Independent 7072/Virgilius
Posted by John on June 16th, 2009
As almost always with Virgilius, a beautiful production with an original and enjoyable theme. I think it’s simply 13dn, with 19dn, 5dn and 2dn appearing in the grid, and many of the answers (4ac, 9ac, 12ac, 21ac, 25ac, 26ac, 7dn, 15dn, 22dn) fitting this theme.
| Across | |
|---|---|
| 1 | P AIR |
| 4 | RAW RECRUIT — cru in (a writer)* |
| 9 | R(1 PROA R)ING |
| 10 | MACE — 2 defs |
| 11 | CHAR — 2 defs |
| 12 | STIRRERS — James Bond liked his martinis (I think) shaken not stirred |
| 14 | rePORT EDitor, rev. |
| 16 | GA (S) LIGHT |
| 17 | shocKING LEARner |
| 20 | AS SETS |
| 21 | RE(A {soldie}R)WARD |
| 22 | EURO — (o rue)rev. |
| 24 | PLOT — 2 defs |
| 25 | REIN T ERRED |
| 26 | REAR RANGED |
| 27 | RUSH — 2 defs |
| Down | |
| 2 | ARITHMETIC — I in (time chart)* |
| 3 | RARER — I think this is saying that a steak that is less well done is rarer, and rare is the opposite of usual |
| 4 | bREAD SUPposedly |
| 5 | WRITING — “righting” |
| 6 | ENGIRDS — (rig)rev. in ends |
| 7 | REMARRIES — (a merrier s{eaman})* |
| 8 | INCH — 2 defs |
| 13 | THE THREE RS — but I’m a bit lost here: where do the spelling mistakes come in? (“Basic education, with a couple of spelling mistakes”) |
| 15 | REGRETTER — Miss Otis Regrets and Je ne regrette rien (this at least shows Edith Piaf singing, but this one sounds better) |
| 18 | ETRURIA — (Eur art I)*, although I may be wrong here, since I can’t really see why the first pieces of European gives Eur (as opposed to Eu or Euro etc) |
| 19 | READING — (garden I)* |
| 20 | AUDI TED |
| 22 | {t}ERROR |
| 23 | FLEE — “flea” |
June 16th, 2009 at 12:16 pm
Great puzzle, the spelling mistakes are that 2 don’t start with R.
June 16th, 2009 at 12:17 pm
Re 13: It refers to the fact that it’s riting and rithmetic that make up two of the three rs.
Re 18: I assume you can see that the first (three) pieces of European are EUR. The question is whether it is justified.
June 16th, 2009 at 12:21 pm
Colin — I must have been editing the blog at the exact time you posted: yes, I am unconvinced that it’s justified.
Thanks to you and nmsindy for making the obvious explanation of 13dn.
June 16th, 2009 at 12:28 pm
…especially, John, as Eur. is an abbreviation of European found in most desk dictionaries.
June 16th, 2009 at 12:40 pm
Very enjoyable although I didn’t spot the theme.
I wasn’t sure about 15D – Chambers does not have it and I thought it might be REGRETTED or REGRETFUL.
I was also trying to incorporate SMERSH into 12A !
June 16th, 2009 at 1:52 pm
Nice puzzle. Liked the unusually well-concealed hidden KING LEAR in “Tragedy shocking learner to some extent”. It took me ages to work out!
June 19th, 2009 at 8:53 am
The star clue for me was 12A – brilliant (it took me ages to spot it, however). I found this a bit harder than most of Virgilius’s, but perhaps it would have been easier if I hadn’t missed the theme. Nonetheless, it was a delight to solve.