The Monthly Digest

There are usually one or two points of interest in an Observer barred 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.

Gemelo 18 Plain

Solver difficulty rating

3.1 based on 42 votes (voting is now closed)

A printable version of this puzzle can be found at https://cdn.slowdownwiseup.co.uk/media/documents/obs.GEMELO.20251214.pdf.

Please give your own G-rating for this Gemelo puzzle by clicking on the relevant star above, with one star representing a very straightforward solve by your own standards (Gentle) and five stars indicating a seriously tough one (Ghastly). Note that hovering over the ‘graph’ icon will show you the full breakdown of votes for the current puzzle.

I thought that the previous Gemelo crossword (G17) was probably the least difficult plain puzzle that he has served up so far, and your rating of 2.6 (compared to 3.5 for G16) suggested that many of you felt the same way. Most of the scores were 2’s and 3’s, resulting in an average reduced by almost a whole point from that of its predecessor – which seemed just about right to me.

We wait to see what sort of puzzle we will get – and from whom – at Christmas, but in the meanwhile Gemelo turns 18 with a crossword that seemed to me a lot more polished than his previous offering, with plenty of cleverly deceptive definitions, some well disguised breaks between definitions and wordplays, and one or two (actually, three) unwarranted capital letters of the kind that I’m none too keen on.

Incidentally, regular correspondent Jim H informs me that the Observer are offering half-price annual subscriptions for their online product. He has been told “We’d like to extend a special offer to our puzzle fans to take up an annual digital subscription now for 50% off in your first year. If you are already on one of our £1 trial subscriptions, you will be able to cancel that and take out this offer over the next month. To redeem this offer, visit https://observer.co.uk/subscribe/observer-friends; at the checkout, once you’ve registered or logged in, enter PUZZLES50 in the “Promo Code’ box, and click Apply. Enter your payment method to complete your purchase.”

Setters’ Corner: This week I’m going to look at clue 16a, “Opening book, sitting in tree with child (9, 2 words)”. A five-letter ‘opening’, particularly one starting a piece of popular music, is followed by the usual single-letter abbreviation for ‘book’ inside the three-letter name of a Central American rubber tree often indicated by ‘rubber’, the result being a familiar (2,7) phrase. The point of interest is the definition. Chambers shows the answer as being a euphemism for ‘pregnant (when unmarried)’, and clearly the ‘unmarried’ bit is important, since even in days gone by it was possible to be pregnant but not in the state described here. So is the definition valid? The rule is that the generic can indicate the specific, so ‘dog’ can define (in crossword terms) COLLIE, but the reverse is a definition by example, and must be indicated as such, so ‘collie, say’ could legitimately indicate DOG. Here, the definition is the all-encompassing ‘pregnant’ and the answer refers to being in such a state, albeit only in a specific situation, so it is ok. Using the answer here to define PREGNANT would not be acceptable; it would need to be accompanied by a ‘definition by example’ qualifier such as the word ‘perhaps’ or a question mark.

Across

1a Worcester’s old-fashioned celebration turned into nonsense (6)
A two-letter word for a celebration of the party kind is reversed (‘turned’) inside (‘into’) a word for ‘nonsense’ which could (in 1977, at least) have described Johnny Rotten or Siouxsie Sioux. The reason for ‘Worcester’ appearing in the definition is made clear by the Chambers entry for the answer. As the Times Literary Supplement put it in 1960, “A diploma from Harvard is much more marketable than a diploma from ?????? College.”

5a Haggard Roman welcoming drunken Scottish band (6)
I feel that Gemelo has been deliberately naughty here. ‘Haggard Roman’ relates to a Gothic novel (‘roman’) written by Henry Rider Haggard, but rather than adding that undeserved capital to ‘roman’, Gemelo could have chosen, for instance, ‘Haggard queen’. The three-letter name by which the African version of Dorian Gray was known contains a Scots word meaning ‘wet’ or ‘drunken’ (and a forename which I immediately associate with a man who fomented revolt against the poll tax and was put to death for his trouble).

9a One provided with speed going round circuit, it’s like something else (8)
The Roman numeral representing ‘one’ and a two-letter adverb/conjunction meaning ‘provided’ (Dickens, Bleak House: “He could play ’em a tune on any sort of pot you please, so as it was iron or block tin”) are followed by a three-letter abbreviation for a measure of speed (not speed itself) containing (‘going round’) the name given to a type of logic circuit of which the  output is 1 if either input is 1.

12a They provide colour in Scotland Yard compound when pressed by detective (8)
The usual abbreviation for ‘yard’ and a five-letter ‘compound’ (of the sort which is polymerized in artificial textiles) are contained (”pressed’) by a detective ranking between a DC and a DI.

14a Fed, mostly following cook’s principles (5)
I’m clearly getting attuned to Gemelo’s deviousness, because as soon as I saw ‘Fed’ here I though ‘Federal agent’, and by putting the word at the start of the clue he has dealt with the ‘Fed/fed’ problem in a way that satisfies the purists among us. The four-letter federal agent loses his last letter (‘mostly’) and follows a two-letter verb for ‘cook’.

23a After games with English, everyone’s beginning to whine at Murrayfield (6)
The first letter of ‘everyone’ (“everyone’s beginning”) comes after the two-letter abbreviation for group exercise at school (‘games’) and the three-letter abbreviation for ‘English’.

30a Learner in top set briefly (4)
The single-letter abbreviation for ‘learner’ is contained by a three-letter word for the sort of short-sleeved ‘top’ often adorned with a logo or a statement that seemed a lot wittier when you saw it advertised online. The ‘briefly’ is not required in the definition, since Chambers gives the answer as an informal term in its own right.

31a Singular imbecile concealing order over pudding ingredient (8)
The usual abbreviation for ‘singular’ is followed by a reversal (‘over’) of a five-letter word for an imbecile containing the abbreviation for ‘Order of Merit’ (‘order’). Anyone who ate school dinners in the third quarter of the last century will surely be familiar with the answer.

Down

2d Game on, without Labour getting returned under local poll (9)
The three-letter word equivalent to ‘on’ when used about a side of the cricket field is put around (‘without’ – not a containment indicator that’s to my taste, but I’m braced for it now) the three-letter abbreviation for ‘Labour’ and the whole lot reversed (‘returned’) after a three-letter dialect (‘local’) word meaning ‘[to] poll’ or ‘[to] cut the hair of’.

4d Origins of Kal-El regularly identify this? (7)
If you take the first letters (‘origins’) of ‘Kal-el’ and ‘regularly’, retaining the case in which they appear in those words, you will have the chemical symbol for an element which shares its name with the planet on which Kal-el was born to Jor-el and Lara. He was sent to earth shortly before the destruction of his home planet, landing in Smallville, Kansas, where he was found and adopted by Jonathan and Martha Kent. The rest, as they say, is history…well, kind of.

5d Pierce Brosnan’s central character – brilliant! (5)
I’ve written several clues involving the device employed by Gemelo here with ‘Pierce Brosnan’ (including my first VHC in an Azed comp). In this clue, the middle letter of ‘Brosnan’ is followed by a word for a brilliant-cut diamond of a particular form.

8d Bathroom without pronoun to follow (5)
A (2,5) term for a particular kind of bathroom is missing (‘without’) a two-letter pronoun.

11d Idler’s whole purpose in rolling about (10)
A three-letter word for ‘whole’ (which in fact often follows ‘the whole’ when emphasizing totality)  and a three-letter word for purpose (such as a piece of equipment might have) are followed by a two-letter preposition which has a meaning similar to ‘in’ (and is sometimes interchangeable with it, in something like “He was in school”) and a reversal (‘rolling’) of that familiar piece of commercial jargon meaning ‘concerning’ or ‘about’. The answer is hyphenated, 5-5.

13d One working too much with East China (5)
A four-letter derogatory term of indeterminate origin for “a socially inept person, especially a student seen as being excessively studious” is followed by the usual abbreviation for ‘East’.

18d Sculpture elevated with a highly ornamental metal plate (5)
The word for a sculpture representing the upper part of a person’s body is reversed (‘elevated’) ahead of the letter A (from the clue).

27d Bore’s elaborate lyric read out (4)
The homophone (‘read out’) of a word for an elaborate lyric addressed to eg a nightingale, the west wind, or joy is the past tense of a word meaning ‘bear’ as in ‘I bear him no ill-will’.

(definitions are underlined)

There are usually one or two points of interest in an Observer barred 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.

Gemelo 17 Plain

Solver difficulty rating

2.6 based on 45 votes (voting is now closed)

Please give your own G-rating for this Gemelo puzzle by clicking on the relevant star above, with one star representing a very straightforward solve by your own standards (Gentle) and five stars indicating a seriously tough one (Ghastly). Note that hovering over the ‘graph’ icon will show you the full breakdown of votes for the current puzzle.

Readers collectively rated last week’s  puzzle around half a point up on  the previous week’s ‘iambic pentameter’ special, with a rating of 3.5 compared to 2.9. The great majority of scores were 3’s and 4’s, with just a few 2’s and 5’s (no 1’s this time around). I was torn between giving it 3 or 4 before eventually settling on 3, but 3.5 seemed just right.

As for this week’s offering – well, either I’ve had an unsolicited brain boost, or Gemelo has been, well, slightly emasculated. There seemed to be very few of the devious definitions which have been the trademark of Gemelo’s earlier ‘plains’, with this one looking in parts as though it had been put together rather hastily. That’s not to say that it wasn’t without its challenges, but the tricky entries are always easier when you’ve got a few ‘cheap’ checkers. I’ll be interested to see how other solvers viewed the difficulty of the puzzle.

I had no problem accessing the crossword once I had registered on the site. This may portend the disappearance of Gemelo behind a paywall – but I note that access to the new ‘Goldilocks’ puzzle already requires a subscription, and it does not appear in the printed edition, so we will have to wait and see.

Setters’ Corner: This week I’m going to look not at one specific clue, but at four abbreviations, indicated by ‘jolly’ in 2a, ‘Scottish Education Department’ in 33a, ‘right now’ in 20d and ‘Stokes’ in 28d.

Those who regularly solved blocked puzzles will no doubt have come across ‘jolly’ for RM before. Chambers gives ‘jolly’ as a slang term for ‘a royal marine’, along with the abbreviation ‘RM’ for ‘Royal Marines’. There is no evidence in Chambers that RM can stand for ‘Royal Marine’, and a web search suggests that it usually refers to a retired missionary; I think that ‘jolly band’ would be ok (similar to ‘gunners’ for RA), but surely not ‘jolly’ on its own (which would be the equivalent of ‘gunner’ for RA).

Chambers gives ‘stat’ as ‘immediately’, from the Latin ‘statim’. Although it doesn’t explicitly give the meaning ‘right now’, there are two reasons why this is not a problem, either of which is sufficient in my view to justify this indication. Firstly, since ‘stat’ is an abbreviation of a Latin word, ‘right now’ is just as good a translation as ‘immediately’; secondly the abbreviation has what I think of as ‘a life of its own’, so a medical treatment could be described in conversation as being required ‘stat’. This aligns with something like LP (“I had their first LP”) and contrasts with, say, ‘Av’ for ‘Avenue’ (“We strolled down the Av – not”).

The ‘Scottish Education Department’ no longer exists (its function is now performed, I believe, by Education Scotland), and neither does the British Territorial Army (now the Volunteer Reserve). That doesn’t change the fact that SED is a historically valid abbreviation of Scottish Education Department and TA of Territorial Army, nor that these abbreviations can be used in cryptics so long as the full form is accurately reproduced. However, an indirect reference such as ‘volunteers’ for TA becomes invalid when the organization in question ceases to exist, and must be replaced by something along the lines of ‘volunteers once’.

The appearance of ‘Stokes’ is coincidental, as in the last couple of days it was the subject of a discussion about its validity in blocked crosswords, since it is not allowed in some series but was used in a recent Guardian puzzle. Chambers has S for ‘stokes’, the CGS unit of kinematic viscosity, so it’s certainly fair game in a barred puzzle. Should the clue here be ‘Send stokes in’, though? Technically, yes, but to insist on that would be to open up a whole can of cruciverbal Lumbricidae. It’s allowable (if undesirable) to deceptively capitalize the first letter of a word that would not normally have an initial capital (eg ‘stokes’ becoming ‘Stokes’), but to change an initial capital to lower-case is forbidden (eg the French city ‘Nice’ becoming ‘nice’). How often, though, do we see ‘river’ for R or ‘street’ for ST? These abbreviations occur only as part of names, eg ‘River Thames’ and ‘New Street’, so they should be indicated only by ‘River’ and ‘Street’. Some stones are best left unturned.

Across

2a Horse with a jolly young man (9)
We start with a charade of the usual abbreviation for ‘with’, the letter A (from the clue), the two letter abbreviation normally associated (rightly or wrongly) with ‘jolly’, and a five-letter word for ‘a young man’, a recent addition to Chambers, although I ‘m surprised that it’s shown as neither ‘slang’ nor ‘US’.

11a Where French children learn about British digression (6)
The five-letter French word for ‘school’ (ie ‘where French children learn’) contains (‘about’) the usual abbreviation for ‘British’.

13a Watcher circling area after potential killer shoots in the kitchen (9)
The five-letter name of a many-eyed ‘watcher’ containing (‘circling’) the usual abbreviation for ‘area’ follows a three-letter term for a venomous snake of various kinds (‘potential killer’). The watcher had a hundred eyes – less than the night, according to Bobby Vee, but considerably more than most people. This made him the perfect candidate for the job of guarding Io, a priestess whom Zeus had turned into a heifer, since he was able to look in all directions even when having a degree of shut-eye. He was killed by Hermes at the behest of Zeus; thankfully, he carried an organ donor tablet, and a lucky peacock was thus the recipient of the first multiple transplant.

17a Pollock actor dropping hard edge for character (3)
The (2,6) name of the actor who directed and starred in the film Pollock, based on the life of Jackson Pollock, is deprived of a five-letter word for a sharp edge at the meeting of two surfaces, usually these days seen followed by the word ‘rail’

23a On reflection, most common Scrabble piece is best (5)
A neat clue, a (1,4) term which could describe the ‘most common Scrabble piece’ being reversed (‘on reflection’) to produce the answer.

32a Earth covered in mostly slick clay (4)
The usual abbreviation for ‘earth’ is contained by (‘covered in’) a four-letter word meaning ‘slick’ or ‘too smooth to be convincing’ missing its last letter (‘mostly’).

33a Glaswegian hated Scottish Education Department welcoming American swimmer (9)
The three-letter abbreviation for the former Scottish Education Department contains (‘welcoming’) an alternative spelling of a six-letter word for “a kind of wrasse, the goldsinny or corkwing”. I know the Scots word which gives rise to the answer here as part of the expression ‘take a ??????? to’, meaning ‘take a dislike to’.

Down

2d Tree in western that’s amazing when top’s trimmed (5)
The usual abbreviation for ‘western’ is followed by a five-letter interjection of joy (and the name of a search engine which dominated the field in the late 1990s but whose market share is now under 3%, although that still represents a podium position) without its first letter (“when top’s trimmed”).

4d Local steals rubbish bit of card to read (9)
A four-letter dialect (‘local’) word meaning ‘steals’ (or an informal term for periodicals collectively) is followed by a word for complete and utter nonsense (‘rubbish’), the result being a (3-6) answer.

8d Twin getting upset about receding praise (7)
A four-letter adjective meaning ‘twin’ contained by a three-letter word meaning ‘upset’ or ‘overturn’ (ie ‘getting upset about’) is reversed (‘receding’).

9d Regressive name for Indian trees (4)
A four-letter slang term, a minced form of ‘celebrity’ (ie ‘name’), is reversed (regressive’) to yield one spelling of a word for some thorny Indian trees.

14d Wave when leaving UN following American sycophancy? (9)
A ten-letter word for a wave stripped of the consecutive letters UN (‘when leaving UN’) is preceded by the usual single-letter abbreviation for ‘American’.

15d Ordinary war-club turned into trick bat (9)
The usual abbreviation for ‘ordinary’ and a four-letter Maori name for a war club, once a regular visitor to cryptics either with an E on the end (as here) or an I, are reversed (‘turned’) inside a word for a trick. Mr Wilkins: “What do bats do in winter?” Jennings: “They split if you don’t oil them, Sir.”

25d Salamander with extremely elastic tongue (5)
A three-letter “blind, cave-dwelling, eel-like salamander of Europe” is followed by the first and last letters of ‘elastic’, producing the name of the language used by a prehistoric Mexican people. Azed once wrote, “I don’t accept that ‘extremely’ can be used in a clue to indicate the first and last letters of the relevant word or phrase. This does not seem to me to come within any of the normal senses of the word.” I completely agree.

27d Gradually moved out, having got rid of relative (5)
An eight-letter word meaning ‘out’ (perhaps from a prison or a contract) loses (‘having got rid of’) the three-letter abbreviation for ‘relative’.

(definitions are underlined)

There are usually one or two points of interest in an Observer barred 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.

Gemelo 16 Plain

Solver difficulty rating

3.5 based on 38 votes (voting is now closed)

Your collective rating of G15’s versified challenge was  more than a full point down on its predecessor; the votes were distributed in a way that produced a near-symmetrical bell curve, there being a few 1s and 5s, a higher number of 2s and 4s, and a higher number still of 3s . I rated it as a 2, largely because the constraint on the setter limited the complexity of the clues, but at the same time it also led to some rather vague definitions, and I wasn’t sure whether to opt for 2 or 3. I think the solver ratings are very interesting, and I’d like to take the opportunity to thank all of you who provide them.

This week’s puzzle seemed just a little flat to me, with a few clues that felt rather too convoluted for their own good, but perhaps I just wasn’t in the ideal frame of mind for it. Unusually, but in common with Gemelo 8, there were no seven-letter entries in the grid.

Setters’ Corner: This week I’m going to look at clue 25a, “King rejected honey dish (5)”. The chess-and cards abbreviation for ‘king’ is followed by a reversal of a term of endearment similar to ‘honey’, the result being “a dish of thin slices cut from a block of minced and seasoned lamb grilled on a spit”. The point of interest here is the reversal indicator, ‘rejected’. The word ‘reject’ derives from the Latin verb meaning ‘to throw back’, but Chambers doesn’t give any sense of it which suggests reversal, and neither does Collins, while the OED gives the ‘throw back’ meaning as ‘rare’. That said, I suspect that most solvers will have seen ‘rejected’, said to themselves “reversal indicator”, and moved on. I think it falls into the category of cryptic ‘codes’ which are hard to justify but are fixtures in the cruciverbal landscape – that doesn’t mean that I would ever use it myself, though.

Across

1a Type A struck by intelligence, hard to impress (12, 4 words)
This five-part charade involves a four-letter word for ‘type’ (as in ‘type of car’), the letter A (from the clue), a three-letter word meaning (‘struck’), a three-letter word for ‘intelligence’, and the usual single-letter abbreviation for ‘hard’. The answer is (4,1,3,4).

10a S American plainsman’s brief ceremony cut short (6)
A four-letter word for ‘showy ceremony’ deprived of its last letter (‘brief’) is followed by a four-letter word for ‘cut’, similarly trimmed (‘short’).

12a Crisp potatoes to save you shouldn’t have eaten at the start (5)
A six-letter ‘informal’ form of ‘potatoes’ loses (‘to save’) a two-letter informal interjection meaning ‘thank you’ (ie “you shouldn’t have”) and is followed by the first letter (‘at the start’) of ‘eaten’.

17a Flash photography originally avoided by design (3)
The first letter (‘originally’) of ‘photography’ is dropped (‘avoided’) by a four-letter informal shortened form of a thirteen-letter word, this abbreviated version being used frequently in the context of the attributes of a particular car model or the design of a computer program.

25a Canadian channel from Hamilton then shifted centrally (4)
A four-letter Scots (‘Hamilton’) word meaning ‘then’ (or, when it comes to New Year’s Eve, ‘since’) has its central letters swapped over (‘shifted centrally’) to produce the answer.

27a Tree no longer living after losing bark (3)
A five-letter word with an archaic (‘no longer’) meaning of ‘living’ (but now typically used to mean ‘necessary to life’ or ‘essential’) is stripped of its first and last letters (‘after losing bark’).

29a Stop on the spot – and again, by god! (6, 2 words)
A two-letter adverb meaning (among many other things) ‘on the spot’ is followed by the same word (‘and again’), the pair being put after (‘by’) the alternative spelling (not the one with an A) of the two-letter name of the ancient Egyptian sun-god. The answer is divided (4,2).

33a One tending to flee after middle of test, repeatedly assuming your backing (12, 2 words)
A three-letter word meaning ‘to flee’ is put after the middle letters of ‘test’ , the combination being duplicated (‘repeatedly’) either side of (‘assuming’) the two-letter abbreviation for ‘your’; the whole shebang is then reversed (‘backing’). The solution is (7,5), but I have a problem with the definition – the only modern intransitive sense of ‘tend’ given by Chambers is ‘pay attention’, and I don’t think that fits with the answer.

Down

1d Social movement engulfing rector and priest, separately fired before an archbishop (12)
The name given to the “cultural movement that seeks to expose and eradicate predatory sexual behaviour, especially in the workplace”, containing (‘engulfing’) first the usual single-letter abbreviation for ‘rector’ and then later on (ie ‘separately’) the single-letter abbreviation for ‘priest’, is followed by a three-letter word meaning ‘fired’ (or ‘set fire to’) and the letters AN (from the clue).

2d Currency arrangement formerly underpinning krona is fair for Brussels (6)
The three-letter abbreviation for “the mechanism formerly used in the European Monetary System in which participating governments committed themselves to maintain the values of their currencies in relation to the ECU” follows the single-letter abbreviation for ‘krona’, this combination preceding the letters IS (from the clue).

6d Wet bud in Gower (4)
The way into this double definition clue is the ‘chiefly North American slang’ – but now common in the UK – term for a ‘wet’ or a particularly timid person, which always puts me in mind of Homer Simpson and his shame at being thought of as a ‘chilli ????’ which drives him to coat his mouth with wax in order to consume the  Merciless Pepper of Quetzalacatenango, also known as the Guatemalan Insanity Pepper (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DOz2u0ptQoQ).

7d Chauffeur cycling to get cones? (4)
A four-letter Anglo-Indian word for a servant who attends to horses or (according to Chambers, anyway) a chauffeur has its first letter moved to the end (‘cycling’).

13d Swaying run adopted by somebody exhausted (6)
A four-letter word for ‘run’ in the sense of discharging a fluid is contained (‘adopted’) by the first and last letters (‘exhausted’) of ‘somebody’.

15d Self-evident fraud almost taking in group from the Outer Hebrides (8)
A five-letter word for a fraud or a deceit missing its last letter (‘almost’) contains (‘taking’) the four-letter name given to a group of islands in the Outer Hebrides.

24d Dutch city’s finally removed river levee (6)
Hands up if you first thought you were looking for a Dutch city. Yes, my hand is raised – you got me there, Gemelo. In reality, the single-letter abbreviation for ‘Dutch’ precedes a word meaning ‘of a city’ (ie “city’s”) without its last letter (‘finally removed’) and the usual abbreviation for ‘river’.

29d Orders from section of menu? (4)
I believe that the idea here is that a section of a menu devoted to a particular type of wine would have a heading that corresponds to the answer, but Chambers defines ‘menu’ as “in a restaurant, etc, a list of dishes that may be ordered”, so I don’t think this works.

(definitions are underlined)

There are usually one or two points of interest in an Observer barred 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.

Gemelo 15 ‘It could be verse’

Solver difficulty rating

2.9 based on 45 votes (voting is now closed)

You rated G14 at 4.0, a significant increase on the 3.3 ‘awarded’ to G13, with scores of 4 predominating. Personally, I didn’t think there was much between the two puzzles difficulty-wise, and I do wonder if G13’s relatively low rating owed something to it directly following the ‘anagrams’ special. I gave 4’s to both of them, so we’re in complete agreement as far as G14 is concerned.

I’m not sure what to make of today’s puzzle. Many years ago, writing clues in verse was very popular, and more recently it’s something I’ve done myself, but only in themed puzzles where the verse form had a bearing on the overall theme. I’m really not convinced about puzzles where the setter has artificially placed themselves under a constraint which has no impact on the solve, and I would have thought that no explanation was needed beyond the title. In the circumstances, Gemelo has undoubtedly done an excellent job with the clues here, but scanning/rhyming clues are inevitably of lower entertainment value than unconstrained ones, and since the clues are presented individually there is no reason for the solver to consider them in quatrains (with this sort of gimmick, I favour the clues being run together in groups of four, such that the solver has to work out where the breaks come). In general terms, I’d still rather that the setter – as Azed always did – produced ‘specials’ which challenge the solvers as well as himself.

Setters’ Corner: This week I’m going to look at clue 3d, “Where beer is special under king, for one (4)”. The usual single-letter abbreviation for ‘special’ follows the abbreviation for ‘king’ used in chess/cards and the two-letter abbreviation of the Latin phrase meaning ‘for example’. Several times this year I have seen ‘for one’ used in clues to indicate this particular abbreviation, but I can’t accept it. The expression has a very specific meaning: Chambers gives ‘As at least one, albeit possibly the only one, as in I for one disagree‘. It seems to me that “I for one disagree” and  “I for example disagree” mean quite different things, but perhaps the meanings are close enough for solvers not to be discomfited. It’s not something that I shall be adopting myself, but as always it is down to individual setters to decide whether they think ‘for one’ and ‘for example’ are effectively the same.

Across

10a Escape The Royal Oak? Remove its rind (4)
‘The Royal Oak’ is an example of a particular type of establishment; a six-letter slang term for such a place must be deprived of its first and last letters (‘Remove its rind’).

11a Mundane to sin through grief of older men (7)
A familiar three-letter word meaning ‘to sin’ is contained by (‘through’) an archaic word (‘of older men’) for ‘grief’.

17a Come back about, say engineers from right (8)
That two-letter bit of commercial jargon meaning ‘about’ or ‘concerning’ is followed by a reversal (‘from right’) of the usual two-letter abbreviation indicated by ‘say’ or ‘for example’ and the four-letter abbreviation for a corps of the British Army founded in 1942 (motto: By Skill and by Fighting) to keep everything from helicopters to rifles in full working order.

19a Organic fat from Rio grabbing knight (5)
The four-letter name of the standard monetary unit of Brazil (‘fat from Rio’, ‘fat’ being slang for money) contains (‘grabbing’) the chess player’s (or por speler’s) abbreviation for ‘knight’. The definition refers to the ‘relating to, derived from, like or of the nature of an organ’ sense of ‘organic’ in Chambers.

24a Where public may call Kansas chap around (5)
A reversal (‘around’) of the two-letter abbreviation for ‘Kansas’ and a word for a ‘chap’ which Chambers qualifies as being ‘slightly derogatory’; this seems something of an understatement, since it is typically used to refer to someone who, as Collins puts it, ‘you think behaves in a rude or unacceptable way, especially in a way that you believe to be typical of a low social class.’

27a In losing silver, having head that’s sound (8, 2 words)
A (3,3,4) phrase that means ‘very much in fashion’ (ie ‘in’) loses the chemical symbol for silver, the result being a (3,5) expression.

31a Support a pound to share election form (12, 2 words)
The (6,6) answer is produced by a charade of four elements: a four-letter word for the sort of’ ‘support’ that might hold up a fence, the letter A (from the clue), the two-letter abbreviation for a pound weight, and a five-letter word meaning ‘to share [out]’.

33a As halves of former collars worn by male (7)
This is a tricky one, where an old spelling (‘former’) of a familiar word meaning ‘collars’ or ‘grasps’ contains (‘worn by’) the usual abbreviation for ‘male’. The craftily-disguised ‘as’ is not the common adverb, rather a Roman coin.

Down

2d Did fool cut through in wake of spring that’s short? (6)
A four-letter word meaning ‘cut through’ or ‘dispensed with’ follows (‘in wake of’) a three-letter word meaning ‘[to] spring’ or ‘[to] leap on one leg’ from which the last letter has been omitted (“that’s short”).

7d I’m much depressed concerning name in flop (9, 2 words)
The piece of commercial jargon for ‘concerning’ also seen at 17a is followed  by the single-letter abbreviation for ‘name’ contained within a term describing a film or suchlike which is a complete failure – although in the language of tenpin bowling, far from being a flop it is the achievement of three consecutive strikes, after which comes a ‘badger’. The (6,3) answer gives away the lower-tech origins of the thing in question, which is now usually known by a more appropriate (5,3) phrase.

9d For Spooner, ushered leaner food that’s hard (12, 2 words)
The (3,9) answer is a spoonerized version of a three-letter word meaning ‘ushered’ and a six-letter word for someone who leans or reposes; in this sense, the word ‘leaner’ is not given by Chambers, but Collins lists it.

13d How much is charged to fix declining cast (4)
An eight-letter word for what you do to an entire horse to turn it into a gelding (‘to fix’) has the consecutive letters CAST removed (‘declining cast’).

16d Get round to info, spinning current bit (9)
The letters TO (from the clue) and a three-letter crossword staple answering to ‘info’ are reversed (‘spinning’) ahead of the single letter from physics representing electrical current and a three-letter word meaning ‘bit’ or ‘consumed’.

20d Inflated mattress – air not wholly old (4)
A four-letter word for ‘a cheerful song or air’ (or the drink with the totally tropical taste, now sadly rebranded as the rather more prosaic Fanta Pineapple and Grapefruit) is shorn of its last letter (‘not wholly’) and followed by the usual abbreviation for ‘old’.

25d Before, before, I cheer for bird of gold (6)
An archaic conjunction meaning ‘before’ (ie ‘before, before’) precedes the letter I (from the clue) and the sort of cheer that you would formerly have associated with the bullring (not the one in Birmingham) but which now often accompanies each of a long series of passes by a team controlling a soccer match.

29d Delight in run, removing top for good (4)
A four-letter word meaning ‘run’ in the escaping sense has its first letter replaced by the usual abbreviation for ‘good’ (‘removing top for good’).

(definitions are underlined)

There are usually one or two points of interest in an Observer barred 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.

Gemelo 14 Plain

Solver difficulty rating

4.0 based on 44 votes (voting is now closed)

Please give your own G-rating for this Gemelo puzzle by clicking on the relevant star above, with one star representing a very straightforward solve by your own standards (Gentle) and five stars indicating a seriously tough one (Ghastly). Note that hovering over the ‘graph’ icon will show you the full breakdown of votes for the current puzzle.

The overwhelming view was that Gemelo 13 was considerably less demanding than the preceding ‘anagram special’, its rating of 3.3 being way down on G12’s 4.8. The scores were mainly 3’s and 4’s; I did feel that the person who saw it as a ‘1’  must have been on top form (or performance enhancing drugs) . When I solved the puzzle, I rated it as a 4, but I certainly wouldn’t argue with the collective assessment. I’ll be interested to see how you think this one compared; it had some pretty sneaky definitions, but I’m ready for them now, likewise the ‘invisible commas’ (eg 27a) and the deceptive capitalization of words (eg 5d). There were plenty of clues to choose from when selecting my sixteen for comment, so please tell me if there are any which I haven’t included but that you would like me to cover.

Setters’ Corner: This week I’m going to look at clue 7d, “Report underground cell, missing the point (3)”. The wordplay has a five-letter ‘underground cell’, such as might be found beneath a church, being deprived of (‘missing’) the two-letter abbreviation for ‘point’, the result being a word meaning ‘report or rumour’. The item of interest here is the word ‘the’ preceding ‘point’ in the clue. Normally it would be inappropriate to add a definite article where it is not required, and the wordplay here would work perfectly well without it; a clue such as ‘Chose dictionary covering the point’ for OPTED (OED around PT) would not be acceptable. However, the situation here is different – we are talking about a word losing something that it already has, so ‘the point’ seems to me entirely valid, just as ‘its point’ would be, and ‘Dictionary chose to ignore the point’ for OED would similarly be sound. Note that things would be different, though, if there were to be multiple instances of the subtrahend in the source, eg ‘scrap dealer spending the time’ as a wordplay for OTTER (TOTTER – T), since it is actually ‘one of its times’ that is being lost, not ‘the [one and only] time’.

Apologies if these notes seemed to appear later than usual – I am still getting to grips with the caching facilities available from the new hosting provider and hadn’t set up the helper to reload the front page when a new post (or a new comment) is published. Changes to the site should now be visible in a more timely manner!

Across

1a Unloved part of performance no longer having top or tail in this? (12, 2 words)
An &lit to start us off, albeit a bit of a stretchy one. A four-letter word meaning ‘unloved’ (a bit of an understatement – ‘dreadful’ would be nearer the mark) is followed by a three-letter word for a part of a performance, which must have its first letter removed (‘no longer having top’). Then come the letters OR (from the clue) and a four-letter word for a tail of the modest sort sported by hares, rabbits and suchlike. The whole clue serves to suggest the answer, which is (9,3) and contains an apostrophe – Azed indicates apostrophes in his enumerations, but it is generally considered unnecessary to do so.

9a Graphic designer stripped, having lost second card game (6)
The surname of the French philosopher, scientist and mathematician who effectively bridged the gap between geometry and algebra by devising the coordinate system which allowed geometric shapes to be described in terms of algebraic expressions is shorn of its first and last letters (‘stripped’) before losing the usual abbreviation for ‘second’. There is a type of graph called the ‘????????? snark’ which was discovered by Blanche ????????? (the pseudonym of William Tutte), but I’m sure that it is not he to whom Gemelo is referring here.

10a Demonstrate what was moved from B Palace to H Park? (5)
In 1827 work started on a white marble structure designed by John Nash to frame the state entrance to the new Buckingham Palace (aka B Palace). In 1833 it was finally completed, albeit without some of the trimmings which its designer had envisioned. The palace was completed in 1837, and it soon became clear that it was not going to be large enough for Queen Victoria’s growing family and expanding entourage. In order to accommodate the extension of the palace, Nash’s structure was dismantled in 1847, and in 1851 it was rebuilt as a ceremonial entrance to the northeast corner of Hyde Park (H Park) at Cumberland Gate. By analogy with B House and H Park, the structure would be addressed formally as ? ????.

16a Czech play about quiet in Paris, or when most people are out (8, 2 words)
The three-letter name of a Czech play contains (‘about’) a three-letter interjection equivalent to ‘quiet[!]’ and the French (‘in Paris’) word for ‘or’. When I was at school (many years ago!) one of the plays that we performed was The Insect Play (or Pictures from the Insects’ Life) by the brothers Josef and Karel Čapek; Karel is best known, though, for his 1920 science fiction play known in English as Rossum’s Universal Robots, which introduced the word “robot” to the English language. The answer is (4,4).

20a Don’t play at home in underground passage to Canada (7)
If you think of a phrase like “They don’t play at home this weekend – they ??? ????”, then the inflections in the wordplay make sense.

24a Where demerara may be mostly crystallised in some beef (7, 2 words)
The four-letter past tense of a five-letter verb meaning ‘crystallise’ has its last letter omitted (‘mostly’) before being inserted into a word for a particular cut of beef to produce the (3,4) answer.

25a What was once mulled over, to indicate gathering ships (6)
A three-letter word meaning ‘to indicate’ (or ‘give a gratuity to’) is reversed (‘over’) around (‘gathering’) a word for ships, such as might be “o’ war”.

31a Air kiss declined by dunghill (4)
The single letter that represents a kiss is removed from a five-letter word for a dunghill, the result being the sort of ‘air’ that is only likely these days to be encountered in literature, describing a person’s appearance or bearing, particularly when serving as an indication of their mood.

Down

1d Mark 10.19 has impact on idle criminal (12, 2 words)
Our setter also, I believe, produces puzzles for the Church Times, but although Mark  chapter 10 verse 19 is relevant to the surface reading, no biblical knowledge is required to solve this clue – all you need to do here is infer a relative pronoun such as ‘that’ between ‘Mark’ and ‘10.19’, solve the anagram (‘criminal’) of IMPACT ON IDLE, and put the (7,5) answer in the grid.

4d Professional starting late, carrying tons of roofing material (7)
A  seven-letter word meaning ‘professional’, specifically applied to permanent members of the militia, without its first letter (‘starting late’) is preceded by (‘carrying’, this being a down entry) the usual abbreviation for ‘tons’. I’ve seen ‘starting late’ used in this way several times recently, but I’m not particularly keen on it – it seems rather akin to ‘during’ as a containment indicator, with ‘late’ and ‘during’ both being used exclusively in real life with a temporal sense.

5d Stops dropping Middle English round? (5)
Chambers lists an impressive number of organ stops, the ones here being so named because of their similarity in tone to a particular woodwind instrument. They lose their central letter (‘dropping [m]iddle’) and are followed by the usual abbreviation for ‘English’.

6d Trip while following southern dance (6)
A two-letter word meaning ‘while’ follows the usual abbreviation for ‘southern’, with the combination preceding a three-letter term for a winding country dance, often spelt with an E in the middle rather than an A.

15d Scotsman’s pet to appear without lead, cutting through restraint (8)
A six-letter word meaning ‘to appear’ or “to reach one’s destination” missing its first letter (‘without lead’) is contained by (‘cutting through’) a word for ‘restraint’ much favoured by crossword setters.

21d Parents needing clothing to become younger and more attractive (7)
A seven-letter word for parents of the distaff variety has its first and last letters replaced by the two-letter abbreviation for ‘younger’ (ie ‘needing clothing to become younger’).

26d This might finish cricket before accepting one’s bowled (5)
A two-letter word that means, among many other things, ‘before’ contains (‘accepting’) a two-letter word for “one’s” and the single-letter abbreviation for ‘bowled’. The ‘cricket’ in the definition is an insect, while the surface reading seems to relate to the game, although I’m not entirely sure what it’s trying to say.

29d Independent head who originally signed The Beatles and Queen (4)
The three initials by which the record company that signed The Beatles in 1962 is known combines with the single-letter abbreviation of the Latin word for ‘Queen’ to produce the answer. But hold hard! They were not the first record company to hold a contract with the Fab Four; Brian Epstein had to work hard to get them released from their 1961 contract with Polydor (My Bonnie, Ain’t She Sweet etc). Decca then were given first dibs on the band, but famously rejected them, supposedly justifying their decision with the words “Guitar groups are on the way out, Mr. Epstein”. Three months later they signed with George Martin’s Parlophone label.

(definitions are underlined)