Independent on Sunday 1437/Poins

Poins normally appears once a month in the IoS. In August we met on the windswept street corner on the rough side of town that is the Fifteensquared blog, and we meet again this month. People will talk if this keeps happening.

A pleasing puzzle in the IoS style. Tractable, no obscurities, and clear, concise cluing. Some references to the British political left. The prevailing doctrine among my left-leaning friends seems to be Jez we can, once May has self-immolated. Anything I haven’t explained fully (or indeed correctly), please just ask.

 

Abbreviations
cd cryptic definition
dd double definition
(xxxx)* anagram
anagrind = anagram indicator
[x] letter(s) missing

definitions are underlined

 

Across

1 Increase rapidly when everyone’s in favour
BALLOON
An insertion of ALL in BOON. BOON for ‘favour’ is in dictionaries, but is marked as ‘archaic’.

5 Avoid being last to get away
KEEP OFF
KEEP for ‘last’ followed by OFF for ‘away’.

9 Black bishop residing in northern town
SABLE
An insertion of B in SALE, the town in Greater Manchester.

10 Deliver over split boarding, having no doubt – right?
SURRENDER
The surface reading is not putting a picture in my head, but that could be my lack of imagination. Whatevs, it’s REND for ‘split’ in SURE and R.

11 Probably hypocritical to stock earliest of tomes on saints
DOUBTLESS
An insertion of T for the first letter of ‘tomes’ in DOUBLE, followed by SS for ‘saints’. The last bit is most commonly seen in church names: ‘SS Peter and Paul’.

12 Country cousin’s bottom seen through loose flowing garment
TONGA
This one is putting a picture in my head, not necessarily one I want there on a Sunday morning. An insertion of N for the last letter of ‘cousin’ in TOGA.

13 Stylish cane
SWISH
As is almost always the case with two-word clues, a dd.

15 Destined to join obscure set
HIDEBOUND
A charade of HIDE and BOUND. ‘To join’ is just telling you to stick the two words together.

18 Quote about Green movement at first showing great vitality
ENERGETIC
(GREEN)* followed by CITE reversed.

19 Insist upon being strict
EXACT
Another dd.

21 Fasten on to bag
CATCH
And another.

23 Version of text revealing communist infiltration primarily in part of Ealing
REDACTION
A charade of RED and I inserted into ACTON, which is part of Ealing in London. For a little place, it has a claim to fame: it has the most stations of any London district – six. North Acton, South Acton, East Acton, West Acton, Acton Town and Acton Central. My head is full of crap like this, which is a worry.

25 Make sure of showing sectarian trouble
ASCERTAIN
(SECTARIAN)*

26 Italian writer covering for the most part one cause of food poisoning
E COLI
A charade of (Umberto) ECO and LI[D]. Escherichia coli bacteria are generally good for human guts, but strain 0157 is the one that can make you seriously ill.

27 Stuff regularly found in orders for hats
TITFERS
The ‘regular’ letters of sTuFf inserted into TIERS. A passing acquaintance with cockney rhyming slang is handy for solving cryptics: here you have to know (or learn) that TITFER means ‘hat’, as in TIT FOR TAT.

28 Appreciate not starting without academics being all together
EN MASSE
Took me a while to parse this one. It’s MAS for those with a Master of Arts degree in [S]ENSE.

 

Down

1 Happen to find fish on board as well
BESIDES
A charade of BE for ‘happen’ and IDE for the setters’ favourite fish in SS – ‘on board’ in a ship sense.

2 Made up lie about debut of Real’s left-winger
LABOURITE
An insertion of the first letter of ‘Real’ in (LIE ABOUT)* The anagrind is ‘made up’. But isn’t ‘about’ doing double duty?

3 Plainly apparent in extra time
OVERT
A charade of OVER and T.

4 Wrong over having to prevent access to space inside military housing unit
NISSEN HUT
A charade of SIN reversed and EN for the printer’s ‘space’ in SHUT.

5 Dairy products reportedly made by people in northern Iraq
KURDS
A homophone of CURDS, close friends with WHEY.

6 Choose line penned by Lincoln to show what Labour may have become
ELECTABLE
In my dreams, I think, but we’ll see. ELECT followed by L in ABE Lincoln.

7 Relating to former times as happy without a bit of gloominess
OLDEN
[G]OLDEN

8 Send on an attacker
FORWARD
Another dd.

14 Powerful heroin’s what the arrogantly superior may be on
HIGH HORSE
A charade of HIGH and HORSE for a slang word for ‘heroin’.

16 Cultural decline in North Carolina initially evident after the 30’s for example
DECADENCE
A charade of DECADE, NC and E for the first letter of ‘evident’. This word always makes me think of the description of America as being ‘a nation that went from barbarism to decadence without the civilisation in between’. It’s commonly attributed to Oscar Wilde, but he didn’t say it; it was originally coined about Russia, apparently.

17 In complete agreement with peacekeepers over containing hostility? Just the opposite
UNANIMOUS
A charade of UN for ‘peacekeepers’ and O in ANIMUS, and not ANIMUS in O as suggested by the first part of the clue. Hence ‘just the opposite’.

18 Dean oddly ignored song’s charm
ENCHANT
The even letters of ‘dEaN’ followed by CHANT.

20 Capable of being stretched in future possibly to include the centre of Basildon
TENSILE
An insertion of IL for the central letters of ‘Basildon’ in TENSE, of which the FUTURE TENSE is an example.

22 Understood to be essentially unskilled in diplomacy
TACIT
The central letter of ‘unskilled’ inserted into TACT.

23 Studies grass say at start of semester
READS
A charade of a homophone of REED for ‘grass’ and S for the first letter of ‘semester’. I wonder whether Poins meant to write (or indeed did write) Grass, as in the author Günter Grass, since this would make much more sense of the surface and we’re meant to ignore capitalisation anyway.

24 Pick an irresistibly funny person first off
CREAM
[S]CREAM

 

Many thanks to Poins for this morning’s puzzle.