Phantom entertains us and puts fire in the tail
ACROSS
8 During leap, policeman fell off on tracks — hurt (6) INJURY (IN JUmp RY)
9 When two lead characters are old, portraying becomes challenging (8) EXACTING (ENACTING-EN+EX)
10 Steep tax on a club in Middle East (8) MACERATE (A C in ME RATE)
11 Slob sits here, essentially idle (6) LOITER (sLOb sITs hERe)
12 A nice fellow’s excited to be married (6) FIANCE (A NICE F)*
It's the marriage season. We have a fiance today, and had a fiancee a couple of days back and a wedding
yesterday!
13 Commuted between cabin and junction, in snow vehicle (8) SHUTTLED (HUT T in SLED)
15 Evidence found in dregs (7) GROUNDS 2
This coffee seems to be poisoned with 23. But you can still drink it without worry, I understand, because ..
17 Investigate swindler beginning to assume knight’s title (7) ESQUIRE (ENQUIRE-N+S)
20 Abandoned wife after escape becomes centre of attention (8) ESCHEWED (ESC W in HEED)
22 Blackflies return well concealed inside (6) APHIDS (HID in SPA<)
DS.jpg)
23 Poison from arsenic contaminated medicine (6) CURARE (AR in CURE)
... it's harmless if taken orally !
25 Short version of long jump, first seen in 1896 perhaps (4,4) LEAP YEAR (jump=LEAP is seen first before YEARn)
Is 1896 a random choice out of the many examples one might give? Any observations? As CV puts it,
an exercise for the readers ...
26 Artists have love for a breed of setters (8) POINTERS (PAINTERS-A+O)
27 Cricket team’s uniform sported by short leg (6) ELEVEN (EVEN with LEg inside)
DOWN
1 Hidden snake, one, about to retreat is more furtive (8) SNEAKIER (SNAKE* 1 RE<)
2 As expected almost nothing remained, when water reportedly submerged old city (4-6) SURE ENOUGH (~sea SEE submerged UR NOUGHt)
3 Finally googly bowler, broke wicket with spin (6) GYRATE (googlY bowleR broke GATE)
4 Reserve suffered setback (7) REVERSE (REVERSE*)
5 Fairies shelter stupid gulls no end, from becoming these? (4,4) FALL GUYS (FAYS shelter GULLs*)
6 Pert Susie, oddly forgetting her handbag (4) ETUI (pErT sUsIe)
Also starred on Saturday as a small box
7 Mini explosion invoking best wishes? (6) SNEEZE (God Bless!)
14 Using feel, way letters were composed using smart phone’s screen? (5-5) TOUCH TYPED CD
asdf ;lkj frf juj ded kik ses lol aqa ;p; ... The index fingers cover 12 of the 26 alphabets!
16 Empty words: “Wily Emily” ? Indeed! Rather, naive (4-4) DEWY EYED (WilYyeD in DEED)
18 Hot drink without kick? Duke on rising, rejected, flushed (3-5) RED FACED (DECAF D RE<)<
19 Writer to work on story describing Saint’s worship (7) IDOLISE (I DO LIE describing S)
21 Ram butts, as a result, run in a daze (6) STUPOR (TUP in SO R)
My present status (still recovering from yesterday's wonderful lunch)
22 Bewildered Bill lost in jungle? Just the opposite (6) AMAZED (MAZE in AD)
In Bangalore, we are lost in a maze of bill-boards
24 Missile breaks down again after meltdown of core (4) AGNI (AGaIN)*
The first modern Olympic games were held in 1896 in Athens; long jump was one of the events.
ReplyDeletePerfectly correct. My fav for the event was Bob Beamon at Mexico ...
DeleteGot CUR(AR)E; but was a little doubtful as Arsenic is usually represented as AS (the chemical symbol) and not AR.
ReplyDeleteAs you noticed yesterday too, chemistry is my bete noir ...
DeleteProbably the Phantom's too ;-)
DeleteReminds me of an amusing clue for Arsenic by Paul in The Guardian: As bottom attractive, pinched bottom
DeleteKishore,
ReplyDeleteA couple of corrections-
11A- the solution is loiter- no 's'
17A- the solution seems to be 'esquire' to fit crossing of 5D. Then def. would be 'knights title'.
Updated. Thanks. Errors of copying from working file.
DeleteCorrection to your correction ;-) :
In 17a, the def is 'title' not 'knight's title'
Investigate= enquire
swindler beginning to assume knight= s in place of n=knight, as in chess
title=defn
Some decades ago, the name in letters used to be followed with Esq. (akin to Avl - Avargal in Tamil)
Delete16D-
ReplyDeleteempty words would lead to 'wy' & 'ey' (with middle letters removed in both) and not as shown. Pl. make the correction.
Done. Proves my comment under 21d
DeleteAll that empty reminds me of Sidney Wang (played by Peter Sellers) in Murder by Death, describing an empty room:
DeleteA room full of empty people
I've seen Murder by Death and I thought the movie was brilliant.
DeletePeter Sellers is awesome. Liked all his movies in the Pink Panther series. After he was gone the franchise kind of lost its charm.
So,correction seems to be mutual! With no effects of lunch from my side.
ReplyDeletePhantom was too heavily masked for me. Couldn't solve maore than half :-((
ReplyDeleteKishore thanks for standing in on Sat. If your present status is stupor, I am way beyond that and walking around like a zombie!! The last few days were like a whirlwind, it was rly station wedding venue, rly station wedding venue and so on, then falling over one another at the packed house and pushing everyone to get ready in time for the wedding. Luckily being a Sunday the traffic was thin, so there were no holdups on that account, however a couple of guests got lost and reached late despite having sent them a route map.
ReplyDeleteThis is gruesomely difficult. Got just a few. And, after seeing the answers with annotations here, I still remain by and large unenlightened about many of the clues.
ReplyDeleteCol.
ReplyDeleteGlad to hear wedding went off well as planned. Convey our blessings to your son & D.in law on all our behalf.
Definitely towards the tough end of the THC scale. Had to work back after getting the answer for quite a few clues. Liked the clues for LOITER and LEAP YEAR.
ReplyDeleteAre setters and pointers the same breed of dogs? I thought they were different.
I thought "1896 perhaps" was too vague a definition for LEAP YEAR. Why 1896 in particular when there are so many numbers to choose from?
DeleteNo particular reason except that the first modern Olympics, when the event was held was in 1896. If I'd had 1900 or 1904 it would still be vague.
DeleteMaybe '1896 or 1900' in the clue would have been better.
DeleteExcept that 1900 was not a leap year
Delete@ CV Sir,
ReplyDeleteThis refers to Balderdash’s clarification quoted in your yesterday’s post on the classification of clue “Yap but settle accounts (3,2)” :
“ …….. I would call it a 'reverse reversal', on the logic that In a reverse anagram, Defn = Anagram Fodder + Anagram Indicator. Similarly, in a reverse reversal, Defn = Reversal Fodder + Reversal indicator “
In cases where a clue is answered with a clue, the clue in the answer has an indicator that includes not only reversal but rearrangement and reduction as well.
Take, for instance, the following clue from Guardian 26091:
"Flit suggested – so take flight, then? ( 4,3,2,5) "
Answer: LIFT OUT OF ORDER
Here the answer itself is a clue for 'FLIT' in the original clue and “out of order” is a rearrangement indicator.
I’m not sure if ‘reverse reversal’ better labels it.
Generally I call it a 'counter-clue' type. I don't know if anyone has classified it as such.
DeleteThe counter-clue type has the fodder plus the indicator. This type could include 'reverse reversal' as well.
Never realised that the puzzle was tough. I thought it was slightly tricky, but not hard. Seems to have put off a lot of people.
ReplyDeleteI think setters are hardly aware of the level of toughness of their own puzzles.
DeleteHaving written the clues it'd be easier for the setters to crack 'em. With solvers it's not so.
Bhavan,
ReplyDeleteYou have a point there. I too filled in a few but was trying to work out how to justify. You were always trying to find out why and when we, solvers, find it difficult. This is one of the reasons. Working out the answer from the cryptic def. is one thing, but justifying / trying to justify later is totally different and one is not always sure until we see the blog.
Annapoorani
ReplyDeleteIt seems many Guardian cryptic crossword fans are here. Suresh is one of them, I know. Now you too are are citing a clue from that puzzle. I trust you are aware of www.fifteensquared.net where the cwd is blogged every day. If you have any doubt over the justification for a clue, you can check there.
As for the clue "Flit suggested – so take flight, then? ( 4,3,2,5) "
I would classify it as reverse anagram.
The answer LIFT OUT OF ORDER suggests an anagram of lift and the clue gives the anagram FLIT.
Every clue must have a subsidiary indication. Here it is "so take flight, then?" - that is if the lift is out of order, we need to take flight - steps.
Of course you have mentioned all this. But I am writing merely to look at it myself.
Yes, I would call it reverse anagram.
In the case of BD's clue, it might be reverse reversal.
CV sir,
ReplyDeleteThanks for your reply. Sorry I hadn't seen your reply before posting my second one.
Generally I take it as counter-clue type.