A riveting challenge from Wanderer. I was ok all the way until I reached the SE corner, where I was left to my devices trying to crack the remaining clues and needed help getting over the line. Thanks Geoff!! 27d still needs a well-parsed solution.
FF: 9 DD:9
| Across | ||
| 1 | LISSOM | Nimble and flexible model turned 51 earlier (6) |
| LI (51 in roman numerals) SSOM (model = MOSS, kate, reversed) | ||
| 4 | OCCASION | Need time (8) |
| double def | ||
| 10 | WARBLER | During quarrel bra worries backing singer (7) |
| hidden, reversed, in “…quarREL BRA Worries…” | ||
| 11 | ABDOMEN | Agreed about odd bod’s belly (7) |
| AMEN (agreed) about BOD* | ||
| 12 | ERNE | Bird from another nest (4) |
| hidden in “..anothER NEst”. I briefly tried checking for an anagram of NEST. | ||
| 13 | STREETWISE | Wily setter, cooking with sage (10) |
| SETTER* with WISE (sage) | ||
| 15, 16 | CREDIT ACCOUNT | Put some money in the bank as a way of paying later (6,7) |
| (not so) cryptic clue? [CREDIT (put money in ) ACCOUNT (~in the bank)] | ||
| 20, 21 | PICTURE PALACE | See friend at one cinema (7,6) |
| PICTURE (see) PAL (friend) ACE (one) | ||
| 24 | PROGENITOR | Hack reporting about love for parent? (10) |
| REPORTING* around O (love) – loved this clue. | ||
| 26 | PERI | Fairy appearing in first half of Shakespeare play (4) |
| PERIcles (prince of tyre, shakespeare play, half of) | ||
| 28 | SCALPEL | Knife left in incorrect places (7) |
| L (left) in PLACES* | ||
| 29 | SAILING | Voyage in trouble east of Sweden (7) |
| S (sweden) AILING (in trouble) | ||
| 30 | STARTERS | For which chaps have got into cooking ham and pea soups? (8) |
| intriguing clue; CHAPS can be clued as STARTERS of “…Cooking Ham And Pea Soups” | ||
| 31 | HAGGLE | Hearing battle-axe will barter (6) |
| sounds like HAG (battle-axe) ‘LL (will) | ||
| Down | ||
| 1 | LAWRENCE | Novelist initially into Buddhism (8) |
| cryptic clue, initials of D.H. (Lawrence) can be found in budDHism. | ||
| 2 | SERENGETI | Tiger seen here mistakenly, it’s plain (9) |
| TIGER SEEN* | ||
| 3 | OILS | More than one painting topless works (4) |
| tOILS (works, without first character) | ||
| 5, 23 | CLARENCE HOUSE | Residence of Prince Charles once EU gets involved (8,5) |
| CHARLES ONCE EU* | ||
| 6 | ADDITIONAL | Further operation required by gangster (10) |
| ADDITION (operation) AL (gangster, capone) | ||
| 7 | IAMBI | Setter is into both men and women’s feet (5) |
| I AM (setter is) BI (into both men and women) – naughty Wanderer? | ||
| 8 | NANTES | Playing partners holding stake in French port (6) |
| NS (playing partners, North and South, in bridge) holding ANTE (stake) | ||
| 9, 18 | FRITZ KREISLER | Violinist with animated cat likes playing outside right in front of royalty (5,8) |
| FRITZ (animated cat) [ LIKES* around R (right) ] ER (royalty) | ||
| 14 | HIT THE SPOT | Non-drinking male – in his pocket was just what was needed (3,3,4) |
| ( [ TT (non drinking, teetotaler) HE (male) ] in HIS ) POT (pocket, in pool) | ||
| 17 | NEATENING | Putting in order in French – gin drunk without tonic initially? (9) |
| [EN (french for in) GIN* ] after NEAT (without tonic) | ||
| 18 | See 9 | |
| 19 | MERINGUE | Bit of a sweet gum ‘ere, perhaps? (8) |
| cryptic clue, “gum ‘ere” can be clued as MER (IN) GUE | ||
| 22 | OPUSES | Spouse unfortunately works (6) |
| SPOUSE* | ||
| 23 | See 5 | |
| 25 | OMAHA | Norwegian group after short time over in US city (5) |
| AHA (norwegian group) after OM (short time = MO, reversed) | ||
| 27 | TINA | Girl adopted by Maggie Thatcher initially (4) |
| Unable to parse this clue – one for the other readers/solvers here. / See comments below | ||
*anagram
27d is Tina an acronym for There is No Alternative, a phrase adopted by Maggie ‘the lady’s not for turning’ Thatcher.
It is rumoured that she never understood the allusion in the ‘turning’ bit.
Thanks to both. Took me a long time to see 30.
PS I meant to add that it was good to be reminded of Fritz the Cat. I will probably watch the movie this evening.
I don’t think Wanderer is the hardest setter in the FT stable but (s)he is good, isn’t (s)he?
Thanks, Conrad, for explaining TINA (27d) which I didn’t get.
I could make a connection with today’s politics but this is obviously not the place to do that.
30ac I didn’t understand but, wow, that is really a novelty.
I like setters who, at times, do something unusual.
Many thanks, Turbolegs, for your fine blog.
Only in 14d I think ‘was’ should be part of the definition.
Thanks Turbolegs and Wanderer.
This was a really tough challenge with the SE corner and the violinist the last to fall for me.
For 9, 18 I had to resort to a long list of violinists in Wikipedia before I finally got there – but educational all the same.
I’m still not convinced at addition = operation at 6dn and I needed your help to explain STARTERS ( which I felt very iffy about) – brilliant – and NEATENING where I couldn’t explain the NEA – I thought that the solution was outside of T!
But I’m smug about getting and understanding both LAWRENCE at 1dn and TINA at 27dn.
The latter reminded me of an old chum – now deceased – who was known as MISTY because he perennially used the phrase May I Suggest To You in discussions.
Tough overall but mostly fair.
Slightly behind in replying to the comments on this one:-
CC@1,2 – Thanks a lot for the help with 27D. Good to learn something new. I will make the edit.
Sil@3 – Yep, sounds right. I will edit. Thanks.
Hamish@4 – I kept frowning at 30ac until it wilted to my persuasion! 🙂 Seriously, I had no clue as to how to address the clue and then suddenly it just came – no logical progression in thinking.
Regards,
Mahesh
Thanks Wanderer and Turbolegs
This one puzzle has held up my backlog solve for ages, struggling to get the girl in at 27d – today I, after not deciding whether RITA or TINA would be the one, I finally looked here to find out why either of them would be correct. Don’t think that I would ever have found it unless I had typed Tina into Wikipedia and stumbled on the Maggie Thatcher acronym in there !!! Quite brilliant in hindsight. As were his clues for STARTERS, MERINGUE and IAMBI (only the first that I was able to properly parse).
A brilliant crossword and I’m not too disappointed to admit failure on TINA and the missing parsings.