Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 31334
Hints and Tips by Deansleigh
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BD Rating – Difficulty **/*** Enjoyment ****
Good morning everyone, and welcome to the midweek back-pager blog. I found today’s puzzle quite challenging – an excellent Wednesday workout. My favourite from a plethora of fine clues is the naked president in 22a. I also enjoyed the Quickie pun. Many thanks to our setter.
In the hints below the definition element of each clue has been underlined, anagrams are CAPITALISED and indicator words (e.g. anagram indicators) are in brackets. The answers are concealed under the Click Here buttons.
Across Clues
1a Go westwards over motorway, having walked (7)
TRAMPED: A synonym for ‘go’ or ‘leave’ is reversed (westwards) and placed round the abbreviation for motorway.
5a Upper-class bishop leaves rum cocktail measure (7)
CALIBRE: Remove the abbreviations of ‘upper-class’ and ‘bishop’ from a rum-based cocktail. ‘Measure’ here means ‘degree’ (of excellence, for example).
9a Studio curtains ordered, hosting new RSC production (5,10)
TITUS ANDRONICUS: This gory Shakespeare play is an anagram (ordered) of STUDIO CURTAINS around (hosting) the abbreviation for ‘new’.
10a Finale of Byron poem that might bring a lump to the throat? (4)
NODE: The last letter (finale) of Byron, and a word for a lyric poem.
11a Crazy pub, goodness! (5)
BARMY: Another word for a pub, and an interjection expressing surprise.
12a Giant conger-eel regularly sliced (4)
OGRE: The alternate letters (regularly sliced) of ‘conger-eel’.
15a Native American agreed to put on cotton cloth (7)
CHINOOK: An informal way of saying ‘yes’ (agreed) follows a cotton fabric used for making trousers.
16a Daffy actor playing Mickey Mouse? (7)
CARTOON: An anagram (daffy) of ‘actor’, and a synonym for ‘playing’ (at the cinema, for example).
17a Terminate bank clerk (7)
CASHIER: A double definition.
19a Surrey town‘s blemishes reported (7)
STAINES: A homophone (reported) of ‘blemishes’.
21a Burden ordinary youngster carries (4)
LOAD: A word for a youth or young man is placed around around (carries) the abbreviation for ‘ordinary’.
22a Disgraced president naked? (5)
NIXON: Split (3,2) this could mean ‘not wearing anything’; the first part is an informal word for ‘nothing’.
23a Skip – very clever dog – denied good run (4)
OMIT: Remove the abbreviation of ‘good’ and the cricketing ‘run’ from the name of a much-loved animated dog.
26a Klopp counsels us to work, work harder (4,4,5,2)
PULL ONES SOCKS UP: An anagram (to work) of KLOPP COUNSELS US.
27a Dismissed job in far-flung location (7)
OUTPOST: A word that means ‘dismissed’ in cricket and a synonym of ‘job’ or ‘position’.
28a Massage revered figure after which there’s no going back (7)
RUBICON: A synonym for ‘massage’ or ‘apply friction to’, and a word for someone who is revered or admired.
Down clues
1d Film, one that went down, in the main, rather dreadfully? (7)
TITANIC: A double definition, the second one being a cryptic description of the fate of the film’s subject.
2d Sun, Daily Star etc put out work of fiction (1,5,2,7)
A STUDY IN SCARLET: An anagram (put out) of SUN DAILY STAR ETC.
3d Urge American to visit British drinking establishment (4)
PUSH: An abbreviation for ‘American’ inside (to visit) the abbreviation for a public house on an Ordnance Survey map.
4d Men travelling in Black Country (7)
DENMARK: An anagram (travelling) of MEN inside a word meaning black or gloomy.
5d Work from Potter after getting fired? (7)
CERAMIC: A cryptic definition of a potter’s output.
6d Left at home finally gutting fish (4)
LING: The abbreviation for ‘left’, the usual word for ‘at home’, and the last letter (finally) of ‘gutting’.
7d Notes produced by the Speaker for the lobby? (10,5)
BACKGROUND MUSIC: A cryptic definition of the sound that comes out of a speaker in a public place such as a hotel lobby.
8d Oriental religious festival ending in afternoon (7)
EASTERN: A Christian festival, and the final letter of (ending in) ‘afternoon’.
13d Doctor set up appropriate theme (5)
MOTIF: An abbreviation for a doctor or medical officer, and a reversed (set up, in a down clue) synonym of ‘appropriate’ or ‘apt’.
14d Holiday snap (5)
BREAK: A double definition.
17d California agent rejected old West Indian song (7)
CALYPSO: The three-character abbreviation of California, a reversed (rejected) word for a secret agent, and the abbreviation for ‘old’.
18d End in torn clothing (7)
RAIMENT: A synonym of ‘end’ or ‘objective’ inside another word for ‘torn’.
19d Tesco use recycled bags one found in Liverpool (7)
SCOUSER: Hidden in the first three words of the clue.
20d Exercise leg and bottom? (3-4)
SIT-UPON: An abdominal exercise, and the term for the leg side in cricket.
24d Engine Charlie parked in station, out of Water? (4)
LOCO: Remove the word ‘Water’ from the name of a London terminus, and insert the letter represented by Charlie in the NATO phonetic alphabet.
25d Taxi carrying southern strikebreaker (4)
SCAB: Another word for a taxi comes after (carrying, in a down clue) the abbreviation for ‘southern’.
Which clues did you like best? Let us know in the comments below.
The Quick Crossword pun: FOUGHT + NUMB + MANNED + MASON = FORTNUM AND MASON
This was definitely a step up in difficulty from the past 2 days, with plenty of excellent clues. The main sticking point for me was to unravel the three long anagrams, after which the remainder fell into place. LOI was the disgraced president which required reverse parsing; a very clever clue. My other favourites were the speaker notes at 7d and working harder at 26a.
Many thanks to the setter and DL
3*/4*
Plenty of low-hanging fruit, but there were some particularly amusing references.
The rum cocktail at 5a, the president in the buff at 22a and Wallace’s pal in 23a were my pick of the crop.
My thanks to our setter and Deansleigh.
Nicely chewy for a Wednesday workout. Started off at a canter, but was slowed down by a few clues in the east which needed some teasing out. All in all, thoroughly enjoyable. My podium comprises all across clues, 28, 15 and 22. Thanks to compiler and Deansleigh
A real challenge but very enjoyable.
After a first pass I look for anagrams, especially long ones to unveil checkers. I can only admire today’s setter for three brilliant examples of the art at 9a, 26a and 2d. How anyone can create one let alone three is completely beyond my comprehension. I had to start again and seeking checkers from elsewhere.
Only slight wobble was the naked president, an obvious answer but not sure about the parsing.
COTD – the anagrams
I really enjoyed this puzzle as I teased out the answers.
Top picks for me were 22a, 23a, 16a, 11a and 4d.
I also liked the Quickie pun.
Thanks to Deansleigh and the setter.
This was a very enjoyable crossword, penned, I reckon, by Mr T, purely based on the humour of 22a. I was trying to convince myself that ‘linto’ meant ‘disgraced’.
24d doesn’t quite work for me as Water’s initial is capitalised and I’ve never heard of the cocktail.
I still have it in my head that 19a is in Middlesex which I know is wrong.
My picks are 26a, 2d and 4d.
MTTTA and Adele Singh.
3*/4*
I forgot to say that I haven’t heard of 20d which is brilliantly self-descriptive and funny.
3.5*/2*. A puzzle of extremes for me both in terms of enjoyment and difficulty.
I couldn’t parse 5a, and I’m not surprised having read Deansleigh’s decryption. Even though PH in 3d appears on OS maps, it is not in either the BRB or Collins. The definition for 20d seems decidedly dodgy, even with the question mark. The capital W in 24d is unnecessary and ruins the surface. I thought it was a pity that three of the four long answers were anagrams (although no grumbles from me about the indicators!)
I did like 11a, 15a, 22a, 23a & 7d.
Thanks to the setter and the hinter.
Well spotted – because of its appearance in OS maps it’s certainly a very long established and accepted usage but it’s curious that PH is in neither BRB nor Collins – and the latter gives four definitions for the abbreviation.
I guess the capital W is required on the basis that the setter may capitalise a leading letter to give the illusion of a word being a proper noun, but may not give a proper noun a lower case letter. So Waterloo must retain its capital W even without its loo, despite the detriment to the clue?
Mustafa, I’m not convinced that the capitalisation rule applies when specifying letters to be subtracted (or as part of anagram fodder), so “water” would have been fine.
In any event, Water with a capital W looks utterly incongruous in the surface.
The question mark is the setter asking us to let him off.
It’s a difficult one but, in this case, I’m a ‘No’
RD. 20d answer = the buttocks – straight out of the BRB!
I suppose there’s no need for PH to be in dictionaries because it’s only really encountered on maps, and they have their own keys. I think it gets a pass as being ‘general knowledge’, along with, say, names of disgraced presidents.
I’d much rather PH be indicated as Hudson has done today than with 💜, even though the latter is supported in dictionaries!
A step up in challenge and a hugely enjoyable crossword, I wasn’t making much progress until I cracked the four long clues which opened up the rest of the grid. I too thought 22a was excellent and 23a, 7d and various others were pretty good too. Like TDS, I hadn’t heard of the cocktail and thought 19a was in Middlesex, despite clearly being on the Surrey side of the river. Thanks very much to the setter and to Deansleigh. I’m off to the Escher exhibition at Somerset House in a bit and looking forward to it.
Hi CM
Many moons ago, 19a was in Middlesex and changed in 1965 which is was earlier than I thought.
All to do with when ‘Greater London’ was created and Middlesex was ‘erased’ from the map. Staines, now Staines-upon-Thames, and its environs were transferred into Surrey.
C’s confusion may have have arisen because 19a officially retained Middlesex as its postal county until 1996, for addressing mail, etc.
Dear Middlesex, dear vanished county friend,
Your neighbour, London, killed you in the end.
John Betjeman, late 60s.
Love it.
Johnny boy, of course, penned this….
Come, friendly bombs, and fall on Slough!
It isn’t fit for humans now,
There isn’t grass to graze a cow.
Swarm over, Death!
It took me a while to cotton on as I still think of 19a as being in Middlesex, as per above comments.
I no longer know which town is in which county, they have all changed so much since we moved across the pond.
I’d always thought wrongly that it was Cubra Libre (which left an R unaccounted for) until Mr G put me right – I’ve had a few rum based cocktails over the years (but not this one) & of course had to give a Zombie a try though unlike Babs sadly not out of a cocoa shell….🐚
Pretty tricky in places for me today. The upper case ‘S’ in Speaker threw me as I thought that setters avoided such breaches of English usage. I spent far too long thinking about the house Of commons Chamber Music.
20d was a new use of that phrase for me but the word play led me there.
I have used 2d to prompt me to listen to that story again from my audio book collection. We can only guess what Sherlock Holmes would have thought of crosswords, as he retired just as they were introduced. My guess is that he would have considered them a waste of his time and grey matter. Perhaps he sat on his sit upon on the promenade at Eastbourne when he no longer had more consequential problems to solve.
23a is my COTD.
DR. Using false capitalisation for misdirection purposes (which seems to have worked well) is common in cryptic clues and is a perfectly legitimate device. But the opposite – lowercasing a word that should have a capital letter – is generally not allowed.
Hi J, me old cocker.
I’ve always wondered why the latter is generally not allowed.
Any ideas?
I’m not sure why, exactly. I guess it’s just one of those things that “the powers that be” decided years ago was unfair on the solver. Like indirect, either partial or full, anagrams.
It is a strange one as they could have some fun with it.
Thank you, anyway.
AI gives this explanation. But not altogether convincing:
In cryptic crosswords, lowercasing a proper noun is forbidden because it violates the fundamental rule of Ximenean fairness: the cryptic reading of a clue must be grammatically and orthographically correct.
While crossword setters are famous for using “deceptive capitalisation”, the rules governing case changes operate strictly as a one-way street.
The One-Way Street of Capitalisation Allowed (Lowercase to Uppercase): A setter can capitalise an ordinary word like “turkey” to “Turkey”. This is considered fair because any common noun can legally become capitalised in standard English—such as when it starts a sentence or appears in a book title. The cryptic reading remains valid.Forbidden (Uppercase to Lowercase): A setter cannot write a proper noun like “Shakespeare” or “the Sweet” in lowercase as “will” or “sweet”. In the English language, a proper noun cannot lose its capital letter in the middle of a sentence without becoming ungrammatical
Thanks for this.
The two rules for making a lower case an upper one make sense though ‘Water’ today has broken those rules.
I guess a setter can do what they want as we occasionally see grammatical errors to make a surface work which isn’t Ximenean but I’m okay with it though it does make me flinch.
We need to give these superstars a bit of latitude, other than AIs, of course…
I love that the two examples are Shakespeare and that other British behemoth…The Sweet.
Hilarious!
Having put outcast in 27 I made a right Horlicks of the south west .. Also not convinced about 20 d , Surface? Apart from these, the rest went in very quickly.I really enjoyed this puzzle despite my shortcomings.Favourites 2 and 24 . Thanks to all .
Hi Fran
20d’s surface is saying that you should exercise your leg (maybe do a stretch) and do some glute work-outs which will help tone your behind.
I’m still reeling from your encounters with Sir Garry. Soooooo jealous.
Enjoyed that very much, despite being unable to parse 5a – fortunately the answer was evident. Some very clever anagrams and a good variety of clues. I did like the cryptic ones.
Honours to 22a, 23a & 2d, with a mention in dispatches to 26a.
Many thanks to the setter (really not sure … Hudson, maybe?) and to Deansleigh
5a is still lost on me. I would appreciate it of someone could explain it.
Dicky, if you click on the extra link in Deansleigh’s hint for 5a you will be taken to a page describing a particular rum cocktail.
By removing U (upper-class) and B (bishop) from the name of that cocktail you are left with a type of measure, one in my experience most often associated with firearms, and a homophone of which was once an utterly ghastly non-alcoholic lager-style drink!
Thank you so much. I just call it a rum and coke. That is about to change.
Dicky,
The rum-based cocktail is a Cuba Libre. Remove the abbreviations for Upper Class and Bishop and you’re left with CALIBRE. Chambers defines this as a ‘degree of suitability or excellence’. ‘Measure’ can also be defined as ‘some amount or degree’. I hope that helps.
Thought this was going to be a DNS (Did Not Start) rather than a DNF! Struggled to get 6 answers on the first pass, then hit a small streak of success, before being stumped by changing county boundaries. I too thought the town belonged in Middlesex.
The cocktail was remembered from a family holiday in Ibiza in mid 70s. Pepe’s bar was just a short walk down the road (dirt track) from the hotel and hosted a DIY barbecue in the back – first pick your steak……
My parents and aunt and uncle were astonished that after several rounds of said cocktail, lemonades for us 5 kids and steaks, the total bill translated to £9 odd, which was cheap even for those times. That Pepe’s English amounted to “pay later, pay later” didn’t appear to help him total the bill correctly.
I really appreciated the long anagrams – what a skill – and the quickie pun was excellent.
Thanks to setter and hinter.
What a fabulous puzzle. My downfall was 20 down because leg made me think of pin which led to spin which led to not getting the answer. Fair enough. Always hoped to find a first edition of 2 down. They keep such in the marvellous bookshop in Henley. Going back too far, the clever dog was Lassie – no it was not. For best clue I’ll cross out the fine 28 a. and go for the president left naked.
3 * for difficulty and 5 * for enjoyment
Many thanks
Glad it wasn’t just me fixated on pins !
And me. And ‘sits,’ my answer being sit-spin, an ice-skating exercise, can be a sort of generic term for chair based exercises.
Quite tricky in places but very enjoyable throughout – many thanks to our setter and Deansleigh.
I didn’t know the rum cocktail so that was a case of getting the answer from the definition and checkers and reverse parsing it.
Ticks from me for 22a, 23a, 7d, 20d and 24d.
Dean sleigh
26a = pull ones socks up
Thanks for the hints. 10 were needed.
Thanks C, now corrected.
Definitely quite chewy for a Wednesday with 5a being the last to fall – 3.5*/3.5*
Candidates for favourite – 1a, 22a, 7d, 18d, 24d, and an HM for the Pun – and the winner is 22a.
Thanks to whomsoever and Deansleigh.
Brilliant puzzle, kept me busy all morning and helped keeping my 91 year old brain working. I only failed on 15 a,TW
Welcome to the blog, Tony.
Now that you’ve introduced yourself I hope that you’ll become a regular commenter.
Welcome, keep contributing
Two flippin’ days in a row where the puzzle can’t seem to be loaded in a timely manner. What the heck is with the TT team … it is just annoying.
3*/3.5*
Favourites today include 1a, 11a, 19a, 1d, 4d & 19d
Thanks to setter & Deansleigh
Telegraph … get your act together for goodness sake.
It’s not just the crossword, I have to exit and return several times for not only the cryptic, but the 1% puzzle and the pangrams.
I agree with RD on this one.
5a I’ve heard of but who has asked for one of those in the UK. Rum and Coke yes. I suppose the addition of lime juice maybe a distinction.
Thanks to Dean and Setter
Defeated by 5a, I knew I was looking for the name of a cocktail to subtract a U and a B from, but can probably only name a handful of the most obvious ones, so thanks to Deansleigh for the answer. The rest went in fine although trickier than mon/tues as it should be. Im not sure about 20d – just doesn’t really work (although who am I to question?)
Thought 22a a cracker – can’t believe I’ve never noticed that before – bravo setter.
Thanks to them and to Deansleigh for the cocktail
A very good Wednesday offering. Great clues, a decent challenge and an enjoyable tussle. I have ticked a few and will pick 22a across as my favourite, because it took a while to suss out. 3*/4*.
Very enjoyable but challenging, I needed the hints for 5a and 22a. The long clues and anagrams were all very helpful.
Many thanks to the setter and to Deansleigh for the hints.
1.5* / 4* Excellent midweeker, very enjoyable only foxed by the 5a cocktail, but managed the answer without parsing.
Top clues include 22a the naked president, clever dog at 22a and no going back at 28a
Thanks to Deansleigh and compiler
An excellent puzzle today with some cracking clues definitely a notch up from the last couple . Quite a few that had ‘subtract letters’ to make the definition , which I always find trickier , but they were all doable and good fun. 20d was a great clue and I too also thought it had something to do with pin as a word for leg , and as spin is a type of exercise … anyway in the end I got the answer and had not heard of it as a term for the buttocks , so there you go! I loved 23a and 24d also 5a. Thanks to the setter and Deansleigh.
I did this while waiting to see the colorectal professor at the QE Hospital in Birmingham. He’s pretty confident that he can sort everything out and I’m to have an op in the next couple of months. He then proceeded to tell about all the ways I could die!
Took me a while to get this completed and I’m still not too sure about the parsing of a couple but I haven’t looked at the hints yet. Plenty to like but my COTD is the naked president at 22a.
Thank you, setter for a the waiting room diversion. Thank you, Ashlee Ding for the hints.
Great to read the positive news, SC, though some docs just can’t help themselves being grim reapers.
They have to point the pitfalls out, Tom. It’s the law. I got the same when I had my liver transplant. To hear the surgeon you’d have thought they were already constructing my coffin.
All the best Steve!!!!!!
Thanks AP. 😊
Very best wishes to you, dear sir
Thank you, Hudson. 👍
I’m having one of their lovely “scopes” next week, and in true manner, all the possible mishaps were pointed out to me also…
Wishing yiu the very best when you finally get this sorted in a couple of months Steve.
Thank you, BL and I hope your scoping goes smoothly.
2d I didn’t like. It was obviously an anagram, but, I mean, there are millions of works of fiction. A more imaginative reference to the 2nd of 4th words would have been helpful. Also 7d was quite an obscure clue.
No time to say any more than enjoyed this immensely. Now off to bowl in the rain. Thanks to the setter and She Aligned.
Very enjoyable indeed except that I had never heard of the solution to 20D. Sounds like a right poncey expression when ar*e would be preferable? Thanks as always for the explanations.
3*/3* …
liked 11A “Crazy pub, goodness ! (5)”
Good evening
Well, first of all, I’m a beer and whisky man rather than a cocktail man. After pondering 5a for an absolute age, having finally discounted the use of “rum” as an anagram indicator, I looked up rum cocktails and the answer fell into place (I’d written it in the margin, but the margin doesn’t count)
That was my last to fall, and it takes joint honours for COTD with 22a (oh, for goodness sake! 🤣) and 23a, amongst several strong contenders.
No idea who set this. Many thanks to him or her for a cracking set of clues. Many thanks to Deansleigh also.
I don’t normally get this far on a Wednesday but found this puzzle quite quirky especially the long anagrams😳 ****/**** but enjoyably unique 😃 Favourites 9, 10 & 22a. Thanks to Deansleigh and of course to the compiler 🤔
A curate’s egg for me but I did enjoy some bits of it. IMHO 7d could have been rather more specific. 5a was a bung-in as I certainly had not heard of the cocktail. 22a was grinworthy. Thank you to the so far unidentified setter and to Deansleigh.
A bit too chewy for my liking, but it could be the pinched nerve aggravating my neck, shoulder and left arm that is making me grumpy. I too did not care for 2d – too many fiction titles. Smiled at 22a. He is now remembered more positively by many Americans, as his disgressions pale compared to the current tenant. But this kept me out of mischief so thanks to the setter and Deansleigh.
Needed the hint to parse 5a as I’ve never heard of the cocktail but had to be what it was. The first part of 22a is an unindicated Americanism to me, I’ve never heard it used here in Blighty in my life, I’m sure others will disagree. 20d didn’t really work for me but the parsing was clear. Not easy but arguably about right for a Wednesday. Favourite was between 23a and 28a and I’ll go with 28a. Thanks to the setter and DL.
Found this very very hard. Apart from 12a, solved no clues in the north half. Solved all of nine in the South.
At least most people managed to solve this mega beastie.
Quite tough. Still fun. Favourite was the 23a dog. Thank you to Hudson and Deansleigh (especially for the cocktail), and best wishes to Steve.
Top notch puzzle as per from Hudson (presumably). Liked the wee ones at 23a&24d, the anagrammed long ‘uns (needed Mr G to tell me who wrote 2d) & RN in the buff. The cryptic def at 7d gets my late vote as fav.
Thanks to Deansleigh
Just finished with my final entry being 20d and which I got wrong. I entered sit-spin which apparently is an ice-skating technique, so not quite a correct completion. I now see how the clue is constructed, cricket was never my sport, but I was looking at pin as a term for leg. It was still a challenging puzzle with some very nice clues, my favourites were 23a, 28a and 7d. Perhaps I ought to include the disgraced president at 22a.
Thank you to the setter and to Deansleigh for the hints.