Notes for Azed 2,688

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 2,688 ‘A Cool Yomp’

Difficulty rating: (6 / 10)

First and foremost, may I take this opportunity to wish all readers a very happy Christmas indeed.

The closing date for competition entries has, I understand, been corrected – it is now Monday 8 January.

This year we have a Spoonerisms puzzle for our Christmas special – a first time for me as a solver, since the last one was back in 2006. The hardest things with these puzzles are (i) getting your head round how the two different clue types work, and (ii) dealing with the occasional oddity (see below). For the type ‘A’ clues, always remember to write in the answer (which will normally have no definition), not the spoonerized version. For the avoidance of clarity (as a lawyer I used to work with was fond of saying), a ‘type A’ clue is one like this:

Sailor pub crawl to wind up in exchange deal (9) – BARTENDER [END in BARTER, ‘tar bender’, defined words spoonerized)

while a ‘type B’ is like this:

Eat up messily what could be made of shoal (5) – TAUPE [anagram of EAT UP, ‘what could be shade of mole’, words in definition spoonerized)

Generally, the spoonerisms are consonantal and involve only two words, but occasionally they can be vocalic (eg 27a) or involve more than two words (eg 30a) – these exceptions can be hard to spot and therefore to solve. 34a (see comment below from MuchPuzzled) is a particularly awkward customer, requiring only two vocalizations of the same vowel to be exchanged. A little bit of creativity in pronunciation will be required every so often. And just sometimes the ‘subsidiary indication’ in a type A clue can simply be a definition of the answer (eg 10a).

The wordplays (subsidiary indications) always lead to the answer to be entered in the grid.

The way to approach the clues is to look at whether there is anything on view that can readily be spoonerized (and probably looks a little unusual) – so in “Jean’s to mock such as Dixie going topless”, we can be pretty sure that “Jean’s to mock” will translate to “Means to Jock” (ie a Scots word for ‘means’), and we have a type B. If we can’t find anything spoonerizable in the clue, then it’s going to be a type A.

The difficulty of this type of puzzle depends very much, I think, on how familiar you are with the genre and how twisted your mind is – so I don’t find them too hard! The last Spoonerisms puzzle was 2,551 and got  a rating of 5/10, which attracted no dissenting views; it is clear from comments received, both on the blog and by email, that the quirks of this one made it significantly harder. I have therefore given it a revised rating of 6/10, which puts it up there with the very trickiest ‘specials’.

After the notes on a few individual clues, I have included a checklist of clues by their type. I will be happy to provide hints for any clues not listed below.

Clue Writers’ Corner: Competitions of this type invariably result in some clues being submitted which are of the wrong type and will therefore stand no chance of success. For Spoonerisms puzzles, Azed always requires a type B clue. Let’s assume that the word to be clued was DASHER. What is needed is a spoonerized definition of the answer, and a wordplay which leads to the answer. So our real definition could be ‘One scooting about’, the spoonerized version being ‘One booting a scout’ (pretty good, huh?), with the associated wordplay ‘has red curls’ (anagram of HAS RED). The full clue is ‘One booting a scout has red curls’. Not likely to garner any laurels, I grant you, but it does satisfy the brief. Note that, as in this example, the treated words do not have to be consecutive in the clue, and other words (here the ‘a’) can also get involved.

The key to a good spoonerism clue is coming up with an original definition. It doesn’t have to be succinct or show pinpoint accuracy – if you look at the published clues for that 2006 comp, you will see the sort of thing that is likely to do well. For a Christmas competition, I would normally say that seasonally-themed clues had a much higher chance of success than non-seasonal ones, but getting a festive feel into a spoonerism clue is not easy, and you will notice that there are a lot of clues in the 2006 list which have no such flavour – note also, though, that the winner does include a reference to Christmas.

Across

1a Fool again reverse of ready, flaw shown outwardly (8, 2 words)
We start with a type A, wherein a four-letter ‘abusive slang’ word for a fool (or a non-abusive slang term for the derrière) and a four-letter adverb meaning ‘again’ or ‘in return’ exchange their heads to provide the (4,4) answer, while in the wordplay a reversal of a three-letter word meaning ‘ready’ or ‘liable’ is contained by (ie ‘shown outwardly’) a five-letter term for a flaw in cloth. Given that Chambers gives the answer as both a two-word noun and a single-word adjective, it wasn’t actually necessary for Azed to show it as ‘2 words’.

12a What makes painting work, looking back? Base place for mail (5)
A three-letter type of painting and the usual two-letter abbreviation for ‘opus’ (‘work’) are reversed (looking back) in this type A clue where ‘base’ leads to a three-letter adjective and ‘place for mail’ to the names of the two letters making up a familiar abbreviation which anyone submitting a competition clue will shortly find themselves writing on an envelope.

14a Carver’s list this, often? It may be eaten mixed with last of sauce (4)
The form of this clue makes it look like a type B, but you may need to say the unspoonerized definition to yourself a couple of times before it becomes clear. The wordplay effectively says ‘the answer (‘it’) may produce (‘be’) EATEN [when] anagrammed (‘mixed’) with the last letter of SAUCE.

15a Rock guitar confined? In consequence, cross dad (6)
Can’t be a type B, so the question is which bit is the nefidition? It turns out to be the first part, a three-letter slang term for a rock musician’s guitar and a six-letter word meaning ‘confined’. The wordplay has a single letter indicated by ‘cross’ and a two-letter word for ‘dad’ contained by a three-letter consequence.

29a Get low nasty shock (4)
It’s tempting to think this might be a type A, but it’s a B. The ‘subsidiary indication’ here is just a straight definition of the entry (Chambers: ‘an unpleasant surprise’).

30a Any mage is acceptable in the main, making comeback (5)
In this type B clue, the spoonerism actively involves three words, while in the wordplay a two-letter word meaning (among many other things) ‘acceptable’ is contained by a reversal (‘making a comeback’) of the sort of ‘main’ that often appears in cryptic crosswords and tales of Sir Francis Drake.

34a Seizure of goods? Crown meant rap somehow (8, 2 words)
A type A where getting the (4,4) answer is easier than finding the nefidition, which involves an old legal  word of either three or four letters meaning ‘distraint’ and a four-letter word ‘old or humorous’ term for ‘the crown of the head, especially when bald’.

Down

3d Played an alto pipe, obsessive to a fault?
This type A features a vocalic spoonerism, the materials for which are a three-letter word from classical literature for a pipe made from a particular type of straw and an adjective from Freudian psychology applied to adults that have certain personality traits such as obsessiveness and extreme attention to detail.

4d Salt to cut? Portion went wrong mostly (8)
A type A, where the ‘salt’ is the sort that all the nice girls love, and the ‘to cut’ leads to a verb which suggests removing the (thin) outer surface of something. In the wordplay, a four-letter ‘portion’ is followed by a five-letter word meaning ‘went wrong’ from which the last letter has been lost (‘mostly’).

5d Pop tart one nibbles by the sound of it (4)
A readily-identifiable type B, where the wordplay involves one of my bêtes noires, a single-letter word meaning ‘one’ being followed by a three-letter homophone (for a word meaning ‘nibbles’) which is not itself a word.

6d Store rick for the table? Speed’s disposed of it (6)
In this type B, we have an eight-letter word for ‘speed’ from which the consecutive letters IT have been removed (“[has] disposed of it’).

13d Ratlin rope adapted as skin disease bandage (10)
Another type A where working out the nefidition is the trickiest part. The skin disease shares its name (but not its pronunciation) with the sort of thing the milkman (where such is still available) might leave on one’s doorstep, and it gets combined with a term for ‘a long, coiled-up bandage’.

22d Gate for a Mod, pagan? He cut one (6)
Clearly a type B, the pagan has one instance of the letters HE omitted (‘He cut’) and is followed by a single-letter word meaning ‘one’.

25d Francis maybe (or Roger) with rising name has ability as fiddler? (5)
In the wordplay of this type A, the surname of Francis or Roger (and something that I hope to find wrapped round a sausage or two tomorrow) has the usual abbreviation for ‘name’ moved upwards to produced a word, a spoonerism of which is given by a (3,3) phrase.

28d A lost play, T., Wat? (4)
The spoonerized definition in this type B needs to be read as ‘Tee Wat’; the wordplay has a missing comma between ‘lost’ and ‘play’, a five-letter word for a play being deprived of the letter A.

(definitions -ie the non-wordplay parts of each clue – are underlined)

Checklist of types

Across

1: type A (spoonerized entry); 7:type B (spoonerized definition); 10: A; 11: B; 12: A; 14: B; 15: A; 16: normal; 18: A; 20: B; 26: A; 27: B; 29: B; 30: B; 31: A; 32: A; 33: B; 34: A.

Down

1: A; 2: A; 3: A; 4: A; 5: B; 6: B; 7: B; 8: A; 9: B; 13: A; 17: B; 19: A; 21: A; 22: B; 23: B; 24: B; 25: A; 28: B.