Another enjoyable, well clued puzzle from Quixote. The south-west corner took longest, for no good reason – just couldn’t think of the right words for a while. H was pleased to see ‘demotic’ make an appearance, having only recently learnt the word from another puzzle.
ACROSS
1. ST RIFE Wasted quite a while thinking that this would be a word meaning everywhere: ‘Conflict in street everywhere’. Pesky old ‘in’
4. LANCER Hidden
10. A RR IV (IST) E Did know the word, but it didn’t spring to mind immediately
11. S(L)ANG
12. REP LACE
13. DEMO TIC cit(y)<
14. CONCENTRATED dd
18. INEXTRICABLE (inebriate)* with clx (160) in
20. R(EVER)ED
22. TAVERNA ‘Aver’ inside ‘ant’ backwards
24. SH R.U. G
25. EC CENT RIC(h)
26. STEADY (sad yet)*
DOWN
1. STRIPE ref 1 across, substituting ‘p’ for ‘f’
2. RAVE ABOUT inferred anagram of ‘Vera’
3. FOSTER CHILDREN (friends chortle)*
4. AS SAM ref Sam Fox, legendary page three ‘stunna’ and Brit Awards presenter
6. C(HAST)ITY
7. REGICIDE (e.g. CRI die)*
8. LAIR ‘Liar’ with the middle two letters swapped
9. LEADING ARTICLE cryptic definition, not our favourite clue
15. RELEVANCE (NE a clever)*
16. D I ARISES This one took us longest to get
17. PER VERSE
19. DRY ROT We’ve come across very similar clues for this a number of times in our relatively short puzzling lives
21. RI(G.I.)D(e)
23. (l)ARCH
Found this a mixture of very easy and quite tricky with my last three words ARCH, TAVERNA and RELEVANCE taking nearly as long to get as the rest of the puzzle.
Would love to know whether Handel has ever won a Quixote prize, since I keep seeing the same names!
Nope, never won anything. Would like to though, as the prize for this puzzle is better than many. Also want the glory, obviously!
Delighted to finish this in less than an hour! Really enjoyable.
25 across EC CENT RIC(hes) = 50% of wealth?