Enjoyable as always. A nicely varied selection of words (for those of us that like that sort of thing) but not gratuitously obscure. Thank you Tees.
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | DERONDA | Loved returning to embrace new hero in Eliot (7) |
| ADORED (loved) reversed (returning) contains N (new) – eponymous hero of Daniel Deronda by George Eliot | ||
| 5 | HALFWIT | Fine intelligence associated with Prince Charlie (7) |
| F (fine) WIT (intelligence) following (associated with) HAL (prince Harry) | ||
| 9 | FIFTH COLUMNISTS | Animated fun with Scottish film showing collaborators (5,10) |
| anagram (animated) of FUN with SCOTTISH FILM | ||
| 10 | SMELL A RAT | Archaeologist Croft tucking into fish that’s suspect? (5,1,3) |
| LARA (Lara Croft, fictional archaeologist) inside SMELT (type of salmon, fish) | ||
| 11 | OZONE | Wizard seen here complete in bracing sea air (5) |
| OZ (wizard seen here) and ONE (complete) | ||
| 12 | SCHWA | Unstressed syllable in school was cut (5) |
| SCH (school) then WAs (cut short) | ||
| 14 | PROGNOSIS | Professional revealed spiritual knowledge in forecast (9) |
| PRO (professional) GNOSIS (revealed spiritual knowledge) | ||
| 16 | TERMAGANT | Target man flying Spitfire (9) |
| anagram (flying) of TARGET MAN | ||
| 17 | RIPEN | Become ready to eat carp — no good before noon (5) |
| gRIPE (carp) missing (no) G (good) before N (noon) | ||
| 19 | ABOUT | U-boat on the move nearby (5) |
| anagram (on the move) of U-BOAT | ||
| 20 | BRIC-A-BRAC | Cheap items almost free in black taxi drivers’ association (4-1-4) |
| RId (free, almost) inside B (black) CAB (taxi) and RAC (drivers’ association) | ||
| 22 | THREE-LEGGED RACE | Contest in which all runners finish tied? (5-6,4) |
| cryptic definition | ||
| 23 | ELECTED | Chosen people news boss put in office (7) |
| ELECT (chosen people) then ED (editor, news boss) | ||
| 24 | RANGERS | Team runs to Plantagenet stronghold (7) |
| R (runs) then ANGERS (home of the Plantagenet dynasty) – Glasgow Rangers football team | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 1 | DEFUSES | Removes risk element from brilliant exercises (7) |
| DEF (brilliant, hip-hop slang) and USES (exercises) | ||
| 2 | REFRESHER COURSE | Varied resources here to cover French study update (9,6) |
| anagram (varied) of RESOURCES HERE contains (to cover) FR (French) | ||
| 3 | NIHIL | Elvish giant oddly dismissive over nothing (5) |
| every other letter (oddly dismissed) of eLvIsH gIaNt reversed (over) | ||
| 4 | APOCRYPHA | Strange approach taken about year books (9) |
| anagram (strange) of APPROACH contains (taken about) Y (year) | ||
| 5 | HAUNT | Answer found in search for plague (5) |
| A (answer) inside HUNT (search) | ||
| 6 | LANDOWNER | Squire needs way to cross Blue River (9) |
| LANE (way) contains (to cross) DOWN (blue) then R (river) | ||
| 7 | WESTON-SUPER-MARE | Watts set out riding magnificent horse in town (6-5-4) |
| W (watts) then anagram (out) of SET ON (riding) SUPER (magnificent) MARE (horse) | ||
| 8 | TUSKERS | Elephants endlessly compact eating Welsh flower (7) |
| TERSe (compact, endless) contains (eating) USK (River Usk in Wales, something that flows) | ||
| 13 | APARTMENT | Cunning fellows housed in suitable accommodation (9) |
| ART (cunning) MEN (fellows) inside APT (suitable) | ||
| 15 | OUTRIGGER | Boat from Oxford University set off (9) |
| OU (Oxford University) then TRIGGER (set off) | ||
| 16 | TOASTIE | Member consuming wine asks for snack (7) |
| TOE (member) contains (consuming) ASTI (wine) | ||
| 18 | NUCLEUS | Setter flips about changed clue for atomic base (7) |
| SUN (setter, something that sets) reversed (flips) contains (about) anagram (changed) of CLUE | ||
| 20 | BLEED | Milk from humble educator (5) |
| found inside humBLE EDucator | ||
| 21 | AUDEN | Poet in uniform in old British colony (5) |
| U (uniform) inside ADEN (old British colony) | ||
A quick, but enjoyable, solve.
PeeDee: I am lost in admiration at your ability not only to solve but to post a detailed solution and completed grid in such a short space of time.
Incidentally, is the appearance of 22dn after yesterday’s 4dn a pure coincidence, I wonder?
Argh – 22ac I mean.
Possibly the most enjoyable Tees puzzle I have solved. Credit where due and this was welcome during my weekly battle with the Inqy
(I have to admit being a big fan of Mary Ann Evans)
Thanks Tees and PeeDee
Lots of lovely clues here making for an enjoyable solve. Didn’t know DERONDA but an easy guess. Don’t know how well 7d is known to oversea solvers but a fairly easy clue for us brits.
Liked 5a for its splitting of PRINCE CHARLIE; 9a was a wonderful anagram; and 3d was a clever reversed regular inclusion for a fairly rare word. When I first read 10a, I thought I was going to have to google archaeologists called Croft so was pleasantly surprised when I realised this was unnecessary.
Thanks to Tees and PeeDee.
A lovely crossword for a wet Sunday morning. A couple of words I had to get help with, and I also liked the Prince Charlie split. I was considering the Bonnie one and all sorts before I solved it.
Lovely crossword thank you to Tees and PeeDee
Hi Rog, your words are too kind. Sadly I am not a genius.
Unlike the other publications the editor of the Independent kindly lets the bloggers have an early sight of the puzzle so they can have the blog ready first thing on the day of publication without having to stay up all night. I often solve the puzzle the previous Sunday (if it is available) so I get the authentic lazy Sunday-morning ambience, something that comments often mention too.
What a pleasure this morning. I’m delighted Tees is such a regular setter and this was as good as I’ve come to expect with misleads and clever definitions all over the place. I like Rog’s observation: sack or wheelbarrow tomorrow?
Very lucky with DERONDA – a dnk but, for some reason, adored came to mind and Google confirmed the existence of the novel. And I’m another who loved the prince Charlie device. If I listed everything I’d ticked, I’d be simply retyping PeeDee’s list of solutions in its entirety. Three of the long ones were top notch and WESTON only fails to get there because the enumeration plus town was a bit of a giveaway (but, as Hovis says, possibly only for us Brits). Of the shorts, OZONE, ABOUT, RIPEN and the cunningly defined HAUNT were all excellent. A refreshingly different approach to clueing RANGERS and a brilliant anagram for FIFTH COLUMNISTS. With such a cornucopia of top notch clues, it’s hard to pick a COTD but it’s probably shared by PROGNOSIS and TERMAGANT for their pithyness and smooth surfaces. No, it’s not: it goes to NUCLEUS for the brilliant misdirect of ‘setter’. There, I’ve namechecked nearly half!
I know elephants are referred to as TUSKERS but have never come across the usage outside crosswords.
Thanks to Tees and PeeDee
What PostMark said, with the addition of BRIC-A-BRAC and OUTRIGGER – except that I did know Daniel Deronda. (I’m with copmus.)
Thank you, Tees and PeeDee
Eileen @10: ha! I’d have listed them too but have occasionally been guilty of over lengthy posts…
Excellent! Tees seems to have matured into a more gentle setter than once upon a time. My only cavil was with 14A, where ‘revealed’ seems superfluous. Thanks Tees and PeeDee.
excellent all round! didn’t spot the mechanism of 3dn till I’d wrestled with TROLL for a while.. well i still didn’t spot the mechanism until PeeDee pointed it out.. the solve came entirely from the checkers and a glancing acquaintance with Latin..
thanks to Tees and PeeDee for a fine start to a fine Sunday..
Very nice puzzle which despite having a couple of words that I didn’t know was a steady solve. My favourite clue was the much praised 5a.
Thanks to Tees and PeeDee.
A delightful Sunday diversion (not the railway engineering kind). A few write-ins from definition and enumeration but balanced by others that needed more thought. A change to have ‘books’ refer to APOCRYPHA rather than OT or NT. Favourite was SMELL A RAT.
Thanks, Tees and PeeDee
@12 Tatrasman – I think that “revealed” in 14A is to indicate that the knowledge has been revealed to its religious devotees or practitioners by divine means, rather than by them simply by reading a lot of books, holy or otherwise.
@5Hovis – kindly meant, but you are perhaps a little too solicitous about non-UK solvers’ difficulties. I have the advantage of being British by birth, but having lived most of my life in Australia; I don’t think knowing the place names of other than really obscure UK (or non-UK) locations should be a great challenge to those who do cryptics.
Echo all above, a wonderfully clued and entertaining puzzle.
Thanks to Tees and PeeDee.