I don’t know whether the Lord of the Flies is wreaking his terrible vengeance upon us after Gaufrid recently accused his crosswords of being a bit too easy, but that’s two blog days in a row that I’ve failed to complete the puzzle.
It all started off rosily enough, but the crossers at 18 down and 23 across did for me. I found 23 using the Chambers app search, but I think 18 down is the name of a volcano, so it isn’t in the dictionary.
At 19 my parsing seems a little wobbly, and there are a couple of others that have me beaten, so we’ll have to go interactive this week, which is no bad thing.
*=anagram, []=dropped, <=reversed. Hover to expand abbreviations.
| Across | ||
|---|---|---|
| 1 | MUIR – U in MIR|[e]. | |
| 5 | EMU WREN – (W in EMURE) + N. | |
| 12 | OENOPHIL – (ONE< in (OP + H)) + I + L. Complex wordplay here. | |
| 13 | TESLA – (AL[l] + SET)<. | |
| 14 | OSMOSIS – [c]OSMOS + IS. | |
| 15 | HYPERACIDITY – (DIY PIE CHART)* + Y. | |
| 16 | EMERY – M in EERY. | |
| 19 | ETAT – I guess this is EAT* + T, though that would be an indirect anagram of the kind that I believe Ximeneans would get their knickers in a twist about, and the clue reads like it should be EAT<. Foreign state to worry about Thailand. |
|
| 20 | RACE CARD – (ACE + CAR) in RD. | |
| 23 | DURUKULI – this was hard. I suspect the answer and both of the components of the wordplay are unfamiliar to me. Primitive country engaged in endless veneration for monkey. |
|
| 24 | HEHE – (EH? + EH?)<. | |
| 27 | RIPEN – R + I + PEN. | |
| 28 | CRY ROAST-MEAT – (SO MY RARE TACT)*. An unfamiliar term, but it means “To publish one’s good luck foolishly”. | |
| 30 | RAW SILK – [d]RAWS + ILK. | |
| 31 | HOLLA – HOLLA[nders]. | |
| 32 | SOLENOID – ONE< in SOLID. | |
| 33 | BELLMAN – LLM in BEAN. A town crier. | |
| 34 | OSLO – from SOLO, but with the S shifted. | |
| Down | ||
| 1 | MOTHERY – OTHER in MY. | |
| 2 | INSPECT – P[itch] in INSECT. | |
| 3 | ROLE REVERSAL – (REAL RE SOLVER)*. Nice, slightly meta crossword-themed clue. | |
| 4 | SPAR – two definitions: a bar or rail/a fight. | |
| 6 | MISCARRY – (IS + C[onflict]) in MARRY. | |
| 7 | ULMIN – [usef]UL MIN[erals]. | |
| 8 | WOODEN KIMONO – WOO + DEN + (MO in KIN) + O. An American term which, without wishing to go all politically correct on you, I suspect dates from WWII and seems to have a slight whiff of racism about it. | |
| 9 | RESIT – I in REST. | |
| 10 | EDITABLE – IDE< + TABLE. | |
| 11 | NOSY – (Y + SON)<. | |
| 17 | MACERATE – MACE RATE. A lovely surface here: Steep cost of spice? |
|
| 18 | ?AU?ALOA – Must Scots welcome Hawaiian avoiding hot volcano?. |
|
| 21 | TUPELOS – (SOLE + PUT)<. I hadn’t heard of the tree, but I’d heard of Tupelo, Mississippi for its Elvis connections, and a band named Uncle Tupelo, so that got me through. | |
| 22 | PINTADO – PINT + ADO. | |
| 25 | HYWEL – it’s from HWYL, with the middle two letters swapped, then you’ve got an E in there. | |
| 26 | ZOISM – IS in MOZ< | |
| 28 | CRAB – two definitions: to obstruct wreck or frustrate/well, you know what a crab is. | |
| 29 | THEM – H in TE[a]M. The enemy as in “us and them” | |
I was out last Sunday evening and didn’t start this till I got home about eleven, but I did manage to finish it by midnight, albeit with a couple of word searches, 23ac and 26dn.
The volcano is MAUNA LOA, which is MAUN (Scots for must) plus ALO(H)A. I knew Mauna Kea (I have a friend who sometimes works at the observatory there), and thought it was that for a bit. Typing MAUNA into google and the autosuggest gave me the answer.
23ac is UR (primitive, from the German, as in Urtext) plus UK in DULI(A), veneration.
Surely 19ac is not an indirect anagram, but EAT surrounding (about) T?
Tremendous stuff. Thanks L of the F, and sorry you didn’t quite get there Simon – it happens to me quite often. No shame there.
Absolutely at one with Dormouse about 19ac and 23 ac.
Time for some old wine of Scotland, as Alastair Cooke had it.
I set these some distance ahead (the latest set of clues are for March) so the response timescale is pretty extended.
WOODEN KIMONO I was somewhat astonished to encounter in Louis de Bernieres’ latest novel, which is set in and shortly after WWI, in England and France (though with some Americans among the characters). I really don’t think it would have been common parlance among Edwardian RAF officers, though (earliest OED ref I spotted was Depression era, I think, as an alternative to WOODEN OVERCOAT). Not quite as long a time gap as when I encountered FORMALDEHYDE in a novel set in 1827, I suppose.
Looks like I’m turning into one of those people who look out for TV aerials in Dickens adaptations…
Thanks, all. Agree about 19 across. As always, they’re easy once you know the answer 🙂