The Times Crossword Friday Masterclass: 22 March 2024

** TODAY'S PUZZLE **
In the 58th edition of our attempts to solve a Friday Times crossword, Simon tackles today's puzzle which is another brilliant workout.
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[@cartoonkitteh]

Thank you, Simon, for making these videos. My parents presented me with a clue today and my brain, using the voice of Simon, told me "well if something's off, it's been altered."

[@LedSomeFlops]

The singing birds add to the serenity of your videos.

[@longwaytotipperary]

Yes!

[@Anne_Mahoney]

Is there anyone else here who listened to GBH radio in Boston in the 1970s--90s and remembers Robert J. Lurtsema's morning program? He always started out with bird song.

[@henrymarkson3758]

The first and only time I have come across the word 'litotes' was in the Piranha Brothers episode of Monty Python. "Everyone was terrified of Doug. I've seen grown men pull their own heads off rather than see Doug. Even Dinsdale was frightened of Doug. What did he do? He used sarcasm. He knew all the tricks, dramatic irony, metaphor, bathos, puns, parody, litotes and satire. Presenter: (voice over) By a combination of violence and sarcasm, the Piranha brothers by February 1966 controlled London and the South East."

[@emilywilliams3237]

I really enjoyed the dual-video presentation of this puzzle. I first watched Mark's solve in near-blazing speed, and then came here to learn more about the clues and also to see how you went about the same puzzle. Absolutely fascinating. Anyone watching this who is not a Patreon should definitely become one. The birds are amazing, as well - sometime you should mention what birds we are hearing (the songs are not familiar to me, as some of the varieties of birds you have in the UK are not around me in the southeastern US).

[@MarcMcMillin]

I always look forward to Friday morning because of this Masterclass!

[@longwaytotipperary]

Ditto!

[@longwaytotipperary]

❤ hearing the birds outside Simon’s window! Spring is playing peekaboo here - some beautiful days and some lousy days. Today hasn’t decided what it wants to present as yet. So enjoying Simon puzzle though while I enjoy tea and waffles. 😊

[@GordonjSmith1]

5d is an even smarter clue! Not only 'Charles Rex' - cr, 'our rex' - our dog, but also the dog breed 'King Charles' Spaniel' ... very clever clue...

[@jonh6585]

Wonder if Simon finds the birds distracting because of flash backs to the Witness sound puzzles

[@longwaytotipperary]

😄

[@d4r4butler74]

For the Wicklow clue, you are thinking of Candles, but some Lanterns have more of a ribbon wick (which can look more like a band than a string), and delivers fuel (lamp oil). No, I didn't get it before you, but I understood it when you were trying to explain it. I love how you look up the words for us. As for "Duns"... I have seen it in historic romance books, so authors still use it (but they use all kinds of words).

[@davidrattner9]

Continous joy and pleasure seeing you solve these for us Simon!! The best Friday tradition there is!!

[@longwaytotipperary]

Yep 😁

[@Anne_Mahoney]

I was away this weekend. When I got home Saturday night I wanted two things: cuddling with my cats, and watching this video. (Well, OK, and dinner, but you know what I mean.) 😺😻💜

[@debrabowen4276]

Thank you so much for these cryptic crossword videos. They make my Fridays!

[@arthurcharest9061]

Thanks for the weekly solve, I’m glad it’s spring somewhere!

[@katy-music]

It was delightful to hear the birds! Thanks for these videos, Simon! I have seen improvement in my cryptic solving as I work my way through a book of the Times Quick Crosswords…I’ve got a book of “real” ones lying in wait, though 😂

[@Astervista]

I think that wick as a band bringing fuel is referring to a lamp wick, which both brings fuel to the flame and is a cloth strip more like a band than a string. This is in cotrast to a candle wick that neither is a band nor it brings the fuel to the fire (but rather brings the fire to the fuel)

[@neodemonhawk]

Candle wicks do still wick up fuel to the flame in the form of liquid wax via capillary action though.

[@toxicara]

Let's get cracking!

[@clivebrenchley5319]

Proud to say that dope was a write-in for me... without having gone to a fish school! Very enjoyable & instructive, as always.

[@jigj119]

Finally caught up with this series. Glad you kept it going all this time. Please remember to update the Playlist when you can, it was very convenient. Though it didn't have any of Mark's videos in this series.

[@mjkluck]

Good solve. Keep 'em coming.

[@Sgray-ep7se]

Thank you, Simon! As a non-English speaker, I love your explanations

[@adrever1986]

Brilliant video Simon!

[@nsrikand1]

Superbly explained. Thanks.

[@richardfarrer5616]

In an oil lamp, the wick is a band or ribbon rather than a string. Harts and hinds - male and female deer.

[@peterdunlop7691]

Great vid!

[@grenvillephillips6998]

Very tricky but all the more satisfying!

[@Raven-Creations]

Wicks are often bands in kerosene lamps. Your dictionary has exactly the same definition as the one I learnt the word from, which wasn't Chambers - "affirmation by negation of the contrary" - not a bad definition eh? I like the word, as much for the succinctness of that definition as its usefulness as a rhetorical device. A couple of other favourite, obscure words are tmesis (e.g. abso-bloody-lutely), and "acnestis" (a great crossword word) meaning the bit of the back between the shoulder blades that an animal can't reach to scratch. I could almost hear the cogs whirring as you finally got to "catch". I think "of" is ok here, catch is a description "of some fish". Harts was a pretty sneaky clue that would be easy to get wrong in a speed solve. A very nice puzzle, with some very cute clues. I don't think it was particularly hard, but it did take longer than usual to parse the clues. I suppose there were a few crosswordy words in there, which might trip up newer solvers, but it was mainly the cleverly worded clues which disguised the definition quite well (although I did spot "obtain" immediately).

[@Ray_Ridley]

Saved this till Saturday. Perfect accompaniment to tea and a bacon sarnie !

[@gunnersfan111]

The speed of getting alembic blew my mind

[@martindemello9249]

i puzzled out CRUFTS and HARTS, but didn't know crufts was a dog show or bucks was a county, so the beauty of the clues went over my head :)

[@user-ho4vm1hy4e]

Great solve. I fell for the Herts/harts trap. Irritating to get it wrong by one letter. A lesson learned.

[@heatherallan9767]

🌱thank you ✏✨🐦

[@altreusplays]

You’ll be pleased to know there are, indeed, spray-on fabrics! At least, there was one presented recently on a fashion show, so possibly not for general consumption, but still!

[@Lamby77777]

Thanks Simon for making these videos! As a cryptic novice, it's wonderful to hear clues containing more esoteric language explained so concisely. Can anyone in the comments tell me which program/app Simon uses to check definitions at the end of these videos? I've tried searching Chambers dictionary and thesaurus but I can't seem to find the exact version, thanks in advance!

[@DarklordZagarna]

Litotes is a poetic or literary double-negative, so "no little one" is indeed precisely an example of litotes.

[@MartinTheMartin.]

5d When I heard "King Charles" my thoughts went to spaniel (dogs), then to CRUFTS (dog show). Took a slightly different route but ended at the same destination!

[@nemuchan]

Litotes are a typical figure of speech in the french language we're taught to look for while studying a text, it's not crossword only word ! :)

[@iwishexamsneverhappened]

Nice

[@oak3001]

Once again, thank you for these crosswords. Let's hope the algorithm learns how wonderful they are. With the CRUFTS clue, is there any mileage in the fact that the dog in question might be a King Charles Spaniel?

[@williambarnes3868]

When speaking 'of some fish' one could refer to the catch!

[@davidharris8496]

36:55 Another Old Dunstonian here! As you've mentioned you went to Dulwich College I'm assuming it's the same one, in Catford.

[@user-fp6dt1os1l]

For 26 across, I think it might be because a couple has "tied the knot", so the reverse of that is an "untie"? Still a bit iffy

[@VonBlade]

This is my reading of it too. Although two or three clues in this one were iffy (fish in particular).

[@mwddavis1]

Dunning Letter or Dunning Notice = a demand for an overdue payment

[@archivist17]

Oh deer! 😂

[@misomiso8228]

Could you guys do some 'Logic Grid Puzzles'? I am sure they are quite similar to suduko, but it would be interesting watching you use infer facts from language as well as numbers! Many thanks

[@erickehr4475]

Interestingly there were two answers which were anagrams of each other. Often when this happens, one clue will reference the other.

[@2077jimbo]

Alembic new for me, tried acerbic

[@AcidDotCom]

The fashion icon is solving a cryptic crossword. What else do you want from a Friday? :D

[@a705fay]

fashion con I think is befitting

[@willjohnsnow]

Can I check my thinking for a clue I'm constructing? The target letters are O A R, which are part of the overall target solution. In the charade I'm cluing this as 'dictator’s gold', or 'gold, we hear' - as in a homophone of 'Or', one of the synonyms for Gold. Is that fair / correct cluing? As the whole clue isn't just OAR, I don't also give the definition for Oar in the charade.

[@a705fay]

hmm Ive just started learning cryptics and I am doing the Lovatts cryptic crosswords regularly though Im usually in the last group of times but I haven't been last... I thought I might have learned something to help me with the Times crossword but sadly I wouldn't have stood an earthly....

[@rhysbart]

Simon was not a little annoyed by that "of"....

[@kellwillsen]

Both Oxford and Cambridge lie north of Kent, Surrey, and the bulk of the home counties. Hence you go "up" to university, and being sent home is "down". Theoretically, there are other universities, and even other places to live, but these are to be swept away in the best traditions of Podsnappery.

[@thescrewfly]

Yes, I believe the 'up' and 'down' terminology started at Oxford.

[@CilantroGamer]

11:45 (ish) - Do you not have screens on windows in England? Is that not a thing? If I didn't have a screen on my window here in Ohio in the states I'd be accosted by a million bugs immediately.

[@craftsmanwoodturner]

Nope, nor on doors. Our summers until recently were never good enough for it to be a problem!

[@cypher686]

Are you using windows 98 or something? The close and minimize button on the dictionary looks very old school

[@michaelcripwell1724]

Could the 5 across fish, be a cat fish?

[@stuartharris2165]

Didn't Wicklow used to have an oil refinary?

[@eclectichoosier5474]

Still so weird to hear you talk about "our king." I miss the queen.

[@zealot2147]

Simon idk if you’ll see this, but like in 15 across, would you say that “understood, read out” could be used to represent “nu”, the Greek letter? I only was thinking for other puzzles where you could use it as wordplay like in 15 across. “German understood, we hear, mammal” = gnu or something like that

[@markhawthorn7438]

I'm one who did get annoyed by the 'of' in CATCH, Simon. Such a little thing. Link words in double defs really only work if they are non-directional equivalences. 'And' works, 'is' and 'or' also. But 'of' is directional. Fine to link a def with the wordplay that gives it. Then the directionality makes sense. But not in CATCH. Same issue applies with 'for' and 'from' but all sorts of quality setters seem to have dispensed with the view that directionality matters. The stance seems to be that you can get the WP 'from' the solution in that the solution 'displays the effect of the WP'.

[@IguitarVreakI]

Could it be you're going "up" to universities because they might tend(or have tended) to be located uphill more often than not? Just a guess.

[@markgillespie3971]

I always assumed it meant going up to 'higher' education

[@IguitarVreakI]

Makes a lot more sense tbh. I've changed my mind!@@markgillespie3971

[@David_K_Booth]

@@markgillespie3971 As Cambridge is at elevation 6m, that seems more plausible.

[@TheMaestromMephisto]

shocks me how people are able to solve this in under 5mins

[@rpb424]

.. but they probably didn’t. As Simon explains, you get people who solve it in advance in whatever time it takes them and then simply type the answers in and press Submit. You could probably type the answers in around a minute and press Submit immediately, but that would produce a listed time that obviously looks impossible. I suspect some people therefore pause after finishing typing and before submitting simply to produce a more plausible Top 10 time, albeit still not the time they actually took.

[@vinyl1Earthlink]

If you go to the SNITCH, and go to the details for this puzzle, you will see the real solvers - the algorithm excludes the neutrinos. The fastest genuine solver of this puzzle is therefore John McCabe at 6:19 - which is still rather impressive.

[@markgillespie3971]

It is amazing. I can solve these but will generally take me an hour or more. I can see though that if you practise these constantly your times would improve quickly as small improvements in wordplay, knowledge of short synonyms etc. would give you more checking letters faster and make the next clue easier, a kind of virtuous circle.

[@TheMaestromMephisto]

@@rpb424 he said that without any evidence, he also said he doesn't know them so they probably cheating, this guy just cant imagine there might be better solvers than him

[@DaShikuXI]

I interpreted 14 down slightly differently, yet came to the same solution. I saw the "sign of the times" as the sign of the "end times" as described in various religions. Notably in Christianity this is marked by the second coming of Christ, who's symbol is a cross. So when the cross appears, it would be a sign of the end times.

[@emirspahic2886]

Isn't the definition of untie simply the word "reverse" instead of the whole clue?

[@nightwishlover8913]

28 Across - Simon is obviously too young to remember the glorious 80s...

[@fynnsternis6432]

...is that image in the thumbnail ai generated?

[@sebastienlecoq3956]

Mark is a real person ? shocking ! no real person is allowed to be that smart.

[@discostoo]

Lots of foul language here after the reveal to 12 across.