Monday Prize Crossword/Sep 30
An overall enjoyable offering from Crux which may be found here.
That said, as so often with Crux, I wasn’t very keen on the cryptic definitions while there were altogether five double definitions, too many to my taste. Double definitions are my least favourite device, I usually qualify them as a kind of lazy clueing.
But as ever some nice finds too and good surfaces throughout.
Definitions are underlined wherever possible and/or appropriate.
| Across | ||
| 1 | EL NINO | Disrupter of weather patterns represented on-line (2,4) |
| (ON LINE)* | ||
| 4 | DATE LINE | Where we change from day to day (4,4) |
| Cryptic definition | ||
| The International Date Line is an imaginary North-South line to the east of which it is one day earlier than it is to the west. I agree with ernie @2 that this could also refer to the FT (‘we’) changing its ‘date line’ from day to day. | ||
| 10 | EIGHTFOLD | Size of increase in the number to go bankrupt (9) |
| EIGHT ((the) number) + FOLD (to go bankrupt) | ||
| 11 | DWELL | Lustful revolutionary Lolita’s first to appear live (5) |
| DWEL (reversal of LEWD (lustful)) + L[olita] | ||
| 12 | LETT | Reportedly allowed in East European (4) |
| Homophone of LET (allowed) | ||
| 13 | STONE WALLS | What boring batsman does with possible boundaries (5,5) |
| Double definition | ||
| I am far from an expert on cricket, therefore I have to rely on what dictionaries say: to stonewall can be to bat extremely defensively. Maybe, the clue as a whole is even one of the definitions? Please read Musca’s comment for an expert’s view on this clue! | ||
| 15 | FLANNEL | Use soft soap – or this, appropriately (7) |
| Double definition, the second one being a piece of washing cloth | ||
| 16 | APEMAN | Exercise taken by a person like Tarzan (6) |
| PE (exercise) inside A MAN (person), with ‘a person’ doing double duty | ||
| 19 | ASCENT | St Bernard follows this Alpine expedition (6) |
| One of my last entries. Of course, it probably had to be ‘ascent’ but I could hardly see anything cryptic here so I hesitated. It might well be, though, that there’s something very clever going on here, something that I didn’t see. How blind I was! Thanks Muffyword @1 for your help. | ||
| 21 | ENTITLE | Allow inside apartment? It leaks! (7) |
| Hidden solution: [apartm]ENT IT LE[aks] | ||
| 23 | DONER KEBAB | Fast food cooked by foreign baker, Bravo (5,5) |
| DONE (cooked) + (BAKER)* + B (Bravo, in international radio communication) | ||
| Perhaps my favourite clue, nice surface. | ||
| 25 | MERE | Nothing more than an area of water (4) |
| Double definition | ||
| 27 | BOMBE | Lethal-sounding dessert (5) |
| Homophone of BOMB (a possibly lethal object) | ||
| 28 | MASSEUSES | Physios need employment in large numbers (9) |
| USE (employment) inside MASSES (large numbers) | ||
| 29 | END IT ALL | What the fat lady’s song should do, it’s said (3,2,3) |
| “It ain’t over till the fat lady sings” | ||
| One more cryptic definition that didn’t appeal very much to me. | ||
| 30 | ABUSED | Ill-treated American asleep, probably (6) |
| US (American) inside A BED (asleep, probably: literally in a bed) | ||
| Down | ||
| 1 | EYES LEFT | Order to parade witnesses clearly not right (4,4) |
| EYES (witnesses) + LEFT (clearly not right) | ||
| 2 | NIGHTCAPS | Final round, perhaps, assumed to prevent head colds (9) |
| Double definition | ||
| 3 | NOTE | Consequence of negative trade disheartening (4) |
| NO (negative) + T[rad]E | ||
| 5 | ADDENDA | Extras put in to complete article (7) |
| ADD (put in) + END (to complete) + A (article) | ||
| 6 | ENDOWMENTS | Natural talents some schools rely on (10) |
| Double definition | ||
| 7 | IDEAL | “First-class!” as one in command of deck might say (5) |
| ‘One in command of (a) deck (of cards)’ might say: I DEAL | ||
| 8 | ENLIST | To join up uneven lines takes time (6) |
| (LINES)* + T (time) | ||
| I don’t think I have ever seen ‘uneven’ as an anagram indicator but I am OK with it. | ||
| 9 | FOETAL | Hostile short speech about a defensive position (6) |
| FOE (hostile) + TAL[k] (speech, short) | ||
| My penultimate entry and I am still not happy with ‘about’ as a link word (if it is). As Muffyword @1 says, perhaps ‘about’ should be seen as part of the definition (but I’m not sure). | ||
| 14 | ENDEARMENT | Unusually tender name? Precisely! (10) |
| (TENDER NAME)* – the clue as a whole might be seen as the definition | ||
| 17 | ACTRESSES | Starlets in Hair appearing under a cloud, initially (9) |
| A + C[loud] + TRESSES (hair, lower case) | ||
| 18 | REVERSED | How Aidan might change sex (8) |
| When REVERSED Aidan (boy’s name) would become Nadia (girl’s name), hence: change sex | ||
| This sneaky clue was my last one in. | ||
| 20 | THERMAL | The right man, almost, to model such underwear (7) |
| THE + R (right) + MAL[e] (man, almost) | ||
| 21 | ELAPSE | Pass English then go to the dogs (6) |
| E (English) + LAPSE (go to the dogs) | ||
| 22 | EDIBLE | Like some mushrooms, I bleed when bruised (6) |
| (I BLEED)* | ||
| 24 | NOMAD | Rover barking after devious doctor (5) |
| MAD (barking) coming after NO (devious doctor, Dr No) | ||
| 26 | HERB | He starts to risk breakdown, like Basil (4) |
| HE + R[isk] B[reakdown] – definition: basil (lower case) being an example (‘like’) of an herb | ||
| A fine nod to John Cleese’s character to end with. | ||
Thanks Sil and Crux,
Re FOETAL – I wonder if “about” should be included in the definition?
Re ASCENT – a St Bernard dog follows a scent.
I was thinking that the ‘we’ in 4A referred to the FT and the dateline related to the line on the newspaper which needs changing every day.
Thanks to Sil
I think 13 ac is quite clever but you need to know a bit about cricket! ‘Possible boundaries’ can be a 6 or a 4 in cricket and also ‘stone walls’ are the boundaries to a field, like a fence is. ‘Stonewalls’ as a verb means, as you say, ‘plays (too) defensively’.
Anyway, thanks yet again Crux for a satisfying puzzle, and thank you, Sil, for your careful analysis.
Many thanks for the useful comments so far.
I have now ’embedded’ them in my blog.
Three missing
21a Don’t you just hate it when you don’t see a hidden word?
18d I must remember this trick
21d
Thanks for blog