Notes for Azed 2,661

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

Azed 2,661 Plain

Difficulty rating: (3 / 5)

Another reasonably tricky puzzle, with some obscure words in wordplays contributing to the difficulty. That said, it was an entertaining solve, and a crossword which I felt Azed had enjoyed setting.

Setters’ Corner: This week I’m going to look at clue 8d, “SA drain, alright in side of road, clearing closure (5)”. When Chambers shows the usage of a word as being restricted to a specific geographical area, whether that be northern England or Australia, custom and practice demands that this should be indicated by the setter. While this convention is often a bit of a nuisance, and can on occasion be ignored (‘wee’ for ‘little’ may be given by Chambers as Scottish, but it is rarely flagged as such in clues), it does provide an added opportunity for deception. Apart from old chestnuts like ‘Nice friend’ for AMI, ‘in Perth’ could indicate a Scottish word…or an Australian one. A term from ‘East London’ may in reality be South African, and so on. When a word is shown as being from more than one place, eg ‘Aust and NZ’, only one need be indicated. Here the ‘SA’ is an abbreviation not of ‘South Africa’ but of ‘South America’, the positioning of a two-letter word for ‘alright’ inside a four-letter word for a pavement edge missing its last letter producing a Guyanese word for a sluice-gate.

Across

1a Lolly flash couple of loves put into glossy mags (12)
Quite a testing clue to start with, a four-letter word shown by Chambers under flash² followed by a double helping of the letter representing love (for Andy Murray) being enclosed by a mid-century US term for expensive or glossy magazines, as opposed to ‘pulps’.

12a Fool from Ohio welcomed by Republicans (4)
The acronym GOP for the US Republican Party dates back to 1875, at which point it stood for Gallant Old Party. It has been given several alternative interpretations over the years (most notably Get Out and Push) but the accepted expanded form is now Grand Old Party. In 2009 the Wall Street Journal instructed staff to discontinue use of the term GOP on the basis (ostensibly) that readers might not know what it meant. Incidentally, the party’s elephant symbol dates back to an 1874 cartoon by Thomas Nast, showing the Democratic Party as a donkey trying to scare an elephant depicting the Republican Party. Here the single-letter abbreviation for ‘Ohio’ is contained (‘welcomed’) by the TLA in question.

15a One expelled with the others I have returned before middle of trimester (7)
A three-letter abbreviation for ‘and the rest’ (‘with the others’) and a contracted form of ‘I have’ are reversed (‘returned’) ahead of the middle letter of ‘trimester’.

16a NZ tree beside local bracken (6)
A charade of a two-letter word meaning (among many other things) ‘beside’ and the name of a variety of bracken found in New Zealand (ie ‘local bracken’), and also of the Georgia plantation in Gone with the Wind established by Gerald O’Hara on land that he won in all-night poker game.

19a River twice entering Scots one causing delay (5)
The standard abbreviation for ‘River’ appears twice (in succession) inside (‘entering’) the name of a Scottish river (ie ‘Scots one’).

21a Early arrivals set to work impress, shedding coat (5)
An anagram (‘set to work’) of IMPRESS without its first and last letters (‘shedding coat’).

24a Points around hard parts of buckle (6)
I puzzled for a while over the synonym for ‘points’ which was to go around the usual abbreviation for ‘hard’, before I realised that Azed was talking about points of land.

29a Style in basic nature (almost) followed by the French (7)
A six-letter word for ‘basic nature’ or ‘something that exists independently’ deprived of its last letter (‘almost’) is followed by the  masculine form of the French word for ‘the’.

31a Opposition in deep clashing quibble (9)
The ‘opposition’ which is to be put inside an anagram (‘clashing’) of DEEP takes the form of the plural of a word for ‘a person who is opposed to anything’.

Down

2d A bit of a poser for bachelor (4)
A simple charade of a three-letter word meaning ‘for’ (cf the opposition in 31a) and the standard abbreviation for ‘bachelor’, but the clue put me in mind of this early exchange between Morse and Lewis in Colin Dexter’s Last Bus to Woodstock:

By a quarter to midnight Lewis had finished his task and he reported to Morse, who was sitting with The Times in the manager’s office, drinking what looked very much like whisky. ‘Ah Lewis.’ He thrust the paper across. ‘Have a look at 14 down. Appropriate eh?’ Lewis looked at 14 down: Take in bachelor? It could do (3). He saw what Morse had written into the completed diagram: BRA. What was he supposed to say? He had never worked with Morse before. ‘Good clue, don’t you think?’ Lewis, who had occasionally managed the Daily Mirror coffee-time crossword was out of his depth, and felt much puzzled. ‘I’m afraid I’m not very hot on crosswords, sir.’ ‘”Bachelor” – that’s BA and “take” is the letter “r”; recipe in Latin. Did you never do any Latin?’ ‘No sir.’ ‘Do you think I’m wasting your time, Lewis?’ Lewis was nobody’s fool and was a man of some honesty and integrity. ‘Yes, sir.’ An engaging smile crept across Morse’s mouth. He thought they would get on well together.

Incidentally, the surnames of all the characters in the novel are those of competitors in Ximenes/Azed competitions, something which is explored further in an article  on this site.

3d Where to log on over a latte, even holding case up? (7)
A poetic contraction of ‘even’ containing a four-letter word for a case (perhaps more accurately for a statement of facts presented in a court of law) is reversed (‘up’).

4d Former mishap originated with conclusion taken to head (6)
A six-letter word meaning ‘originated’ or ‘brought up’  has its last letter moved to the beginning (‘conclusion taken to head’).

7d Device for fixing wedge, mostly ingenious, cut up in copper, say? (9)
A six-letter word meaning ‘ingenious’ (or ‘decorative’) missing its last letter (‘mostly’) is reversed (‘up’) inside a term for the something that is exemplified (‘say’) by a copper – or by a 50p piece. The solution is hyphenated, 6-3, while the ‘cut’ strikes me as being somewhat de trop.

11d What was behind Moroccan tree being found around Spain? (5)
The Moroccan name for the sandarac tree, when placed around the IVR code for Spain, produces a Spenserian spelling of a word meaning ‘that which is in the rear or behind’, so ‘what was behind’.

20d Sound of one seeking to enter vale in desert (7)
The magazine issued every term by my college had a ‘joiners and leavers’ section headed ‘Ave atque Vale’ (‘Hail and Farewell’, a spot of Catullus), and it is that sort of ‘vale’ (‘goodbye’) that leads to a four-letter word to be inserted into a verb often indicated in cryptic slues by ‘desert’. The answer contains a couple of hyphens.

22d Speaking less than the rest, group in the middle? Reverse of that (6)
A three-letter word for a group is to be placed in an informal word that could be applied to one’s ‘middle’, and the combination is then reversed (‘Reverse of that’).

24d Second half of ring on a square wedge? (5)
The second half of a six-letter word for a ring is followed by the letter A (from the clue) and a single letter which describes the shape of a square used in technical drawing and carpentry.

25d Typical of classy folk in county resorts (6)
A single letter which designates something or someone as being of first class is contained by the five-letter abbreviation for the name of an English county.

(definitions are underlined)