Thank you to Goliath. Definitions are underlined in the clues.
Across
1. Note as clever? Not half! (6)
QUAVER : QUA(as/being/in the capacity of, as in “President Trump qua president was no different from him as a private citizen”) + 1st 3 letters deleted from(…? Not half) “clever“.
Defn: … with a specific time value in music.
4. Find out intramural unexpected wealth (8)
WINDFALL : Anagram of(… out) FIND ci(intra …/within) WALL(a mural/a wall on which a picture has been painted).
10, 11. Loving father‘s treacle? (7,7)
ELECTRA COMPLEX : Reverse clue: Anagram of(COMPLEX) ELECTRA …‘s/is TREACLE.
Defn: In psychoanalysis, the sexual attachment of a female child to her father/….
12. Side of meat in a stew (4)
TEAM : Anagram of(… in a stew) meat.
13. For the cat, the mat is trendy (5,3,2)
WHERE IT’S AT : [WHERE IT SAT](The relation between “mat” and the “cat”/it, besides being rhymes, in say, the titles of a number of children’s books).
16. Freeloader’s suffering (6)
ORDEAL : Anagram of(Free) LOADER.
17. Hare is always among the leaders of leftist existential theatre (7)
LEVERET : EVER(always/constantly) contained in(among) 1st letters, respectively, of(the leaders of) “leftist existential theatre“.
… in its 1st year.
20. Flute of champagne first served in cool half-pint, perhaps (7)
PICCOLO : 1st letter of(… first) “champagne” contained in(served in) anagram of(…, perhaps) [COOL + 1st 2 letters of(half-) “pint“].
21. Please supply pass (6)
ELAPSE : Anagram of(… supply/flexibly) PLEASE.
24. Single awful sin, still? This could describe it (3,2,5)
ONE IN SEVEN : ONE(single in number) + anagram of(awful) SIN + EVEN(still/to a larger degree, as in “it was even less than he had expected”).
Defn: The “it” in the clue, ie. one of the seven deadly sins/a single awful sin.
A WIWD (wordplay intertwined with definition) clue.
25. See 1 down
27, 29. “Your excellency, rub my pink dicky”, says yokel (7,7)
COUNTRY BUMPKIN : COUNT(whom one may address as “Your Excellency”) + anagram of(… dicky) RUB MY PINK.
… and his pink dicky.
30. Got into debt, breaking nearly every word (8)
OVERDREW : Anagram of(breaking) [last letter deleted from(nearly) “every” + WORD].
Defn: … by drawing out more money than one has in one’s bank account.
31. Extremely strict order expected to be put aside (6)
STORED : 1st and last letters, respectively, of(Extremely) “strict order expected”
Down
1, 25. Ask a gospeller? (8,4)
QUESTION MARK : QUESTION(ask/query) + MARK(the Evangelist/gospeller, to whom the Gospel of Mark is attributed)).
2. Twelve syllables and rhymes in verse of old times (11)
ALEXANDRINE : Early/old times form of French poetry/verse, consisting of a line of 12 syllables with a pause between the 6th and 7th syllables. The wordplay seems to be the clue itself: Twelve syllables and rhymes // in verse of old times. But that line is 6+5 and not 6+6 syllables – unless I’ve counted wrongly?
3. Brute after this part of street tussle (2,2)
ET TU : Hidden in(part of) “street tussle“.
Defn: “This” in the clue ie. the first part of the Latin phrase “Et tu, Brute” (translated as “You too, Brutus”) in Shakespeare’s play, Julius Caesar.
5. Where lemons may be said to be experienced (8)
INCURRED : Homophone of(… said to be) “in curd”(as used in lemon curd, where lemons may be said to be).
6. Fille de Septembre, peut-être la femme (10)
DEMOISELLE : DE + MOIS(French for “month”, of which Septembre/September is example) + ELLE(French for woman/la femmer).
{Parsing by courtesy of ub @1}
7, 28. Attraction of having everyone on the river (6)
ALLURE : ALL(everyone) placed above(on the, in a down clue) URE(a river in North Yorkshire, England).
8. Lack of rigour by non-professionals boxing (6)
LAXITY : X(letter representing “by”/times as in “2 x 2 = 4”) contained in(… boxing) LAITY(collectively, the category of non-professionals/amateurs).
9. Wash and finally scrub articles (5)
BATHE : Last letter of(finally) “scrub” + A,THE(2 articles in grammar).
14. Smoother cover for pillow, all stuffing taken out, one wanders (11)
SLEEPWALKER : SLEEKER(smoother/more streamlined) containing(cover for) inner letters, respectively, deleted from(… stuffing taken out,) “pillow, all“.
15. What’s sweet as nothing on fixed distance makes us spellbound (10)
FASCINATED : FA(what’s sweet, in the expression “sweet FA”/sweet Fanny Adams/nothing at all) placed above(on, in a down clue) anagram of(fixed) DISTANCE.
18. What’s in deadly mixture? A type of chemical (8)
ALDEHYDE : EH?(like “What?”, an expression of inquiry or surprise) contained in(…’s in) anagram of(… mixture) DEADLY.
19. Thought to be half reckless and poorly done (8)
RECKONED : 1st 4 letters of(half) “reckless” plus(and) anagram of(poorly) DONE.
22. Blanket with a hole once mostly covered in noodle soup (6)
PONCHO : “once” minus its last letter(mostly) contained in(covered in) PHO(Vietnamese noodle soup).
23. Consider Byzantium partly a city (5)
DERBY : Hidden in(… partly) “Consider Byzantium“.
26. Belly’s showing up in porn (4)
SMUT : Reversal of(… showing up, in a down clue) TUM(one’s belly/stomach)‘S.
28. See 7
Thanks to Goliath and scchua for explaining some complicated parsings. I don’t know French but I had the def. as ‘fille,’ or young girl. Parsed as DE = of + MOIS for month (September perhaps) and ELLE = woman.
I had the same parsing as ub, can confirm ^^
Teasing and irreverent with quite the most suggestive clue I’ve seen for the innocuous 27a!
I know there’s fun in store with Goliath and so it proved with ticks all over the place, chiefly for DEMOISELLE and PONCHO but FASCINATED, WHERE IT’S AT and SLEEPWALKER too. Ub@1, I parsed DEMOISELLE as you did.
Was looking for a pangram which failed to materialise but still it helped confirm answers in the NE corner. Shame that 2d wasn’t 12 syllables.
Thanks to Goliath and Scchua
I also seem to recall that in French Alexandrines, you would pronounce “verse” as one syllable since it’s followed by a word starting with a vowel, whereas if it was followed by a consonant it would count, making it a 6+6 (two ‘hémistiches’)
What ub said re DEMOISELLE
Nice puzzle
Thanks ub@1. I’ve deleted my parsing and entered yours instead.
Re 27A – this is the best ever recording: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CoxcyHZlv1o
I don’t know why they didn’t use a two-syllable word (“ancient” would do) instead of “old” in 2d. The whole clue would then read naturally as an alexandrine line of six iambic feet.
I wondered if it was supposed to have “a verse” in place of “verse”.
Thanks Goliath and scchua
A raunchy in places, but quite brilliant crossword – highlighted by the French clue at 6d (which I couldn’t properly parse), the intent of the total clue as an example of its answer at 2d (although I didn’t pick that up either), his other trademark tricks as in the lift and separate at 16a, punctuation as the definition at 1d,25a along with his outright audacity with the surface of 27a, 29a. Also liked the word play, only seen afterwards, of FASCINATED.
Started off with LAXITY and finished off with PONCHO (first introduced to pho in the late 1990’s when I was one of the few Caucasian people eating in the Vietnamese districts of Melbourne – it is now one of the trendiest dishes served here), OVERDREW and ALEXANDRINE (which had to be changed from the original and only semi-parsed ALEXANDRIAN) as the last one in.
Despite my DNF (QUAVER, ALEXANDRINE, ORDEAL) I liked this crossword with ELECTRA COMPLEX, QUESTION MARK, and LAXITY being favourites. I thought the surface for COUNTRY BUMPKIN was hilarious even though I need the blog to parse it. Thanks to both.
Hovis is, of course, right. 2 down was meant to be “Twelve syllables and rhymes in a verse of old times”. Somewhere along the line the ‘A’ managed to escape. It was my fault, and I apologise. Many thanks to all for the kind comments.