Solving time: 30 minutes, but needed to look up 17ac, made a mistake (4dn) and can’t fathom 18ac.
I found this pretty difficult, and took a long time to work out what ‘5ac 21’ and ‘5dn 21’ were all about, not helped by not knowing the phrase at 21/22dn, PARTI PRIS. 21 is therefore PARTI = ‘Part 1’, indicating the first syllables of the two answers at 5, ‘bear’ and ‘bull’. Whether this theme was inspired by the American Stock Exchange or Chicago’s basketball and american football teams, I’m not sure.
* = anagram, “X” = sounds like ‘X’.
| Across | |
|---|---|
| 1 | APAC(H)E |
| 5 | BE ARABLE |
| 9 | AR(BIT + R)AL |
| 10 | [bear] WITH ME |
| 11 | APPLE (= ‘pupil’) + B(L)OSS + O.M. – difficult wordplay, with ‘one’ indicating another ‘pupil’. I think the definition refers to this song. |
| 13 | BLAH (hidden) – very wordy clue. |
| 14 | P.L. + A + CABLE |
| 17 | POL P(ERR)O[t] – a village in Cornwall. I didn’t know this name and couldn’t work it out, but should probably have thought of ‘Pol Pot’ from ‘oriental dictator’. |
| 18 | B?R? – can’t make anything of this; ‘barn’ or ‘byre’ are my best guesses. The (interpreted) clue is: “Home for bull sounds like that rather than bear”. [It’s BYRE – see comments.] |
| 20 | DESPITE + FULLY |
| 23 | S(HARE)R – the playwright is Sir David Hare. |
| 24 | ENAMOURS; rev. of MANE + OURS (= ‘bear’ in French) |
| 25 | TRAI(N,S,E)T |
| 26 | RA + DISH |
| Down | |
|---|---|
| 3 | CH + IN + ASH + OP – it took a while to split ‘woodwork’ and so see that this was right after all. |
| 4 | EUROPA – not ‘Europe’. Refers to Greek mythology. |
| 5 | BULLETPROOF VEST; (FOR LOVE BUT SPELT)* – excellent anagram. I had ‘breastplate’ in as the first word, then tried making the second word ‘foot’ (as in a lucky charm) before finally seeing the answer. |
| 6 | AS WELL AS [can be expected] |
| 7 | AN’T + IS – nonsensical clue. |
| 8 | LUM + PO(F)LAR + D |
| 12 | ALTO + GET + HER |
| 15 | AB(BEY)ROAD |
| 16 | A + RC + T[a]URUS – the brightest star in the northern sky… |
| 19 | ALT (= ‘high’ in music) + AIR – …and another bright star. Both are pseudonyms of crossword compilers. |
| 21/22 | PAR(TIP + R)IS |
18. is byre, a homophone for buyer, one who is a bull, rather than a bear in the stock market.
A nice double definition.
Aaah. Thanks. Yes, that is good.
11 Though I doubt he had the White Stripes version in mind!
No, perhaps not… maybe this version would be more to his taste?