offered to someone’s vanity.

28a An old field having parts switched for hunt? (6)
A (1,5) phrase equating to ‘a field’ (the term being ‘archaic or poetic”, hence the ‘old’) has its last two letters exchanged with its first four, producing a word which relates to hunting using a particular breed of animal.

30a Mountain plant, strangely pleasing, one picked out (7)
The letter to be removed from PLEASING prior to rearrangement (‘strangely’) is not the Roman numeral representing ‘one’ but the single-letter word with that meaning.

32a Scots engineer, no longer vigorous in energy (7)
The key element of the wordplay is a four-letter word which formerly meant ‘vigorous’ but now is usually seen in the sense of ‘out-and-out’ or ‘absolute’, and often applied to an outsider in a horse race. It is followed by IN (from the clue) and the usual abbreviation for ‘energy’. The engineer’s presence in Chambers is down to his absolute scale of temperature, similar to the Kelvin scale but using Fahrenheit rather than Celsius units (so absolute zero is 0ºR and the boiling point of water 671.64ºR) – it is apparently still used in engineering systems where calculations are done in Fahrenheit.

34a Butterfly? It’s thrown out in air gusts (5)
AIR GUSTS has the non-consecutive letters ITS discarded (‘thrown out’) to produce an answer which some may think of first and foremost as a butterfly, a vigilant Greek whose eyes (post mortem) were transferred to the tail of the peacock,  or a Wishbone Ash album.

Down

2d Amateur in grip of old pro, substantial? (5)
The usual abbreviation for ‘amateur’ is in the grip of one of the many terms dating back to the 17th century for a fille de joie, now confined to the sense of the girlfriend of a criminal or the unmarried female companion of a professional thief. Despite my training in chemistry (or perhaps because of it), the answer here seems impossible to define succinctly, so I exclude it from my own crosswords; I think Azed has made a good stab at it.

3d Dad’s enveloped by homily as of old, gassy stuff (7)
A two-letter word for ‘dad’ is contained (‘enveloped’) by an obsolete word for ‘a place in a church where intimations are given out; hence, a homily’, which shares its spelling with a word that means ‘lying face down’. Those who have watched King of the Hill will be familiar with the ‘gassy stuff’.

5d Ribs? Huge, emerging from college shortly (4)
An eight-letter word meaning ‘huge’ has the four-letter abbreviation (‘shortly’) for ‘college’ stripped from it. The question mark forms part of the definition, because not all of the things indicated by the answer are ribs and it is therefore a definition by example.

8d Roman magistrate? See special one in seat (5)
If the standard abbreviation for ‘special’ is prefixed to the answer, the result is a word for a seat, typically one of three, either movable or recessed in the wall and crowned with canopies, pinnacles, and other enrichments, usually placed on the south side of the choir near the altar for use by the clergy. The singular form is uncommon, and appears under the entry for the plural.

16d Rodent fancying sweet bulbs in quantity – once worth trapping it (9)
A four-letter word meaning ‘[a] quantity’ has a word with an obsolete meaning of ‘worth’ (more familiar, I suspect, as a unit of weight used for gems) containing (‘trapping’) it. The solution is hyphenated, 6-3.

22d Chant involving consecutive trio like wind among the leaves? (7)
A four-letter word meaning ‘[to] sing’ containing (‘involving’) a sequence of three consecutive letters of the alphabet produces a word which describes something the wind does, although a similar word with OU replacing I is perhaps even more evocative in that respect.

24d Fashionable number turned up in this cut? (6)
The two-letter abbreviation for ‘number’ is reversed (‘turned up’) in an anagram (‘cut’) of THIS. The validity of ‘cut’ as an anagram indicator is perhaps open to question.

29d Subject I sat in e.g. poly, missing pass at first (5)
The letter I (from the clue) is positioned (‘sat’) in a seven-letter word for a place of higher education (‘e.g. poly’) deprived of a three-letter word for a pass at the start (‘missing pass at first’).

31d Painful swelling making one miss work in career (4)
The somewhat convoluted wordplay here involves a six-letter word meaning ‘to move very fast’ (ie ‘career’) having the usual two-letter abbreviation of the Latin word for ‘work’ removed.

(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 2,690 Plain

Difficulty rating: (3 / 5)

Although not explicitly stated in the title, this is a competition puzzle, confirmed by the presence of an asterisked clue and the (correct) instructions for entrants. It certainly wasn’t an easy one, and there were a couple of clues which I felt were slightly less than satisfactory.  There’s an enumeration error at 35a, which should be ‘(7, 2 words)’.

Clue Writers’ Corner: It’s not too often that Azed chooses a competition clue word which describes a person with a particular skill or interest, and when he does it presents competitors with a wealth of potential definitions which go well beyond anything found in a dictionary. This in turn inevitably means that many entrants will be aiming for &lit clues (such as 35a in the current puzzle), where the whole clue serves as both the wordplay and the definition. A brilliant &lit (eg Colin Dexter’s clue for MAGIC LANTERN in comp 1,648 – ‘Item gran arranged family slides in’) is likely to beat anything, but an &lit as good as that is extremely rare, and a good conventional definition + wordplay clue will do better than an unconvincing &lit. Another way of getting the judge’s attention is through an eye-catching definition, supported of course by a sound wordplay which completes a compelling story. If you have a look at the clue list for comp 1,641 (GADGETEER) you will see what I mean. The current word is one which also lends itself to ‘name-dropping’ definitions (eg ‘Aloysius does something for me’ for ARCTOPHILE) – the best example I can find is comp 1,814, which is almost too good an example, in that the word to be clued was very close to the current target, but it does illustrate my point well.

Across

4a Paper-making machine enveloping craftsman’s head in choking dust (7)
One of those ‘definition doing stuff in wordplay’ clues, here the first letter (‘head’) of CRAFTSMAN is contained by a six-letter word for choking dust or, more commonly nowadays, fuss.

13a Chinese house (in Sydney?) creating a stink beside magnolia cham removed (7)
In this wordplay, ‘A beside B’ equates to ‘A following B’, so a seven-letter word for an East Indian tree of the magnolia family with the consecutive letters CHAM omitted (‘cham removed’) precedes the letter A (from the clue) and a word for…well, something that might not smell too good, but is considerably more tangible than a ‘stink’.

16a Servile rustic to call up beforehand? (7)
The wordplay is a whimsical second definition, a (3-4) combination which could conceivably mean ‘to call up (on the telephone) beforehand’.

17a Piece of Venetian glass showing Latin citation, translated (9)
Nothing too complicated about this clue, an anagram (‘translated’) of the usual abbreviation for ‘Latin’ plus CITATION, but I was much taken by the answer, which I confidently expect to see any day now on the list of hybrid coffees available in our local Costa.

22a Unattractive expression one pulled? (4)
As Shania would say, this one don’t impress me much. A seven-letter ‘expression’ (there are many expressions, but the one here is ‘a distortion of the face, in fun, disgust, etc’) has a three-letter word often indicated in crosswords by ‘one’ removed in order to produce the answer.

25a Dodge, mostly half-hearted, taking king in (4)
A familiar eight-letter word for ‘half-hearted’ (often used to describe the reception received by something that isn’t particularly impressive) also exists in a four-letter form which Chambers shows as ‘dialect’. This latter form is deprived of its last letter (‘mostly’) before ‘taking in’ the monarchical abbreviation for ‘king’.

26a Singers rarely get beyond these shrines (5)
Not my area of expertise by any means, but I understand that true sopranos can reach the notes suggested by the answer here, while no-one else is going to get there without outside assistance and considerable discomfort.

29a Those working in capitals maybe give power to muscle? About right (9)
A three-letter word meaning ‘give [the] power to’ (or ‘allow’) is followed by a five-letter muscle (one of two in the shoulder blade) containing the usual abbreviation for ‘right’ (‘about right’). There’s no reason to believe that these people are working solely in capitals, and they might not be using them at all, so the ‘maybe’ is entirely appropriate.

33a Alas, having to miss final piece in such as the Albert Hall? (4)
There’s a familiar (2,4) expression (given by Chambers) which means ‘alas’, but I’m distinctly dubious about the validity of the (1,4) version which must lose its final letter (‘having to miss final piece’).

35a Runny organ’s bunged by one ultimately? (7)
An &lit, where the whole thing is both the wordplay – an anagram (‘runny’) of ORGANS containing (‘bunged by’) the last letter (‘ultimately’) of ONE – and a definition of the answer. Note that for &lit clues there is a general acceptance that the ‘definition’ can be somewhat looser than in conventional clues, much more along the lines of an indication of the answer, and there can be words (such as ‘ultimately’ here) which are required for the wordplay but not the definition, as long as they contribute to the latter in a broadly positive way. The solution is actually two words, (4,3).

Down

1d Dad called up boor, cheerful, for what’s afflicting orchard? (11)
A reversal (‘called up’) of a two-letter ‘childish or familiar’ word for a father, a four-letter ‘boor’, and a five-letter word meaning ‘cheerful’ combine to produce the (5-6) solution

2d Tailless lizard, variable length (4)
If you don’t know the lizard or the linear measure known as a ‘Spanish yard’ (usually around 33 inches, but probably depends whether you’re buying or selling), then a trawl through Chambers is likely to be required. Should you be using the paper version, I would advise starting the search at V.

3d Special girl? Bob may be attached to one in the US (5)
The usual abbreviation for ‘special’ is followed by the name of a girl that you might associate with a small insectivorous mammal. Bob ‘may be attached’ to the answer in the sense that Chambers has an entry for BOB ????? which is shown as ‘N Am‘.

5d Love film including shot of snake-worshippers (7)
The letter that often represents ‘love’ in crosswords is followed by a three-letter informal word that would generally be understood these days to refer to a photograph, but can also refer to a film (Esquire 1936: “Raft’s next ??? is Proud Rider“), containing a three-letter word for a shot, in particular a successful one. 

6d Floor lamp? Here goes – it’s made of twisted metal (4)
An eight-letter ornamental lampstand has the consecutive letters HERE omitted (‘here goes’).

7d Managing with old mirror that’s skew (11)
The quick way to solve this one is to look up skew² in Chambers; the wordplay has a six-letter word for ‘managing’ combining with a somewhat surprising five-letter Shakespearean word for a mirror – as Lear says:

Lend me a looking glass;
If that her breath will mist or stain the ?????,
Why, then she lives.

9d Further attempt to clear up that’s over (4)
I have never liked ‘has’ as a juxtaposition indicator, and I can’t see me warming to it any time soon. Here we have a three-letter word (a crossword regular) meaning ‘to clear up’ that is followed by (“that’s”, ie ‘that has’) the usual cricketing abbreviation for ‘over’.

19d Ne’er-do-well that is confined to jug having gone after Virginia (7)
The two-letter abbreviation of the Latin for ‘that is’ is contained by a three-letter ‘jug’ (or a container that could hold a lot of tea), the combination following the two-letter abbreviation for ‘Virginia’.

27d Trump’s last East will have to provide taking partner’s last lowish trump (5)
The last letter of TRUMP (“Trump’s last”) is followed by the usual abbreviation for ‘East’ and a two-letter word meaning ‘to provide’ containing (‘taking’) the last letter of PARTNER (“Partner’s last”), representing a convoluted route to the name given to the five of trumps in a number of American card games such as Cinch. The entry for the answer in Chambers is a stub which refers to another entry.

28d Here is dry in Rome without sun overhead (4)
The five-letter Italian word for ‘dry’ (which is given by Chambers without qualification, so could in isolation have been indicated just by ‘dry’) loses the usual abbreviation for ‘sun’ at its start (‘without sun overhead’) to produce an interjection meaning ‘see’ or ‘here is’ which Chambers does show as being Italian, hence the ‘in Rome’ is needed and applies to everything that precedes it in the clue.

30d Pawn, raising swag (4)
There’s no ambiguity here – ‘raise’ is a transitive-only verb, so it must be the ‘swag’ which is going upwards, but just as in 4a I don’t like the answer being the subject of the verb in the wordplay.

(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 2,689 Plain

Difficulty rating: (3 / 5)

No spoonerisms to deal with this week, but that wasn’t to say that this was a straightforward ‘plain’. There was a relatively low proportion of ‘gimmes’, quite a few unfamiliar words, and some neatly oblique definitions to deal with. As I solved the puzzle I identified an unusually large number of clues as being potentially worthy of comment, which generally suggests a puzzle of significantly above average difficulty. But having understated the difficulty last week, perhaps I am just ‘levelling up’…

Note that the closing date for the Christmas comp has (I understand) been corrected to Monday 8 January, so there is still plenty of time to get your entries in.

Setters’ Corner: This week I’m going to look at clue 19d, “Jellyfish that is core of jelly quivering in luminous glow (7)”. The luminous glow is an AURA, but what’s going on inside it? It’s an anagram (‘quivering’) of IE (‘that is’) and the middle letter (‘core’) of JELLY. But (I hear you say) surely that’s an indirect anagram – the fodder for an anagram should be on view within the clue, and that ‘IE’ certainly isn’t. Well, Azed isn’t averse to including single-letter abbreviations in anagrams (something like ‘new and old’ for DONA, anagram of AND + O), but I think this is a bit of a stretch. At one time indirect anagrams were common in cryptic crosswords, and a clue along the lines of ‘Be detestable abroad’ for LIVE (anagram of VILE) would have raised few eyebrows. This sort of clue began to disappear in the 1970s and has been outlawed for many years. However, a certain level of indirection in anagrams is generally tolerated. I think that in a clue like ‘Couples from capital of France confused’ for PAIRS, the ‘capital of France’ could only be PARIS or something to do with euros/francs, so it just about gets through. And the jellyfish clue? Let’s just say I wouldn’t have been happy with it myself.

Across

5a Monoxide of a kind? Charm incorporates reverse of it (8)
The sort of charm that might adorn the bonnet of a classic car contains (‘incorporates’) a reversal of the letters IT (from the clue). 

11a Blow received in ruck? That’ll be a buckeroo (10)
A familiar five-letter word for a blow is contained by (‘received in’) another familiar five-letter word, but (like me) you may well need to consult Chambers to identify it, as what we have here is not ruck¹, nor even ² or ³, but ruck ⁴. The Chambers definition of ‘buckeroo’ offers an alternative which Azed could have used here, but didn’t for obvious reasons.

16a Plug giving tip after show’s opening (7)
There are several sorts of ‘tip’ to choose from when it comes to finding the six-letter word to follow the first letter of SHOW (“show’s opening”), but the type that is required relates to the verb meaning ‘to tilt’. The solution is given by Chambers as ‘rare’, so I’m surprised that Azed didn’t write “Plug rarely giving…”.

18a Prat abandoning European supporters of home rule (4)
A five-letter medical/anatomical term for the derrière now exposed only in crosswords is deprived of (‘abandoning’) the usual abbreviation for ‘European’.

22a Was stuffing left out? Very disappointed (6)
A seven- letter word meaning ‘was stuffing’ or ‘gorged’ has the usual abbreviation for ‘left’ omitted (‘out’).

26a Clownish slap we stand up to, absorbing blow (9)
A (2,4) phrase meaning ‘we stand up to’ containing (‘absorbing’) a three-letter word for a blow produces the answer, the definition of which originally (as Azed intended) fooled me good and proper. The ‘slap’ of course has nothing to do with physical violence and everything to do with altered appearance.

29a Scaly eels wriggling round loose fish? (7)
An anagram (‘wriggling’) of EELS contains a three-letter word for a ‘loose fish’, one of many terms used to describe a member of Mrs Warren’s erstwhile profession.

31a Number one dictionary (shorter), an evergreen (4)
The Roman numeral representing ‘one’ is followed by the abbreviation (‘shorter’) for a term describing ‘a wordbook or dictionary’.

33a Whirlwind outing with notification of what’s owed in advance (10)
There might look to be some manipulation going on here, but in fact the wordplay is a 4+4+2 charade of the outing, the notification, and a word which includes ‘in advance’ among its many meanings.

35a Nursery favourite losing half of stuffing, tiresome for Walter (4)
The ‘nursery favourite’ is losing one of a pair of identical letters in its ‘stuffing’ in order to produce Sir Walter Scott’s word for ‘tiresome’.

Down

3d Young girl holding knot of ribbon up, cheap in US (6)
A ‘derogatory’ term for a young girl or woman contains (‘holding’) a reversal (‘up’) of a very familiar word, the indication of which blind-sided me by its phrasing. The answer is hyphenated, 3-3.

4d Mine prop right inside passages seen from below (5)
The usual abbreviation for ‘right’ is contained by (‘inside’) a reversal (‘seen from below’) of a word for the sort of passages that you need to mind when travelling underground.

6d Duck when catching book? This may detect visual defects (10)
The six-letter name of a type of sea duck contains (‘catching’) a word for a book, particularly a large and weighty one. The instrument which results might sound as though it could be used to test the extent of someone’s Caledonian pedigree, but it probably can’t.

8d Old nag having short run within grasp no longer (6)
One of those clues where a wordplay containing an obscurity leads to an obscure answer. A five-letter word for a horse, now given by Chambers as ‘obsolete’ (hence the ‘old’), contains the usual cricketing abbreviation for ‘run’, producing an obsolete (‘no longer’) variant of a familiar seven-letter word meaning ‘to grasp’ or ‘to wrestle mentally (with)’, which apart from the first letter it resembles closely.

9d With respect to fee paid, pound included not connected (7)
A two-letter word meaning (among many other things) ‘with respect to’ is followed by a four-letter word for a fee paid, or a monetary penalty, into which the single-letter representation of a pound sterling has been inserted (‘included’).

13d House plant, large: one sags from below, stair disturbed (10)
A single-letter word for ‘one’, a reversal (‘from below’) of a four-letter word meaning ‘sags’, and an anagram (‘disturbed’) of STAIR combine to produce something of which Gracie Fields had an extraordinarily large example.

21d Countryman’s bird? Do please let it out (7)
The wordplay leads to a (1,4,2) phrase equating to ‘Do please let it out’. The sort of bird in question (which I don’t remember encountering previously) is hyphenated 4-3 and takes its name from the shape of its nest, and is thankfully not something that the Cratchit family had at Christmas.

27d Routine, broad imposition (5)
The two-letter word which starts this 2+3 charade is shown by Chambers as ‘US slang’, but the relevant definition is itself given as ‘N Am offensive slang’, which is why Azed has not felt the need to indicate the Americanism. The imposition may not be familiar – it is a contraction of a six-letter word which at this time of year is often associated with ‘Bah!’. The solution is hyphenated, 2-3.

28d University initially limited in money, providing unacceptable service? (5)
The usual abbreviation for ‘university’ and the first letter (‘initially’) of LIMITED are contained by one of many slang terms for ‘money’, this one being the sort that might adjectivally be applied to a wealthy ‘cat’. The definition refers to the kind of service which would be unacceptable if delivered by Andy Murray.

(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 2,688 ‘A Cool Yomp’

Difficulty rating: (6 / 10)

First and foremost, may I take this opportunity to wish all readers a very happy Christmas indeed.

The closing date for competition entries has, I understand, been corrected – it is now Monday 8 January.

This year we have a Spoonerisms puzzle for our Christmas special – a first time for me as a solver, since the last one was back in 2006. The hardest things with these puzzles are (i) getting your head round how the two different clue types work, and (ii) dealing with the occasional oddity (see below). For the type ‘A’ clues, always remember to write in the answer (which will normally have no definition), not the spoonerized version. For the avoidance of clarity (as a lawyer I used to work with was fond of saying), a ‘type A’ clue is one like this:

Sailor pub crawl to wind up in exchange deal (9) – BARTENDER [END in BARTER, ‘tar bender’, defined words spoonerized)

while a ‘type B’ is like this:

Eat up messily what could be made of shoal (5) – TAUPE [anagram of EAT UP, ‘what could be shade of mole’, words in definition spoonerized)

Generally, the spoonerisms are consonantal and involve only two words, but occasionally they can be vocalic (eg 27a) or involve more than two words (eg 30a) – these exceptions can be hard to spot and therefore to solve. 34a (see comment below from MuchPuzzled) is a particularly awkward customer, requiring only two vocalizations of the same vowel to be exchanged. A little bit of creativity in pronunciation will be required every so often. And just sometimes the ‘subsidiary indication’ in a type A clue can simply be a definition of the answer (eg 10a).

The wordplays (subsidiary indications) always lead to the answer to be entered in the grid.

The way to approach the clues is to look at whether there is anything on view that can readily be spoonerized (and probably looks a little unusual) – so in “Jean’s to mock such as Dixie going topless”, we can be pretty sure that “Jean’s to mock” will translate to “Means to Jock” (ie a Scots word for ‘means’), and we have a type B. If we can’t find anything spoonerizable in the clue, then it’s going to be a type A.

The difficulty of this type of puzzle depends very much, I think, on how familiar you are with the genre and how twisted your mind is – so I don’t find them too hard! The last Spoonerisms puzzle was 2,551 and got  a rating of 5/10, which attracted no dissenting views; it is clear from comments received, both on the blog and by email, that the quirks of this one made it significantly harder. I have therefore given it a revised rating of 6/10, which puts it up there with the very trickiest ‘specials’.

After the notes on a few individual clues, I have included a checklist of clues by their type. I will be happy to provide hints for any clues not listed below.

Clue Writers’ Corner: Competitions of this type invariably result in some clues being submitted which are of the wrong type and will therefore stand no chance of success. For Spoonerisms puzzles, Azed always requires a type B clue. Let’s assume that the word to be clued was DASHER. What is needed is a spoonerized definition of the answer, and a wordplay which leads to the answer. So our real definition could be ‘One scooting about’, the spoonerized version being ‘One booting a scout’ (pretty good, huh?), with the associated wordplay ‘has red curls’ (anagram of HAS RED). The full clue is ‘One booting a scout has red curls’. Not likely to garner any laurels, I grant you, but it does satisfy the brief. Note that, as in this example, the treated words do not have to be consecutive in the clue, and other words (here the ‘a’) can also get involved.

The key to a good spoonerism clue is coming up with an original definition. It doesn’t have to be succinct or show pinpoint accuracy – if you look at the published clues for that 2006 comp, you will see the sort of thing that is likely to do well. For a Christmas competition, I would normally say that seasonally-themed clues had a much higher chance of success than non-seasonal ones, but getting a festive feel into a spoonerism clue is not easy, and you will notice that there are a lot of clues in the 2006 list which have no such flavour – note also, though, that the winner does include a reference to Christmas.

Across

1a Fool again reverse of ready, flaw shown outwardly (8, 2 words)
We start with a type A, wherein a four-letter ‘abusive slang’ word for a fool (or a non-abusive slang term for the derrière) and a four-letter adverb meaning ‘again’ or ‘in return’ exchange their heads to provide the (4,4) answer, while in the wordplay a reversal of a three-letter word meaning ‘ready’ or ‘liable’ is contained by (ie ‘shown outwardly’) a five-letter term for a flaw in cloth. Given that Chambers gives the answer as both a two-word noun and a single-word adjective, it wasn’t actually necessary for Azed to show it as ‘2 words’.

12a What makes painting work, looking back? Base place for mail (5)
A three-letter type of painting and the usual two-letter abbreviation for ‘opus’ (‘work’) are reversed (looking back) in this type A clue where ‘base’ leads to a three-letter adjective and ‘place for mail’ to the names of the two letters making up a familiar abbreviation which anyone submitting a competition clue will shortly find themselves writing on an envelope.

14a Carver’s list this, often? It may be eaten mixed with last of sauce (4)
The form of this clue makes it look like a type B, but you may need to say the unspoonerized definition to yourself a couple of times before it becomes clear. The wordplay effectively says ‘the answer (‘it’) may produce (‘be’) EATEN [when] anagrammed (‘mixed’) with the last letter of SAUCE.

15a Rock guitar confined? In consequence, cross dad (6)
Can’t be a type B, so the question is which bit is the nefidition? It turns out to be the first part, a three-letter slang term for a rock musician’s guitar and a six-letter word meaning ‘confined’. The wordplay has a single letter indicated by ‘cross’ and a two-letter word for ‘dad’ contained by a three-letter consequence.

29a Get low nasty shock (4)
It’s tempting to think this might be a type A, but it’s a B. The ‘subsidiary indication’ here is just a straight definition of the entry (Chambers: ‘an unpleasant surprise’).

30a Any mage is acceptable in the main, making comeback (5)
In this type B clue, the spoonerism actively involves three words, while in the wordplay a two-letter word meaning (among many other things) ‘acceptable’ is contained by a reversal (‘making a comeback’) of the sort of ‘main’ that often appears in cryptic crosswords and tales of Sir Francis Drake.

34a Seizure of goods? Crown meant rap somehow (8, 2 words)
A type A where getting the (4,4) answer is easier than finding the nefidition, which involves an old legal  word of either three or four letters meaning ‘distraint’ and a four-letter word ‘old or humorous’ term for ‘the crown of the head, especially when bald’.

Down

3d Played an alto pipe, obsessive to a fault?
This type A features a vocalic spoonerism, the materials for which are a three-letter word from classical literature for a pipe made from a particular type of straw and an adjective from Freudian psychology applied to adults that have certain personality traits such as obsessiveness and extreme attention to detail.

4d Salt to cut? Portion went wrong mostly (8)
A type A, where the ‘salt’ is the sort that all the nice girls love, and the ‘to cut’ leads to a verb which suggests removing the (thin) outer surface of something. In the wordplay, a four-letter ‘portion’ is followed by a five-letter word meaning ‘went wrong’ from which the last letter has been lost (‘mostly’).

5d Pop tart one nibbles by the sound of it (4)
A readily-identifiable type B, where the wordplay involves one of my bêtes noires, a single-letter word meaning ‘one’ being followed by a three-letter homophone (for a word meaning ‘nibbles’) which is not itself a word.

6d Store rick for the table? Speed’s disposed of it (6)
In this type B, we have an eight-letter word for ‘speed’ from which the consecutive letters IT have been removed (“[has] disposed of it’).

13d Ratlin rope adapted as skin disease bandage (10)
Another type A where working out the nefidition is the trickiest part. The skin disease shares its name (but not its pronunciation) with the sort of thing the milkman (where such is still available) might leave on one’s doorstep, and it gets combined with a term for ‘a long, coiled-up bandage’.

22d Gate for a Mod, pagan? He cut one (6)
Clearly a type B, the pagan has one instance of the letters HE omitted (‘He cut’) and is followed by a single-letter word meaning ‘one’.

25d Francis maybe (or Roger) with rising name has ability as fiddler? (5)
In the wordplay of this type A, the surname of Francis or Roger (and something that I hope to find wrapped round a sausage or two tomorrow) has the usual abbreviation for ‘name’ moved upwards to produced a word, a spoonerism of which is given by a (3,3) phrase.

28d A lost play, T., Wat? (4)
The spoonerized definition in this type B needs to be read as ‘Tee Wat’; the wordplay has a missing comma between ‘lost’ and ‘play’, a five-letter word for a play being deprived of the letter A.

(definitions -ie the non-wordplay parts of each clue – are underlined)

Checklist of types

Across

1: type A (spoonerized entry); 7:type B (spoonerized definition); 10: A; 11: B; 12: A; 14: B; 15: A; 16: normal; 18: A; 20: B; 26: A; 27: B; 29: B; 30: B; 31: A; 32: A; 33: B; 34: A.

Down

1: A; 2: A; 3: A; 4: A; 5: B; 6: B; 7: B; 8: A; 9: B; 13: A; 17: B; 19: A; 21: A; 22: B; 23: B; 24: B; 25: A; 28: B.

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 2,687 Plain

Difficulty rating: (2 / 5)

The last plain puzzle before Christmas struck me as being significantly easier than its recent precursors – there were one or two tricky wordplays, and the long anagrams weren’t trivial, but there were quite a few straightforward clues to more than redress the balance.

Setters’ Corner: This week I’m going to look at clue 22d, “Its webs adorn the garden space bordering one (6)”. The wordplay here has a four-letter word for [a] space containing (‘bordering’)  a two-letter word meaning ‘one’, the definition being ‘Its webs  adorn the garden’. A few weeks ago I was writing a clue for the name of a particular genus – I can’t remember what it was, but let’s say for the sake of argument that it was ‘Rana’, the principal genus of frogs. It prompted me to consider what definitions might be valid, and my conclusion was that ‘group of frogs’ would be fine, ‘frogs’ would probably be ok, and ‘frog’ would definitely not be acceptable – there is no such animal as ‘a rana’. Something like ‘Oryx’ would be a different matter, because not only does Chambers show this as being a genus of antelopes, but also the name for any individual member of this genus. The problem with the answer here is that is only the name of the genus, and therefore I think at the very least this clue should begin with ‘Their webs adorn the garden…’. If the answer had been the similar seven-letter word ending in -id, there would have been no issue.

Across

14a What gives (Malay?) maiden shelter in shower? (5)
Not a spectacular &lit, but a reasonably neat one nonetheless. The cricketing abbreviation for ‘maiden’ is ‘sheltering in’ (ie contained by) a four-letter word for a shower of anything coming from above. The inclusion of ‘Malay?’ certainly clarifies the definition, but at the cost of rendering the wordplay slightly questionable, as the word plays no part in the cryptic reading.

16a Sugar pound short in a helping (6)
A single-letter abbreviation for ‘pound’ (‘pound short’) is contained by A and a word for a helping, usually of the sort of thing that a spoonful of sugar helps to go down.

20a Russia maybe? Not her race (4)
The word involved here that describes a particular sort of material would not normally have a capital letter, but Azed gets over that problem by putting it at the beginning of the clue. The general term for that material (the indication by example being signalled by ‘maybe’) has the consecutive letters HER omitted (‘not her’) to produce a word which is given by Chambers as ‘dialect’ but not flagged as such in the clue.

33a Shell getting good mark after exam (5)
A four-letter word for an exam is followed by the highest grade one can achieve therein, the result being the sort of shell which covers an animal or a seed. The lowest forms in my secondary school were called ‘shells’, followed by the ‘removes’ and the ‘upper middles’, after which the labels became rather more prosaic, but I had never realized that this ‘shell’ was originally named after the apsidal end of the school-room at Westminster School, so called from its conch-like shape. As Lord Chesterfield wrote in a letter to his son,

Observe, therefore, progressively, and with the greatest attention, what the best scholars in the form immediately above you do, and so on, until you get into the shell yourself.

Incidentally, I thought that my favourite Lord C quote, ‘Judgment is not upon all occasions required, but discretion always is’, was from one of those many letters, but it doesn’t seem to be.

35a Force one left disgracefully, caught in immorality (8)
An anagram (‘disgracefully’) of ONE and the usual abbreviation for ‘left’ is contained by (‘caught inside’) the sort of immorality that the police had squads to deal with.

36a Meat a bit off in Maxim’s? (4)
Perhaps not strictly a double definition clue, as the second answer is the French (ie “in Maxim’s [restaurant]?”) word for ‘far away’ or ‘distant’ (‘a bit off’), which since it is not in Chambers could not stand as the sole definition in a definition + wordplay clue.

Down

1d Highland crowd resounded after this is removed (6)
A four-letter word meaning ‘resounded’ goes after the word THIS from which the letters IS have been deleted (‘is removed’).

2d Pair like to get drunk, left in, showing avoidance of moral considerations (11)
For the second week in succession we have a string of words governing a singular verb in the cryptic reading of a clue, as it is PAIR LIKE TO which gets, or as written in the clue, ‘get’ drunk, the usual abbreviation for ‘left’ being inserted into the anagram (‘left in’). I think that the answer is perhaps more along the lines of a policy which takes no account of moral considerations, but it’s a tough word to define succinctly.

6d Sailors leaving navy to get lubricated (5)
The six-letter sailors are relinquishing (‘leaving’, in the way that I might seriously consider leaving my broccoli) the usual abbreviation for ‘navy’, producing a verb which almost certainly ought to be shown by Chambers as ‘obsolete’, but isn’t; the OED doesn’t even give this spelling.

7d Brewery stout I included in main course, not the last (6)
The letter I is included in a six-letter word deprived of its last letter (‘not the last’). Neither the OED nor I think of this word as referring to a main course, rather to something that comes between main courses, but Chambers says that it can be ‘also (esp N Am) a main course’. In The Picture of London (a correct guide to all the curiosities amusements exhibitions in and near London, 1802), John Feltham wrote:

The wholesome and excellent beverage of porter obtained its name about the year 1730 … [formerly] the malt-liquors in general use were ale, beer, and twopenny, and it was customary for the drinkers of malt-liquor to call for a pint or tankard of half-and-half, ie a half of ale and half of beer, a half of ale and half of twopenny, or a half of beer and half of twopenny. In course of time it also became the practice to call for a pint or tankard of three threads, meaning a third of ale, beer, and twopenny; and thus the publican had the trouble to go to three casks, and turn three cocks for a pint of liquor. To avoid this trouble and waste, a brewer, of the name of Harwood, conceived the idea of making a liquor which should partake of the united flavours of ale, beer, and twopenny. He did so and succeeded, calling it ?????? or ?????? butt, meaning that it was drawn entirely from one cask or butt; and as it was a very hearty nourishing liquor, it was very suitable for porters and other working people. Hence it obtained its name of porter.

The accuracy of this account seems highly debatable.

8d With shifting of time alarms minor cast players? (8)
An eight-letter word meaning ‘alarms’ or ‘astounds’ has the usual abbreviation for ‘time’ relocated within it to produce a term for those in the cast who may not be minor in terms of their billing but  are certainly so when it comes to their age.

17d Brassy alloy, ample in coal that’s mined (8)
A four-letter word meaning ‘ample’ or ‘abundantly supplied’ is contained by an anagram (‘mined’, in an explosive sense) of COAL.

24d Old coin (no shilling) that may still be found (6)
A seven-letter word for a Roman bronze coin worth a sixth of an as is shorn of the standard abbreviation for ‘shilling’ (‘no shilling’).

28d Sexiness revealed in article, quite a small part (5)
A two-letter word for sex appeal is contained by (‘revealed in’) the definite article. ‘It’ is that indefinable quality ascribed to certain female film stars, most famously Clara Bow. She starred in the 1927 film “It”, about which Variety said “You can’t get away from this Clara Bow girl. She certainly has that certain ‘It’…and she just runs away with the film”, and became known as ‘The It Girl’. Sadly it was not Clara but a character in Elinor Glyn’s novel ‘It’ that Dorothy Parker was referring to when she wrote in a review “And she had It. It, hell; she had Those”.

30d Small foreign coin? It’s fallen out of tunic (4)
One of those clues where you need to know either the Korean currency unit (and thence coin) or the six-letter loose tunic worn by ancient Greeks from which the consecutive letters IT must be removed, otherwise some checked letters and a dictionary trawl will be required.

34d Measure of cloth, length shown in two ways (3)
I’m not entirely sure that the wordplay quite works, but the idea is that the single letter which constitutes the standard abbreviation for ‘length’ appears as both its name and as itself.

(definitions are underlined)

In the absence of the puzzle on the Guardian website, I uploaded a copy of the scan here.

The notes on the puzzle can be accessed from the home page.

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 2,686 Plain

Difficulty rating: (3.5 / 5)

Those familiar with Azed’s ‘little ways’ are invariably at an advantage when it comes to tackling his puzzles, and rarely more so than today, where among many personal touches we had no less than three clues which included a bonus route to the answer (a ‘spare’ definition or a second wordplay). I thought this was one of his best puzzles of recent times, with a particularly good &lit at 12 down, and many of the clues exuded a sense of fun. Perhaps I was over-infused with the Christmas spirit, but I found nothing in the crossword with which I wanted to take issue. I may perhaps have overstated the difficulty of last week’s puzzle, but this one seemed to be comfortably past the halfway mark on the scale.

Setters’ Corner: This week I’m going to look at clue 5d, “One exercising choice, apt to dither about last of ten (6)”. Nothing difficult about this clue, an anagram (‘dither’) of APT TO containing the last letter of TEN, but the point of interest is the anagram indicator, and in particular its plural form. I cannot accept that a sequence of words without punctuation or conjunction can cryptically govern a plural verb, so here the element would need to be ‘apt to dithers’, which doesn’t work. Azed, however, takes a different view on this matter, In the slip for AZ 2,306, he wrote:

An interesting point was raised by a very experienced campaigner. In my clue to PLIANCY (‘Being flexible I can swim in strand’) should not ‘swim’ be ‘swims’ for the anagram to work cryptically? This took me back to a similar question I put many years ago to Ximenes when the late Eric Chalkley won first prize with this clue to PANTOPHAGIST: ‘What pig has to become when gripped by hunger? (anag. in pant, & lit.). Surely, I asked, it should be ‘becomes’, unless he accepted that as a singular string of words or a plural set of words, in this case three of them, it could govern a singular or a plural verb. He replied (I still have his pencilled note) that yes, he did think either a singular or a plural verb was OK, ever since when I’ve followed his dictum, both in my own clues and in my judgement on those of others. Does anyone hold strong contrary views on this?

Yes – me! When the wordplay requires us to deal with a word or words as simply as sequence of letters, they form a single string. We would say ‘Bass drum is a musical instrument’ but ‘Bass, drum are musical instruments’ or ‘Bass and drum are musical instruments’. I couldn’t bring myself to use the ‘one string/plural verb’ construction in an Azed comp submission, but other competitors should note that he will accept them – if he didn’t, we would have been deprived of Dr Eddie Young’s classic clue for ROUGH-AND-READY (AZ comp 1,775),

A hard tussle with Dr E. Young plainly winning? [anagram of A HARD with DR E YOUNG, but for me ‘tussle’ ought to be ‘tussles’ or ‘tussling’]

Across

1a Mound in burnt remainth revealing Semitic goddess (9)
I wonder if Azed considered using ‘Themitic goddeth’ as the definition? Anyway, a three-letter ‘mound’ or hill is contained by the Violet Elizabeth Bott (“I’ll thcream and thcream until I’m thick”) version of a word meaning ‘burnt remains’.

15a Filler? It provides finishing touch to hotel (5)
One of those clues that looks as though it might be a lot trickier than it is. The letters IT (from the clue) follow (ie provide the finishing touch to) a three-letter word for a hotel, the result being a modern interjection which Chambers says is ‘used as a tag question or as mere oral punctuation’.

17a Collaborative Scottish church group producing short prayers (4)
The collaborative church group provides us with a four-letter acronym (the first letter representing ‘Action’) which is also a familiar English word here indicated by one of its less-than-familiar meanings.

19a Senior diplomat from China welcomed by Robert maybe? (6)
I like this one. A two-letter abbreviation for ‘China’ is contained by the middle initial and surname of the Robert, confederate general and ‘Monarch of the Mississippi’, that Al Jolson, among others, was waiting for.

20a Clerk to tease, made to fill small Italian register (11)
A three-letter slang word meaning ‘to tease’ (or to go bad) is ‘made to fill’ (ie put inside) the Italian word for ‘little’ (‘small Italian’) and a four-letter word for a register.

30a Ruler recalling wrongdoing, not the first (look in the mirror) (4)
Two wordplays for the price of one here, a five-letter word for a wrongdoing losing its initial letter (‘not the first’) and being reversed (‘recalling’), with a separate ‘hidden’ following in parentheses. I said at the start that there was nothing in the puzzle with which I wanted to take issue, but on another day I would look more closely at that ‘recalling’ and ask why Azed hadn’t opted for ‘recalled’.

34a Half sin? More than half – they’re humdingers (5)
The first two letters of a four-letter sin of the deadly variety (‘Half sin’) is followed by the first three letters of the same sin (‘More than half’) in a neat little clue.

35a Canting character chronicled, first to talk? (6)
The character here was ‘chronicled’ by CS Lewis together with the witch and the wardrobe; his name is followed by the first letter of TALK.

Down

2d Sons to select fish basket for small rowing boat (5)
The usual abbreviation for sons is followed a four-letter word meaning ‘to select’ and two discrete definitions. That ‘for’ between them concerns me slightly, but I’ll let it pass.

3d Downcast, no good going off for alfresco nosh (5)
A seven-letter word which you might not immediately think of as meaning ‘downcast’, but has that meaning explicitly ascribed to it by Chambers (example from Browning: “Have you noticed, now, Your cullion’s ??????? face?”), is deprived of the two-letter abbreviation for ‘no good’ (‘no good going off’).

6d Vegetarian dish with frills unlimited, including an armadillo! (11)
A word that may put those of a certain age in mind of Manuel’s ‘filigree Siberian hamster’ (“Only one in shop. He make special price: only five pound”) is produced by depriving a seven-letter word meaning ‘with frills’ of its first and last letters (‘endless’) and putting it outside the letter A plus a five-letter name for an armadillo. Whether the dish in question would be more acceptable with armadillo or a lot of Basil in is a matter for debate.

7d French painter losing head? It often ends in a turn (6)
The French painter who must lose the U which constitutes his head (first letter) is Maurice,  a twentieth century artist of the School of Paris whose speciality was cityscapes. The son of the artist Suzanne Valadon, he took his surname at the age of eight from a Spanish artist who signed a legal document acknowledging paternity, but there has been considerable speculation about his true pedigree, with various artists, including Pierre-Auguste Renoir, thought to be in the frame. The definition of the answer makes sense in the context of its Chambers entry.

8d Family feature apparent in crook’s young offspring? (7)
A charade of a three-letter word for ‘family’ and a four-letter feature of the facial variety leads to a word for a child which (according to OED) started out as a term used by 16th century tramps, then passed into more general use, and was then used by convicts. In Oliver Twist, Dickens wrote:

“The ???????s, my dear,” said Fagin, “is the young children that’s sent on errands by their mothers.”

12d Mass out of the way, I cater for men in mess? (11)
The best &lit I can remember Azed coming up with for many a moon. An anagram (‘in mess’) of I CATER FOR MEN without the usual abbreviation for ‘mass’ (ie ‘mass out of the way’) produces a word which is very neatly indicated by the clue in its entirety.

23d Ring in NZ trees covered with cracks (6)
The letter which takes the form of a ring is contained by the plural of the name given to a particular coniferous tree found in New Zealand.

24d Melodious Italian poet of yesteryear, not tense inside (6)
We have to go back to 1474 to find the birth of Ludovico, responsible for the epic Orlando Furioso, who must have the usual abbreviation for ‘tense’ removed from inside his surname.

25d Swallow on the spot to discern about summer’s start (6)
A two-letter word of many meanings, one of which is ‘on the spot’, is followed by a three-letter word meaning ‘to discern’ or ‘to understand’ containing the first letter of SUMMER (ie “summer’s start”).

28d The old shut in pulpit, not initially mobile (5)
A six-letter word for the pulpit in a mosque has the standard single-letter abbreviation for ‘mobile’ removed from its beginning (‘not initially mobile’) to produce an obsolete (‘old’) form of a word meaning ‘to shut in’.

29d What Scottish seers use to penetrate extremes of terrible grief as before (5)
A Scots word for the things that one sees with (‘What Scottish seers use’) is contained by (‘to penetrate’) the first and last letters (‘extremes’) of TERRIBLE. The solution is shown by Chambers as ‘archaic’, hence the ‘as before’.

31d The best of north England timber part of the kingdom cut (4)
Just as the down clues started with a ‘two definitions, one wordplay’ clue, so they finish with one. The part of the kingdom which is ‘cut’ (shorn of its last letter) is the bit that isn’t England, Scotland or Northern Ireland.

(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 2,685 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)