Times 27651 – time to brush up your schoolboy Latin

Author   pipkirbyPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
An odd crossword, i thought. It took me around 20 minutes to do all but a few clues, mostly gaps in the top half, where I could see an answer but wasn’t clear about the definition. I’m still a bit mystified by the full explanation (if there is one) for 9a and 10a. All the down clues were straightforward, but some of the Across ones were less so.

I liked “underground money collector” at 7d.

Given last week’s references to Boris’s Poodles (being yes-men), and my view (shared by martinp1) that poodles are seriously un-wussie dogs undeserving of this epithet (especially the Standard variety), I’ve changed from my usual owl gallery to a portrait of Muffin, a.k.a.Ragamuffin, who is sadly no more but was IMO more intelligent than many a leading politician.

Across
1 Forbidden writer given external stimulus (10)
PROSCRIBED – Writer = SCRiBE, surrounded by PROD = external stimulus.
7 Female organisation backed by iron lady (4)
WIFE – WI (Women’s Institute) followed by FE (Fe, iron).
9 Weaselly creature after organising talk caught cab (5-3)
BLACK-CAT – (TALK C CAB)*. I have no idea why black-cat means weaselly, I know seeing a black cat can mean bad luck, or even good luck, but perhaps there’s more to it. Nothing to do with Ron Weasley, of HP fame, I think, he’s spelt differently.
10 Person seen as unusual confronting monarch? (6)
FISHER – Another mysterious clue where the wordplay is clear but I don’t quite see how the definition works. An ODD FISH or QUEER FISH can be a person seen as unusual, so put FISH next to ER (monarch). Answer: FISHER. any particular Fisher? Jeremy? Archbishop? Or jusr a person called Fisher?
11 Woodpecker and two mythological figures flying round (6)
YAFFLE – ELF and FAY reversed; popular name for the green Woodpecker. Fay is an alternative version of FAIRY.
13 Most ancient stars to get excited about (8)
HOARIEST – ARIES has HOT around it. I thought of this early on, but left writing it in until I had all the checkers, as thought there may be a better idea for ??ARIES?. Hoary means ‘white or grey with age’.
14 Bringing pleasure? Awful nightmare about battles! (5-7)
HEART-WARMING – Insert WAR (battles) into (NIGHTMARE)*.
17 Like good sight in cricket match? (6-6)
TWENTY-TWENTY – double definition.
20 This writer getting to stay endlessly after party creates a row (8)
DOMESTIC – DO (party) ME (this writer) STIC(K) = stay endlessly.
21 Miserly type maybe hoarding pounds in trophy (6)
SALVER – SAVER has L (pounds) inserted.
22 Way to use bad language, suppressing love (6)
COURSE – Curse with O inserted.
23 Scot offering a song at funeral? (8)
ALASTAIR – Well, A LAST AIR could be a song at a funeral, I suppose, and Alastair is a name of Scottish origin.
25 Provider of notes is bank, half being advanced (4)
LYRE – RELY (bank) has its last half moved forward.
26 Running mobile home into grass (10)
SCAMPERING – CAMPER (mobile home) inside SING (grass, inform on).

Down
2 Meadows covered in grass given up (8)
RELEASED – LEAS are meadows, surrounded by REED = grass.
3 Thus stitch regularly disappears (3)
SIC – Alternate letters of S t I t C h, Latin for thus, as in ‘sic transit gloria mundi’.
4 See Roman south of river making investigation (5)
RECCE – R (river) ECCE = Latin for ‘see’ or ‘behold’, as in Ecce Homo, words delivered by Pontius Pilate (in Latin or a local tongue?)
5 Fuss about Charlie who does a bad job? (7)
BOTCHER – BOTHER (fuss) has C for Charlie inserted.
6 Fed up, having worry, one good soul having negative attitude (9)
DEFEATIST – FED reversed, EAT (worry), I ST (one saint).
7 Expressing warm feelings towards underground money collector (7,4)
WISHING WELL – double definition, one amusingly cryptic.
8 Skin feels bad around top of neck (6)
FLENSE – insert N (top of neck) into (FEELS)*. Skin here as a verb.
12 Sort of murder, getting a BSc perhaps! (5-6)
FIRST-DEGREE – double definition.
15 They fight with the others, having nasty looks, no heart (9)
WRESTLERS – W (with) REST (the others), LE(E)RS = nasty looks without the middle E.
16 Three articles about province relating to capital city (8)
ATHENIAN – A, THE, AN around NI (Northern Ireland).
18 Music played staccato needing no introduction (7)
TOCCATA – Anagram of TACCATO) the S being omitted.
19 Lots of bacteria in part of the gut unknown (6)
COLONY – COLON, Y an unknown.
21 Incisive English coming from satirical novelist (5)
SHARP – Tom SHARPE the satirical novelist (Porterhouse Blue, etc.) has his E dropped.
24 Hill made of piled-up rubbish (3)
TOR – ROT reversed.

​

87 comments on “Times 27651 – time to brush up your schoolboy Latin”

  1. 37 minutes, with the last eight trying to find something to fit in 10a, so I’m glad it wasn’t just me. I was also a bit concerned about 11a, where it was only Bagpuss that saved me. On the plus side, I got 21d SHARP quickly as Tom Sharpe wrote the intro to the book of Saki stories I’ve just read, so he was fresh in my mind.

    Thinking about it—and possibly pushed in that direction by Morgan le Fay specifically for the fairy at 11—I wonder if 10a is referencing the Fisher King? And having checked Chambers, a BLACK-CAT is another name for the pekan, who being martens are presumably a bit weaselly? (Coincidentally, I think, the pecan is also known as the fisher!)

    FOI 1a PROSCRIBED LOI the aforementioned 10a FISHER COD to 7d WISHING WELL for the excellent definition.

    Edited at 2020-04-29 06:03 am (UTC)

  2. DK FLENSE. As baffled as Pip by the answers in Row 3. Because of The Times rule about living people I looked up SHARPE at 21dn and discovered I must have missed the report of the death (in 2013) of a one-time favourite author.
  3. Wikipedia says: John Fisher (c. 19 October 1469 – 22 June 1535), was an English Catholic bishop, cardinal, and theologian. Fisher was also an academic, and eventually served as Chancellor of the University of Cambridge.

    Fisher was executed by order of Henry VIII during the English Reformation for refusing to accept the King as Supreme Head of the Church of England and for upholding the Catholic Church’s doctrine of papal supremacy.

    That seems to fit the clue.

    1. My goodness!

      Well, that’s certainly better than Peter Anthony Goodwin Fisher, FRCP, homeopathic (!) physician to Queen Elizabeth for 17 years, who died in 2018.

      (But was this papist Fisher weaselly? Haha, no, wait, that’s the other clue.)

      Edited at 2020-04-29 06:56 am (UTC)

      1. I’m shocked that an FRCP could be a homeopathic ‘physician’. Grounds for being struck off if you ask me!
        1. Indeed!
          In France, the government stopped reimbursing costs for such “treatment” just in the past year.
          1. The NHS has now closed almost all of its homeopathic hospitals, I’m glad to say. I have a very good doctor friend who supported their existence, on the basis that the placebo effect is very powerful and it was a good way for GPs to manage time-wasting hypochondriacs. I have always felt that the fundamental dishonesty involved risks bringing medicine into disrepute in a way that outweighs any such benefit.
    2. Well found, Bruce, and that seems fine for the definition if somewhat obscure, but have we accounted for ‘unusual’?
      1. Chambers has as the fourth definition of “fish”: A person, as in a queer fish.

        So, I guess “person seem as unusual” = “queer fish” = “FISH”. And of course the confronted monarch is ER.

        1. Thanks. That’s something mentioned in the blog and had occurred to me whilst trying to justify the answer but I dismissed it, reasoning that it’s the additional word ‘queer’ or ‘odd’ that distinguishes the unusual.
      1. Yeah well that’s why I referred to archbishop in the blog, although it seemed an unlikely option.
  4. A lot of DNKing going on: BLACK-CAT, YAFFLE, SHARPe, TWENTY-TWENTY (of cricket). I must have come across DOMESTIC here once. YAFFLE from an alphabet trawl that unfortunately began at BAFFLE. I think the poodle’s undeserved rep comes from the asinine hairstyle so many owners impose on their dogs.
    1. Without going into the details, my understanding is that there were good reasons fo what I believe is called the “Lion Cut”. That is where the top of the head is left long, the body shaved, but the fur left on the chest and the legs shaved except for pom-poms near the feet. It all related to hunting as, again, my understanding is that Standard Poodles were used as water retrievers.
      1. I can see why you’d but hair off for hunting (and indeed I cut my own dog’s hair for this very reason) but you’d just cut it all.
        1. What I described is what my wife and I were told by a breeder.
          The top knot was left long so hunters could attach a coloured ribbon so they knew which dog was which. The fur was left on the chest to protect the vital organs while the body and most of the legs were shaved to ease passage through the water. The pom-poms on the legs were also to aid swimming while the tail was left undocked so the hunters could pull dogs out of the water more easily.
          As I said ,that is what we were told. No idea if it’s accurate or not.
  5. but 10ac wrong – I went for FUSSER unusual person – a fuss
    (she’s a bit of a fuss-pot abr. – FUSS) confronting ER majesty. FISHER!!? Well I never – would not have got that in a month of Wednesdays. Stooopid clue IMHO. If we can’t remember Eddie Cantor, how might we remember …..?

    FOI 2dn RELEASED

    LOI 10ac FUSSER

    COD 21dn SHARP – I adored Tom SHARPE and read em’all prior to publication as I knew his agent. Very funny.

    WOD 11ac YAFFLE DNK – I thought it was WOODIE – only other woodpecker that I have encountered thus far.

    Edited at 2020-04-29 01:22 pm (UTC)

  6. 17 minutes, with FISHER (obviously) on a hit and hope basis. I suppose the historical connection is intended, but there must been many more monarch-confronters available. I mean, I’m binge watching GoT at the moment – take your pick. The Fisher King? Robin Williams and Terry Gilliam and the amazing Grand Central dance scene. Solving by association?
    Happy memories of Professor Yaffle. Surprisingly, there were only 13 episodes ever made.
  7. Well that was a bit odd. I sailed through it and had everything but 10ac in 8 minutes or so. I had forgotten about the eminent bishop and king-defier so spent a third of my overall time trawling through the alphabet till I was struck by ‘queer fish’ and decided it had to be that. Knowing YAFFLE helped a lot (I always think it’s a lot more expressive than ‘green woodpecker’). I didn’t actually know BLACK-CAT but it seemed obvious that it would be weaselly, along the lines of ‘polecat’.
  8. Put FISHER in and crossed my fingers. What are the chances that I’ve never heard of a pekan before and it is the meaning of two answers (one ‘inappropriate’ whatever that means, though). I wondered why BLACK-CAT was hyphenated.

    VHO YAFFLE, FLENSE. The symbol of my former college is a yale, another mythical creature, which confused me there.
    COD WISHING WELL just beats SCAMPERING

    Yesterday’s answer: two is the only prime number not to contain an ‘e’, mainly because all odd numbers contain an ‘e’. Inspired by FACTOR.

    Today’s question (a bit of a chestnut): who killed a quarter of the world’s population?

      1. Naughty Chair, O’Niel! There is tradition hereabouts not to give the right answer! Is it cororna-19 virus? Or the next one?
        1. Dear Whoever,
          Humblest apologies.
          I’ve probably completed big T about once a month.
          Didn’t know the protocol.
          What can go up a chimney down,
          But can’t go down a chimney up?
          I’m out of here.
          Stay safe, everyone.
  9. Used to love Professor YAFFLE, the wooden woodpecker-shaped bookend in Bagpuss!
  10. The HOARIEST song I could come up with. 44 minutes but with an incorrectly biffed BAFFLE. I did the alphabet trawl and dismissed YAFFLE as waffle. FLENSE also biffed, but successfully. I assumed BLACK-CAT was a polecat variant. I wasted time trying to make 19d NOBODY, which would have been a terrific answer if only it had worked. Joint COD to WISHING WELL and ALASTAIR. Quite tough but enjoyable apart from the bird. Thank you Pip and setter.
  11. Lots of post-solve learning after trusting wordplay and entering FLENSE, BLACK-CAT, FISHER and YAFFLE without knowing the whys and wherefores. As others have said, lovely to remember Wilt and Porterhouse Blue, which came out just before my fortunately rather less eventful time at Cambridge.

    Thank you educational setter and Pip for the excellent blog.

  12. DNF. Gave up after 22 mins and used aids to finish, defeated by the unknown YAFFLE – maybe an alphabet trawl would have got me there, but I never thought of FAY as the second creature. I was also stuck in the SE corner where I carelessy misspelled ALASTAIR so couldn’t get the random novelist SHARP(e) or SALVER. Not my finest solving attempt!

    Edited at 2020-04-29 07:52 am (UTC)

  13. Thank you, Pip. Yes, our “Alice” did have a quizzical way of looking at us as if to say “Are you MAD?!

    And thank you for being as baffled by FISHER and BLACK-CAT as you were, although Bruce and others look to have solved the puzzles.

    I should have solved ALASTAIR far more quickly than I did. In the back of my notebook, along with other stuff, I have noted down some favourite clues over the past few years. In puzzle #26702 on 18Apr07 14ac was “Funeral hymn by a Scotsman”. A: ALASTAIR.

  14. A mundane puzzle with little to distinguish it other than the obscurity of BLACK-CAT and FISHER.

    For BLACK-CAT I trusted the wordplay. For FISHER I thought of “queer fish” and just went with that. If brnchn is correct – and I think he probably is – this is taking needless obscurity to a new level.

  15. 18:12 and unsurprisingly a fair bit of head-scratchery, largely in common with others:
    ■ is black-cat like pole-cat?
    ■ is flense really a word?
    ■ Fisher? Have I been spelling the chess player’s name wrong all these years?
    ■ Ah yes, Bagpuss to the rescue
  16. 23.04. An interesting mix of the straightforward and the challenging. FOI proscribed and that set the scene for a pretty swift first three quarters followed by a tricky group of stragglers. Guessed at yaffle, not your everyday description of a green woodpecker! Similarly wasn’t entirely happy about fisher but the phrase odd fish convinced me I was right. Salver gave problems mainly by thinking the trophy was the outside of the clue rather than the whole. LOI was alastair, that was my COD as well. A cracking clue in my opinion. Always nice to see a bit of humour from the setter.
  17. I entered BLACK-CAT and FISHER not really understanding either and vaguely remembered FLENSE from somewhere. Ran out of luck with YAFFLE though for which the alphabet trawl led to the usual unsuccessful outcome, in this case the appropriate ‘baffle’. Fifty minutes, just for for that. Ah, well.
  18. Dnf. 3 errors in just over 20 mins. Baffle, Alistair and Scattering.

    As someone who was sent off to the tender care of the Jesuits at age just 8, I know of John Fisher. He was a Roman Catholic martyr and was canonised along with Thomas More for defying Henry VIII over “The King’s Great Matter”. More and Fisher share the same feast day.

    “Give me the boy at 7 and I will show you the man” is a famous saying attributed to Ignatius Loyola, the founder of the Jesuits, (but also to Aristotle). I was under the Jesuits’ influence from age 8 to 13 and appear to have escaped their enduring influence. Unless I have a death bed conversion? Always possible I suppose, as a sort of Pascal’s Wager.

    Edited at 2020-04-29 09:18 am (UTC)

    1. Come to think of it a lot of children in our village go to St. John Fisher Catholic High School in Harrogate. I didn’t make the connection with opposing monarchy though.
  19. Was okay with FLENSE and YAFFLE, and happy that BLACK-CAT would be something weaselish. Stumped completely by FISHER, so thanks for the explanation. (As usual, once it was explaineed, it was a case of “Oh, that Archbishop Fisher …”)

    But a MER (mega-eyebrow-raise) at ‘fish’ meaning odd person, without ‘odd’. (Even if it is in Chambers: this isn’t The Listener.)

    1. I would like to point out that I was not a tosser! Never thought of Fisher.
  21. 9:34. FISHER and YAFFLE are both clues that shouldn’t have been let through IMO. Obscure answers with obscure and/or dodgy wordplay. The latter is a write-in for anyone who grew up with Bagpuss but probably impossible for most people who didn’t. I put in FISHER faute de mieux based on the phrase ‘a queer fish’ but I wasn’t happy with it.
    BLACK-CAT is also rather obscure (it’s another only-Chambers job) but the wordplay is clear.
    For some reason I knew the word FLENSE, and even that it is associated with whales. I’ve no idea how.
    1. I agree about FISHER, but did know a yaffle was a woodpecker from being interested in garden birds although never seen Bagpuss. And knew flense from whaling terms.
      1. Fair enough: people who watched Bagpuss and twitchers 😉
        It does seem to have tripped a few people up.

        Edited at 2020-04-29 11:10 am (UTC)

        1. Those who haven’t ever seen “Bagpuss” really should look on YouTube for it. Utterly brilliant, and totally wasted on kids !
          1. Just watched some of episode 1, annoying squeaky mice, but quite fun I agree. Same guy Postgate I think as did the Clangers, of which I was a fan.
        2. I don’t think twitchers are interested in old-fashioned bird names, just ticks on lists! I think we should be keeping these words going, so go out of my way to say dabchick, bonxie, and indeed yaffle in preference to the dreary made-up pseudo-scientific terms. I have sadly never seen Bagpuss but will see if I can track it down on You Tube now that I know there was a Professor Yaffle. He sounds a lot more fun than the treacherous old cleric, who apparently used to place a human skull on the altar during Mass…
    2. I also agree. I think “Fisher” is an awful clue that doesn’t work and is outrageously obscure. I also guessed at “Baffle”, knowing neither “Yaffle” nor “Fay”. Might have a chance with “Yaffle” if it appears again in the next 20 years – then again, probably won’t!
  22. 17’45. A monarch’s a fishing fly isn’t it? As others am foxed by the black-cat. One would like a tougher clue for 20-20. (Not so easy though. I offer: ‘Less than half an even split still makes for a good outlook’.)

    Edited at 2020-04-29 10:19 am (UTC)

  23. Like everyone else, I was puzzled by FISHER, and spent the last couple of minutes of my time trying to think of something better (not helped by FLENSE being a guess from wordplay).

    Not only is the definition very obscure, but ‘Person seen as strange’ doesn’t quite mean fish, does it? I know the expression ‘a queer fish’, but the fish part of that just means person… I suppose it just about works, but when you combine it with the definition, I’m surprised the clue got through.

    8m 49s.

      1. The editor I assume. That’s at least what I meant when I said ‘let through’!
        1. Messrs. Keriothe/Mauefw!?

          I had rather assumed 27651 had avoided editorial oversight.

  24. Have reverted to paper as timing to the second too stressful. 22′, same crossed fingers as everybody else.

    FLENSE heard of in connection with whaling (yuck). I now notice my 26d was wrong, with a careless CARPER inserted.

    Thanks pip and setter.

  25. Carelessly threw in scarpering.
    Got everything else okay, but fisher? Like Matt said, could be TS Eliot’s mate, the fisher king. Entered that with a shrug.
    Thanks pip.
  26. After the rather odd CAT in 9a I was reminded of the saying “a cat may look at a king” which in turn reminded me of a “kingfisher” which made me think 10a was a rather convoluted “andlit” so it went in with a shrug. DNK the martyr but that’s certainly possible, as is Joekobi’s monarch fishing tackle. Hmmm. 20.27
  27. ….FISHER which I eventually accepted under the “queer fish” logic. NHO BLACK-CAT, but the parsing was fine (although as a retired taxi driver I had to resist the urge to pop in “black cab”).

    FOI WIFE
    LOI FISHER
    COD WISHING WELL
    TIME 9:53

  28. But no idea about FISHER . Person does seem to be a strange definition for an obscure cleric, was wondering if the definition was ‘person seen’, but that doesn’t really help.
    POI YAFFLE which I didn’t know either
  30. … can you shed any more light on FISHER please? Nothing satisfactory seems to have emerged so far. Regards, blogger of today.
    2. [person seen as unusual] = FISH as in ‘queer fish’
      [monarch] = ER
      Definition = &Lit reference to John Fisher.
      I’m not sure this is satisfactory but it seems clear to me that it’s how the clue is supposed to work.
  31. Started off well but baffled by the same clues as others – FLENSE and FISHER. I wondered if 8d was an anagram but couldn’t make a word that looked right, and as for 10a, well it’s all been said already. Also confused by BLACK-CAT although I got it. Ashamed to admit that I couldn’t get Alastair, even though it’s my brother-in-law’s name – well nearly, he spells it with a D. Maybe that was the problem? No, I don’t think I can pass the buck – and it’s a great clue too!

    No problem with YAFFLE and I feel we had a similar conversation last time it made its appearance. I never saw Bagpuss but the Clangers continue to give much joy 😊

    FOI Wife
    COD Alastair – even though I didn’t get it
    DNF in about 45 minutes

    Thanks (red, English, Irish?) setter and Pip, and Muffin the poodle (lovely pic. If I ever had a dog, I’d have a poodle – I think they’re great!)

  32. Afraid I am firmly in the camp which didn’t care much for either BLACK-CAT or FISHER. After some thought, no satisfying penny-drop moments, more being resigned to putting them in without being able to see why they’re right but not being able to come up with anything better.
    1. I thought BLACK-CAT was OK. I’ve never heard of the animal but it seemed a reasonable conjecture based on polecats, and the wordplay was clear.
      1. Well, “black-cat” is not given in the Wikipedia entry for “Fisher” (they didn’t go with “Pekan”… interesting that the name has nothing to do with fishing), but it can be found associated with that critter; however, I don’t see any reference with a hyphen.
        1. The clue defines BLACK-CAT as ‘weaselly creature’ so the link with FISHER doesn’t really matter. It’s in Chambers, with a hyphen.
  33. Mostly as above: FISHER guessed; my parrot was the Napfle using Pan as the only other mythological figure I could fit in.
    In my rush to finish I bunged in Seller at 21a as SALVER had not occurred to me. It was a missed opportunity for the setter to clue SOLVER.
    Enjoyed the journey with today’s caveats. COD to ALASTAIR. David
  34. DNF in 22-something minutes. Bit of a curate’s egg. Mostly straightforward but a few oddities. I was too lazy to alpha-trawl for yaffle so ended up with baffle. Should’ve remembered the prof from Bagpuss. Fisher went in with limited understanding as did the weaselly black-cat. Flense another hit and hope but couldn’t see a likelier looking redistribution of the anagrist. FOI was the (Groucho Marx?) ‘that’s no lady that’s my wife’ entry at 7ac.
  35. Though I couldn’t remember whether the woodpecker was JAFFLE or YAFFLE, I decided that a FAY was a more likely mythological creature than a FAJ.

    As with everyone else, FISHER went in with a shrug.

    27:51, which I’m going to say is OK for me, though my range is 15 to 85 mins, though I normally pull the plug at 60 mins.

  36. Still don’t like Fisher.

    Here’s a laugh for you. Couldn’t parse Alastair, so put in the most morbid thing that fitted: abattoir 🙂

    1. Now logged in. As in the Fisher King and the legend of the Holy Grail.
      1. How would that work though? In the clue the FISHER is confronting a monarch, not being one.
        1. Maybe FISH confronts ER and FISHER is the monarch, or the FISHER KING might be a person seen as unusual – esp if you think about the film of the same name. And I suppose it also sounds a bit like fish a king for what it’s worth.
  38. Like nearly everyone else here I got FISHER from the cryptic but had no idea how the definition worked. I thought of Fisher and his dispute with the monarchy but dismissed it as too vague. Otherwise this was a slowish solve with no real problems. 34 minutes. Ann
  39. Hmmm .. no problem with yaffle, in these parts reasonably common dialect word for woodpecker, which are plentiful including on my bird tables.
    However totally bemused by 10 & 11ac. I cannot believe a reference to bishop Fisher is meant. Even in his own day, over 500 years ago he was obscure .. it so happens I am reading Wolf Hall at the moment and Thomas Cromwell doesn’t give a fig for him … Thos. More of course being a different matter. Incidentally it is amusing to discover that Hilary Mantel really has it in for More, posy self-seeking sadistic bigot she depicts him as .. no man for all seasons there!

    1. He was important enough to be beatified, and to have Hans Holbein the Younger paint him… but yes it is terribly obscure. The best anyone’s come up with so far though!
      Did you mean 9ac?
  40. Coming back to this late I notice no-one has appeared to notice my ‘fisher’ suggestion (bar Olivia). As an &lit all it needs is a liberal take on ‘confront’, i.e. a fisherman as it were squarely facing the fly he’s launched (the ‘monarch’) though of course not aggressively, or not directly so. I’m not convinced this is the right way to go but it’s reasonably lucid and seems at least as likely as the fisher king or martyr allusion. Let’s hope the setter solves it for us.
    1. Sorry joekobi for not commenting on your suggestion before, I’ve only just revisited to see if there was a new insight. I can see your thinking, it sort of works, but it’s no less obscure IMO than the other ideas punted. A monarch is one of many kinds of fishing flies, pretty obscure, and seems more salient as a butterfly than a fishing fly when you Google it. And ‘person seen as unusual’ is not a fisher, but a (queer) fish. Surely you can’t use the monarch bit to get your ER then use it again to add to fish to narrow down your ‘person’ as an &lit. Anyway, it’s a poor clue, we all seem agreed on that, unless our setter can shed light and make us all look dim.
      1. Well – a bit of an offbeat &lit – but has some kind of coherence for me. But the setter’s input would indeed be welcome.
  41. Yes, but the interlinkage of those two clues, both of which had us all fishing for explanations, is kind of weird.
  42. I got sidetracked yesterday and forgot to comment on this puzzle, but like almost everyone else, raised eyebrows at 9a and 10a. I assumed the cat was something to do with polecats and took ER as the monarch and used queer FISH to go in front of it, ignoring the definition. Constructed YAFFLE from wordplay and looked it up. FLENSE was a new word on me too. 30:28. Thanks setter and Pip.
  43. Similar thoughts on 9 and 10 across as most others here but out of interest looked up the word, ‘fisher’ in Chambers only to find that one meaning is a pekan or wood-shock, the weaselly creature referred to in the previous clue!Weird or what? could the clues be deliberately contiguous?

  44. I’m sorry but that is all obvious nonsense. I’ve found similar explanations on the internet but I don’t believe a word of it.

    Edited at 2020-04-30 09:18 am (UTC)

  45. Finished in two days. Got all the answers correct without dictionary but admit I had no idea why Fisher ,Lyre and Blackcat were right..

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