A feast of jumbling from the Panjandrum of anagrams Sayang this morning.
Anagrams galore, some lengthy parses and a talking-point or two beside. Pretty good for a Tuesday. Thanks, Sayang.
| Across | ||
| 1 | GLOSSY | Highly polished magazine (6) |
| Double definition. | ||
| 4 | MALAYSIA | Set sail, May, to a tropical country (8) |
| Anagram (‘set’) of SAIL MAY + A. | ||
| 9 | ACTUAL | Stroke oddly not curable – it’s true (6) |
| ACT (‘stroke’, in the sense of a deed or action, as in ‘at a stroke’), then even letters (‘not oddly’ as it were) of ‘cUrAbLe’. | ||
| 10 | INSTRUCT | Show popular street game to class teachers initially (8) |
| IN (‘popular’) + ST[reet] + R[ugby] U[nion] – a ‘game’ – + intial letters of Class Teachers. Phew. | ||
| 12 | FOOL | Sweet Charlie (4) |
| Double def. | ||
| 13 | ANTHRACITE | Worker with time for a quote for solid fuel (10) |
| ANT (‘worker’) + H[ou]R (‘time’) + A + CITE (‘quote’). | ||
| 15 | TRANQUILLITY | State of serenity in the lunar sea (12) |
| Sea of Tranquillity, of course, long-haul vacation destination for 12 U.S. men. | ||
| 18 | CATASTROPHIC | Socratic path disastrous and tragic (12) |
| Anagram (‘disastrous’) of SOCRATIC PATH. | ||
| 21 | REPLICATOR | Unravelled racier plot for clone producer (10) |
| Anagram of RACIER PLOT. | ||
| 22 | FREE | Release without charge (4) |
| Double def. Easy and familiar but still elegant. | ||
| 24 | ICE HOUSE | Dies of cold here (3,5) |
| Cryptic definition, ‘dies of cold’ being, I take it, cubes of ice. Couple of quibbles: I’d orginally entered ‘ice cubes’ with some confidence and still think it works, which is slightly unfair. The other quibble is that the plural of ‘die’ in the sense of a cube is surely ‘dice’. There’s always the Wrong Tree Hypothesis of course, but I’m still confidently barking up this one. | ||
| 25 | BEDSIT | Sorting out side in empty basement, a very basic accommodation (6) |
| Anagram (‘sorting out’) of SIDE in ’empty’ B(asemen)T. | ||
| 26, 27 | TREASURE ISLAND | As Turner sailed abroad for classic adventure with Hawkins (8,6) |
| Anagram (‘abroad’) of AS TURNER SAILED. | ||
| Down | ||
| 1, 19 | GRAFFITI ARTIST | His writing’s on the wall (8,6) |
| Cryptic definition. | ||
| 2 | OPTIONAL | Voluntary work Latino vandalised (8) |
| OP[us], ‘work’, + anagram (‘vandalised’) of LATINO. | ||
| 3 | SCAB | Rascal’s not out but is in captain’s cabin (4) |
| Inclusion in ‘captainS CABin’. ‘Not out’ means ‘not striking from work’ of course and may be part of the def. | ||
| 5 | ANNIHILATION | Abolition of national Hindi programme initially drafted out (12) |
| Anagram (‘programme’) of NATIONAL HINdI, with its ‘D’ (‘intially Drafted’) removed. | ||
| 6 | ATTRACTION | Crowd puller – transformation of cat into rat (10) |
| Anagram (‘transformation’) of CAT INTO RAT. | ||
| 7 | STUDIO | Rhodesian rebellion came to nothing after Smith’s tentative openers in workshop (6) |
| ‘Openers’ of S(mith’s) and T(entative), then U[nilateral] D[eclaration] of I[ndependence] then ‘0’ (‘coming to nothing’). Involved evocation of the Ian Smith era of a sadly benighted country. | ||
| 8 | ANTHEM | The Judi Dench character behind a song (6) |
| THE + M (Dench character in the Bond films) follow AN (‘A’). Last in for me, being of a generation for whom ‘Judi Dench character’ sets off a kaleidoscope of images from 60’s Stratford to the Marigold Hotel with ‘M’ trailing in about third-last. | ||
| 11 | ANTIMACASSAR | Protection against smeared mascaras (12) |
| ANTI (‘against’) + anagram (‘smeared’) of MASCARAS. Lacework antimacassars seem now to be a thing of the past, conjouring the faint aroma of Aunties. | ||
| 14 | EQUANIMOUS | Soma, unique restorative for calm (10) |
| Anagram (‘restorative’) of SOMA UNIQUE and nothing to do with Huxley. | ||
| 16 | CHARISMA | Is a charm magical and spiritual power given by God? (8) |
| Anagram (‘magical’) of IS A CHARM. | ||
| 17 | ACCEPTED | Did swallow mushroom that’s approved (8) |
| ACTED (‘did’) surrounds ‘CEP’ (the penny bun ‘mushroom’). | ||
| 19 | See 1 | |
| 20 | SPHERE | Odds on present being solidly round (6) |
| S[tarting] P[rice] (‘odds’) + HERE (‘present’). | ||
| 23 | MESS | Make a hash of dining room (4) |
| Double def. | ||
*anagram
I took the ICE HOUSE in 24a to refer to an igloo – yes, ‘dies’ as a plural is in Chambers and the OED. That was the only one that really gave me pause for thought, although I thought ANNIHILATION was a bit strong for ‘abolition’.
When I hear of Judi Dench, what comes to mind is a BBC TV series called ‘Talking To A Stranger’, which I remember when it was first shown the small matter of 50 years ago. True.
ANTIMACASSAR was my favourite. Your ‘faint aroma of Aunties’ is my ‘Grandma’s parlour’.
Thanks to Sayang and Grant.
Thanks to Sayang and Grant. Enjoyable. I took a while getting various anagrams and CDs (e.g., ANTIMACASSAR). I wasn’t sure about ICE HOUSE, my LOI, even with all the crossers, and resisted ACTUAL because of the “acted” that was part of ACCEPTED.
Thanks Sayang and Grant
Occasionally this setter will present a puzzle that ‘slightly grates’ me as I do it. Technically it proved to be sound but I found a number of answers didn’t give that little buzz of satisfaction on getting it out. Whether it was the labour involved in the construction of INSTRUCT and to a lesser extent STUDIO (could appreciate what was being done with the surface though), the odd alternative spelling of TRANQUILLITY, the stretched synonym with ANNIHILATION and abolition (I did find it in the online Oxford eventually) or the vague cryptic definition for ICE HOUSE.
Like I said, nothing particularly wrong with any of them but they just didn’t rock my boat this morning … or maybe it was just the lousy cup of coffee whilst doing it :-/.
To be a quibbler (as undoubtedly I am), The Sea of Tranquil(l)ity itself was the vacation destination of only 2 U.S. astronauts. The other 10 men were bound for other hotspots (coldspots?). The Ocean of Storms. Fra Mauro. The Sea of Holes. Oops, wait; that last one involved an entirely different set of explorers.