Times Quick Cryptic 1677 by Izetti

Author   william_j_sPosted on Categories Quick Cryptic
I was told when starting crosswords that The Times was perhaps not the best to cut your teeth on (but obviously the superior puzzle), and if you’re starting out with this tricky little number, I’ll extend that advice to you. This is a great example of the sort of QC that is totally fair, teaches you something, and has a bit of a sting in the tail. Classic Izetti. It is very easy, however, to throw in the towel and convince yourself that this just isn’t your game. Persevere!

I understood 1ac straight away, but had to figure out the rest of the anagram at the same time as writing in the -TION. The rest followed with just a bit of effort, except for the unknown shrub, the African/Asian mammal, and the drunkard. All but the last rang no bells whatsoever, and each was deduced painfully from the wordplay and checkers. I imagine many more will cause some trouble.

COD to 6dn for its semi-&lit-ishness, and being a lovely long clue for a lovely short word.

Definitions underlined.

Across
1 Arguments in studios apt to get out of control (12)
DISPUTATIONS – anagram of (to get out of control) IN STUDIOS APT.
8 Picture of prisoner brought to India (4)
ICON – CON (prisoner) next to (brought to) I (India, NATO alphabet).
9 Fool nabbed by servant in corridor (7)
PASSAGE – ASS (fool) contained by (nabbed by) PAGE (servant).
11 Former member of the Lords? That is right (7)
EARLIER – EARL (member of the Lords), I.E. (id est, that is), and R (right).
12 Part of flight from Budapest airport (5)
STAIR – hidden in (from) budapeST AIRport.
14 Those people, leaders of English Society, offering ideas (6)
THEMES – THEM (those people), then the first letters from (leaders of) English and Society.
15 Decay in small green vegetable or shrub (6)
PROTEA – ROT (decay) contained in (in) PEA (small green vegetable). A quite pretty southern African plant.
18 Badger-like creature surprisingly alert (5)
RATEL – anagram of (surprisingly) ALERT. Another name for a honey badger.
20 Soldiers having drinks with recreational drug get ill again (7)
RELAPSE – RE (Royal Engineers, soldiers), with LAPS (drinks) and E (ecstasy, recreational drug).
21 Having no weapons and lacking ability to punch, say? (7)
UNARMED – one of those awkward-to-define double definitions where one of them is cryptic. Not a double definition, not a cryptic definition. One of them.
23 Too restricted by ceremonial sometimes (4)
ALSO – hidden in (restricted by) ceremoniAL SOmetimes.
24 Her good faith sorted out answer to alcohol problem? (4,2,3,3)
HAIR OF THE DOG – anagram of (sorted out) HER GOOD FAITH.
Down
2 Trendy church’s leader, silly rector is wrong (9)
INCORRECT – IN (trendy), the first letter from (…’s leader) Church, and an anagram of (silly) RECTOR.
3 Broody writers this writer’s taken after (7)
PENSIVE – PENS (things that write, writers) and I’VE (this writer’s).
4 Top lady entertained by excellent boozers (6)
TOPERS – ER (The Queen, top lady) contained by (entertained by) TOPS (excellent). A toper is a drunkard.
5 Street set up trial runs (5)
TESTS – ST (street) and SET reversed (up).
6 Cells with circular shape, having very small area (3)
OVA – O (circular shape) with V (very) and A (abbreviation for (small) area).
7 Where a rat’s destroyed a bird (10)
SHEARWATER – anagram of (destroyed) WHERE A RATS.
10 Perceive the true nature of what must be transparent? (3,7)
SEE THROUGH – double definition.
13 Asti on tap — novel provision for start of Italian meal (9)
ANTIPASTO – anagram of (novel) ASTI ON TAP.
16 Full relief after only 50 per cent relief brings freedom (7)
RELEASE – all of the (full) word EASE (relief) after only 50% of the word RELief.
17 Acclaim — Conservative meeting left-winger gets it (6)
CREDIT – C (conservative) with RED (left-winger) and IT.
19 Dance in a state of oblivion (5)
LIMBO – double definition.
22 Boxer went to ground briefly (3)
ALI – ALIt (landed, went to ground) without the last letter (briefly).

45 comments on “Times Quick Cryptic 1677 by Izetti”

  1. Straightforward, although I biffed the three long anagrams, just scanning to see what appeared to be anagrists. 5:25.
  2. Another puzzle finished within the last few seconds of my 10 minute target time. In the early stages I always look for easy pickings rather than spending time on any particular clue and I had to do a lot of hopping around the grid to get any sort of momentum going and then to keep it up. My only unknown was PROTEA although I’m sure it has come up before and I’ve probably blogged it myself.
  3. Struggled on this one, not everything was parsed, wrote out anagrams and had to resort to the Chambers Crossword Dictionary before making it over the line in 21 minutes – I then took comfort from William’s introduction and the fact that my time puts me mid-table in the early leaderboard thanks to lots and lots of wrong letters – the result of guessing RETAL rather than RATEL I suspect). DISPUTATIONS fell quite early, solving from the back thanks to those last five letters. It’s usually my lack of culture that lets me down so it was a nice change to be shown up by natural history today never heard of SHEARWATER or RATEL but Chambers had – I still didn’t know a RATEL was a honey-badger but at least I knew how to organise ‘alert’. Didn’t know PROTEA either but clueing gave little room for doubt. LOI was TOPERS, unparsed, solved from the checkers, it would have taken a long time to get ‘tops’ for excellent – not synonyms to me but since it’s out I just looked in Chambers and it’s there. Enjoyed 2d INCORRECT, quite a lot going on in that clue!

    Edited at 2020-08-12 07:47 am (UTC)

  4. I started at the bottom with HAIR OF THE DOG and found the SW pretty easy. I slowed markedly after that but was drawn into a fascinating QC, finishing in a few seconds over 19 mins. I was frustrated by 1a working out the ending quickly but, without pen and paper to hand to write out the rest of the anagrist, the answer only came late with the help of crossers. I liked PROTEA, dnk RATEL (but it couldn’t be anything else). I thought the first seven down clues were a very fine set. A test from Izetti but an enjoyable one. Thanks to both. John M.
  5. Typical Izetti, I thought, with some neat and inventive wordplay and a couple of challenging words. I left DISPUTATIONS until I had nearly all the checkers so never had to write out the anagrist. I only know RATEL from crosswords and PROTEA from living in South Africa for a few years as a child. I liked EARLIER but COD to HAIR OF THE DOG. Thanks Izetti and William. 4:23.
  6. Don’t enjoy izetti. Imo not suitable for QC:
    Too many long uncommon words clued as anagrams, disputations, shearwater.

    Ratel you have to guess the placement of the a and e if you don’t know it.
    Didn’t particularly like ali(t).
    At least protea was clued kindly.
    5d tests cod.

    Presumably the 15×15 is by the same setter…

  7. Thought I was on for a pb for a while as I raced through most of this, smiling to myself as I wrote in RATEL straight away, thinking that that African mustelid might cause others some pause. I put “armless” for 21a, but that was corrected easily when I got SEE THROUGH. I’d only vaguely heard of PROTEA, but it couldn’t be anything else so that was okay. Soon I was left with 1a, 14a, 4d and 6d. I wanted to fit “theories” or “theses” into 14a, but forced myself to stick to the word play and THEMES came out. That took me over 16 minutes though and then the long anagram at 1a took a while to untangle even after I had seen it was DISP-something. I mean, who has a disputation? Anyway, that gave me OVA quickly enough, but TOPERS took another five minutes. In this case the wordplay hindered as much as helped, because in retrospect I think I have heard of a toper, but wasn’t familiar enough with it to biff it. I almost put “topari” down, thinking that the Queen might just be R, surrounded by A1 and TOP was itself. Maybe a single drinker is a “toparus” I thought. Thankfully I saw sense. Time was 25:10 in the end. COD 11a Thanks William and Izetti.
  8. 11:16 today but with another sloppy error: THESES not Themes which is clearly clued.
    I thought this was an excellent puzzle. Everyone has to learn Ratel at some point doing crosswords. Protea I worked out from the clue; should be easy for cricket fans.
    LOI TOPERS. David
  9. 7:27 today, but fully 30 seconds of that was trying to get TOPERS. I knew it had to be, but for some reason I just couldn’t see the wordplay … and I’m stone cold sober! If only I’d seen it faster I might have beaten 7 minutes, which is my personal target for the QC. Should have biffed it 🙂

    I see I’VE for “the writer’s” cropped up again.

    H

  10. I didn’t time myself on this one but I suspect it took ages… just over half an hour maybe? I didn’t mind, though, because I was enjoying it so much. It was a slow and steady solve where, because izetti is so reliable, I knew I could work it out if I just trusted the wordplay, however hard some of the clues seemed. The possible exception was RATEL, 18 across, which I’d never heard of and within which the A and the E could easily have been the other way around. Ratel sounded and looked better than retal! I knew the plant and the bird so they were fine. Sometimes it’s the easy ones that catch me out and thus it was today with my LOI, 11 across, EARLIER. Why did I find this tricky? No idea. It was clearly going to be E*R*IER and I still couldn’t see it for far longer than is explicable.
    I needed help with the parsing of TOPERS, 4 down, so thanks, William, for that. I got caught up with TOP from… erm… “top” (thought it was a bit lame to repeat the word ) plus ER for a very special “lady” but then was at a loss for how “excellent ” worked…. Well, Her Maj is an excellent lady, I reasoned…. Duh!
    Similarly, I couldn’t see what ALI, 22 down, was a shortened version of.

    All good fun. Very much liked the double definitions today especially UNARMED, SEE THROUGH and LIMBO.

    Thanks very much for the helpful blog, William, and thanks, too, to Izetti, for a pleasant start to the day

  11. Just goes to show how much wavelength works! I thought this was really easy and that Izetti was being super-kind to us today, but based on previous comments, I’m in a minority. I got more than halfway through without dropping a clue until I tentatively put in perota for the plant. Annoying, because I do know of them – I believe they are South Africa’s national flower.

    So many great clues – particularly a couple of the anagrams! But I also loved INCORRECT, ALSO, and HAIR OF THE DOG. It’s hard to know which to choose for COD. So, for me anyway, it’s A Brilliant Day!

    FOI Disputations
    LOI Release
    COD Antipasto – sounds like my kind of a do, although I might need a 23a later on!
    Time 7:45 – close to a PB

    Many thanks Izetti for a great start to the day, and to William for the encouraging blog

  12. I agree with your summary william j so thanks to you and Izetti. I had not heard of a ratel but it was perfectly fair. Tricky but enjoyable for me.
  13. 12 minutes today for a really satisfying Izetti puzzle. DNK the badger or the bush, but one was clearly clued, and i plumped for the correct placement of the vowels in the other. DISPUTATIONS FOI. Thanks both.
  14. ….and no gaps in my knowledge to hold me up. I have to strongly disagree with Flashman – this was everything a QC should be.

    FOI PASSAGE
    LOI ALSO
    COD HAIR OF THE DOG
    TIME 3:27

  15. Missed EARLIER, idiotically. And biffed Scan instead of Icon, and Retal.

    Oh well. COD Hair of the dog.

    Many thanks all round.

  16. The thing with Izetti is that his cluing is so precise that for a seasoned solver a puzzle like this is (largely) a breeze. (Ratel, for example, comes up a lot in the 15×15. The Danny Dyer of the animal kingdom). I was almost a minute under target. But.

    But. SHEERWATER. Drat. Loads of WOE on the leaderboard so I suspect I was not alone.

  17. I raced through this and was grateful for the anagrams of SHEARWATER and ANTIPASTO as I have misspelled them before now. I knew of PROTEA and that went straight in. I paused twice, firstly with RATEL where I debated over the vowel order and secondly with my LOI TOPERS as I couldn’t quite believe the answer would include TOP so I was determined to parse it before submitting. Thanks to Izetti and William. 7 mins
  18. I know SHEARWATER lake, but DNK the bird. Thought a PROTEA was a SA cricketer. And had to look up RATEL v retal.
    Despite all that, finished in 40 mins or so. Good challenge.
    PlayUpPompey
    1. The SA cricket team are named the Proteas after what is their national flower.
  19. I was so surprised to get through this puzzle in 6:03 that I carelessly put GET THROUGH instead of SEE THROUGH. Drat! WOE is me! Thanks Izetti and William.
  21. I was also delayed by the badger and the drunkard. Otherwise fine – thanks.
  22. I’ve been doing well on Izetti puzzles recently so was disappointed not to finish after ploughing through for 45 mins. Just couldn’t get 11ac, probably because I was fixated on it being “Ex” something. This made it difficult to see 4dn which I DNK, along with 18ac which I got the wrong way around with my 50/50 flip of the “a” and the “e”. Will have to store that one for future reference.

    I don’t mind the long anagrams, but they take me much longer as I have to get the checkers first if I don’t have the GK. 7dn “Shearwater” is an example of this, although we’ve had that before so no excuse really.

    FOI – 5dn “Tests”
    LOI – DNF
    COD – 21ac – probably a chestnut but it made me smile 😀

    Thanks as usual.

  23. … as 18A came down Ratel not Retal. Phew, and all therefore done and correct in 11 minutes,. Not sure I am the greatest fan of clues that lead to a 50-50 guess for those that don’t know the answer: clue of course gives no guidance at all once one has the checkers.

    I thought 4D Topers not up to Izetti’s usual standard, with Top in both clue and answer. Would have been so easy to phrase the clue something like “Leading lady …”

    That apart a nice puzzle, especially for those that like long anagrams! COD 16A Release for the neatness of half then full relief – made me 150% relieved when I got it.

    Thanks to William for the blog
    Cedric

  24. Two hold ups for me today. I looked at 1a and thought that’s an anagram meaning argument and left it for later. On returning I decided to use ‘to get out of control’ as the definition and the anagram indicator which caused a few problems! I blame the heat. At 21a I initially went for ARMLESS, switched to DEARMED when LIMBO went in and finally plumped for the correct answer having got 10d. I fortunately knew the bird and the flower and guessed the correct spelling of the badger. Finished in 9.08 with LOI TOPERS.
    I thoroughly enjoyed this one and my COD goes to UNARMED.
    Thanks to william and Izetti
  25. bunged in DISPOSITIONS (doesn’t even mean arguments – idiot!) from a cursory scan of the anagrist at 1 across, which meant that TOPERS was much more difficult than it should have been, but eventually I twigged that it was my 1ac that was awry. SHEARWATER took a bit of untangling, though I stopped short of having to write out the letters.

    As others have said already, a neatly and precisely clued puzzle, which took 25 seconds over my 7 minute target. Thanks to Izetti and our blogger william_j_s

  26. As mentioned above, Izetti is so reliable in his cluing that a lack of GK in some areas doesn’t really matter.
    I had to biff PROTEA and RATEL and was a bit doubtful about TOPERS and ALI but amongst my favourites were PASSAGE, EARLIER and PENSIVE for their lack of complication. I loved the long anagrams, particularly HAIR OF THE DOG which is my COD.
    A whisker over my target of 15 minutes so a good day.
    Thanks to Izetti and William.
      1. Whilst I would normally agree with you regarding the reliability of the cluing and not needing GK – I think the Ratel/Retal combination bucked the trend today.
        1. Yes, James, that’s true but luckily I guessed correctly – for once!
  27. Not our fastest time (took us 12 minutes) but it was really enjoyable. Lovely mix of clues set at a suitably challenging level for a QC. Many thanks Izetti – love your puzzles.

    FOI: icon
    LOI: topers
    COD: protea

    Great blog William – hit the right note – always good to offer encouragement.

  28. Better than yesterday but still took me a lengthy 23 minutes. Knew SHEARWATER and PROTEA and guessed the correct vowel sequence for RATEL (and then looked it up to check). Took me too long to realise that 24ac was an anagram.

    FOI – 8ac ICON
    LOI – 18ac RATEL
    COD – the slightly philosophical 14ac THEMES

  29. I made the mistake of leaving this until after an exhausting trip out, so I wasn’t exactly fresh as a daisy. Couldn’t see anything at the top of the grid, other than noting that 1ac and 7d were going to be a tricky anagrams, but had more success lower down. I thought it was poor to clue the unknown loi Ratel/Retal via an anagram, and Ova seemed a bit clunky at the time, but there was also lots to enjoy, with 9ac Passage my CoD. A (heat stressed) 30mins overall. Invariant
  30. I found this a mixture of write ins (see through and hair of the dog) and tough nuts (topers and ova). Took ages dithering on the unknown badger (Retal or ratel ?) before plumping for the right one. I knew the boxer had to be Ali but NHO alit. I was surprised on coming here to find it was Izetti whose puzzles I usually find both entertaining and challenging. COD to Ova!

    Thanks to William for the explanations and Izetti for the daily challenge.

    Penny

    1. I deduced ALI from alit, too, but what a horrible word. I know it is in dictionaries as a verb: ‘a rare past tense and past participle of alight’. Long may it remain rare! John M.
  31. One unfair clue can ruin your chance of finishing a crossword.
    20 Across is unfair:
    “RELAPSE – RE (Royal Engineers, soldiers), with LAPS (drinks) and E (ecstasy, recreational drug).”

    In which universe does LAPS mean drinks ? Not the one I live in.

  32. Liked the blog. Ratel and Protea not known but ok.
    Shearwater a write-in as were many others but just had to quit once stared at 4d for too long.
    Disputations late in but obvious once most checkers in place…
    Topers with even T-P-R- known just not to happen
    Thanks all
    John George
  33. Super puzzle, I’m with William and Phil on this though sadly not with them on speed. I took the full 2K on this little gem, with most time being lost by my refusal to believe that TOP would be in both clue and answer. So if that’s a trick then I fell for it!

    In re RATEL – it is very disconcerting not being able to do a 5 letter anagram.

    FOI DISPUTATIONS, LOI TOPERS, COD HAIR OF THE DOG.

    Thanks William and Don

    Templar

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