How lucky I am. Yesterday’s Anax took me absolutely ages, and that was with a paper copy in front of me, which always makes it a little easier. Preparing to do this online shortly after midnight I feared the worst, but in fact it was a mild and pleasant crossword from Glowworm themed around 1ac.
| Across | |
|---|---|
| 1 | THE WIZARD OF OZ — the = article, expert = wizard (old slang?), oz. = little weight |
| 9 | AK(EL)A — ref boy scouts and Kipling’s Jungle Book |
| 10 | G(A RIBALD)I |
| 11 | ENSHRINED — (dinners he)* |
| 12 | EVIAN — (naive)rev. |
| 13 | T IN MAN — ‘blotke’ can be seen as ‘t in man’, another W of O reference |
| 14 | ESTRANGE — (sergeant)* |
| 17 | {l}END(US)ERS |
| 20 | EDITED — (tide)rev. ed |
| 23 | crypT OR CHancel |
| 25 | SCARECROW — (cowers)* around car — I hadn’t realised that scarecrow had this meaning, but perhaps it doesn’t and it’s just that a scarecrow is inanimate. Anyway, another W of O reference. |
| 26 | TOTTERING — tot (rig net)* |
| 27 | KNAVE — kn (Eva)rev. I think, with ‘ties’ simply meaning combines/links/puts together |
| 28 | YEAR IN YEAR OUT — 2 defs, one of them referring to the fact that Thursday night is New Year’s Eve |
| Down | |
| 1 | TEAK {s}ETTLE — ‘going into’??? |
| 2 | EMERS{I}ON |
| 3 | IN ARREARS — “inner ears” |
| 4 | ANGINA — (ana{gg}ing)* |
| 5 | DORADOS — (sod a rod)rev. |
| 6 | FABLE — if you get rid of ‘oak’ from ‘of a bleak’, this is what you are left with |
| 7 | Z(ILL)ION |
| 8 | LION — the girl rising from 7 (zillion) is Liz, and this is another W of O reference |
| 14 | gEtLoSt — Ernie Els is a pretty good golfer but crossword setters are particularly fond of him. He often appears in the Azed Slip. I don’t like clues of the form [wordplay] with [def], although [def] with [wordplay] is OK. In the first case what does the ‘with’ actually mean? |
| 15 | RU(DBE)CK 1 A{laddin} |
| 16 | ENDOWMENT — (women tend)* |
| 18 | DO ROTH {Hard}Y — references yet again to the W of O and to Philip Roth |
| 19 | {d}ROSS IN {su}I{te} — I think probably, although why the dross is godforsaken I’m not sure |
| 21 | TORN A DO — and another — I’m never very happy with definitions of this type (phrases without a subject) — recently Azed tried to justify some of them but I couldn’t see what he meant. To me they simply seem inadequate. |
| 22 | TANGLY — (at Glyn)* |
| 23 | TOT O — and another |
| 24 | HYENA — “hi Ena” |
Hi, I found this much tougher than you did, and eventually turned to your remarkably early post in order to finish it off, so well blogged 🙂
25 – Scarecrow is “brainless” in the context of this particular book/film. He’s in search of a brain, much like the other chaps are in search of, well, other stuff.
19 – I similarly wondered about [d]ROSS, but Chambers has D for Deus/God so “Godforsaken” does work quite nicely.
Thanks for explaining FABLE and “Blotke”, would never have understood those without your help.
Hmm, and I wonder how many readers can recall the names of the lion, scarecrow and tin man without turning to Wikipedia?
Yes Simon, The Scarecrow in the film is brainless, similarly The Tin Man is heartless and The Lion is spineless. Nice linking.
Everyone on night shift or in a different time zone last night?
Since we’re in the middle of rehearsing Wizard of Oz for our village pantomime I didn’t have much excuse to not finish this one. After yesterday, was pleased to get there, with just one or two I didn’t understand, so thank you, John for the early blog. I thought it was a well-constructed puzzle with a good variety of clues. I especially liked DORADOS, which was last to go in and made me laugh out loud.
Right, off to watch a bit of England thrashing the Saffers all around the park in Durban!
I think the definition comes ‘with’ the wordplay just as the wordplay comes ‘with’ the definition. It makes no difference to me. With the puzzle I would also say ‘mild and pleasant’.
Did not find it quite as easy as John, tho being familiar with the film certainly helped. My favourite clue was also DORADOS.
good to see you on here kathryn’s dad. positions eversed! my first try at the indy, and finished it but needed the blog for some which i didn’t totally understand. dorados i got from the crossing letters eg and saw Rod but not the rest.
Easier than other Gloworms i’ve done but got stuck on top left corner.
6 ac. fable is also a hidden word: tale o(f a ble)ak tree; there is no hidden word indicator so was this by chance, and unnoticed?
I was also hunting for a river/lake evilo (olive rev). there isn’t one.
I got FABLE on first run through seeing the letters. I think John tho is totally right in his explanation which I only understood after. So no hidden word indicator is needed, I think.