DT 28468 (Hints) – Big Dave's Crossword Blog
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DT 28468 (Hints)

Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 28468 (Hints)

Big Dave’s Saturday Crossword Club

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As is usual for the weekend prize crosswords, an assortment of clues, including some of the more difficult ones, have been selected and hints provided for them.

Most of the terms used in these hints are explained in the Glossary and examples are available by clicking on the entry under “See also”. Where the hint describes a construct as “usual” this means that more help can be found in The Usual Suspects, which gives a number of the elements commonly used in the wordplay. Another useful page is Wolves in Sheep’s Clothing, which features words with meanings that are not always immediately obvious.

A full review of this puzzle will be published after the closing date for submissions.

Some hints follow.

Across

1a    Agree to fix being very thin (10)
A charade of a verbs meaning to agree and to fix

6a    Nail poet that’s twisted inside (4)
Start with a word for a poet and swap (twisted) the middle letters (inside) around

9a    Rock singer learning to join blooming band (7)
A word or learning followed by a band of flowers (blooming)

 

10a    Seam put in Her Majesty’s furs (7)
A seam which is a source of minerals inside Her Majesty the Queens regnal cipher and the S from ‘S

12a    Trump’s game upset insurgent concealing mean person exposing wrongdoing (7-6)
This one is easy once the definition has been isolated – a five-letter card game that involves the use of trumps followed by the reversal (upset) of an insurgent around a three-letter adjective meaning mean or humble

19a    Six-footer belonging to religious faction (6)
A general word for a six-footed creature could, if split (2,4), mean belonging to a religious faction

22a    Prepare a lithe model for Victorian artist (3-10)
An anagram (model) of PREPARE A LITHE gives a Victorian artist – Millais, Hunt or Rossetti for example

This painting was set on the banks of the Hogsmill River in Surrey

 

27a    French short story with surprise ending entering competition (10)
A five-letter French word for a short story (which was a new one for me) followed by (with … ending) a surprise, especially for a criminal who falls for a trap set by the police!

Down

1d    Mass with everyone in shopping complex (4)
It’s time for an old chestnut! – M(ass) followed by everyone

2d    Old gardener has hour in tall building (7)
Will younger solvers know about this iconic old gardener? – put the two-letter abbreviation for H(ou)R inside a tall building

4d    Needing refreshment when sun comes out, making a couple of points over love? (6)
Drop (comes out) the S(un)from an adjective meaning needing liquid refreshment to get a tennis score

5d    Party in playground having to turn up smarter (8)
A five-letter party inside an abbreviated name for a playground, all reversed (turned up)

7d    Sheep gets to tear around refreshed (7)
A female sheep with a verb meaning to tear around it

13d    Bad-tempered person in vote plot (10)
The mark used in order to vote followed by a garden plot

20d    Old professors deserve interrupting that is on the rise (7)
These old professors are derived by putting a verb meaning to deserve inside the reversal (on the rise) of the Latin abbreviation for “that is”

23d    Dress up showing swagger (4)
The reversal (up in a down clue) of dress or clothing

The Crossword Club is now open.

Next Saturday Mrs BD and I will be at the S&B meeting in Macclesfield and Kath will be here looking after the hints.  The following Saturday I have an appointment for a cataract assessment and Tilsit will be sitting in the chair.


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The Quick Crossword pun: litter+arty=literati


37 comments on “DT 28468 (Hints)

  1. 2*/2*. A curate’s egg for me today with some nice clues, some iffy surfaces and a few verbose charades. 9a was my favourite.
    Thanks to the setter and to BD.

  2. A gentle canter for this one which was probably a little trickier than recent Saturday puzzles – ***/***.

    Favourite – 12a, once I got past the potential trump mis-direction.

    Thanks to the setter and BD.

  3. Very enjoyable, some great anagrams and 13d was a new word to me. I only managed to understand the ‘parsing’ of 12a, 13d and 4d after getting the answers and really having a think about the wordplay – very enjoyable and a feeling of satisfaction after understanding them.

    The Rugby was great and it really sets up next weeks game, I’m currently watching Surrey having a bit of a field day at Lords – it’s 99 for 1 after 15 overs – that’s good going!

  4. Pleasant enough but IMHO nothing to write home about. SW was last to go in mainly due to struggling to come up with an artist ‘s name in 22a and bunging in 16d without parsing it (stupidly still can’t!). Fav as Wimbledon begins has to be the simple 4d. Thank you Mysteron and BD. Now for more square eyes with Eastbourne tennis.

    1. 16d Previously popular leading man’s touring time (8)
      This one was on my shortlist for hints, but just missed the cut!
      A three-letter adjective meaning popular, as in a popular record, followed by a leading man around (touring) T(ime)

  5. After a disastrous week, giving up after Wednesday I decided to be brave and pick up my trusty pencil. Sailed through helped by fact that OH called me 13d earlier in the week, just had to check 16d parsing. Not smug about it because with my luck it will come unravelled tomorrow. Have a splendid weekend. Happy little old lady because OH bought me 2 DT cryptic crossword books as anniversary present :yahoo:

    1. BD hope assessment means second eye will be done very soon, it must be difficult for you having mismatched eyes.

  6. Like Angellov, I found that this to be a rather pleasant exercise and I was grateful for not being over-taxed because I was listening to the rugby commentary at the same time. I particularly liked 9a with 17a coming a close second.

  7. I really enjoyed today’s crossword – Mister Ron? – thought it was a bit trickier than some Saturdays.
    My main problem was a bad attack of ‘wobbly spelling’ which caused trouble with a couple of answers – no-one to blame but myself.
    Even having sussed out the definition and the answer to 12a it took me ages to untangle it all.
    I never did get to the bottom of why 27a was what it had to be – thanks BD.
    I did know the 2d ‘old gardener’ as he was my Nan’s favourite – she was as hooked on him as I am on Monty Don.
    I liked 9 and 15a and 2d. I thought 22a was a pretty smart anagram and my favourite was 13d.
    With thanks to whoever set this one and to BD.

  8. Thought this was a bit of a level up in the difficulty stakes for a Saturday. Took far too long to get 16d and confess to looking up the French short story. 6a only came to me when I remembered the name of the handy little tool I use when putting up pictures!

    Really enjoyed the solve despite agreeing with RD that there were a few iffy surfaces.
    Podium places going to 15,17&19a plus 4d.

    Many thanks to Mr. Saturday Ron and to BD for the hint selection – hope you and Mrs. BD enjoy the Macclesfield bash and good luck with the cataract assessment.

  9. A nice puzzle somewhat ruined for me by 27a, not difficult to solve but I get really annoyed by setters who use obscure foreign terms, please stick to English.
    I did, however, really like 17a and 6a. Not heard the term in 13d for many years, sounds like something one would hear in Downton Abbey. Mrs B had to explain 4d to me, ugh tennis!
    Thx to all

    1. If the setter had used a well known football manager instead in 27a, there would no doubt have been howls of protest from other quarters.

      1. I originally looked up the first three letters of this word using my translation app(*) and got a bit of a shock, it forced me to have a rethink!

        * not for those of a nervous disposition

  10. After a slow start it was smooth sailing today and helped along by a couple of long anagrams.

  11. This was a nice treat for the start of our holiday weekend, much enjoyed.
    Really, BD, 2d wasn’t THAT long ago, but maybe it’s just me being old.
    My Mum called me a 13d when I was throwing a tantrum. Had to check the spelling of 22a and google the French story.
    Thanks to setter, visit us again, and to BD for the hints, in particular 12a, the answer was obvious but I failed to parse it.

  12. Thanks to the setter and to Big Dave for the hints. A very enjoyable puzzle, but very tricky. Needed the hints for 27a&5d,but still couldn’t get them. Also couldn’t do 16d. Managed to get all of them with electronic help. First part of 27a was totally obscure. 2d was a blast from the past. Favourite was 4d which I thought was very original. Was 3*/3* for me.

  13. Very nice puzzle today, with 3 favourites, 2d because I used to love watching him on the tele, 9a because we just saw this last month during a fantastic river cruise, and 8d – my Dad was one of these brave chaps. Sadly I mentioned this to someone recently and they looked at me blankly. Thanks to setter for a pleasant start to the weekend (although I seem to have caught another cold despite still suffering from previous one), and to BD for the hints.

    1. This is possibly an apochryphal story that everyone has heard before but it was one of my Dad’s favourites. An old army colonel who had a penchant for not very clever young blond girlfriends told his latest amour that one of his ancestors had fallen at Waterloo to which she replied, “Oh really, which platform?” He was understandably annoyed and ditched her on the spot. He told the same story to the next girlfriend who laughed at length and he was just thinking that, finally, he’d found someone with a bit more of a brain when she said, “How silly, as if it mattered which platform”.

  14. The SW corner was decidedly tricky, with the rest virtually a R&W, which was more than a little disconcerting…

  15. A funny sort of puzzle but fun to do. A bit of a curates egg I suppose. I liked 13d so that was my fave. 2/3* overall.
    Thanks to the setter, and also to BD for the hints.

  16. I thought after 1d that this was going to be walk in the park . Not so !
    Sufficiently tricky to keep it interesting.
    9a and 19a were among the clues I liked.
    Thanks to the setter and BD.

    1. 26a Hearties regularly are unable to stand (4)
      Regular letters from the first word.

  17. Eventually completed, but never heard of 13 down before. 2d brought back memories of long ago TV programmes. ***/**** for me.

  18. 2d betrays the age of the setter and I don’t think such clues are ‘fair play’ for younger solvers (not me!).

  19. A curate’s egg this Saturday …had to resort to hints -thanks BD, but realised they were ‘Dohh’ situations. Managed to finish on Saturday, as Sunday is always a busy day. We have had some excellent anagrams lately and 25a was a perfect example. However 5d was typical of the unbelievably convoluted ones! 17a keeps cropping up under a different disguise! Enjoyable though.

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