Independent 10,806 by Monk

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The puzzle is available here.

 

Hello everyone.  Today the tonsured one gives us plenty to puzzle over.  I enjoyed the brain strain, especially the fusion of musical dramas in 21a – a very competent clue – and the 17d’s synthetic tongue.  Thanks Monk!

Monk usually has a nina but I can’t see anything.  Any illumination you can provide will go in this space …

 

Definitions are underlined in the clues below.  In the explanations, quoted indicators are in italics, explicit [deletions] are in square brackets, and I’ve capitalised and emboldened letters which appear in the ANSWER.  For clarity, I omit most link words and some juxtaposition indicators.

 

Across

1a    Lusty pics nonce cut out (12)
CONCUPISCENT
PICS NONCE CUT anagrammed (out)

10a   Grasps one dumped in ditch in terrible condition? (9)
ECLAMPSIA
CLAMPS (grasps) and I (one) “dumped in” EA (ditch)

11a   Turn page, interrupting trick (5)
SPELL
P (page) inside (interrupting) SELL (trick)

12a   Fellow rep offering blood products (7)
FACTORS
F (fellow) + ACTORS (rep, repertory)

14a   City bar rejected personal-hygiene equipment (7)
BATHTUB
BATH (city) + BUT (bar) reversed (rejected)

16a   Appetiser containing a mostly whitish flour (9)
WHEATMEAL
WHET (appetiser) containing A + MEALy (whitish) without its last letter (mostly …).  I didn’t know whet could be a noun

18a   First to join ends of optical nerve fibre (5)
ISTLE
IST (first) + the last letters of (ends of) opticaL nervE.  Chambers tells us this is a valuable fibre obtained from Agave, Bromelia, and other plants

19a   Align compass and sail along (5)
RANGE
Three definitions, at least one of which I needed to verify in Chambers

20a   Prima ballerina assoluta about to follow movie symbol for text? (9)
PICTOGRAM
MARGOT (Fonteyn, prima ballerina assoluta) reversed (about) after (to follow) PIC (movie)

21a   Incompetent fusion of Japanese and short musical dramas (2-5)
NO-HOPER
A fusion of two musical dramas, the first – NOH – Japanese and the second – OPERa – missing its last letter (short)

22a   Vulgarian charge overturned prior to brief rendezvous (7)
PARVENU
RAP (charge) reversed (overturned) before (prior to) all but the last letter of (brief) VENUe (rendezvous)

23a   Cardinal quits after getting back to front (5)
SEVEN
It’s a cardinal number: EVENS (quits) with the last letter moved to the front (after getting back to front)

25a   Man turning something that won’t come free without power tool (4,5)
NAIL PUNCH
IAN (man) reversed (turning) + LUNCH (something that won’t come free, idiomatically speaking) around (without) P (power)

27a   Slender leak causing squeak (6,6)
NARROW ESCAPE
A charade of NARROW (slender) and ESCAPE (leak)

 

Down

2d    Endlessly humble wiseacre (3)
OWL
Without the first or last letters (endlessly), lOWLy (humble)

3d    Switched mail order with inferior packaging that’s made of recycled waste (7,4)
COMPOST HEAP
POST (mail) and OM (order, Order of Merit) with their orders switched inside (with … packing) CHEAP (inferior)

4d    Exercises help us to get money (5)
PESOS
PE (exercises) + SOS (help us)

5d    Throw up after meat, so outwardly chaotic (9)
SHAMBOLIC
LOB (throw) reversed (up) goes after HAM (meat), with SIC (so) around it (outwardly)

6d    Twiddle one’s thumbs when ending letter (3)
ESS
The last letters of (… when ending) twiddlE one’S thumbS

7d    A number failed to stop the try when playing English (6-5)
TWENTY-THREE
WENT (failed) inside (to stop) an anagram of (… when playing) THE TRY + E (English)

8d    Number-one cognitive quality (4-9)
SELF-AWARENESS
A cryptic definition, with “number-one” referring to the self

9d    Gossips in unruly rabble spout nonsense for circulating (13)
BLABBERMOUTHS
An anagram of (unruly) RABBLE + MOUTH (spout) with BS (nonsense) around the outside (for circulating)

13d   Groomed families welcoming European asylum (5-6)
CLEAN-SHAVEN
CLANS (families) containing (welcoming) E (European) + HAVEN (asylum)

15d   Toxic pro hit out, loosening up when shaken? (11)
THIXOTROPIC
TOXIC PRO HIT anagrammed (out)

17d   Synthetic tongue person ate anyhow (9)
ESPERANTO
PERSON ATE anagrammed (anyhow)

22d   Spring frost after 2nd of April (5)
PRIME
RIME (frost) after the 2nd letter of aPril

24d   And not the last sightings of Captain Horatio Hornblower (3)
NOR
The last letters of (last sightings of) CaptaiN HoratiO HornbloweR

26d   Shag and doze off (3)
NAP
A cheeky double definition to finish.  This is of course shag as in shagpile

28 comments on “Independent 10,806 by Monk”

  1. Well, that took a lot of working out but got there in the end. I looked up EA for ditch (without much hope) only to remember doing the same last time it cropped up.

    Really enjoyed the workout. As for a theme, I suspect TWENTY THREE & SEVEN & PRIME FACTORS are involved but that’s as far as I got. Perhaps, the ALSO SIX in 6 & 8 are relevant?

  3. Hmm. And Solution 7 is TWENTY THREE whilst solution 23 is SEVEN. Which would seem one heckuva coincidence.

  4. Well, we completed it but almost every clue was either unparsed or left us saying “that’s not really a synonym”. But the only ones I can’t see at all are ea for ditch (Hovis obviously understands but no amount of googling helped me), and what the significance of 23 and 7 are – hopefully not just random numbers. Will wait for enlightenment.

  5. Thank Hovis and PostMark. I remember now thinking that the numbers in the grid may be to commemorate something. Should have spotted PRIME FACTORS though.

    TWENTY THREE times SEVEN is 161, one SIX one, so I wondered if the SIX appears for that reason – but can’t see any ONEs …

  6. Ericw @4 – sorry, I should have explained ea. Definitely more of a barred puzzle word.
    Chambers defines it as:
    (dialect) noun
    1. A river
    2. Running water
    3. A drainage channel in the Fens, sometimes eau, as if taken from French

    It’s not in Collins or ODE but is in the SOED, defined a bit more pithily as a stream, a watercourse; a drainage canal, a sewer.

  8. I think with the PRIME FACTORS SEVEN and TWENTY THREE, I would put my money (well a few pennies of it) on this being Monk’s 161st Crossword for the Indy.

  11. Don’t usually tango with this setter when he’s wearing his Monk’s habit and this was a forceful reminder of why I made that decision – a very difficult solve for me and more than a few answers which I needed help to parse. Chambers and Google got me across the line and Kitty provided the explanations where necessary but I found it rather too hard to be enjoyable – probably above my pay grade!

    Thanks nonetheless to Monk for the challenge and to Miss K and the kitty cats for all the whys and wherefores.

  12. I found this to be more tractable than Monk’s recent offerings, but even so there were few write-ins and it took me some time at the end to get the crossing OWL then ECLAMPSIA. Never heard of THIXOTROPIC before, even in crossword-land and bunged in WHEATMEAL from the def alone. Didn’t know what to make of TWENTY-THREE and SEVEN. Maybe Monk will drop in to confirm if Kitty is correct.

    Favourite was SHAMBOLIC, perversely (as used about and by me at least) a term not always with negative connotations.

    Thanks to Monk and Kitty

  13. Thanks Monk and Kitty!

    Is EA an abbreviation? How does it represent ‘ditch’? Seen this once before. One of you may please explain this to me.

  15. No real problems with this, although certainly not a doddle. CONCUPISCENT isn’t a word that one uses in everyday conversation, nor is THIXOTROPIC although the latter might be a bit more common. PICTOGRAM and NAIL PUNCH were among our picks of the day.
    Thank you to Monk – and to Kitty for the napping kitties as well as the blog.

  16. Looks like I’m going to be the bluenose who breaks cover to question 1a.

    I know it’s only a crossword, but to me that’s an unacceptably tasteless clue. Surprised that no one else has mentioned it.

  17. Thixotropic is a favourite word of mine. I use it quite frequently in my line of work. No issues with any other clues although the theme passed me by as usual. Thanks to Monk and Kitty.

  19. Only just realised that this puzzle had appeared! Thanks Kitty for a great blog and other posters for the overwhelmingly positive comments.

    PostMark@3 and Kitty@8 — well done for revealing and identifying spot-on the arcane Nina 🙂

  20. Sorry Mike R@16, I really don’t see what your problem is with this clue. The word is just a posh way of saying “lusty” and you cannot surely take offence at that word? As far as I am aware, and maybe in my innocence, there are no other less salubrious connotations. So in what way is it tasteless? Maybe that’s it: I have too innocent a mind.

  22. Deezzaa @20. Although I have no problems with 1a, I’d imagine “nonce” is more an issue than any other.

  23. Thanks Kitty. It’s the first time I’ve come across EA as a ditch – one to remember. I didn’t solve ISTLE though o now think I’ve heard of it. Thanks also to Monk for an enjoyable puzzle and the prime nina which completely passed me by.

  24. Monk@19 – thanks for stopping by 🙂 . Hovis and PostMark really deserve all the credit for the theme spotting, and as for Barb’s observation @9 …

    Mike R@16 – I was surprised at the surface reading of 1a, with the use of the third word of the clue. I therefore decided not to dwell on it or mention it in the blog, and was quite surprised that it drew no comment before yours.

  25. Deezza @20, Hovis @18, the reason 1a crosses a line for me is that a nonce is “a person convicted of a sexual offence, especially against a child” (Oxford); “a rapist or child molestor” (Collins); “a sex offender, esp one convicted of assaulting children” (Chambers).
    In fact I’d say it’s exclusively used to describe a child sex offender in common speech.
    I know the online Indy can go further than the prints, but a surface that suggests a lustful paedophile cutting out photos is going too far.

  26. (Hovis @22 I meant, sorry)

    I mean, I can see that the anagram is technically neat for a difficult word, but I think it should have been forgotten about for publication because of the unpleasant subject matter.

  27. Mike R. That was primarily my reason for mentioning it was the word “nonce” that was at issue. However, this is not the meaning I was brought up to understand (though aware of it). When calling somebody “a bit of a nonce” say, it was using nonce to mean a “weak or ineffectual person”. I was surprised to find neither of my dictionaries gives this definition but it is readily found as UK slang online. When I read the clue, I felt that meaning was Monk’s intention. I do now find myself thinking it was perhaps ill-advised and should have been vetoed, though I’m not the sort that gets angered by such things.

  28. Hovis@27 , that was entirely my intention, and one that must have seemed obvious given a bit of lateral thinking. Additionally, neither the crossword editor’s nor his (experienced, fastidious) vetter raised the word as offensive prior to publication.

    The Wordweb Pro dictionary that augments the mainstream ones in Crossword Compiler defines “nonce” as, inter alia, “(informal) a stupid or worthless person”, and since I have vague memories of Del Boy Trotter using it in just this way in OFAH, it seemed like fair game. I don’t think I can add any more to this.

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