Solving time: 9:51
A rare Saturday outing for Brummie. Nothing too difficult, although NO STRINGS, DROSOPHILA and LUTYENS probably accounted for a third of my time. I enjoyed the puzzle but thought a lot of the surface readings were weak or meaningless.
A mini-theme is the presence of both LOCK, STOCK & BARREL and HOOK, LINE & SINKER in the grid, linked by the clue to 11ac.
* = anagram.
| Across | |
|---|---|
| 1 | BOG + LAND – not the best opener: ‘Gents’ = BOG needs an example indicator such as ‘perhaps’, and I’m not quite sure how this surface reading is supposed to be read; there’s no apostrophe in ‘Gents’, so ‘leading’ has to be a gerund (I think that’s the right term), which spoils the phrase ‘leading light’. Come to think of it, doesn’t ‘Gents’ as a lavatory require an apostophe? Curiously, Chambers says no, although the ladies’ equivalent does have one. Explain that! |
| 5 | CALL OFF; (LOCAL)* + FF – not sure if ‘papers’ = FF is via ‘folios’ or ‘following pages’. |
| 9 | S(T)OCK |
| 10 | BAT + H,C + HAIR (= ‘shock’) |
| 11 | COM(P + LET)ELY – nicely joining the two theme phrases. |
| 12 | [s]HOOK |
| 14 | NON-INVASIVE – a medical term, with a pun on ‘operation’. |
| 18 | RIGHT (= ‘just’) + AS RAIN (= ‘like a fall’) |
| 21 | PUPA; rev. of UP (= ‘erected’) + PA (= Pennsylvania) – one of my favourite clues, ‘Monarch’ (as in the butterfly) is well worked in and fooled me. |
| 22 | DROSOPHILA; (SHIP OR LOAD)* – trying an ‘O’ in second place cost me quite a bit of time here. A bit of Greek would have helped: ‘drosos’ means dew or moisture. Good clue though. |
| 25 | STATION + E.R. |
| 26 | [t]INKER |
| 27 | LUTYENS; (N,U,STYLE) – the hyphen here is a bit naughty and means the cryptic reading doesn’t quite work. The composer is Elisabeth, although I only knew the name via her father Sir Edwin, most famous for designing New Delhi. |
| 28 | AUG + URAL |
| Down | |
|---|---|
| 1 | B + I[n]SECT |
| 2 | G + LOOMY |
| 3 | ALKALINITY (hidden) – with so many curious and short words in the clue this stuck out as a hidden answer. |
| 4 | DEB(I)T |
| 5 | CAT + ALON[e] + IA |
| 6 | [c]LOCK – a hank is a lock of hair, and ‘clock’ is apparently a slang (i.e. vulgar) word for the face. |
| 7 | OR + A + T(O)RIO |
| 8 | FOREKNEW; rev. of OF, + RE(K)NEW – this surface reading doesn’t make much grammatical sense. |
| 13 | MAINS + P(R)ING |
| 15 | NO ST RINGS – nice charade and a cunning one-word definition to kick off the clue (‘Unrestricted’). |
| 16 | PROPOSAL – a very obvious cryptic definition. |
| 17 | EG + G + PLANT – another name for the aubergine. |
| 19 | S[t]INKER – a sinker is a weight for sinking a fishing line. |
| 20 | BARREL; rev. of (ERR in LAB) |
| 23 | STRIA; [six]T[ies] in rev. of AIRS – a narrow groove. |
| 24 | LI + NE – a li is about a third of a mile, as you probably know if you solve barred cryptic puzzles. |
Well, at best clue surfaces merely offer us that false security of sense.
I found it very hard to get properly started on this one, though DROSOPHILA was the first answer I got – one of those cases where the anagram just jumped out at me. On the other hand I didn’t notice the hidden answer in 3dn for ages, despite the rather contrived wording.
I found this slow-going until luckily guessing the mini-theme from HOOK.
DROSOPHILA was also the first one that I got, but given that my PhD topic is neuroanatomy of Drosophila melanogaster I would have been very upset to miss it. 🙂
1a: I thought FF = “papers” for folios worked better…
I enjoyed this. Much as I like Araucaria and Paul on a Saturday, it was good to have a change.
re 1ac apostrophe. Yes, strange. I have never fathomed the difference between “a summer’s day” and “a spring day”
I suppose “gents” without an apostrophe is comparable with “men”.
(Which reminds me that I have always been intrigued by where the emphasis lies in the advice “please adjust your dress before leaving” – is it simply a reminder that adjustment may be required, or a warning against doing it after leaving?)
You can wear a dress if you like, Barnaby.