Phi day again! As usual, we enjoyed this Phi offering – in the middle of the range of difficulty we have come to expect from our Friday setter. There was only one word we hadn’t come across before – 25ac.
Being a Phi, there’s almost bound to be a theme, but if there is, we can’t see it – perhaps others can root it out?
| Across | ||
| 1 | Fact US lawyer presented to corporation (5) | |
| DATUM | DA (District Attorney – ‘US lawyer’) TUM (corporation) | |
| 4 | Was hazy with fourth idea for marsh (9) | |
| SWAMPLAND | SWAM (‘was hazy’ – as in being dizzy) PLAN D (fourth idea – the first being ‘Plan A’). We’re sure we weren’t alone in assuming that this started with an anagram of ‘was’ | |
| 9 | Position taken by Irish politicians in a row (5,2) | |
| LINED UP | LINE (position taken) DUP (Democratic Unionist Party – Irish politicians) | |
| 10 | Unpleasant covering distribution of fuel (7) | |
| HATEFUL | HAT (covering) + an anagram of FUEL – anagrind is ‘distribution of’ | |
| 11 | Symptom of cold has that man tucking into booze (5) | |
| RHEUM | HE (that man) ‘tucking’ into RUM (booze) | |
| 12 | Recovering soldiers not talking about island (9) | |
| RESILIENT | RE (Royal Engineers – ‘soldiers’) SILENT (not talking) round I (island) | |
| 14 | Rude mechanical i.e. an actor (7,5) | |
| MICHAEL CAINE | An anagram of MECHANICAL I.E. – anagrind is ‘rude’ | |
| 18 | The coldest spot in the A-Z? (8,4) | |
| ABSOLUTE ZERO | ABSOLUTE (A – abbreviation) ZERO (Z – ditto) | |
| 21 | Fairy creature returned around course, working to provide light (9) | |
| FLUORESCE | ELF (‘fairy creature’) reversed or ‘returned’ round an anagram of COURSE – anagrind is ‘working’ | |
| 22 | It’s dropped when a new idea comes to mind (5) | |
| PENNY | Cryptic definition – the PENNY drops when a new idea comes to mind | |
| 23 | Spain and Holland debate cutting university supplement (7) | |
| ENLARGE | E (Spain) NL (Holland) ARG |
|
| 25 | Elaboration of prime South Australian motto (7) | |
| IMPRESA | An anagram of PRIME – anagrind is ‘elaboration’ + S A (South Australian) | |
| 26 | House adjourned, about to receive indication of the future? (9) | |
| HOROSCOPE | HO (house) ROSE (adjourned, as in ending a session in court, say) round COP (receive) | |
| 27 | Anger after disposing of one, receiving zero value (5) | |
| WORTH | WR |
|
| Down | ||
| 1 | Liberal party at first beats a depressing situation (8) | |
| DOLDRUMS | L (Liberal) with DO (party) first + DRUMS (beats) | |
| 2 | Inclination to take care of encyclopaedia (8) | |
| TENDENCY | TEND (take care of) ENCY (abbreviation for ‘encycopaedia’) | |
| 3 | Electronic accessory in fashion, with millions in support (5) | |
| MODEM | MODE (fashion) M (millions) | |
| 4 | Plus-fours, used oddly, may possibly be unnecessary (11) | |
| SUPERFLUOUS | An anagram of PLUS-FOURS and U |
|
| 5 | Ready to get rid of cold remnants of fire (3) | |
| ASH | ||
| 6 | Change involving you and the French leads to ill-humour (9) | |
| PETULANCE | PENCE (change) round or ‘involving’ TU (‘you’ in French) and LA |
|
| 7 | Man expressing Cockney view of beer and wine (6) | |
| ALFRED | ‘ALF (‘Cockney view of beer’ – a ‘half’-pint dropping the ‘h’) RED (wine) | |
| 8 | Thin stringed instrument requiring two players? (6) | |
| DILUTE | LUTE (stringed instrument) after DI– (prefix denoting ‘two’) – a rather fanciful image of two players playing one instrument | |
| 13 | Emulates tit, flying a distance (7,4) | |
| STATUTE MILE | An anagram of EMULATES TIT – anagrind is ‘flying’ | |
| 15 | Composer right to interrupt novelist – this stuff stinks (9) | |
| AMBERGRIS | BERG (composer) R (right) in or ‘interrupting’ AMIS (novelist) | |
| 16 | Report of wet weather costly for Lapland herd (8) | |
| REINDEER | A homophone (‘report’) of RAIN (wet weather) DEAR (costly) | |
| 17 | Expert‘s latitude in my operation picked up at hospital (8) | |
| POLYMATH | L (latitude) in MY OP (operation) all reversed or ‘picked up’ + AT H (hospital) | |
| 19 | A slave upset husband again (6) | |
| AFRESH | A SERF (slave) reversed or ‘upset’ + H (husband) | |
| 20 | Objection over misguided King dismissing a servant (6) | |
| BUTLER | BUT (objection) LE |
|
| 22 | Fruit tree father’s taken in hand (5) | |
| PAPAW | PA (father) in PAW (hand) | |
| 24 | Eastern game revealing self-confidence (3) | |
| EGO | E (Eastern) GO (game) | |
Slight typo in 6d – should be petulAnce. And 4a DOES start with an anagram of ‘was’. Very clever. No theme spotted here either. Thanks to S&B.
Thanks Paul A – blog corrected. Apologies for our parsing of 4a – yes, it does start with an anagram of WAS but then the M is unclued – as you say, very clever!
Very nice-not as tough as sometimes but delightful as usual.
Thanks Phi and B&J
Na-na na-na na-na na-na
Na-na na-na na-na na-na
might help, if the wrong medium.
Thanks Phi, B&J
Very good, with a few more helpful nudges than usual. I googled Alfred Butler, thinking he might be a polymath. Not quite, but as usual google knows what you’re looking for.
After Phi’s comment indicating there was a theme, Joyce tried Michael Caine and Absolute Zero. Thanks for the hint Phi and many thanks James for finding the Batman connection. Had Phi said – dinner dinner dinner dinner – we would have got there straight away!
Saw the theme for once whilst solving. With MICHAEL CAINE and ALFRED PENNYWORTH (7d,22a,27a) staring at me. Didn’t know IMPRESA or STATUTE MILE, but easy to get from the clues. Phi at his easiest I thought. Thanks to S&B.
Nice medium difficulty puzzle. We needed to check in Chambers after we worked out IMPRESA for 25ac, and also ‘ency’ as an abbreviation in 2dn. Not sure that a MODEM is an accessory these days – more an essential and usually built-in, but that’s a minor point. Didn’t spot the theme but (obviously) it wasn’t necessary to know it to solve the puzzle.
All very enjoyable but no real CoD. Thanks, Phi and B&J.
Didn’t have an inkling about the theme – not up my street – but that didn’t detract from enjoyment of the puzzle.
25a was new as was the composer in 15d but both easy enough to find from the wordplay.
16d may be a chestnut but it still made me smile.
Thanks to Phi and to B&J for the blog.
Good puzzle, clearly clued. Still don’t know what the theme is, but not bothered.
Thanks all three and good weekend to all.
Nice puzzle. Had to work out the unknown IMPRESA from wordplay, and failed to parse PETULANCE, otherwise all present and correct. Missed the theme of course! Spotted the devious anagramatical red herring in 4a. Thanks Phi and B&J
I’m sure our setter has seen it before, but from today’s i crossword, which I’ve just finished:
Very acidic letter to Timon? (3)
Go on, then, spell the theme out in words of one syllable, please.
Good Evening Kathryn’s Dad – if you read our comment @6 you will see that there is a Batman theme. MICHAEL CAINE played the BUTLER called ALFRED PENNYWORTH.
http://batman.wikia.com/wiki/Alfred_Pennyworth_(Michael_Caine)
Our son was not very impressed with us today as we missed the theme completely. There may be other links that have passed us by.
Incidentally, a bit of comics trivia. I read DC comics in the sixties and it seems Alfred was killed off (in 1964, according to Wikipedia). But then the TV series started in 1966 and Alfred was a popular character in that so DC had to revive him. A villain called the Outsider turned out to be a revived Alfred. Batman and Robin caught him and turned him back into his own self.