It’s about a year since eXternal and I first crossed swords over a pencil and a pint, and since then I try to have a go the puzzle when I hear it’s been set by “the X”. Particularly when he is in the Sunday slot where the clues are slightly on the easy side – not the case for a Saturday slot – it was hard.
Solving came in two halves. No, I wasn’t watching the football with the sound off. After getting 1D very early I had very little else in the top half before getting most of the bottom. I’m sure this is because the clues are on the tough side for me, and it seems I need a few crossing letters to get my toe in towards the answer. In truth, a friend helped with 1A to get me kick-started in the top again.
Because I’m blogging it I have made a special effort to spot any theme or Nina but can find none. As usual I will not be surprised when someone points out a large number of answers forming a glaring set.
| Across | ||
|---|---|---|
| 1 | MR RIGHT | The one vacuous ruler in power (2,5) R[ule]R inside MIGHT (power) |
| 5 | FELICIA | Plant life bewildering classifiers? (7) LIFE* AInd: bewildering, CIA (classifiers) – I suppose the CIA have to classify all the intelligence they gather |
| 9 | EMPORIA | Backing to publicise work setter stores (7) AIR (publicise) OP (work) ME (setter) all reversed (backing) – Last to write in: Even with all crossing letters I was stuck thinking publicise was AD thus DA at the end |
| 10 | ARCHEST | Withholding leader from campaign funds is most shrewd (7) [w]AR-CHEST – Why was that that wordplay so difficult to see? |
| 11 | SLEDGEHAMMERS | Infiltrating prisons, creep with heroin delivers hard smack (13) EDGE (creep) H[eroin] inside (infiltrating) SLAMMERS (prisons) |
| 13 | PANATELLA | Smoke destroyed all but centre of nasal plate (9) (NA[s]AL PLATE)* AInd: destroyed |
| 15 | LATER | Subsequently scoffed, having split sides (5) ATE (scoffed) inside L & R (sides – Left & Right) |
| 16 | RACED | Expert in forward-thinking enterprise advanced quickly (5) ACE (expert) inside R & D (Research & Development – forward thinking enterprise) |
| 18 | WAKEBOARD | Sports equipment with a piece of computer hardware blocking yard (9) W[ith] A KE[y]BOARD – this sports equipment |
| 20 | PESHWARI NAANS | Asian food to be cooked – Sarah Palin disheartened with news (8,5) (SARAH PA[l]IN NEWS)* AInd: to be cooked. Glad I took the trouble to fiddle that anagram out early on – took pen and paper |
| 24 | RUN INTO | Suddenly come upon area where rabbits go digging (3,4) RUN (Rabbits can live in a run) INTO (digging – (man)) |
| 25 | WRITE IN | Contact organisation by text, mocking soft metal broadcast (5,2) Homophone “Wry tin” (“mocking soft metal”) – this answer was NOT a write-in (all crossers needed) |
| 26 | SUSPECT | Dodgy time on mushrooms, American recalled (7) T[ime] after (on) (CEPS US)< (mushrooms American) recalled / reversed |
| 27 | BENZENE | Fuel component from kiwi extract originally used in Ferrari’s good (7) NZ (kiwi) E[xtract] inside BENE (Ferrari’s good – good in italian) |
| Down | ||
| 1 | MEET | Join tie-beam unevenly put up (4) Reverse alternate in TiE bEaM. First answered after reading very few, giving me a false impression of the difficulty of the puzzle. |
| 2 | ROPES IN | Roman’s one with which person uneasily engages (5,2) I (Roman’s one) and PERSON all anagrammed (uneasily). Officially last in – I had written ‘on’ instead of ‘in’ and only noticed when checking later |
| 3 | GARMENTED | Man holding weapon journalist clobbered? (9) GENT (man) around ARM (weapon) ED (journalist) – Lovely PDM as I realised it was that sort of clobbered |
| 4 | TWANG | Couple of Scotsmen with no good suggestion (5) TWA (two in Scots) No Good – I’m not sure about the definition – can a twang be a suggestion, I suppose as in accents and hintof a certain place |
| 5 | FLASHBACK | Déjà vu feeling, as one presenting genitalia to copier might get (9) Def. & CD in Private Eye-like style – but hold on – Back? – correct me if I’m wrong, but last time I looked my genitalia were at the front, rather than the back ! – Oh, I know what he means – when you flash, the photocopier flashes back |
| 6 | LOCUM | Look and act dumb when extremists are wanting deputy (5) LO (look) [a]C[t] [d]UM[b] (extremists wanting – outer letters removed) |
| 7 | CLEMENT | Bond, burying his superior’s predecessor, is gentle (7) CEMENT (bond) around (burying) L (M’s predecessor) – that took a bit of decyphering |
| 8 | AUTOSTRADA | Way foreigner takes gold dish from Mexico without resistance (10) AU (Gold) TOSTADA (dish from Mexico) around R[esistance] |
| 12 | SPARE PARTS | Spring on belt inverted – stock for replacement (5,5) SPA (Spring) RE (on) STRAP< (belt (inverted)) |
| 14 | LOWERMOST | Concede room, getting crushed by misplaced bottom (9) I cannot see the wordplay – removing ROOM leaves LWEST ??? <edit> Gaufrid ” comment 2 explains: OWE (concede) RM (room) in (getting crushed by) LOST (misplaced). |
| 15 | LIBRARIAN | Liar in bar impersonating bookkeeper (9) (LIAR IN BAR)* AInd: impersonating |
| 17 | COSINES | Functions where intimacy’s ultimately lacking (7) COSINES[s] |
| 19 | AUSTERE | Harsh German antihero beheaded monarch with ecstasy (7) [f]AUST (German antihero – beheaded) ER (monarch) E[cstasy] |
| 21 | WINCE | Quail stew in ceramic pots (5) Hidden in steW IN CEramic pots |
| 22 | NAWAB | Graduate not looking well upset former governor (5) BA (Graduate) WAN (not looking well) all rev. |
| 23 | ANTE | Auditor’s against money being put at risk (4) Homophone “Anti” |
Finished but not really enjoyed. Can’t see why LOWERMOST either and didn’t like E for extract.
Not got a favourite in this one – it was hard slog.
But good for a Saturday morning lie-in!
Thx both.
Thanks beermagnet
14dn is OWE (concede) RM (room) in (getting crushed by) LOST (misplaced).
Is 25a not an anagram of wire (broadcast) and tin (soft metal)?
I enjoy eXternal now, but it has taken time to trust their cluing as I find I often have to work hard on the parsing side of things before you suddenly see them, though they’re frequently on the border of tenuous.
It took me a long time to see the word play for 14d, as explained by Gaufried above, but so satisfying when you do. RUN INTO at 24a was another such revelation, I was circling around rabbits digging runs into an area before that sudden realisation that digging can have a different meaning. I thought FLASHBACK was possibly on the wrong side of the tenuousity line(worth it though!), but WRITE IN just on the right side.
almw3@1 – the “e” in 27ac is “extract originally”, meaning the first letter of the word, not just “extract”.
al d@3 – your suggestion is an indirect anagram and they are usually huge no-nos in daily cryptics. I parsed 25ac the same as beermagnet.
I parsed LOWERMOST the same as Gaufrid@2.
I must have been on eXternal’s wavelength this morning because this didn’t take me too long. PESHWARI NAANS brought back many happy memories. I struggled most in the NE and FELICIA was my LOI after FLASHBACK and WAKEBOARD. I’m still not convinced a flashback is the same thing as deja vu.
I found this thoroughly enjoyable, well clued and very straightforward – especially for a prize crossword – though I owe (as in 14dn’s usage) not knowing ‘felicia’ is a genus of the daisy family.
Had I not seen some of these comments, I might have suggested this as a great exemplar for an early to intermediate solver…
Many thanks to S & B
Interesting puzzle, I enjoyed most of it. A couple of quibbles though, I think ‘classifiers’ for CIA, even with the ? is not very good. And the Bond in 7d is surely doing double duty.
Gaufrid: Thanks for the decode on 14D
sidey: I agree with you about CIA as Classifiers – it seemed a bit of a stretch (even with the ?). Then I remembered in the X-Files a line from Scully about Mulder’s paranormal findings – complaining that they cannot be easily documented, classified and indexed (or something like that) – but they worked for the FBI rather than the CIA so it all came to nothing.
I don’t think Bond is doing double duty: Bond (himself as cement) and “his superior” (M – from the films) are mentioned separately even if you have to understand that the word “his” references has a different meaning that moment.
I think your last paragraph actually confirms the double duty Beery 😉
@9
I don’t think that’s what is normally meant by “double duty”. It is usually a criticism, meaning that there is no indication of part of the answer – or rahter the same bit of the clue has to be used twice with no indication that this is the case. Here on the contrary you have Bond = cement and then “his [i.e. Bond’s] superior” for M (and hence L, the “predecessor”). This makes for a tight, fair clue, strictly correct by Ximenean rules. I’ve seen the device in Azed and other strict setters. Beermagnet is right.
The i 2018, another waste of time, egg heads & experts only, no good for general readership. When oh when are the people who keep repeating these 2014 Independent crosswords going to realise the puzzles should be for the everyone who likes cryptic crosswords. These type are “try to guess the answer “ then work the clue out, it should be the other way round. Happy days
A tricky one, I thought, pace William F P. Some parsings a bit convoluted, to say the least. And Enzio Ferrari was either a brilliant misdirection or an accident.
Surprised that none of the picky parsers complained about SLEGEHAMMERS, which deliver (no “s”) hard smacks.
IMHO X could have clued it as “creep and heroin deliver hard smacks”, not “creep with heroin delivers hard smack”. It’s less drug-oriented that way, no bad thing. I never cease to be astonished at the number of compilers who are addicted to drugs(cruciverbally, of course).
Tricky. Less than half in. And look at the time!!