DT 26070 – Big Dave's Crossword Blog
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DT 26070

Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 26070

Hints and tips by Gazza

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BD Rating – Difficulty ***Enjoyment ***

Regular solvers will recognise the style of today’s setter, and he has produced another puzzle to make you think and make you smile.
For those who want to see the answers, they are hidden inside the curly brackets under each clue – just highlight the white space inside the brackets to reveal them.

Across Clues

1a  Celestial location with Mars shot (12)
{ASTRONOMICAL} – an anagram (shot, i.e. shot to pieces) of LOCATION and MARS.

9a  Where volume may be turned up? (9)
{BOOKSHELF} – a cryptic definition of where a book (volume) may be found. I had to wait for the checking letters to rule out bookstand and bookstall.

10a  City of Italy in fashion (5)
{TURIN} – put I(taly) inside TURN (to fashion or shape, on a lathe perhaps).

11a  People in authority holding alternative view (6)
{THEORY} – people in authority are always THEY (“why don’t they do something about it?”) – put OR (alternative) inside (holding) to get a view.

12a  Worth catching performance’s run-through (8 )
{PRACTICE} – worth is PRICE. Put ACT (performance) inside (catching).

13a  Letting concrete set around middle of lintel (6)
{RENTAL} – concrete is REAL – put the middle letters of liNTel inside.

15a  Carp about always getting agitated (8 )
{FEVERISH} – carp is a type of FISH – put EVER (always) inside to get a synonym for agitated.

18a  Con isn’t worried receiving a punishment (8 )
{SANCTION} – an anagram (worried) of CON ISN’T with A inside (receiving).

19a  Time off for depression? (6)
{RECESS} – double definition.

21a  Pension owner from the Loire, perhaps (8 )
{HOTELIER} – from the Loire means that we’re in France where pension means a boarding-house – so we want someone who owns an establishment where rooms are let out, and whose title is an anagram (perhaps) of THE LOIRE. A nice variation on “The Loire is fantastic — I can offer you accommodation (8)” which we saw in Toughie 230.

23a  Flipping drink after drink, creating disturbance (6)
{RUMPUS} – start with RUM (drink) and follow this with SUP (drink) which has to be reversed (flipping).

26a  Poem being performed for theatre (5)
{ODEON} – a charade of ODE (poem) and ON (being performed) produces a word, from the Greek, meaning a theatre.

27a  Egg on toast’s starter — is eating out, outside (9)
{INSTIGATE} – a verb meaning to egg on is constructed by putting an anagram (out) of IS EATING around (outside) the first letter of Toast.

28a  Bored teen isn’t rude, surprisingly (12)
{UNINTERESTED} – an anagram (surprisingly) of TEEN ISN’T RUDE.

Down Clues

1d  A bishop taking hold shows authority (7)
{ARBITER} – put A R(ight) R(everend) around (taking) BITE (hold, grip) to get someone who has the authority to take decisions.

2d  Time travel producing hidden riches (5)
{TROVE} – put together T(ime) and ROVE (travel).

3d  Dutiful retainer following old boy (9)
{OBSERVANT} – place SERVANT (retainer) after OB (old boy) to get an adjective meaning dutiful.

4d  Break out from old prison (4)
{OPEN} – start with O(ld) and add PEN (short for penitentiary, prison) to get a verb meaning to break out (as in “break out the champagne”).

5d  Split’s filled in (8 )
{INFORMED} – double definition – the first meaning betrayed someone’s secrets (grassed, split), the second meaning brought someone up to speed with what was going on (filled in).

6d  A new terrorist leader in charge of caper (5)
{ANTIC} – stitch together A, N(ew), T (first character of Terrorist) and IC (in charge).

7d  Smart, if I cease revealing cunning (8 )
{ARTIFICE} – hidden in the clue (revealing) is a synonym for cunning.

8d  With men transformed, she concocted trap (6)
{ENMESH} – a double anagram, firstly one (transformed) of MEN, followed by one (concocted) of SHE.

14d  Close to a score? (8 )
{NINETEEN} – in fact only one less than a score.

16d  Government kill with intravenous injection (9)
{EXECUTIVE} – put IV (intravenous) inside EXECUTE (kill).

17d  Fraud holding press card (8 )
{COMEDIAN} – put CON (fraud) around (holding) MEDIA (press) to get an amusing person.
ARVE Error: need id and provider

18d  Train set (6)
{SCHOOL} – double definition – a verb meaning to train (horses, for example), and a noun meaning a group (of artists, say).

20d  Arrest and hang (7)
{SUSPEND} – double definition – the first meaning to call a halt to (arrest).

22d  Sheets of novel in English (5)
{LINEN} – a term for articles such as sheets is hidden (of) in the clue.

24d  Works quietly with line worker (5)
{PLANT} – string together P (piano, quietly), L(ine) and ANT (worker).

25d  Man, say, hearing ‘I will’, shortly (4)
{ISLE} – Man (put as the first word to disguise the fact that it requires a capital letter) is an example (say) of this. ‘I will’ shortly is I’ll and we want a sound-alike (hearing) of that.

The clues I liked today included 21a, 5d and 18d, but my clue of the day is 11a. Let us know what you think with a comment.
Those of you who breezed through this one and want something harder are spoilt for choice today – there’s a good Toughie by Notabilis, an Enigmatist (Elgar) in the Guardian and, best of all, if you haven’t tackled it already, a brilliant Demo Puzzle by Anax on this site with the promise of a full write-up of how he constructed it to come at the weekend.

26 comments on “DT 26070

  1. Great test today B Dave. I enjoyed every clue.
    If Libellule is blogging I wonder if she can help me with 7d answer. Does the French word for fireworks …feu >>>>>>>> mean artificial or cunning, or are they linked in someway ?

      1. Mea maxima culpa, It’s funny how you form mental images of people from what they write. I suppose I will now have to give HIM a new mental identity, typical Frenchman I think ,with a gaulloise hanging from his lip and a shrug of the shoulder intersperced with the odd “Boff!”

    1. Nubian, you have the correct french word (I think) but the clue is “Revealing” the answer in any case!.

      I have 2 to go and am NOT looking at the answers above (just yet!)
      Very enjoyable . Even when I understood the constructs I stil had to dig deep to get the solution.

    2. Nubian,
      Apologies for the delay in replying, it was indeed a Toughie today. Took a lot longer to do and blog than normal. The french word for fireworks is indeed feu d’********, the same word in french also means ingenious trick, the same word has a similar meaning in english. So that seems to be the root of the french name for firework.

      Interestingly enough on looking at Chambers, both artificial and the other word have very similar Etymology and there is a reference to an obsolete meaning for artificial via Shakespeare.
      “perh merely skilful (Shakespeare)technical (obsolete):”

      1. Thanks for that, the history of language is an interesting topic although a friend of mine always says “I hate history, it’s just one thing after another !”

  2. Although I found this easy enough, I do have a problem with a couple of the clues.

    10a. Sometimes I think compilers stretch the definition of synonym a little too much. It takes a leap of imagination to get “turn” from “fashion”. I had to get the answer before I could work out why.

    17. The answer was fairly obvious, but the “press” isn’t the “media” – it’s only part of it. The media is the sum of radio, TV, the press and, I suppose, we have to include the internet.

  3. I enjoyed it. Clue of the day for me is 9a. Took me a bit to get what else would have volumes besides noise!!

  4. Top Quality!. Just finished the last two.
    Favourite has to be 21a with an honourable mention for 16d and 17d. I recognise the style but cant place the setter.

      1. Ah! Cheers BD – I seemed to have missed the ‘Comment’ bit.
        Must wander round the sidebar a bit more!

  5. Sorry thought todays was just dreadful! Most clues made very little sense. Not one of my favourites!

  6. Unfortunately, I can find nothing to add to Gazza’s dissection of the clues! Thanks to him and to everybody else for taking the time to give their feedback.

  7. Some clever clues – too clever for me – always seem so easy once explained – thank you Gazza. Again I struggle on clues such as 15a – I am trying to put “carp” around “ever”, not a substitute word for carp. I know that this a routine type of clue but why is there no indicator that carp needs to be replaced by an alternative word, in the way that an anagram would have an indicator. I realise that in this case it would mess up the surface reading but in yesterday’s puzzle there were no “hiddden” words.
    My only other minor grouse (and I will no doubt be shot down in flames!) is 27a. The answer given means to start something off, whereas “egg on” implies that something has already started and is being encouraged to continue.
    I can see why all you clever ones enjoyed it though because I can appreciate how good the clues are even if I can’t work them all out.

    1. Toby
      Like you I thought that ‘instigate’ meant to start, but Chambers gives the following meanings, in this order:
      to urge on, incite; to initiate, bring about.

  8. Very good today. I did like 7a – and generally many of the meanings had to be teased out – a case of looking past the obvious. And yes a few to make me smile.

  9. And thanks again for this site. Well-written, the lessons have sped my solving, and turned a too often solitary exercise into something to share (although my daughter is getting the hang of it and the bug).

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