I found this pretty tough going, though Thursdays are generally the hardest weekday. I made a flying start with some of the across clues, but then slowed up, mainly because I thought that 25A was SNAILED and therefore talked myself out of 7D being an anagram! Nevertheless, some very nice clues here and I enjoyed the challenge.
| Across | |
|---|---|
| 1 | RAUCOUS – Hideen in jungfRAU COUsin |
| 5 | JAYS – Had to check this online. I presume it’s a double definition. Do jays have curled feet!? |
| 8 | WE ARE NOT AMUSED – WEAR,ATONE rev.,MUSED |
| 10 | INKY – IN,KY (Kentucky) – Great clue |
| 11 | NANNY STATE – NANNY (Goat),STATE (say) |
| 13 | ENOLA GAY – ALONE rev. GAY – A nice clue, though probably quite tricky if you’ve never seen Little Britain, or if you didn’t know that the Enola Gay was the plane that dropped the A-Bomb on Hiroshima |
| 14 | PROSIT – PRO,SIT |
| 16 | VOLUTE – V(ery),O(ld),LUTE |
| 17 | RAILCARD – L CAR in RAID |
| 20 | BEDSITTERS – ED’S in BITTERS |
| 21 | SCUM – C in SUM |
| 23 | LES FLEURS DU MAL – F in (MEASURED LULLS)* |
| 24 | QUIP – QUI (‘which’ in French),P[-oems] |
| 25 | SWANNED – N in S,WANED – Not N in S,AILED! |
| Down | |
| 1 | RAWHIDE – W in (HAIRED)*, &lit. |
| 2 | UNACKNOWLEDGED – N,A (new area) in [-l]UCKNOW,LEDGED |
| 3 | OBEY – Hidden in tO BE Youthful |
| 4 | STOWAWAY – TOW,A[-mendments] in SWAY |
| 5 | JOANNA – Cockney rhyming slang for Piano |
| 6 | YOURS TRULY – Not quite sure on this one. Clue is ‘Head off breach, well behaved after greeting me’ |
| 7 | RENAISSANCE MAN – (AN AMERICANNESS)* – I initially thought this might be an anagram (and that it was something MAN) until SNAILED got in the way! |
| 9 | ZEST – SEZ rev.,T – Needed to use the old Reveal button on this one I’m afraid. |
| 12 | GASTRIC FLU – (LURGI FACTS)* |
| 15 | CARRERAS – R[-odolfo] in CARER AS |
| 16 | VIBE – B in VIE |
| 18 | DIMPLED – DIM,P[-a]LED |
| 19 | STREEP – No idea on this, but guessed from the checking letters and the surface reading. Clue is ‘Is she touching in progressive action part?’ |
| 22 | IDEA – 1,DEA[-r] – ‘Most cherished’ for DEA, are we happy with that?! ‘Mostly’ or ‘most of’ is OK, but I’m not convinced by this |
RE (touching) in STEP the letter J is curled! Very tough puzzle, with some absolutely brilliant clues from this very innovative setter.
6D (b)URST+RULY after YO!
In 2dn I saw that it probably began with UNA (having the U and A) and spent too long seeing [p]UNA as the Indian city. This turned the clue around for me and I was looking for a “new area”, something along the lines of “unaccess…?”
I liked 13ac but knowing both Little Britain and the plane, initially via an Orchestral Manouevres in the Dark song!, helped a lot.
22 across DEA is mostly DEAR i.e. cherished
Yes, quite a tough one. Brilliant clue for 10, though. Google/Wiki to the rescue for Baudelaire. But I was distracted in 13 by the mis-spelling – should be ‘Dafydd’, not ‘Daffyd’
Yes, Allan, should be but isn’t. Perhaps he’s the only illiterate in the village:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/comedy/littlebritain/characters/daffyd.shtml
One of the other Indy setters texted me to say how much he enjoyed this and that 13 was his clue of the year.
Yes this was tough, but very enjoyable and satisfying to solve. Enola Gay was last for me. I’d worked out the answer from Little Britain, but didn’t know the reference to the bomber. However, I wasted a lot of time before checking it on Google having persuaded myself that one of the unchecked letters had to be an “x”, given that every other letter in the alphabet had already appeared in the puzzle.
I’m still struggling with 5ac. I guess jays are “foolish” (as in jaywalkers), though in reality they are amongst the cleverest birds. But I am still not clear about toe-curling. Is it just that birds have curved toes?