I always enjoy puzzles from Julius. For me they have a consistently high concentration of penny-drop-moments: those jumps from from “WTF is this about?” to “Aha, of course!”. Thank you Julius.
| Across | ||
| 1 | TENNIS | Time to spoil 9’s game? (6) |
| T (time) then anagram (to spoil) of NINE’S (9’s) | ||
| 4 | STEMWARE | Gaze fixedly about space with glasses (8) |
| STARE (gaze fixedly) contains (about) EM (space, printing) W (with) | ||
| 9 | LAPSED | Backsliding Liberal Democrat: “Recess? Get stuffed!” (6) |
| LD (Liberal Democrat) containing (stuffed with) APSE (recess). I can’t really explain how the containment indicator works here. Not a complaint, just a note to beginners that if they can’t figure this out then not to worry, neither can I. | ||
| 10 | BRUCE LEE | Spooner’s runny French cheese … man, packed a helluva punch (5,3) |
| a Spoonerism of “loose Brie” (runny french cheese) | ||
| 12 | FOURPENCE | 4d united in favour of the VP (9) |
| U FOR PENCE (united in favour of Mike Pence, the VP) – d is an old symbol for pennies | ||
| 13, 27 | RUGBY SEVENS | Public school’s 50/50 to make the game (5,6) |
| RUGBY’S (a public school) then EVENS (50/50) | ||
| 14 | BEEF WELLINGTON | Meat dish (hopefully not as tough as old boots) (4,10) |
| cryptic definition | ||
| 17 | ECONOMIC GROWTH | Order two more gnocchi – it’s good for business (8,6) |
| anagram (order) TWO MORE GNOCCHI | ||
| 21 | NADAL | In Barcelona, Dali is an acknowledged genius (5) |
| found inside barceloNA DALi – Rafael Nadal – a genius at tennis. I don’t know much about tennis apart from what Wikipedia tells me but I assume this is right. | ||
| 22 | OVERDRANK | Nose to tail Channel port vehicle queue had a few too many (9) |
| DOVER (Channel port) first letter to the end (nose to tail) then RANK (a vehicle queue, taxis) | ||
| 24 | FIVE SETS | Grand Prix tops conserving energy, a test for 21 at 1 across (4,4) |
| FI (Formula One, Grand Prix) then VESTS (tops) containing (conserving) E (energy) – a test for Nadal at tennis | ||
| 25 | SIX-GUN | Tabloid featuring nine grand revolver (3-3) |
| SUN (The Sun, a tabloid newspaper) contains (featuring) IX (nine) G (grand) | ||
| 26 | DERISION | In retirement Blofeld became a father, getting ridicule (8) |
| NO I (code name of Blofeld in James Bond) SIRED (became a father) all reversed (in retirement) | ||
| 27 | See 13 | |
| Down | ||
| 1 | TELL FIBS | Being economical with the truth, criminally libels FT (4,4) |
| anagram (criminally) of LIBELS FT | ||
| 2 | NEPTUNE | Returning to write melody, one by Holst? (7) |
| PEN (to write) reversed (returning) then TUNE (melody) – the final movement of Holst’s The Planets suite | ||
| 3 | ICE-UP | Frost admitting “I like a drink” (3-2) |
| sounds like (admitting) “I sup” (I like a drink) | ||
| 5 | THREE WITCHES | When drunk, Cher Tweets “Hi, weird sisters” (5,7) |
| anagram (when drunk) of CHER TWEETS HI | ||
| 6 | MACGREGOR | Scottish family magazine including chapter upsetting Roger (9) |
| MAG (magazine) contains C (chapter) then anagram (upsetting) of ROGER | ||
| 7 | ALLEGRO | Everybody say “Romania!” quickly (7) |
| ALL (everybody) EG (for example, say) RO (Romania) | ||
| 8 | EVELYN | Waugh visiting Kiev, Ely, Naples (6) |
| found inside (visiting) kiEV ELY Naples | ||
| 11 | ONE LUMP OR TWO | The old dromedary/camel question posed by acting mother? (3,4,2,3) |
| double cryptic definition – two questions on humps and sugar lumps. “I’ll be mother” is an expression meaning “I will pour the tea” | ||
| 15 | WINE LISTS | Lewis isn’t broadcast in places where Bergerac might be shown (4,5) |
| anagram (broadcast) of LEWIS ISN’T | ||
| 16 | THE KINKS | Poor Keith Moon’s last Kansas get-together for the band (3,5) |
| anagram (poor) of KEITH mooN (last letter of) KS (Kansas) | ||
| 18 | CADAVER | Hearse transporting ex-PM’s body (7) |
| CAR (hearse) contains (transports) DAVE (David Cameron, ex-PM) | ||
| 19 | WRANGLE | Wife called; left message, ending in noisy argument (7) |
| W (wife) RANG (called) L (left) then messagE (ending of) | ||
| 20 | KNIFED | I had dinner after King Duncan finally got stabbed (6) |
| I FED (had dinner) following K (king) and duncaN (final letter of) | ||
| 23 | DRIVE | “Doctor: I have reduced libido” (5) |
| DR (doctor) I’VE (I have, reduced) | ||
definitions are underlined
I write these posts to help people get started with cryptic crosswords. If there is something here you do not understand ask a question; there are probably others wondering the same thing.
Thanks Julius and PeeDee
Entertaining as ever from Julius, and as usual there’s a mini theme. Dotted around the answers are ONE, TWO, THREE, FOUR, FIVE, SIX and SEVEN. Nice touch.
Thanks Julius & PeeDee.
In 9 across I think that Julius has adjusted the inclusion indicator to reflect language recently employed by the Party to express its opposition to Brexit.
Nice spot Simon. Rather glaringly obviously in hindsight but I managed to miss it.
No problem with inclusion indicator for 9a. Bit unusual but essentially telling “apse” to get stuffed into LD.
For 6d, “upsetting roger” presumably is meant to indicate reversal rather than any old anagram.
Don’t remember the Blofeld code name but clearly must be right.
Thanks to Julius and PeeDee.
Further to Simon’s comment, I wondered after seeing TEN in 1a if 8 & 9 are hidden somewhere. Well, in a sense 9 is part of the anagrind 1a and Neptune is planet number 8. Hah, always like to stretch things past the breaking point.
As a long time solver of American cryptics but relatively new to British ones I appreciate PeeDee’s tutoring. Where else could I have learned that “I’ll be mother” means “I will pour the tea.” Even though I got ONE LUMP OR TWO, I had no clue where “acting mother” fit into the parsing. As always,Julius never disappoints.
Thanks to Julius and PeeDee. I did know “mother,” even in the US but not THE KINKS (though I did parse it) and was slow to get CADVAVERS and ICE-UP.
THE KINKS are very well known in the US to fans of Brit pop. One of their well known songs, Waterloo Sunset, could even be a double definition clue in some setter’s cryptic.
Tony Santucci @ 7: It’s already been clued, though not as DD, by Punk (aka Paul & Mudd) in Indy 10058 on January 8 this year
6D: Battlestar ready for song by 4 [the solution to 4 was THE KINKS, and it was a Kinks-themed puzzle].
Btw PeeDee, just noticed FOURPRNCE? Whoops!
(And, in case anyone cares, “if” in parsing of 6d should be “of”.)
Thanks to PeeDee for the blog and to those who have commented. My wife especially enjoyed your preamble – I think she sees part of her life in it
Warmest regards to all, Rob/Julius
Yes, a typical Julius, very enjoyable (and, as ever, very doable).
Quite amused to see someone not knowing who The Kinks are/were.
I parsed 9ac just like Hovis. That said, how is ‘backsliding’ synonymous to ‘lapsed’?
If I’m picky (but why should I?) then I would question ‘admitting’ as a proper homophone indicator in 3d?
The excellent blog (thx, PeeDee!) gives ‘got stabbed’ as the definition in 20d.
I think it should just be ‘stabbed’ which leaves us with the link word ‘got’.
I am not keen on such a word being in the past tense but, yep, the surface needed it.
Good stuff, for which thanks to Julius.
Definition for 20 down fixed now, thanks Sil.
There is one more thing that I wanted to say (but forgot to do).
Where the Guardian happily fulfils its role as the Grauniad, the FT crossword has its regularly typos too.
Today, I did not understand why (in 15d) Lewis was written in italics and Bergerac was not.
I also didn’t see why ‘Tweets’ (in 5d) started with a capital.
Ah well, in the end it’s probably not really important.
Hi Sil, perhaps italics is used for emphasis, to emphasize that Lewis is important in this sentence (Lewis rather than any other detective show). Presumably Tweets is capitalized a proper noun, derived from Twitter.
Thanks Julius and PeeDee
Spent only around 20 minutes (about half normal) to fill in the grid but probably 2-3 times that time to properly figure out the word play and then still missed the theme. I also didn’t manage to properly parse FOURPENCE, FIVE SETS or the “I’ll be mother” part of 11d (a British phrase that I always have to be re-reminded of).
Lots of interesting clues as per normal from this setter and much deeper meanings in them than what first appeared to be there. New learnings included the James Bond character, the Bergerac wine district and the Holst work (which I actually remembered when I had to look him up again).
A very enjoyable crossword.