Very fast solve of some very sound if sometimes convoluted clueing…
… such that the blog took four times as long as the puzzle
No complaints: I’m glad I was blogging this one because there were subtleties I’d otherwise have let pass, thereby missing most of this morning’s fun. Many thanks to Peto.
| Across | ||
| 1 | BACK TO FRONT | Reversed with help near van (4,2,5) |
| BACK (to ‘help’) + TO (‘near’, roughly) + FRONT (‘van’, of, say, an army). | ||
| 7 | DIP | Sink or swim (3) |
| Nice double definition. | ||
| 9 | HEAVE | Ambassador to welcome cast (5) |
| H[is, -er] E[excellency] (‘ambassador’) + AVE (‘welcome’). Def as in ‘heave/cast overboard’ | ||
| 10 | DEFERENCE | Soldiers taken in by justification for submission (9) |
| R[oyal] E[ngineers], ‘soldiers’, in DEFENCE (‘justification’). | ||
| 11 | MARSEILLE | Hit back at witness describing trouble in port (9) |
| RAM backwards + ILL in SEE. | ||
| 12 | AMBLE | Mosey along to find doctor in drink (5) |
| MB (‘doctor’) in ALE. | ||
| 13 | ANOTHER | One more on Earth destroyed (7) |
| Anagram (‘destroyed’) of ON EARTH. | ||
| 15 | TEAL | Seconds away from theft of duck (4) |
| sTEAL without S[econds]. | ||
| 18 | SLIP | Failing to escape (4) |
| Double def. Wasn’t sure about ‘escape’ but Chambers gives it as stand-alone at 3. | ||
| 20 | LATER ON | Subsequently becoming essential to ignore tales from the east (5,2) |
| Neat reversed inclusion (‘essential to’, ‘from the east’) in igNORE TALes. | ||
| 23 | ANGER | Risk disregarding duke’s wrath (5) |
| dANGER without D[uke]. | ||
| 24 | EMBRASURE | Bit of graffiti removed from stone support on certain part of castle wall (9) |
| G (bit of ‘Graffiti’) removed from ‘gEM’ (‘stone’) + BRA (‘support’) + SURE (‘certain’). | ||
| 26 | DRACONIAN | Dorian can change to become overly strict (9) |
| Anagram (‘change’) of DORIAN CAN. | ||
| 27 | LEARN | Get to know poet by name (5) |
| Edward LEAR + N[ame]. | ||
| 28 | LOT | Biblical figure edges away from wild animal (3) |
| sLOTh without outside letters. | ||
| 29 | SPRINGBOARD | Starting point for design of Dutch prison garb (11) |
| Anagram (‘design’) of D[utch] PRISON GARB. | ||
| Down | ||
| 1 | BOHEMIAN | “Throw him a bone” comes from Virginia Woolf perhaps (8) |
| Anagram (‘throw’) of HIM A BONE. | ||
| 2 | CHAT ROOM | Right about having nothing to stop macho nonsense in place of discussion (4,4) |
| R[igh]T, reversed, + O (‘nothing’) all in anagram (‘nonsense’) of MACHO. | ||
| 3 | THERE | Extremely thorough before a sympathetic word (5) |
| Edges of ‘ThorougH’ + ERE (‘before’). | ||
| 4 | FIDDLER | One going with female for party leader is a fraud (7) |
| ‘One going’ might be a ‘piddler’, whose P (leader of ‘Party’) is replaced by F[emale]. | ||
| 5 | OFFBEAT | Unusual puzzle disappointing at first (7) |
| BEAT (to puzzle, as in ‘it beats me’) after OFF (‘disappointing’), as in “that’s a bit off, old thing”. | ||
| 6 | TERMAGANT | Overbearing woman’s word against a couple of Gambian conservationists (9) |
| TERM (‘word’) then A + 1st 2 letters of ‘GAmbian’ + N[ational] T[rust]. | ||
| 7 | DANUBE | River god is lost – captivated by heartless Danae (6) |
| ANUBis (Egyptian god without IS) within outside letters of DanaE. | ||
| 8 | PEEPER | Repeated exercises involving end of muscle attached to right eye (6) |
| PE x 2 (‘repeated excercises’) around end of ‘musclE’ then R[ight]. | ||
| 14 | HILARIOUS | Girl not entirely finding debts very funny (9) |
| HILARy + IOUS (‘debts’). | ||
| 16 | BROUHAHA | British Airways admits sick German taking flight to Hawaii causes uproar (8) |
| BA includes ROUgH (‘sick’, without G[erman]) + HA[waii]. | ||
| 17 | INTERNED | Bury study written up in confinement (8) |
| INTER (to ‘bury’) + DEN (‘study’), reversed (‘written up’ in this Down clue). | ||
| 19 | PREMIER | First rock band introduced to a member of the nobility reportedly (7) |
| The band REM in PIER, homophone (‘reportedly’) of ‘peer’. | ||
| 20 | LEBANON | Country club oddly rejected accepting earl immediately (7) |
| Even letters of ‘cLuB’ around ‘E[arl]’ + ANON (‘immediately’). | ||
| 21 | SANDAL | Shoe polish applied liberally at first (6) |
| SAND (to ‘polish’) + 1st letters of ‘Applied Liberally’. | ||
| 22 | AGHAST | Shocked when Georgia served up bear once (6) |
| G[eorgi]A, reversed upward, + HAST, old form (‘once’) of ‘have’ = ‘bear’ as in “thou hast a villain’s face” = “you bear” sim. | ||
| 25 | AD-LIB | Extempore offering from well-read libertarian (2-3) |
| Inclusion in ‘..reAD LIBertarian’. | ||
*anagram
I’d agree with fast but convoluted and can quite understand how blogging it would take longer than solving it (which is quite often the case in my experience)
Thanks to PETO and Grant
COD SANDAL.
Thanks Peto & Grant.
Don’t know about a fast solve, but I certainly missed some of the subtleties!
15a theft = STEAL? Don’t think so . . .
To AdamH @4:
Yup, Chambers:
“Noun (informal)
1. An act of stealing, a theft”.
Coming to this late but re 16d, the official (US) abbreviation for Hawaii is HI not HA.
Thanks Peto and Grant
Nice blog! Took about the average time to solve across a couple of sittings. Seemed to be a lot of convoluted charades to unravel in the word play throughout. Was able to get most of them, but wasn’t able to parse BROUHAHA.
Finished in the SE corner with that BROUHAHA, LEBANON, LEAR and EMBRASURE the last few in.