Alan Connor finds poachers and gamekeepers, Irishmen and Scotsmen in his pick of the best – and most jokey – cryptic clues
Cross wit
A cracking clue shares many qualities with a cracking joke – misdirection, economy of language and a cathartic surprise. Micawber in Wednesday's Telegraph took it one stage further, constructing a clue with the surface reading of an old gag …
18ac An Irishman (I forget how this ends), a Scotsman and an ancient Roman… (9)
… when the answer was really, via PATRICK and IAN, PATRICIAN. Bravo to Micawber for evoking the precise queasy feeling you get when someone starts a joke with immediate disclaimers, and for suggesting vagueness while keeping things precise.
One problem: how does the gag end? Other, that is, than with the phrase clued days before by Tramp…
13ac Follow up to joke– have sex? (3,2)
… the verbal nudge-nudge in the ribs, GET IT.
Latter patter
Having introduced an absurdist note …
9d Writerbadly mauled (but not dead)gettingsignalto enterburrow (6,7)
… to indicate SAMUELBECKETT, Shed in Tuesday's Guardian then wanted us to recall one of that playwright's characters …
7d Wicked program in which 9 characterabsorbssickend of tape (6,3)
… namely the chap who listened to tapes, KRAPP, for the answer KILLER APP. The phrase denotes a useful productivity tool, say – or conversely a cool game – so attractive that it encourages you to buy a device or an operating system just for that single program.
In one definition, Microsoft's Computer Dictionary once went further along this road:
an application of such popularity and widespread standardization that it fuels sales of the hardware platform or operating system for which it was written.
And so, in the late 90s, when the company found itself in the dock for allegedly boosting sales of Windows by bundling in Internet Explorer, it seemed unfortunate that Bill Gates had referred to the web browser as "the latest confirmed 'killer app'", and in 1998 the real definition of KILLER APP became an pressing legal matter.
Happily, Gates was able to clarify that he had in fact used the phrase to mean merely "a very popular application", and nothing to do with anti-competitive practices, whatever his company's silly dictionary might have said.
Nowadays the expression is often heard in the context of games consoles, which brings us to this week's challenge. Reader, how would you clue XBOX?
Clueing competition
Thanks for your clues for WHITE-COLLAR CRIME. How felicitous to find the letters of "clerical" among the entry – witness JollySwagman's underhand invitation "Fiddle the clerical work? I'm in for a grand" and andyknott's deft "With more clerical wrongdoing?"
Some lovely suggestive surfaces, including ixioned's Father Ted tribute "Dodgy priests, or cleric with lame rejection 'that money was just resting in my account!'", alberyalbery's panto-ish "Wishy Washy? Peter Pan? Sin-bad? All band together in mad offensive activity", ID3775925's "Ric met Carol while badly performing illegal trades" and JollySwagman's controversial "Ignoring his origins Al Gore got rich with climate change fraud". Meanwhile, gleety provided possibly the rudest clue seen on these pages so far, which is really saying something.
There were some smart allusions, such as Clueso's "Investment fraud?" and Journeyman7's "Goes with cuffs, or handcuffs?"; I enjoyed the wordplay in harlobarlo's "Unethical, yet non-violent, I act rich or well-off. Connect with me!" and Middlebro got extra points for referring to a prior challenge in "First-world problem: I recall the micro-scam".
The runners-up are steveran's "Struggling melancholic writer hides name to create fantasy books perhaps" and wellywearer2's "How clerical merit is destroyed?"; the winner is alberyalbery's economical but fair "Clerical error?".
Kudos to Albery – please leave this week's entries and your pick of the broadsheet cryptics below.
Clue of the week
No stranger to the longer phrase or the misleading surface, Nimrod combined them during a Saturday Independent prize puzzle with his clue …
13/9/21/24ac Cook'sgone offPrior, perhapsaftermatch– he's joined the opposition! (7,6,10)
… for POACHERTURNEDGAMEKEEPER. Since this was from a newspaper which features the same man as poacher (Nimrod, setting this puzzle) and gamekeeper (John Henderson, editing the tougher Inquisitor series), the answer was thematic in more ways than one and certainly nothing to grouse about.