Notes for Azed 2,662

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 2,662 Plain

Difficulty rating: (3 / 5)

Another puzzle that I felt was above average difficulty. I might have rated it half a notch higher had it not been for the neat but straightforward clue at 1a which immediately gave me the first letters of ten down entries. I thought this puzzle showed Azed on his very best form – it seemed as though he had really enjoyed writing the clues, which almost invariably makes for enjoyment in the solve.

Note that the enumeration for 23d should be (6) rather than (5).

Setters’ Corner: Since Azed rarely writes a duff clue, I plan in the coming weeks to look at some clues from other puzzles which illustrate things to avoid when writing clues. I don’t solve many crosswords other than Azed, but I look in on the help forums from time to time, and I see plenty of material there.

I’m going to start with this one from a back-pager: “English teacher’s back in a panic, providing cover for head (7)”. The surface reading is nice, and the wordplay sound, E (English) followed by R (“teacher’s back”) in A FLAP (‘a panic’), leading to EARFLAP (‘cover for head’). The problem here is the use of FLAP in the wordplay and the solution – the ‘panic’ and ‘hanging bit of material’ meanings appear under the same headword in Chambers, so they are the same word rather than homographs. It’s not something that is in any way unsound or unfair, but it’s generally considered weak, and should be avoided wherever possible. A related point applies to answers consisting of multiple words – in barred puzzles, at least, it is considered undesirable to indicate any of the words that make up the answer ‘as is’ – so ‘Secure excellent brown seaweed’ (SEAL ACE) would be much better than ‘Large number netting brown seaweed’ (SEA LACE) for SEA LACE.

Across

13a Woodland umbellifer naturalist transplanted, having cut a border (5)
The word NATURALIST must have the letter A (from the clue) and a word for a border removed (‘cut’) before the remaining letters are rearranged (‘transplanted’).

14a Like a French author favouring bombast? Not the first (9)
A three-letter word meaning ‘favouring’ or ‘in favour of’ is followed by a word meaning ‘bombastic’ from which the first letter has been omitted (‘Not the first’). The ‘bombastic’ word was first used for a kind of coarse cloth made from cotton and flax, while ‘bombast’ itself formerly described the soft down of the cotton plant, with the ‘pompous’ meaning of each developing from the idea of garments padded or puffed out with the material (the original ‘stuffed shirts’, I guess).

15a Regarding building eye something bracing (8)
The ‘eye’ is of the private kind, while the ‘something bracing’ is a medicine designed to invigorate and strengthen, perhaps a solution of quinine in carbonated water, or perhaps what Kanga provided to her somewhat undersized offspring (see 5d).

17a Band section, briefly famous, LSO exploited (6)
Azed has been just a little naughty here, ‘briefly famous’ indicating a three-letter abbreviation of a ten-letter word meaning ‘famous’. The second part of the wordplay involves an anagram (‘exploited’) of LSO.

19a Dogs covering tail I clipped – they’re docked (7)
The dogs, worthless scoundrels that they are, are containing (‘covering’) the letters TAIL without the I (‘I clipped’).

24a With no children around, give up school? Quite revealing! (7)
If this clue were a stick of rock it would have ‘Azed’ written right through it. A (4,7) phrase which might mean ‘give up school’ or ‘no longer offer classes’ has a four-letter word for children of a male persuasion removed from its periphery (ie ‘with no children around’).

25a Measure of acidity that restricts opening of this tiny cutting? (6)
The two-letter description of the number which indicates degree of acidity is followed by a ‘poetic’ word meaning ‘that’ which contains (‘restricts’) the first letter (‘opening’) of THIS.

29a Dance revealing Saudi in his element? (8)
Another neat one, this has a four-letter word describing a Saudi inside a word for the stuff that occurs in profusion in large parts of his country.

33a Tawdry lass (misspelt?) to woo once, accepting half a smacker (5)
An old word meaning ‘to court’ (now associated not with courting but taking to court) contains the first half of a four-letter word for a ‘smacker’. The ‘lass’ is Ms Tawdry, who appears in John Gay’s The Beggar’s Opera, conspiring with Jenny Diver and Mr Peachum to engineer the arrest of Macheath. Her first name appears in various forms, but I’m not sure that the version here is often (if ever) seen, so the ‘misspelt?’ is probably appropriate.

Down

1d Repairer holding torn coat? He helped to keep tavern floor clean (11)
The repairer who contains (‘holds’) an anagram (‘torn’) of COAT is the sort whom you might expect to do a somewhat ‘quick and dirty’ job. The tavern employee would have assisted patrons who were unable or unwilling to, in the words of the Graeme Edge Band, ‘Kick Off Your Muddy Boots’.

2d Indian bean, end of vegetable doubly spiked (5)
A three-letter Indian bean is followed by a double helping (‘doubly’) of the last letter (‘end’) of VEGETABLE.

4d Near unit put up, take in plant firmly (6)
A two-letter word meaning ‘near’ or ‘close against’ and a three-letter word for a single unit are reversed (‘put up’) and the usual single-letter abbreviation for ‘take’ is inserted (‘take in’).

5d Strip of plaid maybe making jumper, new? (4)
An informal term for the  sort of jumper that is exemplified, if not typified, by Tigger’s friend who receives watercress sandwiches and ‘strengthening medicine’ from his mother is followed by the standard abbreviation for ‘new’. The Scottishness of the solution is not explicitly stated but is implied by the use of ‘plaid, maybe’.

9d Sign of aging like what’s left of Ozymandias statue in part? (6)
I won a school poetry recitation contest back in…well, the second half of the last century, with my rendition of Shelley’s Ozymandias of Egypt, and, like many things learned at that age, the poem is firmly fixed in my memory. I had to start by meeting the traveller from an ancient land when solving this clue, but I didn’t need to get any further than the ‘vast and trunkless legs of stone’ to find the answer. I used a clue of this type (a ‘hidden’ where the concealing text didn’t appear directly in the clue) in a puzzle not that long ago, but the editor didn’t like it.

12d Substance enveloping dodgy snack? It’s best to keep off this (9)
The ‘substance’ here leads to a word taken directly from Latin and meaning ‘that which a thing is’ (as well as being an informal word for a pound). It is seen containing (‘enveloping’) an anagram (‘dodgy’) of SNACK.

18d Judge accepts Hants parish being put up for sitting (7)
A three-letter word meaning ‘[to] judge’ or ‘[to] regard as’ contains (‘accepts’) the reversal (‘being put up’) of the name of a village near Petersfiled.

20d Petroleum fuel residue, rubbish taken on board in a race downhill (7)
A three-letter word for rubbish or useless junk is contained by (‘taken on board in’) the letter A (from the clue) and a three-letter word meaning ‘[to] race downhill’ (with the aid of suitable equipment).

23d Fool taken in by deception at being denied dram (5)
A three-letter fool often seen in crosswords is contained (‘take in’) by a five-letter word for a deception from which the consecutive letters AT have been removed (‘at being denied’).

30d Reservation, one for former royal family (4)
There are two ‘US informal’ terms for a (Native American) reservation, but we want the one that doesn’t simply use the first three letters of the longer word. When combined with a single-letter word for ‘one’, the result is the first name of both the last Shah of Iran and his father. They were the only members of the Pahlavi dynasty, and I can’t help feeling that the answer here is not strictly speaking the name of a ‘royal family’, but I’m prepared to be corrected on that.

(definitions are underlined)