You got confusions? Tell us of them here.
Update: My confusions, of which there are two:
8 across: For a brothel, you dressed in suit… (8)
So what’s the answer? I assume it’s got something to do with a brothel.
3 down: F1 champ due to be quiet (6, 2)
I’ve got my theory on this one, which I’ll reveal in the comments, but it doesn’t seem complete.
I have two problems:
23A: I have EATS AWAY. I guess the direct definition is “erodes”, but the best I can do for the wordplay is:
ruin = WASTE
a ruin in recession = ETSAWA
a ruin in recession engrossing a = EATSAWA
yankee = Y this is the bit I don’t get
Is that it?
2D: What’s the connection between being 64 and the setting sun? If it’s merely a reference to getting old, it’s very tenuous.
My problem is 13A. The answer is clearly APEX, but why?
@RB: They were my conclusions: yankee = y; setting sun = old age = 64. Yes, very tenuous.
John, for 13A I have AHEM. I think you’ll be able to work it out.
Ahem.
“Too blokey.”
That was the contemptuous opinion of B who must be obeyed. Brothel, Cousins, rugby mecca, F1 champ.
On the up side, she is a fan of a certain hit machine, which made the rest crossword as easy as Honey Pie.
PS: Anyone know what’s the story with 21A?
My explanation for 21a is somewhat laborious. First of all, I believe the answer is ROTS (but I could be wrong!). Explanation is:
“Heavy defeats” = ROUTS
“gutted 15-across” = “gutted at heart” means ROUTS=>ROTS
“and 23-across” = “eats away” = ROTS
RB, the answer is indeed ROTS. Worthy of gold with the use of ‘gutted’ to mean you take a letter out of another word, rather than the more usual ‘take the innards out of a word’.
RB – I believe you are spot on, and a good and complex clue it is. I got there eventually for 21A, albeit via trying for a while to do something with RATH, which is the letters of EAT removed from AT HEART (as in, EAT’s away from AT HEART).
Does 3 down refer to the F1 button on a computer? If so, I still don’t understand F1 champ = button up. To champ is to bite down, which would apply a button press rather than a button up.
Have I missed something and it really does refer to someone who drives motor cars?
Jenson Button is a F1 driver and the world champ too, I believe! The bit I’m not sure about is that it would seem that “due” => UP, which I can’t quite accept yet.
8A is CATHOUSE. but I have no good explanation… there is the ‘U’ in HOSE (pants… at least part of a suit) but why the cat ?
8A wordplay, I think, is:
you = THOU
suit = CASE (as in the law)
you dressed in suit = CA THOU SE
you = thou is a bit of stretch, ain’t it?
And what’s with the FOR A before the word BROTHEL?
Is that two cases of bullshit?
22A: is “sheltered” doing double duty here? as both a containment indicator AND part of the definition of “lee”? i’m confused…
AS, re 8A: you=thou seems OK to me. It’s archaic (is that your beef?), but at least it’s accurate (2nd person singular subjective pronoun, so we’d use “you” nowadays). I agree with your objection about “for” or “for a” at the beginning of the clue – its only purpose seems to be to aid the surface reading.
MF, re 22A: the function of “sheltered” has me confused too. Is it doing double duty? My brain’s hurting, but I’ve come up with this plausible (I hope) explanation:
In the lee means on the sheltered side.
So, “sheltered from wind” => in the lee
So “tree sheltered from wind” => GUM in the LEE => LE GUM E
RB, re 13A: Thanks. I would never have got that…
Thanks, RB, for the explanation of 21A. I figured it had to be ‘rots’, but DA was too tricky for me with this one.
22a: RB is spot on, it is a gum in the lee, therefore sheltered from the wind. No extraneous words, no double duty, just neat.
8a: “For a” is just permissible fill in words to allow for surface reading. No problem there. Thou = you is common in Shakespeare and the Mighty Thor. Perhaps he might have said “you old” but I don’t think it necessary.
I reckon if the first or last word is not included in the definition, you’re breaking one of the sacrosanct cryptic crossword rules.
And DA seems to have done that on a clue that’s not particularly well-constructed or clever.
The thou = you I’m a bit dodgy about, but the “for a brothel” business crosses my dodginess line.
re 8A: I really enjoyed this clue and don’t understand the gripes. “for” can be interpreted as “in order to get the word” which is quite precise….and that sets up the “you” = THOU dressed in “suit” = CASE….CATHOUSE. A nice little recipe.
I’d say that to interpret “for” as “in order to get the word”, you’re doing something that isn’t really a definition and more akin to wordplay.
A definition should not include wordplay or interpreting words as a collection of letters. That’s my beef.
The you = thou thing is no big deal and not something I would have mentioned if not for the “for a brothel” thing.
Sorry, AS, but I agree 100% with AL.
You know, if I actually solved 8A, I probably wouldn’t have said anything.