Dac provides us with his usual Wednesday challenge
I thought this was to towards the easier end of Dac’s difficulty spectrum. The only thing that gave me real difficulty was the parsing of 11 across UNPROFITABLE where I spent a long time muttering to myself that TABLE and GRAPH just aren’t synonymous and how does PROFI relate to BILL? Eventually my brain kicked in and I got the right parsing based on TAB [bill] and PROFILE [graph].
Clues I liked today were those for COUNTERIRRITANT at 5 down, even though I’m not usually a fan of cryptic definitions and GRAND OPERA where I was tempted to believe that the definition was ‘outlandish entertainment’. However, I accept that the second bit just illustrates that I am a Philistine.
There were one or two simple clues – e.g. the anagram for CHAIN STORE, the reference to ELI as a priest and the anagram for HOLY WRIT
| Across | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| No. | Clue | Wordplay | Entry |
|
1
|
Visit prison, you say? It’s worth viewing (6)
|
SCENIC (sounds like [you say] SEE [visit] + NICK [prison])
|
SCENIC (having beautiful or remarkable scenery; worth viewing)
|
|
5
|
Catholic priest, perhaps, strangely noticeable? No no (8)
|
Anagram of (strangely) NOTICEABLE excluding (no) the letters NO CELIBATE* |
CELIBATE (descriptive of a Catholic priest)
|
|
9
|
Bird served for starters with beef (10)
|
S (first letter of [for starters] SERVED) + AND (with) + GROUSE (complain; beef)
|
SANDGROUSE (any bird of the genera Pterocles and Syrrhaptes, with long pointed wings, once classified as GROUSE because of their feathered legs but now considered as a suborder (Pterocletes) related to pigeons)
|
|
10
|
Test now in the afternoon, presumably (4)
|
EX (former) + AM (ante meridiem; morning) taken together implying now in the afternoon
|
EXAM (test)
|
|
11
|
Bill probes United Nations graph to no avail (12)
|
TAB (bill) contained in (probes) (UN [United Nations] + PROFILE [graph]) UN PROFI (TAB) LE |
UNPROFITABLE (not productive; to no avail)
|
|
13
|
Sri Lankan male bitten by dog (5)
|
M (male) contained in (bitten by) TAIL (follow; dog) TA (M) IL |
TAMIL (a member of a people of SE India and N, E, and central Sri Lanka)
|
|
15
|
Flier marking the origin of Communism? (8)
|
RED (Communist) + START (beginning; a mark of the origin)
|
REDSTART (bird)
|
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16
|
Film mogul supporting Italian leader? Right (8)
|
PRO (supporting) + DUCE (the title assumed by the Italian dictator Mussolini) + R (right)
|
PRODUCER (someone who exercises general control over, but does not actually make, a cinema film; film mogul)
|
|
18
|
Former president snatched by kidnapper once (5)
|
PERON (hidden word in [snatched by] KIDNAPPER ONCE)
|
PERON (reference Juan PERÓN [1895 – 1974], three times President of Argentina)
|
|
19
|
Morning sermon by priest wanting improvement (12)
|
AM (ante meridiem; morning) + ELI (a High Priest of Shiloh, according to the Books of Samuel. The crossword world’s favourite priest) + ORATION (a sermon is an example of an oration)
|
AMELIORATION (improvement)
|
|
22
|
Mad, reversing over mountain pass (4)
|
(O [over in cricket scoring notation) + COL [mountain pass]) all reversed (reversing) (LOC O)< |
LOCO (mad)
|
|
23
|
One who’s on track to arrange the crockery? (10)
|
PLATE (piece of crockery) + LAYER (one who arranges) together describing someone who arranges the crockery
|
PLATELAYER (railway track worker; one who’s on track)
|
|
24
|
Religious text worthily translated (4,4)
|
Anagram of (translated) WORTHILY HOLY WRIT* |
HOLY WRIT (scriptures; religious text)
|
|
25
|
Detective, mostly insignificant and feeble (6)
|
DI (detective inspector) + (SMALL [insignificant] excluding the final letter [mostly] L)
|
DISMAL (feeble; both DISMAL and feeble express similar sentiments but I can’t find a reference that gives them as direct synonyms))
|
| Down | |||
|
2
|
Shop repairing chairs, note (5,5)
|
Anagram of (repairing) CHAIRS NOTE CHAIN STORE* |
CHAIN STORE (shop)
|
|
3
|
One judo expert standing up on river bottom (5)
|
(I [one] + DAN [descriptive of a person who has attained one of various levels of proficiency in judo]) all reversed (standing up; down clue) + R (river) (NAD I)< R |
NADIR (lowest point; bottom)
|
|
4
|
Wary, adding dodgy fuel to vehicle (7)
|
CAR + an anagram of (dodgy) FUEL CAR EFUL* |
CAREFUL (wary)
|
|
5
|
Annoying shop assistant providing ointment for example (15)
|
COUNTER (a shop assistant frequently works at a counter) + IRRITANT (one who annoys)
|
COUNTERIRRITANT (an ointment could be used to relieve [COUNTER] an IRRITAtion)
|
|
6
|
Song about President Lincoln being a lazy sort? (3-4)
|
LIED (song) containing (about) ABE (reference US President Abraham [ABE] Lincoln [1809- 1865]) LIE (ABE) D |
LIE-ABED (descriptive of a lazy person)
|
|
7
|
No vegetarian warder (9)
|
BEEF (example of a meat) + EATER (one who EATs) together describing someone who is not a vegetarian
|
BEEFEATER (warder of the Tower of London)
|
|
8
|
Tree visible in the dark, oddly (4)
|
TEAK (letters 1, 3 5 and 7 [oddly] in THE DARK)
|
TEAK (tree)
|
|
12
|
P & O arranged outlandish entertainment (5,5)
|
Anagram of (outlandish) P and O and ARRANGED GRAND OPERA* |
GRAND OPERA (opera without dialogue, especially if the subject is very dramatic or emotional)
|
|
14
|
Press and TV right, intervening in dispute (9)
|
MEDIA (press and TV) + TORY (the TORY party is on the right of British politics)
|
MEDIATORY (intervening in dispute in an attempt to reach to a solution)
|
|
17
|
Little bird worth less, we hear (7)
|
CHEEPER (sounds like [we hear] CHEAPER [worth less])
|
CHEEPER (young bird, especially a young game bird or chicken)
|
|
18
|
Forecast the ruin of Hull? (7)
|
PORT (Hull is a PORT city) + END (ruin)
|
PORTEND (forecast)
|
|
20
|
Ducks – appropriate to have head lowered (5)
|
STEAL (appropriate, as a verb) with the first letter (head) S moved to the end (lowered; down clue) TEALS |
TEALS (any of several kinds of freshwater ducks)
|
|
21
|
Pilot very lost? No way (4)
|
SO (very) + LOST excluding (no) ST (street; way)
|
SOLO (to fly [pilot] a plane on one’s own)
|
An easy and very pleasant solve. 24ac is a neat anagram.
My only slight sandgrouse was with 9ac: ‘starters’ is plural but only one starter is used. ‘For starter’ would make sense.
Nothing outlandish about grand opera!
Yes, very straightforward and a pleasant solve.
Regarding ‘starters’, the word is plural but can be (just about) taken as singular, as in “how’s that for starters?”. As for grand opera being outlandish, Dr Johnson defined it in his dictionary as ‘an exotic and irrational entertainment’: I make no further comment.
CELIBATE and AMELIORATION were my favourites.
Thanks, Dac and Duncan
9a, “for starters” is colloquial, meaning “to start with”, e.g. “What’s for starters?” one might ask when enquiring about the first course of a meal.
allan_c @2, apologies, I did not check before posting.
Cookie @3, no problem – we came at it from slightly different angles!
There were a few tricky ones here which held me up at the end. Missed the parsing of UNPROFITABLE as I could never get beyond the same ‘How does PROFI = ‘bill’?’ problem you initially had. I had ‘placemaker’ for 23, thinking of an aths rather than a railway track, and took a long time to get COUNTERIRRITANT which was my COD.
Thanks to Dac and Duncan.
Thank you Dac and duncanshiell.
This puzzle was enjoyable, but some of the parsing was beyond me, UNPROFITABLE in particular. All I could think of for “feeble” and DISMAL was a teacher saying “You made a feeble effort”, “You made a dismal effort”, but I too failed to find a reference giving them as direct synonyms. Loved the outlandish entertainment and the PLATELAYER!
PS, just found in the COED dismal adj. 3 colloq. feeble or inept.
I don’t see 5dn as a cryptic definition, Duncan. It does have a definition (ointment for example) and a subsidiary indication which in this case is a whimsical joke. CDs usually don’t seem to have these conventional things. To me they are simply misleading definitions and we don’t get the two routes to the answer that we normally have.
In Chambers 9ac is (4,6).
Wil Ransome @9, SANDGROUSE is the definitive spelling in all ornithological publications, and in all reliable dictionaries…
Thanks Duncan – for the second time today!
We failed to parse 11ac so we really needed the blog today.
We wondered at one point whether Dac had a bird theme going on here with sandgrouse, redstart, teal, and perhaps cheeper.
Thanks Dac.
Cookie @10, that’s the first time I’ve ever heard Chambers Dictionary described as unreliable. I remain very slightly in a state of shock.