Guardian Cryptic 28,186 by Qaos

84 comments on “Guardian Cryptic 28,186 by Qaos”

1. Yes 29a, and the ‘to’ in ‘horrible to…’ were the only eyebrow flickers in a pleasant canter, thanks Qaos. Had no idea of theme, though Spinal Tap rings a vague bell, thanks Manehi, prob via a radio arts show back whenever. Creation/Big Bang might generate a bit of comment, as might the, to some, oxymoronic singers/rappers (never rushed and bought any, but I don’t mind the rap phenomenon…poetry of the people and all that).

2. Living in Canada I received this early, struggled early on but a steady and it was enjoyable, Thank you to Qaos and Manehi

3. Agree a fun challenge, with some UK GK needed – dredged Levenson out of my memory via a google check once I had ELEVEN and Polly Toynbee once I had LOLLIPOPS. Likewise GOVE. And I didn’t parse STONE but assumed it was related to the postcode. EPSOM I was at least familiar with (lots of Dick Francis reading helps with that). Not that I am complaining – it is, after all, a British crossword.
   Spotted the theme – SPINAL TAP was a big giveaway, but it was not a help to complete the grid.

   I, too, struggled with the grammar of 29a- and think you may be right re a typo.

   ENCAVES was a new word for me. And we see cat meaning VOMIT, something I have only come across in crosswords.

   Fav clue CASTELLAN – Stella as beer has popped up recently and helpfully is a well known brand, given that I am not a huge fan of beer.

   Thanks to Qaos for the fun and Manehi for the blog

4. A quick and pleasant solve, but the parsing was tougher thanks in part to my lack of UK GK. Knew I wouldn’t have a prayer with the postal code without getting the answer first. I liked ELEVEN and GINGER NUT among others. Didn’t see the theme, of course. At least I guessed that it had something to do with SPINAL TAP, but never saw the movie so I knew it wouldn’t help.

   Came here with several still unparsed, so thanks to manehi for sorting things out, and of course thanks to Qaos, still among my favourite setters.

5. Chris “Poppa” Cadeau, drummer from 2007 to 2008 was eaten by his pet python, Cleopatra (1 down).

6. Could levels be added as Eleven Levels [of volume] tops and tails the grid rather neatly ?

7. ..further to tastes in music, Wotan and co always bring to mind a) Anna Russell and b) Rumlole quipping “Who was it who said Wagner is not nearly as bad as he sounds?” (I have Parsifal on vinyl and play the prelude on Good Fridays…the shimmering strings really are sublime..)

8. A fun solve – particularly liked 11 A. Beautifully evocative of cats and carpets!

9. I’m trying to find a reference to Sammy “Stumpy” Bateman drummer from 1990 to 2001, who deserves a mention as he “died trying to jump over a tank full of sharks while on a tricycle in a freak show.”

10. SPINAL TAP was a write-in after seeing lumbar puncture but I never saw the movie so the theme was lost on me. It didn’t matter as the wordplay led to most answers fairly easily. Favorites were SPORTS, LOATHSOME, FLOWER, and HENGE. Couldn’t parse SESSION, TIES UP, or STONE so thanks Manehi for that. Thanks Qaos.

11. I got SPINAL TAP very early on, figured it must be the theme, but decided to ignore it until I got stuck, but never was, it being my quickest finish in quite a while.  Kind of disappointing in a weird way.  But fun, nonetheless.  Oh yes, agree with comments re: 29a – can make a tortuous argument for the way it stands, but a typo seems more likely.

12. For fellow Whovians, an alt. version of 22ac:

    Horrible to behold: a book about Silurian extremists (5,4)

13. An enjoyable challenge, not too easy.

    Did not parse 1a ELEVEN (but I should have known this as I had heard of the Leveson Inquiry), or STONE (Stoke on Trent city postcode – although I saw at wikipedia that the town has ST postcode, but I did not work out what the one/1 meant). [As an aside, I am only just realising what small populations many of the towns in UK have. The cathedral town where the two Russians got poisoned recently had an even smaller population].

    New: ENCAVES, HENGE (guessed it via Stonehenge).

    I did not pick up on the theme.

    29a – should it be demolishes? I agee with manehi’s question on this.

     

    Thanks B+S

14. A fun solve – particularly liked 11 A. Beautifully evocative of cats and carpets!

15. Happily completed today’s puzzle, thank you Qaos.

    Could not parse STONE or ELEVEN so thanks manehi for the explanations.

    Not having seen the film, I completely missed the theme, but cobro picked up on it.

    Favourites were OVERDRIVE and LOATHSOME.

16. Nigel Tufnel (lead guitar) once described an olive as “a complete catastrophe”.

17. I was another for whom this was a fairly quick solve, although I failed to parse ELEVEN and STONE, both of which I’ll just file in the Too British For Me bin.  For me, the theme was hard to miss; I’m a fan of Lord Haden-GUEST’s mockumentaries, though he only acted in this one–the others he generally also directed and at least co-wrote.  I usually solve the shorter entries first, and I figured it was coming when I saw HENGE.

     

18. This was definitely on the easy side for Qaos but I loved the theme as it is one of my favourite films. The title to Christopher Guest’s piece on piano still makes me lol but I will refrain from naming it on here. Thank you Qaos and Manehi

19. I am unfamiliar with SPINAL TAP (14d and the theme) even though I know it is a band in a music spoof (and I think I know that from “The Simpsons”), so sadly I missed the enjoyment of the theme and its many linked references. So thanks to manehi and other contributors for filling me in. I feel like I have missed something by not seeing that film.

    Despite this, I had many ticks against clues as this puzzle unfolded, some of which coincide with ones manehi and others have also said they liked. These include 9a CASTELLAN, which was a TILT but a good clue – and that was all it could be once I thought of STELLA Artois. My other smiles were for 12a GINGER NUT, 15a SPORTS, 19a SHEARER (“worn”was a clever anagrind but I can’t really explain why it works), 22a LOATHSOME, 5d GLOVE (thanks to these cryptics for my knowledge of your pollies), and 19d SMELLS. I was very much held up in the SW by confidently entering FLINCH at 21d – that made perfect sense to me as comprising the first two letters of FLoat and another of the favourite rivers of crosswordland, the INCH. So it took me ages to rethink that one to give FLOWER and thus to solve 28a RAPPERS, followed by the unfamiliar 26a WOTAN. Fortunately I knew Polly Toynbee because a UK feiind often refers me to her articles in the British Guardian, so I was able to get 27a LOLLIPOPS. . I didn’t understand 1a ELEVEN at all as I was unfamiliar with that British scandal. So echoing ngaio@3, DiNC@4 and mrpenney@17 (and I am not complaining, just observing), I must say some UK knowledge was required for some clues. Lastly, I was with manehi, Dr. WO@11 and michelle@13 on the question mark beside “Demolished” (instead of “Demolishes”) for 29a LEVELS

    Thanks to manehi and Qaos for today’s contributions to my puzzling life.

20. [That “UK feiind” to whom I referred @19 is actually a FRIEND!

    BTW, I appreciate the choice of pseudonyms of two contributors to this forum, viz. Owl’n’Bear@8 and Owl@14, as owls are my favourite creatures. Yesterday I finished an challenging owl jigsaw puzzle (500 pieces with at least 50 shades of brown!) and coincidently I also discovered a new word, STRIGINE meaning owl-like, though I am still trying to figure out how to use the latter in a sentence.)

21. I think 29a LEVELS was Qaos’s attempted witticism by reversing a schoolboy joke, “What do you call demolished apartments?  Flats.”  It doesn’t quite work, but got a smile from me and the answer was clear.

22. Given that s is next to d on the keyboard, might “demolished” in 29a be a typo?

23. Enjoyed this one, though I didn’t remember all of the themers.

24. Hi JinA, did see strigine in Phil J’s great limerick yesterday?

25. ..did you see, I meant…

26. Thanks Qaos and manehi

    I saw the theme but only a few of the theme-related solutions – I’ve seen the film, but a long time ago; only ELEVEN and HENGE came to mind.

    Favourite, as with the Owls, was VOMIT.

    I think “demolishes” must have been intended too. Do RAPPERS actually sing?

27. An OK, undemanding puzzle, but IMO less entertaining than Pasquale’s yesterday. FOI (!) was SPINAL TAP (have not seen the movie so missed the theme) and LOI was LEVELS; perhaps the discrepancy in 29 threw me.  ENCAVES and CASTELLAN were new to me. My favourites: ALIENATOR, CASTELLAN and LOLLIPOPS. My first thought for 4 was BONKERS and for 17 it was P – – S UP. I guessed ELEVEN from the crossers, not following the clown closely. Did not know that ‘cat’ can mean ‘vomit’, but the first letters gave it away. I figured that 25 involved SOT and parsed 12 and 27 correctly, but a few others still resisted, so thanks manehi.

    In my opinion, RAPPERS are not singers … we had a similar clue recently.

    Thanks Qaos.

28. I kind of failed to get “eleven”; I guessed the answer because nothing else seemed to fit but couldn’t spot the definition. “Prime” as a definition has precedent, but of course there are infinitely many possible solutions, though most of them would not fit in the grid. I suppose any 2 digit prime might be considered fair, but “Seven Thousand Nine Hundred and Nineteen”, for example, would be stretching the point!

29. howard @28

    That was one the theme definitely helped with!

30. Pretty much what Hmmm in Oz said!

    I would add a gripelet re the ‘E’ in 7d where “top exhibition” is not, and never will be, equal to “top of exhibition”.  Sloppy setting untypical of this excellent setter IMHO.

31. Wow!  8.30 am in the UK and 27 comments already.  An early post certainly generates considerable response from our international contributors.  I’m impressed at the level of British GK in that community: as I solved, I found myself thinking this might be a stretch for some.  I doubt I could name a single journalist in a foreign newspaper, a single overseas postcode and certainly not a public enquiry.

    Whilst I’ve enjoyed Spinal Tap many times, I didn’t make the connection.  HENGE should’ve done it and got me looking for others.  But I never remember actors’ names so wouldn’t have got a full house.  With SPORTS, SHEARER, ELEVEN, SESSION and VOMIT (where I benefited from the discussion of ‘cat’ quite recently), I wondered if it was going to be football!

    All those I ticked have already been mentioned in dispatches.  HENGE made me smile with the surface conjuring up the conversation between two Ancient Britons, “we lost our chickens to a fox last night”.  “Yes, happened to us a while ago, too.  We’re building a henge to keep them in”.

    Thanks to Qaos and manehi for the blog.  Especially the derivation of ENCAVES.

32. Would it be incredibly pretentious to say that the first Toynbee who came to mind was Arnold? Polly did follow rapidly though; Wiki tells me that she’s his granddaughter.

33. Not a lot to add – for once I spotted the theme…with one clue to go (eleven!). I agree Howard @28 that “prime” would not be much of a definition but the number of primes that will fit in the grid is somewhat less than infinity and Qaos is famous (notorious?) for numerical clues so it was a well-hidden example. Much like finding a hidden answer where you least expected it, I find this kind of misdirection the most impressive. It’s like a magician doing a trick you know, but so well you still don’t see the sleight.

    TILT for me was realising that all my family in Staffordshire with ST postcodes are Stoke-on-Trent numbers not STafford ones. It explains why those near the centre of Stafford are ST18 not ST1…

    Thanks Qaos, and Manehi for the blog. Once again proving a puzzle does not have to be near-impossible to be fun.

34. A fairly straightforward solve even for one who has never seen SPINAL TAP so the theme didn’t hit me until I came here. I failed to parse SESSION so thanks to Manehi for that. I have to say my taste in music is far more in line with 26ac rather than the theme!
    Enjoyed GINGER NUT and CASTELLAN. I agree with KLColin that LEVELS was probably meant as a joke. Thanks Qaos.

35. 300-odd comments by nine o’clock indicates the ease of this crossword. An inverted week for me in terms of difficulty!

    Theme entirely escaped me, as usual.

    Thanks Qaos and manehi.

36. No – 30-odd…

37. Julie in Australia @20

    Rain and drizzle in England this morning. No amorous mating noises from our strigine friends. It’s too wet to woo.

38. Cat comes from ‘catharsis’, I guess.

    Qaos had [cat = vomit] last year too. https://www.theguardian.com/crosswords/cryptic/27874#12-down

    Thanks Qaos and manhei.

39. *manehi, apologies.

40. howard @ 28. My thoughts exactly. A better clue would have been

    A prime minister’s  blah blah blah

    with ‘A prime’ being the definition!!

41. I knew of the film but not all that much about it so it was more “Oh yes Harry SHEARER” than the theme helping me with the solve. I didn’t find this all that difficult, partly because I think Qaos’ clues are generally tight and clean and once you get on his wavelength tend to unfold very pleasantly. I’m a big Qaos fan and really enjoyed this as ever, but it was a shame (as has been pointed out by the blog and grantinfreo@1) that there were a couple of bits of wonky grammar in today’s puzzle. Not enough to spoil enjoyment or ultimately stand in the way of the right answers but a little niggle all the same. Thanks Qaos and manehi.

42. For me, it’s an archetypal typo in 29. As Gladys @22 points out, S and D sit side by side on the keyboard, and, as someone who’s done quite a bit of writing in his time, I confirm that it’s a common error to make. Also, as swapping the two more often than not results in a valid word, spell-checkers don’t pick it up and the error doesn’t stand out on a cursory reread.

43. William @30 perhaps Qaos meant “top” as a verb as defined in Chambers  “To take off the top of”?

    Also, I think one of the drummers died from choking on someone else’s VOMIT 🙂

    Fast but fun. Overall a big thumbs up from me

    Anyone seeking musical inspiration today could, apart from the obvious Spinal Tap, check out the electronic lounge sounds of OLIVE or a bit of retro soul with Joss STONE

    Cheers

44. I think OVERDRIVE is somewhat themey too…

45. As others have implied, there’s not much left to say, so early in the day.

    I’d looked at Qaos’ website for his customary hint as to the theme (is that cheating?) – ‘rock hard?’ – solved SPINAL TAP, which I’d just heard of and decided not to pursue it – not my cup of tea.

    However, I did enjoy solving the puzzle. My favourites were 1ac ELEVEN, for the construction, 18dn PEOPLES, for the surface, 21dn FLOWER, which made me smile by turning a favourite crossword ploy on its head and 9ac CASTELLAN and 1dn ENCAVES, because I enjoyed working them out by following the instructions (on the can 😉 )

    I’m with gladys @22 and blaise @42 re the s/d typo (?) – I do that all the time!

    Many thanks to Qaos for a fun puzzle and manehi for a good blog.

46. Probably coincidence, but there’s also a tenuous BIG BANG Theory connection:  Simon Helberg (Howard Wolowitz)’s Dad Sandy was in This is Spinal Tap.

    Thanks Qaos.  Not one of your toughest, but 11 (what else?) for the smiles.  Thanks also to manehi for an excellent blog, il principe for early-morning erudition and Penfold for an enjoyable groan.

    [JinA @20: there must be a blues-loving crossie fan out there who could join the forum as Owl‘n’Wolf]

    [ST1 brought to mind the car Roger Moore drove in pre-Bond days]

47. Including 1a today, I found 17 prime number related clues/answers in the archives 🙂

    Arachne – Prime case of extortion following incident in Home Counties (9)
    Arachne – Prime Suspect’s original episode cut short (5)
    Arachne – So are these! (5,7)
    Boatman – Zero is new factor for all primes (4)
    Boatman – Prime number — up to zero (4)
    Boatman – Prime every other T-shirt, even (5)
    Boatman – Prime and irrational number? Large primes can’t be this (6)
    Boatman – Prime made out to include another (5)
    Bonxie – 3 and 5 are proper codes for additives (5,7)
    Brendan – Prepares for 2027 and 2029, for example (6)
    Brendan – What’s needed to tango in prime, even (3)
    Brendan – Prepares three and nineteen, or one of 3 and one of 19, for example (6)
    Gordius – Prime property, apart from 2 (7)
    Paul – 2 or 3, perhaps, and 500 ready (6)
    Puck – Like 3, 13 and 17, in first of poems by Frost (5)
    Rufus -First one on the shift? (5,5)

48. The postcode for Stoke-on-Trent is ST4.  ST1 is the postcode for Hanley, the biggest of the “Five Towns”.

49. Thanks Manehi for explaining parsing of STONE and reminding me of a few forgotten references (eg Electric Banana!), I got the theme for once from 14D and 19A which helped with 1A (great clue for misdirection as noted by theZed@33 ad others, likewise I would have struggled for longer had I not been aware of Qaos’ penchant for maths/science). I struggled with LOI 29A precisely because of the typo, and 28A took a while because I really don’t see them as synonymous.

    I only know cat=vomit from some other time on here and don’t recall the big discussion mentioned above, Mark@31, is this what is referred to? : https://yourdailygerman.com/meaning-kater/

    Like Alan@18 I was hoping for some Mozart/Bach crossover in the saddest of all keys, but in vain, thanks nonetheless to Qaos for another enjoyable solve.

50. Gazzh @49: It was a Nutmeg on May 8th of this year with the solution THROW UP.  Here

     

51. 26a reminds me of “Wotan, Man of Steel”, a recurring Les Dawson character. His overbearing interviewer made sure Wotan never got a word in by answering his questions himself. Sounds familiar?

52. Wow, 50 replies before 11 BST. I saw the theme but I couldn’t remember the contents apart from ELEVEN.

    Nice to see EPSOM getting a nod. The Derby [and Oaks] was run here successfully behind closed doors. I’ll just go and check on the course after finishing this.

    I liked ENCAVES and PEOPLES among others.

    Interesting comment from bodycheetah @43; I hadn’t considered the use of top as a verb.

    Thanks Qaos and manehi.

53. The theme passed me by.  Though I’ve heard of Spinal Tap, that’s as far as my knowledge of it goes, so the crossword didn’t get the appreciation it deserved. I parsed them all, making an allowance for the error in 29A, so  It was all over too quickly with the succinct clues paving the way.  I don’t normally equate rappers with singers (28).

    As synonyms, equating “struggles” with “resists” is a bit strained I think, whereas “struggles against” is more apt in my book.

    Thanks to Qaos. Thanks manehi for the enlightenment as to the theme.

54. SPINAL TAP in early on. But not knowing details of the film made no difference at all to a surprisingly straightforward solve by Qaos’s usual standards. But stared for ages at 29ac before I assumed it had to be a mistake in the tense of the verb used in the clue. Liked LOATHSOME, bizarrely enough…

55. Quickest solve for some time but that didn’t detract from the pleasure. There’s a difference between a quick solve that’s banal, and a quick solve that is clever and well-clued. But oh, I would have enjoyed this so much more if I’d seen the theme! At 14d I remember thinking “that was a good film” but despite having seen it twice my brain refused to put two and two together.

    But please Qaos, no more references to that Tory MP, it’s bad enough to come across him on the news pages.

56. The clue for 29a is now officially corrected online: final S, not D. But it’s D in the hard copy.

57. Thanks to Qaos and manehi.
    If ever I was going to spot a theme this was it so it will never happen – I can relax. The typo in the clue for LEVELS is now corrected online.
    I urge (jina) anyone who hasn’t watched Spinal Tap to do so – perhaps at some point when the mood is low. It’s a rib-cracker if you “get” it (but maybe only for musicians – all the music heard is actually being played (such a rarity)).

58. Loved 14d – that was a laugh-out-loud moment for me when the penny finally dropped and most of the rest came together.   Great fun today…

59. Embarrassing to have got SPINAL TAP, had a little chuckle to myself at the memory, then failed to pick up on the theme. It must mean I need to watch it again – any excuse.

    I suspected there must be a meaning of “cat” that I didn’t know, and it was a relief to have got that right.

    LOI 1a, partly because the NW corner held me up for a while, partly because I missed the thematic significance of the answer, and partly because Qaos suckered me very effectively into thinking of PMs in general, and Eden in particular. Possibly my favourite clue when the penny dropped.

60. Reasonably quick, reasonably good fun. Interesting to see FLOWER as the answer rather than as the (rather hackneyed) cryptic definition for a change.

    Thanks Qaos and manehi.

61. A simple but enjoyable solve. Favourites were ELEVEN, LOATHSOME (a very Morrissey word!) and BANANAS. I see Rev Spooner made another of his regular appearances. One little moan is that I don’t like the same word occurring in the clue as in its answer (‘can’ in CASTELLAN). The theme gradually dawned on me, but it’s been a long time since I watched This Is Spinal Tap. I recall it as being mildly amusing, though pseudo-trendy DJs and rock journalists love to laud it so as to show everyone they get the in-jokes.

    Howard @28, just wondering if you chose 7919 as it’s the 1000th prime?

62. Slightly disappointing that Messrs Bachman and Turner or ‘interstellar’ didn’t feature in the clue for 16D.

63. 2scotcheggs @61, correct, I wanted a longish one without being ridiculous and went to wikipedia for a list. The last in the list of the first 1,000 seemed as good as any. I had no idea how many types of prime number there are: balanced, bell, carol, chen, circular, cousin … ad nauseam.

64. 2Scotcheggs @61: I think your – admittedly little – moan is a tad unfair.  There would – rightly – be plenty of criticism if ‘corn’ appeared in a clue for ‘corncrake’ or ‘woman’ in a clue for ‘policewoman’.  But words frequently appear in clues only to then be inserted into others or, as in the case of Castellan, to act as envelopes for others.  Of course, Qaos could have used ‘tin’ instead of ‘can’ and the clue would have worked just as well.

65. Never heard of Leveson or Polly Toynbee, or of SMS for text messages.  I had no idea “cat” could mean “vomit.” My cat does not approve.

    The answer to Rumpole’s question is Mark Twain, who said, “Wagner’s music is better than it sounds.”

    I forgot to look for a theme, not noticing that it was Qaos today, but it wouldn’t have done any good if I’d remembered.  I’m so impressed with bloggers who can find all these obscure bits of info!

    Julie, there is no River Inch.  Inch is an island in Ireland.  “Inis” is Irish for “Island,” which puts Inch Island in the same tautological family as the River Avon, afon (pronounced ah-von) being Welsh for “river.”

    I like to imagine a Roman functionary asking a local Ancient Briton (possibly one of Mark’s chicken keepers), “And what do you call this, my good man?”  “It’s a river, you berk.”  Solemnly writes on clipboard “Fluvius Avon est.”

66. Hi Mark @64: Yes, it occurred to me that ‘tin’ would have avoided the repetition. You’re probably right that I’m rather unfair. I’ve inherited my fussiness from my dad, who taught me how to do cryptics when I was about ten. We’d solve puzzles together and he’d often find fault with several clues – a real purist, or pedant.

67. Valentine @65 “Leveson” was pretty parochial UK knowledge I have to admit (and I only parsed it after guessing the answer), but Polly Toynbee is a Grauniad columnist, and has been for a long time, so I imagine they felt it was fair game. Obviously plenty of people only meet the paper through the (free) online crossword, but perhaps this is their way of nudging those folk to pay more attention to the paper as well? As for SMS, it is the original and official name of the text system, so I think is reasonable GK to expect. I think on this forum a couple of weeks ago, in response to the Morse code for “S” appearing in a clue, someone pointed out that the Nokia text announcement “dit dit dit dah dah dit dit dit” is Morse for “SMS”. Now they abbreviate it “dah dah” i.e. “M” for message.

    As for naming of the River Avon, Terry Pratchett brought up the idea with the forest named “Your finger you fool” in the local language (The Light Fantastic). Wikipedia has an amazingly long list of tautological place names including Islands, rivers and mountains.

68. We all have our own standards, as has been discussed here before, but I think it is perfectly ok and NOT CHEATING to google a suspected answer (e.g. Toynbee, Leveson today) to confirm.  Especially for non-native solvers.  I view puzzles such as this to be a test of mental gymnastics, not a test of knowledge per se.

69. Valentine and TheZed @65/67

    Many thanks for the ‘tautological place names’ discussion.  I was surprised to find on the wiki list not only our old friend the River Ouse (apparently Ouse is derived from usa, a Celtic word for water or river), but also Canvey Island (close to my heart, naturally) and the unfortunately named village of Montcuq, which with a little licence may be pronounced in French as a homophone of mon cul.

    This 70s TV sketch brought ‘une certaine notoriété’ to Montcuq.  Some of the double entendres are not hard to predict…  “Aujourd’hui, pour la première fois, je suis heureux de vous montrer Montcuq à la télévision”

    But my favourite story is the one-off cycling event, starting from the Spanish town of Parla and ending in Montcuq, organised with the sole purpose that it could be named the Parla-Montcuq.

70. Dr. WhatsOn @68 As a foreign solver I have no problem using outside references or word finders on occasion to complete a crossword. However, I’ve only submitted entries for prize crosswords when I’ve completed the grid with no help whatsoever.

71. Very much enjoyed and (no offence meant, quite the contrary) I thought this could’ve fitted in a Monday slot and been a fair but fun challenge (I thought this Monday’s was fair but not that much fun, sorry).

    To Mark and Scotcheggs earlier comment, one of the reasons I make that comment is that the unusual words (9 and 26) are clued in a helpful way. If say a tenuous synonym had been used for ‘now’ in 26a, casual solvers would have no hope. As it was a figure it out plus google of Wotan is within the reach of most I think. Same comment on castellan.

    Thanks Qaos and manehi

72. I enjoyed this – I am a lockdown newbie and it took me a fair four hours with help from my crossword dictionaries. I particularly liked 14d 27a 22a and 24a. fon was11a. loi was 28a. Love reading the comments – here and on the guardian website – helps me to learn

73. Hmm, I first thought of Arnold Toynbee rather than Polly- I think it’s an age thing! I got SPINAL TAP quite early on but I still didn’t identify the theme so no help with the puzzle. It was pretty straightforward though. As to the film: I saw it when it first came out and I’ve obviously forgotten most of it- another age thing-because a lot of the references ring no bells at all. STONEHENGE might have provided a glimmer but it didn’t. Nice puzzle,though.
    Thanks Qaos.

74. Loved this cryptic and could parse it all (a rarity for me). Seen the film but, as with others, didn’t help becuase it was so long ago. Loved LOLLIPOPS, LOATHSOME and ELEVEN. Thanks M and Q

75. The amp that goes up to eleven was one of the few things I remembered about the SPINAL TAP film, so this helped solve 1 across once I had the theme.  Quite satisfying as I’d suspected a prime but hadn’t parsed the Leveson bit.  Apart from the miniature Stone Henge, didn’t get the rest of the references – I can see now it was an impressive grid fill.

    Thanks Manehi for the blog and Qaos for another enjoyable puzzle.

76. This was quite a smooth and quick solve for me until the end, when I couldn’t think of FLOWER or WOTAN. I enjoyed what I did, and I recognised SPINAL TAP but was unable to make any connections. ELEVEN was a bit of a mystery, but that was only because I had completely forgotten about the Inquiry.
    I didn’t know Stoke was ST1, but one thing I do know is that Stone is a small town in Staffordxhire very near Stoke-on-Trent.

77. Rapper? Singer? Please!!

78. Dr W @68 I’d be happy to eschew electronic aids if the setter declared none had been used in the creation of the crossword – otherwise it feels a bit like taking a knife to a gunfight 🙂

79. I would argue that rapping isn’t singing. 🙂

80. @Skip

    As a Stoke boy allow me to correct you. The ‘town’ of Stoke-upon-Trent, which is one of the six (not five) towns that originally federated to become the city of Stoke-on-Trent, has the postcode ST4. The city has of course many postcodes, of which ST1 is one, being Hanley and surrounding areas. The clue is therefore absolutely fine.

    The town of Stone, just south of Stoke-on-Trent, has the postcode ST16.

    I would get out more but apparently there’s a lockdown

81. bodycheetah@43
    If you top “exhibition” don’t you get “xhibition”?
    I agree with William @30. This sort of grammar is unfortunately too common.
    I guessed that 14d would be Qaos’s theme but I wasn’t going to watch it to find out. Thanks to him and manehi.

82. Stella? Beer? Please!!

83. [Not sure anyone else will come back to read these comments as many of those in Europe are asleep by now, but just to say thanks to everyone for an interesting and engaging forum following on from Qaos’ challenge and menehi’s blog.

    gif@24, yes you are right about the source of my new word, STIGINE. It was indeed from Phil J’s clever limerick.

    Penfold@37, thanks for the extra laugh regarding amorous owls.

    essexboy@46 now I wish I had thought of Owl’n’Wolf as my pen-name. Very droll.

    alphalpha@57: thanks for the urging re “This is Spinal Tap”. Will follow up. Apparently it is available on YouTube.

    Valentine@65, I might be mistaken about INCH being a popular crosswordland river, but I definitely remember driving over the River Inch in County Wexford on the main road south from Dublin back in 2010. However I appreciated your interesting post regarding islands in Ireland as well, and of course the River Avon thread you initiated.]

84. What is “on” doing in 19d ?

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