A typical BRADMANesque Friday morning.
In what was overall a satisfactory challenge, I did find a couple of clues which I wasnt too 'comfortable' with and would like to hear what others felt about the same.
FF: 7 DD : 8
| ACROSS | ||
| 9 | MAHARISHI |
Mike has hair styled by one wise man (9)
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[ M ( Mike ) HAS HAIR ]* I ( one ) |
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| 10 | RELIC |
Holy bones maybe Roman Catholic priest collected (5)
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ELI ( priest ) in RC ( Roman Catholic ) |
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| 11 | CAMPHOR |
Oil in river by house at edge of settlement (7)
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CAMP ( settlement ) HO ( house ) R ( river ) |
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| 12 | DENIZEN |
Resident of French province sent to religious school (7)
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DE ( of, french ) NI ( province ) ZEN ( religious school ) |
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| 13 | SKI |
Slide involving some riskiness (3)
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hidden in "..riSKIness" |
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| 14 | ROMNEY MARSH |
What may excite Mrs: heron may in part of Kent (6,5)
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[ MRS HERON MAY ]* |
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| 17, 18, 19 | WINES AND DINES |
Entertains with rhyme (5,3,5)
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cryptic def |
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| 21 | ECCLESIARCH |
Northern town with one cunning old church ruler (11)
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ECCLES ( northern town ) I ( one ) ARCH ( cunning ) |
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| 23 | GEE |
Only one half of the pantomime animal? Goodness! (3)
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one half of GEE GEE ( horse, ~ pantomime animal ) |
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| 25 | KHEDIVE |
King, the fellow to go down with viceroy (7)
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K ( King ) HE ( the fellow ) DIVE ( go down ) – persian-origin word for viceroy |
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| 27 | CAPITAL |
What business needs to get going in London? (7)
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double def |
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| 28 | GENIC |
Officer in charge of biological unit (5)
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GEN ( officer ) IC ( in charge ) |
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| 29 | CRY HALVES |
What rival claimants to baby wouldn’t do for Solomon – wailing diminishes (3,6)
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CRY ( wailing ) HALVES ( diminishes ) |
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| DOWN | ||
| 1 | SMACKS |
Punishments or signs of love? (6)
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double def |
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| 2 | CHAMPION |
Winner such as Bob at Aintree in 1981? . . . . (8)
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cryptic def; the grand national in 1981 was won by a horse called aldaniti and his jockey bob CHAMPION ( had to look this reference up ) |
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| 3 | ARTHUR ASHE |
. . . . or maybe me at Wimbledon in 1975, in a rush, heart fluttering? (6,4)
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[ A RUSH HEART ]*, difficult to mark a definition within the clue as it necessarily borrows ' CHAMPION ' from 2d, so what i've marked is more like a partial def. anybody feel differently about this? |
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| 4 | TSAR |
Artist, good person set up as policy chief (4)
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RA ( artist ) ST ( good person ) , all reversed |
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| 5 | MIND-READER |
Person to tell what you’re thinking as one entering pit full of fear (4-6)
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MINER ( one entering pit ) containing DREAD ( fear ) |
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| 6 | GRAN |
Member of family, 23, participated in marathon maybe (4)
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G ( 23a, gee ) RAN ( participated in a marathon maybe ) |
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| 7 | BLAZER |
Item of clothes that is on fire? (6)
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cryptic def |
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| 8 | ACANTHUS |
Plant in a container in the manner indicated (8)
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A CAN ( container ) THUS ( in the manner indicated ) |
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| 15 | MIAMI BEACH |
Maiden, one French friend wanting to be a companion somewhere in Florida (5,5)
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M ( maiden ) I ( one ) AMI ( friend, french ) BE A CH ( companion ) |
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| 16 | MIDSHIPMAN |
Easy for one? (10)
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cryptic def; from the 1836 novel mr.midshipman easy by frederick marryat. this is just a personal quibble of mine – i didnt particularly like this clue as it seems to be near-impossible to solve as a standalone clue ( even if one knew the novel ) and necessarily needs a few crossers in, before the answer can be filled in. |
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| 17 | WRECKAGE |
A crew with keg at sea that may be afloat after accident (8)
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[ A CREW KEG ]* |
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| 20 | NEGATIVE |
A sort of image, no? (8)
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double def |
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| 22 | CLEANS |
Washes cold meat – first requirement for safety (6)
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C ( cold ) LEAN ( meat ) S ( first requirement for Safety ) |
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| 24 | ENLIST |
Listen, stupid recruit! (6)
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[ LISTEN ]* |
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| 26 | ITCH |
Have a desire to reside in Whitchurch (4)
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hidden in "..whITCHurch"; i did consider marking 'have a.." as part of the def but it seemed just a tad off to do that. |
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| 27 | CAYS |
Banks contain all your savings? Only bits of them (4)
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starting letters of "..Contain All Your Savings.." |
Thanks for the blog. I think 3D is good use of the ….. for once. As you say the CHAMPION definition is following on from the previous clue.
I share your qualms about 16D , reference is too obscure for no further help. I have seen this clued as P.
Thanks Bradman and Turbolegs
26dn: I think the definition needs to be all of “Have a desire”, taking the answer as a verb. Although “desire” on its own would be good enough to define ITCH as noun, that would leave the first two words doing nothing in the clue.
Having lived in SE England and Naples Florida, the two place names came easily and let me finish the puzzle. One quibble – CAMPHOR is a solid not an oil. Camphorated oil is a solution of camphor in mineral oil. Thanks Bradman and Turbolegs.
Maybe just me but I made heavy weather of this. I’d never heard of an ECCLESIARCH and KHEDIVE was only (very vaguely) familiar. I was also put off by LEAN for ‘meat at 22d. CRY HALVES was another unknown which went in from wordplay alone.
Good to have the ARTHUR ASHE reference.
Thanks to Bradman for a real challenge (hardest of the day) and to Turbolegs
John@4: FWIW, in the US, at least, we refer to “camphor oil”, so one could argue that camphor is a kind of oil.
I agree with Turbolegs about 16d, especially never having heard of the novel. I needed some help from an app for Romney Marsh, ecclesiarch, and khedive, but otherwise an enjoyable puzzle. Loved Maharishi.
Thanks to Bradman and Turbolegs.
1) Midshipman Easy was (I thought) a very old chestnut, but a less lazy setter might have added an anagram if he could have found one. Clueing the word by P is simply awful.
2) Camphor belongs to the oils chemically, according to the OED, and since Chambers calls it a solid oil, I think we are OK. Definitions have to be simple and accurate and I could not give a longer definition easily.
Anyway, I am glad that most of it went down well. Thank you.
Like most Bradman grids, I found this tough but enjoyable, mostly. I agree with Roz about the correct linking of those sporting clues at 2 and 3 which were among my favourites. Initially, I thought of Sherdar for 2 (right year but Ascot not Aintree) but it wouldn’t fit and CHAMPION was a lucky guess.
Also guessed ECCLESIARCH correctly but failed on KHEDIVE and had not a hope of solving MIDSHIPMAN without all the crossers.
I liked WINES AND DINES, GEE, ROMNEY MARSH and NEGATIVE.
I was puzzled at to where the ‘h’ for MIAMI BEACH came from and despite reading the blog, I’m still unsure. Also thought ‘item of clothes’ (rather than clothing) sounded odd but maybe that’s just me.
I was well entertained nevertheless and learned something new so thanks to Bradman and Turbolegs.
Diane @ 8
CH = Companion of Honour (a regal gift title), and is a crossword staple, so best save it in your etui.
Diane@8, I think the H comes from “companion” meaning “Companion of Honour” (CH).
An enjoyable, not too taxing solve – my only slight quibble was CRY HALVES, where the sense is obvious but the phrase is completely unknown to me. Perfectly happy with MIDSHIPMAN – I’m sure I’ve seen it before.
Thank you, Simon S and Perplexed. I will indeed make a note of this.
Thanks to turbolegs and Brahman. I have to agree with the setter on 16d, I needed some tea tray polish after I saw it!
Esoterica aside this was a fairly decent crossword. I gave up on CAYS and CRY HALVES and needed a word finder for MIDSHIPMAN and ECCLESIARCH but all else seemed to fall into place. Thanks to both.
Well I’ve read the 16dn book… so was kicking myself .. as I still struggled.. the 2 sports names were well-known so were quite straight forward .. Arthur Ashe had cardiac problems so the clue was extra good! Altogether a bit of a legend.. as was/is Bob Champion.. I didn’t know KHEDIVE or ECCLESIARCH so they required looking up.. clueing was all good but grateful for the blog.. n CH!!
Thanks Bradman n Turbolegs
Thanks both as I found this a bit of a struggle. That was mainly because I saw “bob” in 2d and tossed in SHILLING thinking it was the name of the winning horse. It eventually all unfolded and I only got MIDSHIPMAN because of the crossers. It would be fair to say the grey matter was more disturbed than usual.
The only thing we had any problem with was CRY HALVES – an expression we’d not heard before although we were familiar with ‘go halves’. The refernce, btw, is to the Old Testament – 1st book of Kings, chapter 3.
MIDSHIPMAN was fine by us. In most crosswords we would expect to need crossers to get at least a couple of answers although if it’s almost every answer that’s a different matter – and conversely if all the answers can be got without help from crossers there’s not much of a challenge.
Favourite was ROMNEY MARSH – reminding us of encountering in, I think, Ashford, a guy wearing a T-shirt emblazoned with ‘Romney Marsh Mountain Rescue Team’!
Thanks, Bradman and Turbolegs.
Sorry Perplexus, for misspelling your handle. Cheeky autocorrect!
Mostly enjoyable, but I would never have got 29a (still don’t understand it) or 16d. And why is “lean””meat”?
Geoff@18: “Lean” is the nonfatty part of meat. I thought of the old nursery rhyme: “Jack Sprat could eat no fat, his wife could eat no lean; And so, between the both of them, they licked the platter clean.”
Thanks, Bradman and Turbolegs. Somewhere remotely I had heard of Midshipman Easy. I had to look up 2d and 3d in Wikipedia, and 14a wasn’t familiar, but all made sense. Favorites were 3d when figured out, 7d and 8d. Good solve.
Thanks Jeff. I’d forgotten that nursery rhyme! I tried to put “adjective” for 16d, but it didn’t fit!
Thanks Bradman and Turbolegs
An old one that I just got around to and an enjoyable solve with some answers having to be dragged up from memory and others that still needed to be looked up and checked. A couple that I didn’t parse – CAMPHOR (got stuck with CAM as the river and couldn’t progress) and GEE (where didn’t twig to the colloquial horse being a panto animal).
Had to do a double take to get KHEDIVE on the final run through. CRY HALVES was new as was ECCLESIARCH (was happy to remember ECCLES as the town and was able to piece the rest together). Also had to look up the Grand National winning jockey, but remembered ARTHUR ASHE winning Wimbledon all those years ago.
Finished in the NW corner with SMACKS, CAMPHOR and CHAMPION the last few in.