A relatively easy Genius, or so I found, with plenty of simple entry clues peppered around the grid to enable a foothold to be gained.
Given that 10ac was unclued, and a key part of other clues, I looked at 6dn, 7dn and 8dn first, with 8dn being my initial entry. The other two were not immediately obvious so I had a quick run through the rest of the clues and as a result had some entries in most parts of the grid.
It wasn’t long before I guessed that 10ac would be ‘turned’ or ‘turner’ because of the ‘or indicate how the solution should be entered in the grid’ in the instructions. It became clear that 10ac had to be TURNER once I had solved 13ac (LATHE) which, because of 8dn, could only be entered into the grid reversed.
After that, progress was steady though I will admit to using the appropriate Wikipedia page as I am not familiar with the titles of works by J. M. W. Turner (perhaps I should have paid more attention during the General Studies lessons at school).
All in all, a pleasant solve but I would, perhaps, have preferred more of a challenge instead of finishing the puzzle, and this blog bar the preamble, before breakfast.
The completed grid:
Across
1 Up ganno? (2,9)
ON HORSEBACK – ‘ganno’ = ON nag (HORSE) reversed (BACK)
9 Boy inclined in Scotland to pen a unit of poetry on five hundred sheets, perhaps? (3,5)
BED LINEN – BEN (boy) around (to pen) D (five hundred) LINE (a unit of poetry) – the ‘inclined in Scotland’ is a further indication of the required ‘boy’ by linking the name with a Scottish mountain peak
10 See special instructions
TURNER – unclued
13 Henry inspired by recent 10’s 10 (5)
LATHE – H (Henry) in (inspired by) LATE (recent) – entered reversed (‘s 10)
17 10’s fashionable etchers horribly fussy (10,5)
CHICHESTER CANAL – CHIC (fashionable) plus an anagram (horribly) of ETCHERS plus ANAL (fussy) – one of J. M. W. Turner’s works
22 10’s moon masking issue that’s fully grown (5)
IMAGO – IO (moon) around (masking) MAG (issue) – entered reversed (10‘s)
23 Loyalty shown by lady ultimately stuck on appropriate clothing shop (8)
FIDELITY – [lad]Y (lady ultimately) after (stuck on) FIT (appropriate) around (clothing) DELI (shop)
24 Ball inspection exists for 10 (6)
TESTIS – TEST (inspection) IS (exists) – entered reversed (for 10)
27 Tender genius of 10 — is so? (4-7)
SOFT-HEARTED – ‘geniuS OF Turner’ is so (ie has SOFT as its HEART)
Down
2 Originally called Jane, Elizabeth claims (3)
NEE – hidden in (claims) ‘jaNE Elizabeth’
3 10’s smuggled a large amount briefly around capital of Guerrero for a Mexican? (7)
HIDALGO – HID (smuggled) A LO[t] (a large amount briefly) around G[uerrero] (capital of Guerrero) – entered reversed (10’s)
4,14 10’s setter and Irish setters as women, barking (7,4,3,8)
SUNRISE WITH SEA MONSTERS – SUN (setter) plus an anagram (barking) of IRISH SETTERS AS WOMEN – one of J. M. W. Turner’s works
5 Lodging arrangement for second group? (1,3,1)
B AND B – BAND B (second group)
6 Old instrument twitcher turned on bird (7)
CITTERN – TIC (twitcher) reversed (turned) TERN (bird)
7 10’s king of the solvers spurns posh coaches (6)
TUTORS – TUT (king) O[u]RS (of the solvers spurns posh) – entered reversed (10‘s)
8 Mammalian stamp (4)
SEAL – def. & cryptic indicator
12 Comment from Arab as refusal reported (5)
NEIGH – a homophone (as … reported) of ‘nay’ (refusal) – the ‘Arab’ in this case being a horse
15 City’s law enforcers / crossed (3)
MET – double def.
16 Cook while poking crumble (5)
ROAST – AS (while) in (poking) ROT (crumble)
18 Rude way to speak (6)
COARSE – a homophone (to speak) of ‘course’ (way)
19 Taking some fresh air tedious for 10’s 10 (7)
OUTSIDE – an anagram (for 10) of TEDIOUS – entered reversed (‘s 10)
20 Liberal parted over conclusion of legislature in obstructive procedure (3,4)
RED TAPE – an anagram (liberal) of PARTED around (over) [legislatur]E (conclusion of legislature)
21 Table covering leaders in league say, featuring only the best performers (3-4)
ALL-STAR – ALTAR (table) around (covering) L[eague] S[ay] (leaders in league,say)
22,11,25 10’s 10’s 10 catalogued, hiding bird (4,8,8)
DIDO BUILDING CARTHAGE – an anagram (10) of CATALOGUED HIDING BIRD – one of J. M. W. Turner’s works – entered reversed (10‘s)
23 Racing / ships (5)
FLEET – double def.
26 One step, not the first (3)
ACE – [p]ACE (step, not the first)
Thanks for the blog, Gaufrid. Congratulations on finishing this before breakfast – it took us several days, though I would agree that it was relatively easy for a Genius (a plus in my book!)
It took us quite a while to get 10a – not sure why, in hindsight – we even had CHICHESTER CANAL pencilled in, but weren’t aware that this was one of JMWT’s. 25a finally gave it away as I had a vague memory of seeing Dido Building Carthage. At one point I toyed with 10a being SATURN – misled by 22a, and by not checking that IO is actually a moon of Jupiter, not Saturn!
Thanks for parsing 27a, we hadn’t figured that out.
I did enjoy 24a – a classic Paul clue!
I didn’t find this easy: I eat many breakfasts before I finished it. It’s only the second Genius I’ve tried, and I found last month’s a lot easier.
I got into the theme in pretty much exactly the same way as Gaufrid and like him, I didn’t know much about Turner beyond the fact that he was a very famous painter. I’m grateful to Paul for introducing me to the man’s work.
*ate*
Thanks all. Enjoyable as ever. One query re 7. Shouldn’t it be ‘of the setters’ for ours? ‘Of the solvers’ would be yours, surely…
I paused for a long time over 7dn – it has to be a mistake. “Setter” would also have given three different uses of the word in the puzzle, following the two in 4,14
Thanks to Paul and Guafrid
I’ve done barely a handful of Geniuses (so to speak) but have to say I found this by far the hardest yet (the most accessible being last month’s delightful Picaroon – apologies to setter and blogger for managing to neglect to comment on that one). It took a while to get enough to see what was going on, and I’m another who is woefully ignorant of Turner’s work, so needed to look up the titles.
I did enjoy it very much, but scanning my answers now note that I had a mistake, putting CITHERN in for 6d. It’s is in Chambers as an alternative spelling of that instrument and hern is given as a variant of heron. Grr – and double grr because I knew of both cittern and tern (well, duh!) while I had had to look up both parts of my alternative, but still had failed to find the simpler solution. Oh well, them’s the breaks.
Thanks to Paul and to Gaufrid for the blog.