Sunday, May 11, 2014 — ST 4585

Puzzle at a Glance

Puzzle Number in The Sunday Times ST 4585
Date of Publication in The Sunday Times Sunday, April 13, 2014
Setter Tim Moorey
Link to Full Review Times for the Times [ST 4585]
Times for the Times Review Written By Dave Perry
Dave Perry's Solving Time ★★★
Date of Publication in the Toronto Star Saturday, May 3, 2014
Date of Publication in The Vancouver Sun Saturday, May 10, 2014[Note 2]
Falcon's Experience ┌────┬────┬────┬────┬────┬────┬────┐ ███████████████████████████████████ └────┴────┴────┴────┴────┴────┴────┘ Legend: █ - solved without assistance █ - incorrect prior to use of puzzle solving tools █ - solved with assistance from puzzle solving tools █ - solved with aid of checking letters provided by puzzle solving tools █ - solved but without fully parsing the clue █ - unsolved or incorrect prior to visiting Times for the Times █ - solved with aid of checking letters provided by solutions from Times for the Times █ - yet to be solved
Notes
[1] This puzzle appears on the Sunday puzzles pages in the Saturday, May 10, 2014 edition of the Ottawa Citizen. [2] Unverified as a paywall bars access to the The Vancouver Sun website.

Introduction

Today's puzzle was not overly difficult, but provided lots of enjoyment.

Notes on Today's Puzzle

This commentary is intended to serve as a supplement to the review of this puzzle found at Times for the Times, to which a link is provided in the table above.

Primary indications (definitions) are marked with a solid underline in the clue; subsidiary indications (be they wordplay or other) are marked with a dashed underline in all-in-one (& lit.) clues, semi-all-in-one (semi-& lit.) clues and cryptic definitions.

Across

1a   Restrained dog is suffering problems with some chow (6,9)

It may appear that "chow" is yet another dog.— but that is not the case.

9a   Do you transport the lady speaking fast in Eastern capital? (7)

The effect is more pronounced (pardon the pun) when spoken in a non-rhotic^[5] British accent. Non-rhotic accents omit the sound /r/ in certain situations, while rhotic accents generally pronounce /r/ in all contexts.

Jakarta^[5] is the capital of Indonesia, situated in northwestern Java; population 9,125,000 (est. 2009). Former name (until 1949) Batavia.

10a   Go by bike, carrying on in lots of wind (7)

11a   Votes in favour of timeless Irish poet (4)

W. B. Yeats^[5] (1865–1939) was an Irish poet and dramatist; full name William Butler Yeats. His play The Countess Cathleen (1892) and his collection of stories The Celtic Twilight (1893) stimulated Ireland’s theatrical, cultural, and literary revival. Notable poetry: The Tower (1928) and The Winding Stair (1929). Nobel Prize for Literature (1923).

12a   We hear one after another intended to get detention (10)

13a   Progressive leader of Indian state (2-5)

Go-ahead^[5] is an adjective meaning willing to consider new ideas; in other words, enterprising  ⇒ a young and go-ahead managing director.

Goa^[5] is a state on the west coast of India; capital, Panaji. Formerly a Portuguese territory, it was seized by India in 1961. It formed a Union Territory with Daman and Diu until 1987, when it was made a state.

15a   Tower viewed in modified telescope company's put out (7)

17a   Did gag that's despicable, wife walking out (7)

19a   Railing about initially cutting standard brain scanning facility (7)

Positron emission tomography^[10] (abbreviation PET^[10]) is a technique for assessing brain activity and function by recording the emission of positrons from radioactively labelled substances, such as glucose or dopamine.

20a   Finish sounding like a drunken side-kick! (10)

22a   Stages that go with 11 called out (4)

In the game of bingo in the United Kingdom, callers announcing the numbers have traditionally used nicknames to refer to particular numbers if they are drawn. The nicknames are sometimes known by the rhyming phrase 'bingo lingo' and there are rhymes for each number from 1 to 90, some of which date back many decades. In some clubs, the 'bingo caller' will say the number, with the assembled players intoning the rhyme in a call and response manner, in others, the caller will say the rhyme and the players chant the number.

The nickname for the number "11" is legs — a reference to the shape of the number resembling a pair of legs, often chicken legs specifically. The players often wolf whistle in response.

Wikipedia has a list of British bingo nicknames^[7] which you might find of interest — although the overly decorous may wish to avoid looking at "69" and "83".

25a   Starts to hoover under machines, part of kitchen routine (7)

In the UK, hoover^[5] (a genericized version of the trade name Hoover) means (as a noun) a vacuum cleaner (from any manufacturer) and (as a verb) to clean (something) with a vacuum cleaner ⇒ he was hoovering the stairs. 

The Hoover Company^[7] started out as an American floor care manufacturer based in North Canton, Ohio. It also established a major base in the United Kingdom and for most of the early-and-mid-20th century, it dominated the electric vacuum cleaner industry, to the point where the "hoover" brand name became synonymous with vacuum cleaners and vacuuming in the United Kingdom and Ireland.

Kitchen^[5] is an informal term for the percussion section of an orchestra.

26a   Detective hurt and it doesn't look good (7)

Eye^[10] is an informal term for private eye^[10], which in its own right is an informal term for a private detective.

27a   Important figures that are expanded by a corporation (5,10)

Formally, vital statistics^[5] are quantitative data concerning the population, such as the number of births, marriages, and deaths. Informally, the term refers to the measurements of a woman’s bust, waist, and hips. While Oxford Dictionaries Online characterises this latter usage as British, I know from personal experience that the term is in wide-spread use far beyond the shores of the UK.

Corporation^[5] is a dated, humorous term for a paunch.

Down

1d   Relish English post, mostly in the Big Apple (5)

The Big Apple^[5] is an informal name for New York City.

2d   Pull to pieces what an unemployed actor hopes to do (4,5)

3d   Spy seen in new and old ship (4)

Nark^[5] is an British slang for a police informer ⇒ I’m not a copper’s nark.

Ark^[5] is an archaic name for a ship or boat. In the Bible, the ark (or Noah's ark) is the ship built by Noah to save his family and two of every kind of animal from the Flood.

Even Oxford Dictionaries Online perpetuates the fallacy that Noah took "two of every kind" of animal on the ark. God's instruction to Noah actually was “You shall take with you seven each of every clean animal, a male and his female; two each of animals that are unclean, a male and his female; also seven each of birds of the air, male and female, to keep the species alive on the face of all the earth” (Genesis 7:2-3).

4d   Tired daughter showered (7)

5d   Bags of pain in street ending in tears (7)

6d   Story-teller working near court (9)

7d   Far Right no longer show feeling (5)

8d   Mint on lamb, for example is a delicacy (9)

Sweet^[5] is the British term for a piece of candy^[5] ⇒ a bag of sweets.

A sweetmeat^[10] is a sweetened delicacy, such as a preserve, sweet, or, formerly, a cake or pastry. Oxford Dictionaries Online characterises the term as archaic^[5]. Not to be confused with sweetbread^[5] — which, despite the name, is meat while a sweetmeat could be bread.

13d   Famous Russian composer in new edition of Grove (9)

Johann Sebastian Bach^[5] (1685–1750) was a German composer. An exceptional and prolific baroque composer, he produced a massive body of work — not to mention twenty children.

In the surface reading, "Grove" is an instance of the name of an author being used as a substitute for the name of his work.

Sir George Grove (1820–1900) was an English musicologist. He was the founder and first editor of the multi-volume Dictionary of Music and Musicians (1879–89) and served as the first director of the Royal College of Music (1883–94).

Mikhail Gorbachev^[5] is a Soviet statesman, General Secretary of the Communist Party of the USSR 1985–91 and President 1988–91. His foreign policy brought about an end to the Cold War, while within the USSR he introduced major reforms known as glasnost and perestroika. Opposition to his policies led to an attempted coup in 1991, after which he resigned. Nobel Peace Prize (1990).

14d   Short-lived, wild maple here (9)

16d   Travelling pioneer keeping very quiet in what may be called a banger (9)

Pianissimo (abbreviation pp)^[5] is a direction used in music to mean either (as an adjective) very soft or very quiet or (as an adverb) very softly or very quietly.

Banger^[5] is an informal British name for a sausage ⇒ bangers and mash [mashed potato].

18d   Scheduled to include one line over set boundaries (7)

The wordplay parses as a reversal (over) of {TIMED (scheduled) containing (to include) {I ([Roman numeral for] one) + L (line)}}.

19d   Most classy lady's into cannabis (7)

21d   Arrive before time in early jet (5)

The de Havilland DH 106 Comet^[7] was the first production commercial jetliner. Developed and manufactured by de Havilland at its Hatfield, Hertfordshire, United Kingdom headquarters, the Comet 1 prototype first flew on 27 July 1949.

23d   Do they help one to see what builders are doing? (5)

The entire clue is a cryptic definition for specs as an abbreviation for specifications (builders' plans). The portion of the clue with the dashed underlining is a definition for specs as an abbreviation for spectacles (eye glasses).

One commenter at Times for the Times remarked "I'd have thought architects did SPECS rather than builders ..". True it is architects (and engineers) who draw them up, but it is builders who execute them. Thus if you were to look at the specs, you would have a a better idea of what the builder is doing. Another writer appears to think that the reference is to "building on spec" (that is, on speculation).

24d   Marries for one day? (4)

Wednesday can be abbreviated as either Wed.^[5] or Weds.^[5]

Key to Reference Sources: 

^[1]   - The Chambers Dictionary, 11th Edition
^[2]   - Search Chambers - (Chambers 21st Century Dictionary)
^[3]   - TheFreeDictionary.com (American Heritage Dictionary)
^[4]   - TheFreeDictionary.com (Collins English Dictionary)
^[5]   - Oxford Dictionaries (Oxford Dictionary of English)
^[6]   - Oxford Dictionaries (Oxford American Dictionary)
^[7]   - Wikipedia
^[8]   - Reverso Online Dictionary (Collins French-English Dictionary)
^[9]   - Infoplease (Random House Unabridged Dictionary)
^[10] - CollinsDictionary.com (Collins English Dictionary)
^[11] - TheFreeDictionary.com (Random House Kernerman Webster's College Dictionary)

Signing off for this week — Falcon