Guardian 28,222 – Boatman

69 comments on “Guardian 28,222 – Boatman”

1. Thanks, Andrew.

   Quite a workout for me, but everything fair. Boatman is particularly good at ringing the changes on a theme.

   I’d parse 3d slightly differently, with the homophone part being HUMANELY for “hue, mainly.”

2. Yes, I agree with Miche about the homophone in 3D.

   Thanks Boatman and Andrew.

   Noel Coward was a charmer.
   As a writer he was brahma.
   Velvet jackets and pyjamas,
   “The Gay Divorcee” and other dramas.

3. This was fun and I parsed almost all of it. Thank you to Andrew for the explanation of MORRICONE. I also had the homophone of HUE MAINLY; otherwise “chiefly” would be doing double duty. Many thanks to Boatman for do many good uses of time.

4. Very enjoyable. Strictly a dnf since I had to resort to pen and paper for 10ac; I could not hold fodder and subtractions in my head. Thanks both.

5. Agreed that the various clues involving time provided an interesting connector today. I liked 22a FATS DOMINO. Knew NOEL COWARD at 12d more as a playwright than a composer. Like Beobachterin, I needed help to parse 10a MORRICONE, which I entered based on the definition only but knew because I read various obituaries marking his death recently. I also couldn’t work out how LENIENT worked at 27a. Thanks to Boatman and Andrew.

6. Wiggers@4 – I have pen and paper jottings to solve many clues especially anagrams – very seldom can I see them just by looking. Had never thought as doing this as anything other than working out the solutions – I think you are being very hard on yourself calling the use of pen and paper to do the subtractive anagram in 10a MIRRICONE a dnf!

7. Whoops: MORRICONE!

8. Thanks Boatman and Andrew

   Hard, though not as hard as yesterday’s, and a bit irritating – I’m not a fan of the same word turning up repeatedly, even if it has different meanings. Clever, though!

   I didn’t parse MORRICONE either. I thought 11a was rather weak; as you say, Andrew, most of the solution appears in the clues referred to.

   Favourite NUTS ABOUT.

9. Not quite as hard as yesterday but thought provoking none the less. It took me ages to get FATS DOMINO the only “fats” I could think of was Waller. Jazz isn’t my strong suit. Thanks to Andrew for parsing MORRICONE and also LENIENT, of which the latter I should have seen. Also for the explanation of TOERAGS as I was hooked on to rags as being the reference to clothes but could see the rest.
   Enjoyed 14, 15 particularly.
   Thanks Boatman and Andrew

10. Kudos to Penfold @2  – clearly one of the CBs!

11. Like Munromad@9 I was stuck on RAGS in TOERAGS so couldn’t parse. Loved NONE TOO SOON, TEMPO and MERE. Many thanks to Boatman as ever, and to Andrew.

12. Excellent surface theme – very clever to get so many different takes on “time” and “about time”.  Also the composers were not the sort of composer you tend to expect.  Favourite probably 22a FATS DOMINO (who is one of the contenders for the first rock and roll record with The Fat Man, 1949 – it bears a remarkable resemblance to the later Lawdy Miss Clawdy).

    In 20d POSTIE I thought the definition was “letters – one’s job”, with “holder of innumerable” being the IE.

    “Not really” as an anagram indicator in 18a was perhaps stretching it a bit!

    Many thanks Boatman and Andrew.

13. Took us a while today, but we got there eventually! Agree with JinA@6 about Wiggers @4 – using a pen and paper does not make it a DNF!

    LOI was MORRICONE, cobro cleverly worked out the tricky parsing.

    Favourites were PAUNCH and NONE TOO SOON.

    Thanks Boatman and Andrew!

14. I’m in agreement with Lord Jim @12: on a couple of points.  I also saw “letters – one’s job” as the definition of POSTIE with “holder of inumerable” being the IE.  Likewise, it was interesting (and ultimately, for me, defeating) to feature less obvious composers than is often the case.  MORRICONE rang the bell as soon as I revealed but I couldn’t get there from the clue, regrettably.

    I know what you mean, muffin @8, about the irritation factor (I felt it a bit with Pauls’ recent I/island puzzle) but, once put to one side, Boatman has managed to use the device cleverly in the way he so often does.

    When 1ac was such an obvious solution, followed rapidly by 1d, I thought this was going to be Mondayish.  Some chance!  I ground just as rapidly to a halt and it took some time (!) to get on the wavelength.  Then there was plenty to like – I ticked TEMPORAL, NONE TOO SOON, RIDGE POLE, EQUILATERAL (‘Not really’ raised an eyebrow but no more), TURNED IN and the aforementioned POSTIE (perhaps because I’m in Scotland at the moment and posties abound).  I was enchanted by SPELL which is so simple but very clever.

    Finally, two more agreements with others: Andrew and muffin both point to the weakest clue, 11ac, and I’m totally with JinA @6 in response to Wiggers @4: denying yourself the use of pen and paper is on the verge of ascetic.  I think you can be a little more LENIENT towards yourself!

    Thanks Boatman and Andrew

15. Liked NUTS ABOUT.

    Did not parse MORRICONE, TRUTH.

    I agree with Julie’s comment @ 6.

    Thanks Boatman and Andrew.

16. A challenge but got there in the end. Was struggling to see the link between the 3 composers and was a bit disappointed when I realised what 11ac was.
    Thanks for the Ian Dury reference Penfold. There ain’t half been some CB’s!!

17. Seeing Boatman’s name I was prepared for a workout – which it was, but in a good way.  PDM of the day was EMIT (having expended much effort trying to think of a four-letter synonym for time and reversing it).

    Wiggers @4:  From my earliest days of solving cryptics, every bit of available white space around the puzzle has been filled with jottings and crossed-out letters and alphabet trawls.  I realise now that I’ve never successfully completed a crossword in my life! 😉

    Thanks Andrew for parsing MORRICONE (I ran out of space!) and to Boatman for the fun.

18. Did anyone get MORRICONE other than by working out what it must be from all the crossers? Chapeau if so, I didn’t.

19. Wasn’t quite sure what to make of this at first. At times I was stumbling rather blindly through the clues, not particularly enjoying the process. However, when I did miraculously spot how to solve 10ac I rather changed my tune, thinking, that’s a very ingenious clue indeed to have set. Encouraged then to feel that the puzzle was worth completing, I managed to get there without a single reveal. Though I did need to refer to Andrew for some of the parsing. Wasn’t at all sure about SNEERING or TOERAGS. But I’m rather patting myself on the back, eventually. Thanks to Boatman and Andrew…

20. Wow. I agree with JinA that I hope using pencil and paper does not make it a DNF. Like Mark I was sucked into 1a and 1d being easy but the rest took serious thought. Thanks Boatman for everything. Especially None TOO SOON, SPELL and SNEERING. Thanks Andrew for parsing of MORRICONE that I only got by trawling through a list of composers starting with M!

21. Like Mark@14, when I started the NW corner, I thought this was going to be easier than it was, but I liked the initial encouragement, followed by the later challenge. Also, as Lord Jim says, it was clever misdirection to get us thinking of classical composers. Thanks to Boatman for the puzzle and to Andrew for explaining the tricky parsing on some of these.

22. Enjoyed this on the whole but tend to agree with muffin @8 – the repeated word can start to grate a little

    In POSTIE, aren’t IE the holders of inumerable rather than the holder?  Only a quiblet.

    Liked the fact the composers were not of the more traditional crossword ones.

    Cleverest clue for me was PAUNCH.

    Many thanks, Boatman, and to Andrew for unraveling MORRICONE.

23. Found harder than yesterday but very good fun and finished in reasonable time.  FOI was REPAINT followed by TOERAGS.

    Thank you Boatman and Andrew!

24. If Picaroon was Mozart yesterday then Boatman is surf reggae. Made a nice change as i feel the Graun is a broad church

    I quite liked the Morricone clue.

    So two earworms during this solve -Time (Pink Floyd) and the Good Bad and Ugly-flute,ocarina etc

25. William @22: I think you make a fair point.  I justified the singular on the basis that the combination or construct IE is the holder of inumerable rather than the, admittedly, letters I and E. Maybe a slight stretch but worth it in my book for what ends up as a lovely definition element.

26. DavidT @18. Thanks for the chapeau! I had just one crosser and was trying to take EST – “lavish set”=(SET)* – from (IN ORCHESTRAL)* (with movies as anagrind), but when I got the M from TEMPO I realised it was the much more straightforward (IN ORCHESTRAL MOVIES) less LAVISH SET, with pieces as the anagrind. “Set pieces” perhaps refers to the three way shoot out at the end of The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.

    And, yes, Wiggers @4, I used pen and paper. Good grief!

27. Thanks, Andrew and all …

    David@18 – I too would be interested to know how many people solved 10 Ac at least partly from the wordplay rather than from simply guessing the definition. It’s much easier to set subtraction anagrams than it is to solve them, which means that there’s always the danger of crossing into unfairness as a result. When the wordplay adds to the definition, though, I like them very much – the idea in this case being that you’d start by thinking about film composers, you’d play with the letters of “in orchestral”, perhaps see that that would give you most of what you needed for MORRICONE and work out the rest from there. I’m not saying that’s not a lot to ask!

    You may feel, as I did, a slight frisson when I tell you that the MORRICONE clue was not originally intended as a posthumous salute but appeared out of nowhere, along with the other two composer clues, at the last stage of filling the grid, in early June. I was happy to take the opportunity to make an extra mini-theme out of them, I submitted the puzzle and Morricone died three weeks later. The curse of coincidence, and not for the first time …

28. Thanks Boatman for the interesting insight. No unfairness as far as I’m concerned!

    Here’s that scene from TGTB&TU: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4LcVQJ4IBtM. Superb tension in the scene, the editing and the music.

29. Late to the party today, solved in bits (between downtown lunch and cinema, hooray!; Belle Epoque with Auteil, a bit soppy but aptly ‘temporal’). So, yes, quite fun if a bit patchy, eg recomposed. Will now read blog and posts, and say more maybe. Ta B and A.

30. Boatman@7 10 had to be Morricone just from the crossers but i made sure I got the subtraction right. Thanks for the dope on when you compiled it. He is a true legend-and timing is everything

31. Mark @25:  Yes, I went grudgingly in that direction, too, for the same ‘lovely surface’ reason as you.

32. Thanks for sharing, Hatter@28 – extraordinary pace and cutting in that, and thrilling music cues …

33. William @31: grudgingly, maybe, but I hope you feel the better for it.  I continued to muse and came up with an alternative, possibly simpler, justification.  ‘Holder’ and ‘container’ are decent synonyms and the container of innumerable is IE.  We don’t object to other singular terms for outer letters – skin, for example, or envelope – so container should be OK.  That’s the problem with being on holiday: plenty of time to make a mountain out of a quiblet!

34. Hah! Yes, Cop@30, you’re right – for a film composer, timing is indeed everything …

35. Thanks to Boatman for an enjoyable and doable puzzle, and to Andrew for the blog, although for once Mrs Job and I managed to parse everything between us.  I enjoyed NUTS ABOUT and several others.

    I have not heard the word TOERAG used to define a tramp before – in my mind, it is an obnoxious child.  I have heard that the derivation of this word is from the urchins who lay on their backs to propel barges through tunnels on English canals by ‘walking’ along the tunnel roof.  They wrapped their feet in rags for protection, and were referred to by this footwear.

36. Sailed through the first half of this increasingly convinced I was enjoying the calm before the storm and things definitely got choppier. I too got MORRICONE from the crossers and was distracted by thoughts of electro popsters “Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark” and how much their name sounds like a cryptic clue 🙂 Now there’s a theme…

    Many thanks to Boatman for a glorious crossword & Andrew for the blog

37. Well, I had fun with this one, despite the theme not being a hidden one. I was going to say that knowing the theme didn’t help at all, but it actually did in one instance. Seeing a few “about time”s, I thought that there must be an “EMIT” lurking, and there was, although ironically with a different wordplay.

    I really liked 27a LENIENT – a triple-def &lit. if I’m not mistaken. Never seen one before – fantastic!

    While I got 1a REPAINT readily enough, I think the definition has some minor problems. Firstly, “visibly” adds nothing, since colour in the non-physics world is all about what you see anyway. (Yes I know it’s just the wavelengths reflected/emitted, regardless of whether there is an observer, but that’s being even more picky than I am!) Secondly, you can repaint something the same colour, for purposes of enhancing endurance, not colour change.  Not complaining, just wondered if anyone else had the same thoughts.

38. I too enjoyed this. Failed utterly to parse MORRICONE, not seeing the subtractive anagram ( at one point thought ‘ ric is rich (=lavish) cut but then ground to a halt). Also, as did some others, missed the ‘era’  in TOERAGS and was distracted by the rags’. I am with Job@35 as  thinking only of misbehaving folk (not limited to children in my case) however; I don’t see it as a synonym for tramps.

    Favs SPELL, METRE and FATS DOMINO.

    Like so many here, I can’t believe Wiggers@4 thinks using pen and paper implies dnf. Interestingly, for me writing out anagram fodder in alphabetical order (vowels and consonants separately) often helps me see the anagram without further working out. I don’t always use pen and paper but I certainly find it helpful at times.

    Thanks to Boatman for the fun, and for popping in, and to Andrew for the helpful blog

39. Doc What @37:  The run-through of REPAINT showed itself so readily that I have to confess I missed the tautological visibly at the time.  It doesn’t even do much for the surface so I wonder why Boatman included it.  Perhaps he’ll drop in again and say.

40. bodycheetah@36 I’m tingling with electricity at the thought of an OMD themed puzzle. Will have a red frame and white lights?

41. For some reason this was quite a challenge, but not much fun to be had in the solving (unlike yesterday), and the theme was certainly beaten to death. However it was made totally worthwhile for me as I stared at the last of the three composers. The first two had been easy (as special favorites of mine), but now, as the last-one-in for the puzzle as a whole, I stared at M–R–I–O–E with zero inspiration. Five crossers for a nine-letter composer ought to be a piece of cake, but alas, I was just about to concede defeat … when the announcer on the radio playing in the background, stated that “the piece you have just heard was by the prolific Italian movie composer ENNIO MORRICONE”. I nearly fell off my seat! I’m a great believer in the existence of extreme coincidences, but this was surely one spin of the coin too many …. (perhaps this of no general interest but I thought I ought to share, since I’m sure you all have your own crossword-coincidence experiences).

    PS: As a fan of the great Italian movies, I shall play a few of his theme tunes on Youtube and wonder how I missed his name over all these years. PPS: wow just played Malena … wow … how could I have missed this composer …

42. Hmmm, agree that repainting needn’t change the colour, but then there are some cans of worms, Dr. Wh @37. Reminds me of one of my undergrad lecturers asking “Is the tomato’s redness in it, or in your brain?”, and “Where is the pain of your pricked finger..in finger or brain?” I love that sort of thing..

43. I did the subtractive anagram properly! I don’t normally spot them, so I feel particularly blessed today, especially because I also got the dreaded reverse-anagram.

    Felt a little verbose at times (I was baffled by the need for the SNEERING poet and pretty much all of the LADETTE clue), but some lovely bendy use of the language. However, my favourite clue was a non-time one, TORMENTOR making excellent use of the tools available.

44. Minor point. In 28a , bar (except) B(ritish) from Debt…

45. EMIT was easy, as a few years ago there was a locally based computer firm called TIME COMPUTERS. It became quite successful ,as I remember, but then went bust. The MD then tried to resurrect a much smaller enterprise called EMIT COMPUTERS!

46. I didn’t like toerags, as I take it to be an insulting and racist version of Tauregs the Berber nomads of North Africa.

47. [Jennifer @46 – if they come and play as well as Tinariwen or Tamikrest, don’t care if they are toerags…]

    Maybe this is the newbieness in me but I kind of get all star-struck and wobbly when the setter comes on.  I just jumped round the office shouting “Boatman is on 225!  Boatman is on 225!”

48. Thanks Boatman and Andrew

    For me, 10 was a zero-crosser entry. What the clue was doing was there in flashing lights, so it was a case of writing down the fodder, eliminating the givens and juggling the rest.

    It helps that I’m currently working through a 5-CD set of his spaghetti western soundtracks.

49. Ah – the linguistic correctness police are out in force, I see.

    Pretty sure TOERAG is simply a reference to a piece of cloth wrapped round the foot in lieu of a sock, and thence a reference to the wearer such as a tramp, and nothing to do with any perceived slight on nomads in Africa.

50. Jennifer @46.  An interesting discussion about the origin of TOERAG here. Many speculative origins, but the one that is immediately dismissed is any connection with Tuaregs. And I’ve never heard the term used with racist intent.

    Also Job @35: “tramp or beggar” is the first definition in my copy of Chambers. I like your derivation of urchins pushing canal boats through tunnels – I thought that was a heavy job that would have been work for an adult? Either way, respect rather than disgust would seem to have been appropriate.

51. Simon S @48. “It helps that I’m currently working through a 5-CD set of his spaghetti western soundtracks.”

    So, you didn’t really need a clue at all, did you?

    Not like rodshaw @41. He had to wait for the announcer on the radio to tell him!

52. Thank you Boatman for dropping by and for the interesting insight into the creative process. I have to confess, however – and in answer to DavidT’s query – I’m one of those who guessed MORRICONE solely from the crossers. (The word “movies” was a dead giveaway.) Unlike other commenters, I’d solved that plus NOEL COWARD and FATS DOMINO, then went back to11A and wondered what those three composers had in common. All I could think of was that they’re all dead. Am I the only one whose first choice of answer was “decomposed”? In my defence, I did drop it fairly swiftly, largely because it felt too tacky for such a classy setter…
    I enjoyed the deceptive simplicity of SPELL, EMIT and RETURN; ADOPTION and TRUTH were very satisfying, too.
    Thanks to Andrew for help untangling the parsing to 10a, thanks too to Penfold at 2 for ensuring I’ll have a delightful Ian Dury earworm for the rest of the day – and Wiggers at 4: I’m lost in admiration at your mental abilities!!!

53. I’m enjoying the discussion about toerags, and I hope the belief that the word never had racist overtones is the correct one. I’m always sceptical about these etymologies that seem too good to be true and which turn out to be coincidences – English seems to be particularly prone to them. I remember a guide at Anne Hathaway’s House pointing out a corner of a bedroom and confidently explaining that a cubby hole was where seventeenth-century people kept their children, or cubs – which sounds plausible enough, except that there’s a Gaelic equivalent that’s suspiciously close to the same word but with no child-storage connotations, and dinghy sailors have sheltered in cuddies for rather a long time, or it might be something to do with a German word for a cattle stall …

    As for MaidenB@47 – You’re welcome. I do hope you’ve unwobbled yourself now, or at least that your office has been enjoying the spectacle …

54. [Boatman @53

    My Welsh grandmother had a word for a storage space that doubled as a verb for putting something in it. I don’t know how she spelled it, but it sounded like “cutch” – as in “I’ll cutch it away for you in the cutch, shall i?”]

55. [This was the same grandmother who thought that she could speak French, as she could converse with the bicycling “French onion sellers”, not realising that they were speaking Breton!]

56. Thanks Boatman for a very entertaining crossword and commenting on the blog. I ticked many favourites including TORMENTOR, ADOPTION, NUTS ABOUT, MERE, and the brilliantly devious 2d with “at no time” being the letter “a.” Others may know if this was a construction used before but it was a fresh one for me.
    I missed TOERAGS and POSTIE — new words for me. Thanks Andrew for parsing MORRICONE which I got from a few crossings and the generous definition.

57. Muffin@54 It’s a cwtch. The same word means
    a cuddle or hug.

58. Thanks Penfold! I did know enough Welsh to suspect w rather than u…

59. Finally cracked this, although not much pleasure along the way. Some of Boatman’s clues just seem too clunky to me- 28ac the best example.

60. Penfold@57 – Indeed … one of Mrs B’s favourite words!

61. Wonderful gamelan crossword with echoes nautical, temporal and musical all around. Bunged in tough and pine completely under the spell, more fool me. Thanks B and A.

62. Job @35 & sheffield hatter @50: I’ve never heard of urchins being used to propel narrowboats through tunnels and agree with the latter – hatter – that it not only needed strength but also longer legs!  The process was known as legging and there were professional leggers stationed at some long tunnels though it could be done by the narrowboat crew themselves.  Often a family, the urchin’s job would normally be to lead the tow horse over the top to meet the boat the the other end of the tunnel.  Legging was nearly always done on the sides of the tunnel, rather than the roof, often lying on boards attached to the boat.  I talked with someone – a boatman, funnily enough – in the Black Country Museum who had done it and his view was that, whilst strength was necessary, technique was key: once the boat was moving, keeping it going wasn’t as difficult as one might think.  There’s a useful article on Wikipedia (as always) here

63. Mark @62

    The Leeds-Liverpool mile-tunnel isn’t far from us. This used to be “legged” through, though I thought the leggers lay on their backs on the superstructure – not a lot of space on the sides. I agree that urchins legs wouldn’t have been long enough.

    Famously, a cow once managed to swim through the tunnel!

64. ..urchins’..

65. [Mark @62. All I know about legging comes from CS Forester’s Hornblower and the Atropos. He describes it much as you do: lying on boards attached to the boat. Not really a job for a small boy!]

66. Bodycheetah – with your love of HMHB and now your excitement re the prospect of an OMD crossword, am I sensing a Wirral coonection ?

67. Bodycheetah – with your love of HMHB and now your excitement re the prospect of an OMD crossword, am I sensing a Wirral connection ?

68. Jennifer – sorry for the misspelling at 66. It was a genuine error

69. re. TOERAGS.  A synecdoche. From George Orwell, “The Spike” (1931).  “Some of the men refused the bath, and washed only their “toe rags”, the horrid, greasy little clouts which tramps bind around their feet.”

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