Independent 9875 / Monk

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It’s a while since I blogged a puzzle by Monk.

 

 

 

There seemed to be a lot of slang or informal language references in this puzzle, in both the clues and the entries, possibly enough to make it a theme.

There’s one clue where I can’t get the wordplay to work.  That’s the clue for PSALTERY at 3 down.  I’m sure someone will point out how it should be parsed.

My last one in was POIROT, 21 down, where I took a long time to see the definition was ‘busy’ and HERCULEAN referred to HERCULE POIROT.

I started off quite quickly with the acrosses on the left-hand side but then ground to a halt for a while before getting a foothold in the South East corner.

I needed a dictionary to check that PASTE could refer to fine glass as that’s not a definition I have come across before.  Also, LEISTERS was a new word to me, but the crossing letters helped derive the entry.

Across
No Clue Wordplay Entry

5

 

Singular old soccer star, not unknown to be an untidy sort (6)

 

S (singular) + CRUYFF (reference Johan CRUYFF [1947 – 2016], Dutch professional footballer and coach who scored many goals in his glittering career) excluding (not) Y (a letter frequently used to denote an unknown value in a mathematical equation)

S CRUFF

SCRUFF (untidy person)

 

7

 

PM once upset a king, e.g. James 1 (8)

(I [Roman numeral for one; a] + LEAR [reference Shakespeare’s king LEAR] + SID [reference SID James {1913 – 1976}, comic actor]) all reversed (upset)

(DIS RAEL I)<

DISRAELI (reference Benjamin DISRAELI [1804 – 1881] former [once] British Prime Minister)

 

9

 

The same old turns covered by prison entertainer (8)

 

(IDEM [Latin for ‘the same’] + O [old]) all reversed (turns) contained in (covered by) CAN [slang for prison)

C (O MEDI)< AN

COMEDIAN (example of an entertainer)

 
10 A box I posted in the French Republic (6)

(A + TV [television set; box] + I) contained in (posted in) LA (one of the French forms of ‘the’)

L (A TV I) A

 LATVIA (reference the Republic of LATVIA, one of the Baltic countries)

11

 

 Bargain shrewdly?  Alan wheedled amazingly (5,3,4)

Anagram of (amazingly) ALAN WHEEDLED

WHEEL AND DEAL*

WHEEL AND DEAL (engage in shrewd bargaining)

 

13

 

Left after supporter, briefly showing detachment (6)

 

PATRON (supporter) excluding the final letter (briefly) N + L (left)

PATRO L

PATROL (small detachment of soldiers, etc sent on reconnaissance or to make an attack, etc)

 

14

 

Well-paid pro in confusion after rise on 4th of July (6)

 

Y (fourth letter of [fourth of] JULY) + UP (rise) + PIE (mixed state; confusion)

Y UP PIE

YUPPIE (young urban professional or upwardly-mobile person, a dismissive designation for the young city careerist. well-paid professional)

 
18 Awkward situation of disgusting wife wearing small slip (6,6)

(ICKY [repulsive; disgusting] + W [wife]) contained in (wearing) (S [small] + TICKET [slip])

S T (ICKY W) ICKET

STICKY WICKET (awkward situation)

 
21

Busy, in a Herculean way? (6)

 

POIROT (cryptic reference to Agatha Christie’s fictional detective [busy]. HERCULE POIROT who might solve a case in a HERCULEAN way)

POIROT

POIROT (fictional detective [busy is slang for a detective)

 

22

 

Bugs, getting you mostly down – E coli (8)

 

Anagram of (getting you [?]) (DOWN excluding the last letter [mostly] N and E COLI)

WOODLICE*

WOODLICE (woodlice) any of numerous isopod crustaceans of family Oniscidae, found in damp places, under stones and bark, in woodwork, among moss, etc; bugs)

 

23

 

Livingstone maybe runs in user without it (8)

 

R (runs) contained in (in) (EXPLOITER [user] excluding [without] IT)

EXPLO (R) ER

EXPLORER (David Livingstone [1813 – 1873], Scottish missionary and EXPLORER)

 

24

 

One entering names for flight (6)

 

I (Roman numeral for one) contained in (entering) STARS (celebrities; names)

STA (I) RS

STAIRS (reference a flight of STAIRS)

 

Down
No Clue Wordplay Entry

1

 

Visible shell-like coat, perhaps, reduced in width (5,3)

 

OUTER WEAR (a coat perhaps) excluding (reduced in) W (width)

OUTER EAR

OUTER EAR (visible [OUTER] part of the EAR [shell-like is an informal or slang word for EAR])

 

2

 

Collection of countries beginning to fuse into a republic, cutting cost (6)

F (first letter of [beginning to] FUSE) contained in (into) COSTA RICA (reference the Republic of COSTA RICA in Central America) excluding (cutting) COST

A (F) RICA

AFRICA (continent; collection of countries)

 
3 Instrument changing that which follows lines (8)

I’m not sure how the wordplay works here.

We’ve got PS which could refer to a postscript or something that follows a few lines of text and We’ve got ALTER (to change).. I can’t find the word ALTERY is any dictionary as I hoped that might mean ‘changing’.  So we have a Y left over.

Alternatively lines could refer to a railway or RY which leaves PSALTE to parse and I can’t see a way of doing that.

I look forward to learning how I should be parsing this.

PSALTERY (an ancient and medieval stringed instrument like the zither, played by plucking)

4

 

Delicate shade of fine glass on top of lamp (6)

 

PASTE (a fine kind of glass for making artificial gems) + L (first letter of [top of] LAMP)

PASTE L

PASTEL (descriptive of a soft, quiet, delicate shade of colour)

 

6

 

Working-class material getting better (5-3)

 

CLOTH (material) + CAP (outdo or surpass; be better)

CLOTH CAP

CLOTH-CAP (symbolic of the working-class)

 

7

 

Clear unedited broadcast having lost appeal (6)

 

Anagram of (broadcast) UNEDITED excluding (having lost) IT (sex appeal)

DENUDE*

DENUDE (strip or clear and area of land)

 

8

 

Screwed face up (4)

 

DIAL (face of a watch or clock)) reversed (up; down clue)

LAID<

LAID (both SCREWED and LAID are slang terms for having had sexual intercourse with)

 

12

 

This suppresses report of a piece (8)

 

SILENCER (cryptic definition based on the definition of PIECE as a gun)

SILENCER

SILENCER (device for reducing the sound of escaping gases by gradual expansion, used for small arms [guns] for example)

 

14

 

Prepared sterile tip on some fishing gear (8)

 

Anagram of (peppered) STERILE + S (first letter of [tip on] SOME)

LEISTER* S

LEISTERS (salmon-spears)

 
16 Odd training for cooking finishing early, with end of lesson skipped (8)

PE (physical education; training) + CULINARY (relating to cooking) excluding the final letter (finishing early) Y and excluding (skipped) N (last letter of [end of] LESSON)

PE CULIAR

 PECULIAR (odd)

17

 

Perhaps more biased means of pinning things down?

 

SKEWER (more biased)

SKEWER

SKEWER (long pin of wood or metal, a means of pinning things down)  double definition

 
18 Keen horse stuck in bottom of Becher’s Brook (6)

H (heroin; horse is slang for heroin) contained in (stuck in) (S [last letter of {bottom of} BECHER’S + RILL [small brook])

S (H) RILL

SHRILL (high pitched and piercing; keen)

 

19

 

Briefly show how bum gets rush, by the sound of it (6)

 

Anagram of (bum) SHOW excluding the final letter (briefly) W and HOW

WHOOSH*

WHOOSH (the sound of, or like that of, something large passing rapidly through the air; sound of a rush)

 
20 Persuade upon abstinence, initially stopping "one over the eight"? (4)

A (first letter of [initially] ABSTINENCE) contained in (stopping) COX (the person in control of [over] a crew of eight rowers)

CO (A) X

COAX (persuade)

 

     

13 comments on “Independent 9875 / Monk”

  2. Thanks for explaining busy=detective. Dont think I’ve heard it before. But I should have got COX for one over the eight.

    Excellent puzzle crying out for a nina. I hope someone can come and completely parse PSALTERY

    Thanks to duncanshiell and Monk.

     

  3. Cracked it!

    At the risk of spoiling Andrew’s hint, and having given it an hour.

    That which follows = 4d, PASTEL* plus RY.

    Enjoyed that., thanks to both

  4. That took some work but I got there in the end.   Slightly disappointed that there wasn’t a message round the outside of the grid, given that I noticed the ‘crenulations’ and look for one

    Thanks to Monk for the brain-stretching and duncanshiell for the explanations

  5. Some complicated parsing eg DISRAELI and a few others such as ‘busy’ for ‘detective’ which defeated me. Couldn’t explain the ‘you’ in 22a, other than to suggest it as a homonym for ‘yew’ though can’t see the indicator for this. Had to stare at 24a for ages (no indicator there either) before the penny dropped.

    Hard, but lots of good clues, of which my pick was the ‘Visible shell-like’ at 1d.

    Thanks to Duncan and Monk.

  6. Very good (as always) but also – at least for me – at the harder end of Monk’s spectrum.

    Just like others I couldn’t explain 3d and, having the answer, I left it there.

    I think in 22ac ‘you’ is just there for a better surface. One should, IMO, see it as that ‘Bugs’ can offer you (‘the solver’) DOW[n}+E COLI, like some setters use ‘A making you B’ [I am making you a tea].

    Good to see ‘our’ Johan appear in 5ac [one of my first ones in, actually] but I would like to point out that his surname is Cruijff. The Dutch language has the same vowels as English plus ij [more or less pronounced as ‘I’ here]. Added to the u one gets a double-vowel, one of quite a few, which is pronounced the same way as ui or uy [generally, impossible to pronounce correctly for an English person, although what one often hears (oi) comes close enough]. Cruyff, with a y, is the anglification (or perhaps, internationalisation (what a word!) of the footballer’s name.   The Dutch treat ij and y as different ‘letters’, the second often called ‘y-grec’. Across the North Sea, the mathematical unknown is, like in the UK, y but never ij. Does this all matter? Not really.

    Many thanks to Duncan & Monk.

  7. Quite a struggle as expected with it being Thursday and Monk, and we had to cheat for OUTER EAR – it didn’t come up in Chambers Word Wizard and we can’t find it in Chambers 13th Edition under either ‘outer’ or ‘ear’ – and even then we couldn’t parse it.  But there were some easier ones that we saw straight away, such as 9, 11 and 18 across.  COAX and POIROT took ages for the penny to drop.

    Thanks, Monk and Duncan.

  8. Thanks duncanshiell for blog and to all bloggees for comments. Please do persevere with the huge Nina, until the very end.

  10. Just finished our usual late night solve and came here to check the parsing of 3d. Pleased to see that others struggled but congratulations to Andrew for figuring out Monk’s deviousness.

    Thanks to Monk for the puzzle and also your hint about the NINA which we ‘finally’ worked out when we looked at all the across answers.

    Thanks Duncan.

  11. A nina should ideally be an added bonus (and perhaps helpful in finding the last few answers) – well, that’s what I think.

    In that sense Monk succeeded gloriously today, actually meaning I still cannot see that ‘huge’ nina.

    I looked (as B&J suggested) at the Across clues but could only see that a comedian named Poirot with a little help from a yuppie from Latvia named Disraeli took the stairs to get rid of his woodlice.

    I am looking forward to the moment someone tells me that I am plain wrong ….

  12. Sil@11:  Bertandjoyce’s use of the word ‘finally’ was what eventually tipped me off.  Look at the last letters of all the across answers.

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