What one expects: only a handful of clues were solvable without a sometimes protracted wade through Chambers. Someone somewhere may know enough words to solve these things without dictionary help, but I certainly don’t. Often in this blog I make no comment at all: this is because it is hardly much use to anyone if I write ‘an XYZ is a PQR’ when this is exactly what both the clue and Chambers say.
| Across | |
|---|---|
| 1 | FRA(Z)IL |
| 5 | G(AS B)AG — a gasbag, being talkative, is probably a bore |
| 9 | {p}LAQUE ARIA |
| 12 | TR 1 CHINA — easy enough if you remember that Turkey is Tr not Ty, something I failed to do at first both here and in another crossword this weekend |
| 13 | W{H}EAL — a wheal is a Cornish name for a mine, and you get tin mines in Cornwall |
| 14 | SIMON — I think this refers to Simon Peter (of Biblical fame) and Paul Simon (of Simon and Garfunkel), while the surface is a nod to the expression ‘rob Peter to pay Paul’ |
| 15 | E(RAS)MUS — emus are flightless and a ras is a headland. I worked all this out but still wondered what on earth it had to do with the scholar Erasmus, until I saw in Chambers that Erasmus is an acronym for European Community Action Scheme for the Mobility of University Students. Well just about an acronym. |
| 18 | {Ma}RACA |
| 20 | SALINAS — (sails)* around NA |
| 21 | PLIANCY — (I can)* in ply — useful to know: Azed allows imperative anagram indicators (in this case ‘swim’) to come after the anagrist; at least I think that’s what’s happening |
| 24 | BUSK — 3 defs: Hope to make something having set out cap/dress/corset |
| 26 | DOOBREY — do ob (rye)* — a doobrey is a thingummy as is a hootenanny (US dialect) |
| 28 | C(0)RAM — the definition is simply ‘Before’ |
| 29 | DONET — ‘done to a T’ |
| 31 | KNOCKOUT — the explanation of this defeated me for a long time: OK knockout as an adjective means stunning, but the rest of it? I tried to make all sorts of convoluted wordplay work until I saw that quite simply a knockout, in one sense, is a plot in which dealers are complicit |
| 32 | HOBBINOLL — (loin)* in hobbl{e} |
| 33 | ROMAJI — an & lit. since romaji is a system for writing Japanese using the Roman alphabet, J in (Maori)* |
| 34 | A S-SUM E{ffort} |
| Down | |
| 1 | FLOWERPECKER — flower (= the best) pecker (as in keep your pecker up) — a flowerpecker is a small bird that feeds on amongst other things nectar |
| 2 | RAP H.E. — high explosive |
| 3 | ZUPA — (a puz{zle})rev. |
| 4 | LARUMS — which are alarms; a comp. anag., [lured mariners] … [erred in larums] |
| 5 | G.R.I. QUA — Georgius Rex Imperator |
| 6 | SAHIB — (a bish{op})* |
| 7 | {ban}AN(NON)AS |
| 8 | GIANT’S KETTLE — (gasket inlet t{rouble})* |
| 10 | QUER{y} CITRON |
| 11 | D(I’M)IN U(E)NDO |
| 16 | clotheS IN Dreft — to sind is (Scot and N Eng) to rinse |
| 17 | S.(L)O.B. — son of a bitch |
| 19 | AL CONTO — the word that will no doubt attract better clues than I will be able to produce |
| 22 | COLOBI — (i(bolo)c)rev. |
| 23 | YORUBA — (a ruby O)* |
| 25 | PACHA — ‘a chap’ with the p promoted to the initial position |
| 27 | YEA L M |
| 30 | GOON Show |
Nice ‘plain’, which I finished quite quickly. Didn’t send it in, as I struggled to think of a clue. I liked 1down.
Thanks John, for explaining KNOCKOUT (the meaning is in Chambers, but it seemed such an ordinary word that I didn’t check it) and FLOWERPECKER where I didn’t get either part but inserted it because nothing else would fit. ERASMUS however was familiar to me as one of my wife’s nephews spent a year at a Paris university under the Erasmus scheme.
I agree with the point which John makes in his introduction, namely that AZED frequently lifts his definitions straight from Chambers. However on one occasion some years ago, his (AZED’s, not John’s) eyes strayed to the definition of the word below the one which he was clueing, and that definition appeared in the puzzle. In fact, I think this has happened at least twice, although I can’t recall the clues, I’m afraid.