As usual, Eccles gives us a master class in the art of smooth clues
If I didn’t have grandchildren, I don’t think I would have understood the reference to DORA the Explorer in 17 down, but fortunately she was a character I was introduced to recently.
My favourite clues today were the ones that told a story involving characters from life or fiction – e.g. Trump, Noah, Dorothy, Bristolians, Emily Ratajkowski, Eccles and Charles. Having said that, most clues made me think about the definition element.
It took me longer than it should to identify the ‘pulls’ element in TEAR-JERKER at 13 down.
| No | Detail |
| Across | |
| 1 |
Hunt, wearing nursing uniform, is a prickly individual (3,6) SEA URCHIN (one of the Echinoidea, a class of echinoderms with a shell of calcareous plates, without arms; a prickly individual) (SEARCH [hunt] + IN [wearing]) containing (nursing) U (uniform is the international radio communication code for the letter U) SEA (U) RCH IN |
| 8 |
Trump cut short meeting with prostitute, we hear, which is novel (7) IVANHOE (novel by Sir Walter Scott) IVANA (forename of the wife of former President Donald Trump) excluding the final letter A (cut short) + HOE (sounds like [we hear] HO [American slang term for a prostitute]) IVAN HOE |
| 10 |
Outside broadcast follows Frank (4,3) OPEN AIR (outside) OPEN (unreserved; frank) + AIR (broadcast) OPEN AIR |
| 11 |
Patrol old mills for a lot of money (3,6) TOP DOLLAR (highest level of payment, usually a lot of money) Anagram of (mills) PATROL OLD TOP DOLLAR* |
| 12 |
Ordnance is harmless in main transport channel (6) ARTERY (any main channel of communication or movement) ARTILLERY (ordnance) excluding (is … less) ILL (harm) ARTERY |
| 15 |
Developed thick skin about love, or just cold-hearted? (7) CALLOUS (unfeeling; unsympathetic; cold-hearted) CALLUS (an area of thickened or hardened skin) containing (about) O (character representing zero or love score in tennis) CALL (O) US |
| 16 |
Usurer left Noah’s, upset by his mode of transportation (4,5) LOAN SHARK (person who lends money at exorbitant rates of interest; usurer) L [left] + an anagram of (upset) NOAH’S + ARK (Noah’s mode of transportation in the biblical story) L OAN SH* ARK |
| 19 |
Instruction to make payment to prevent heartless child collection (4,5) BANK DRAFT (bill of exchange obtained from a bank by one of its customers, enabling the purchase of goods, etc by the presentation of the draft to the seller, the bank debiting the customer’s account with that amount; instruction to make payment) BAN (prevent) + KID (child) excluding the central letter I (heartless) + RAFT (collection of items) BAN K D RAFT |
| 20 |
White privilege ultimately seen in small child having everything (3,4) CUE BALL (white ball [white] used as the ball struck in games like snooker and billiards) (E [last letter of {ultimately} PRIVILEGE] contained in [seen in] CUB [small child]) + ALL (everything) CU (E) B ALL |
| 22 |
Pulls off tense clergyman (6) PRIEST (clergyman) PRIES (forces off by levering; pulls off) + T (tense) PRIES T |
| 23 |
Cooked steak with ham and eggs, at first, in hurry (4,5) MAKE HASTE (hurry) Anagram of (cooked) STEAK HAM + E (initial letter of [at first] EGGS) MAKE HAST* E |
| 25 |
South American bishop going to spa for day of relaxation (7) SABBATH (day of rest) SA (South American) + B (bishop) + BATH (spa) SA B BATH |
| 27 |
Friend of Dorothy drinking Burgundy perhaps in provincial capital (7) TORONTO (provincial capital of the Canadian State of Ontario) TOTO (friend of Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz) containing (drinking) RON (reference RON Burgundy, lead character in the Anchorman film series [2004 to 2013]) TO (RON) TO |
| 28 |
Route maps confused pest controller (9) MOUSETRAP (example of a pest controller) Anagram of (confused) ROUTE MAPS MOUSETRAP* |
| Down | |
| 1 |
Dodgy OAPs look after gold in financial centre (3,5) SAO PAULO (city that is the financial centre of Brazil) Anagram of (dodgy) OAPS + AU (chemical symbol for gold) + LO (look) SAO P* AU LO |
| 2 |
Soprano thrown out of bar in hail (3) AVE (hail!) SAVE (except; bar) excluding (thrown out of) S (soprano) AVE |
| 3 |
Again, bust chair? (8) REARREST (take into custody again; bust [arrest] again) REAR (back or seat) + REST (relax) – a chair could be described as a REAR REST REAR REST |
| 4 |
Upset, start to reside in temporary building (4) HURT (cause ill-feeling; upset) R (initial letter of [start to] RESIDE) contained in (in) HUT (temporary building) HU (R) T |
| 5 |
Unusual tip to stop theft showing over-attention to detail (3-7) NIT-PICKING (petty criticism of minor detail; showing over-attention to detail) Anagram of (unusual) TIP contained in (to stop) NICKING (theft) NI (T PI*) CKING |
| 6 |
Georgia: country providing fossil fuel (3,3) GAS OIL (petroleum distillate; a fossil fuel) GA (Georgia) + SOIL (country) GA S OIL |
| 7 |
Nude Bristolian covers junk (6) DEBRIS (rubbish; junk) DEBRIS (hidden word in [covers] NUDE BRISTOLIAN) DEBRIS |
| 9 |
Welcome females in the morning at European’s great collection (4,2,4) HALL OF FAME (a gallery of busts, portraits, etc of celebrated people; the ranks of the great and famous; great collection) HALLO (welcome) + (F [female] + F [female] – giving females) + AM (ante meridiem; morning) + E (European) HALL O F F AM E |
| 13 |
Pulls Emily Ratajkowski, for starters, in emotional movie (4-6) TEAR-JERKER (an extravagantly sentimental song, book, film, etc, inviting pity, grief, sorrow) (TEAR [pull] + JERK [pull] giving pulls) + ER (first letters [starters] of each of EMILY and RATAJKOWSKI) TEAR JERK ER |
| 14 |
Flowers might flower around spring and summer, primarily (3,7) MAY BLOSSOM (hawthorn flowers, probably seen in spring and summer primarily) MAY (might) + (BLOOM [flower] containing [around] SS (first letters of [primarily] each of SPRING and SUMMER) MAY BLO (SS) OM |
| 17 |
A young explorer is getting expelled shortly, but is appealing (8) ADORABLE (appealing) A + DORA (reference DORA the Explorer, an American children’s animated television series and multimedia franchise) + BLED or BLEW (getting expelled) excluding the final D or W (shortly) BLEW is the more forceful so is probably closer to expelled than BLED which is more like oozed. A DORA BLE |
| 18 |
Small, small person excited to cheat (6,2) STITCH UP (swindle; cheat) S (small) + TITCH (small person) + UP (excited) S TITCH UP |
| 20 |
Wake up in bed containing Eccles and Oscar (4,2) COME TO (wake up) (COT [bed] containing [containing] ME [the setter Eccles]) + O (Oscar is the International Radio Communication code word for the letter O) CO (ME) T O |
| 21 |
Sunbathe naked to entertain Olympian (6) ATHENA (Olympian goddess of wisdom) ATHENA (hidden word in [to entertain] SUNBATHE NAKED) ATHENA |
| 24 |
Overthrown monarchy welcomes son; he had lost his birthright (4) ESAU (In the Bible, Jacob offered to give ESAU a bowl of stew in exchange for his birthright (the right to be recognized as firstborn) and ESAU agreed, thereby losing the right to inherit the leadership of the family and the judicial authority of his father) UAE (United Arab Emirates, currently an elective monarchy formed from a federation of seven emirates) reversed (overthrown) containing (welcomes) S (son) E (S) AU< |
| 26 |
Perhaps Charles is cycling in Scottish town (3) AYR (town on the west coast of Scotland, some distance south of Glasgow) RAY (reference RAY Charles [1930 – 2004], American singer, songwriter and pianist) with the letters cycled left to form AYR) AYR |
Eccles at his best! I really enjoyed this, despite failing to fully understand several clues. At 27A I set off along the totally wrong route, trying to work ‘red’ (wine) into something meaning ‘gay’ (Friends of Dorothy being an LGBT charity), but eventually got back on track. Thanks Eccles and Duncan.
Eccles is one of my favourite setters who continues to produce top quality puzzles without fail, and this one was no exception.
It’s fair game for a setter as Thesauri will tell you that “country” = “soil”, but I struggle to see how they are synonymous. “On English soil” means being “in England” but that doesn’t show that they have equivalent meanings.
Ron and Emily Ratajkowski were new to me. I quite enjoyed Googling the latter in an attempt to parse 13d. I became convinced that what you needed to to do was put three occurrences of ER (her starting letters) in various places in the TAJK taken from her name. Thank you Duncan for an explanation which makes sense!
As ever with Eccles picking a favourite from such a splendid selection is a tough task, but IVANHOE, LOAN SHARK and COME TO make onto my podium today. Many thanks to him and to Duncan.
Excellent as always from Eccles, just the right mix of simple, medium and head-scratchers. As above too many good ones to list. But for me the surface to LOAN SHARK was sublime, with ARTERY a close second, I was convinced main transport channel was going to be a canal like Suez or Panama, that I hadn’t heard of.
Thanks Eccles and Duncan.
Yes, a good spread of degree of difficulty in Eccles’ clues today. Without the usual reference to “hair”, I didn’t know what the def in ESAU was all about and I took a while to get HALL OF FAME, my last in.
I liked the surface for IVANHOE and ADORABLE, being familiar with little DORA from her adventures in crossword land anyway. Best bits though were the ‘Pulls’ in 13d and the misdirection of ‘drinking Burgundy perhaps’ in the wordplay for TORONTO.
Thanks to Eccles and Duncan
Another splendid crossword, thank you Eccles – lots to enjoy but splitting the solution to 3d to get the chair did make me smile
Thanks also to Duncan
Thanks Eccles, Duncan
IVANHOE, REARREST, TORONTO pretty funny.
I had a little trouble with all the pulling. How is pull tear? And even more so, pulls off for pries? Pry in that meaning is a variant of the more usual prise. Prising is not pulling, and if you want to get something off by prying or prising you have to prise it off, so isn’t the off superfluous too? Compromises for the sake of a rather dubious surface?
James @6
Chambers has an entry under pull (3) to tear or pluck.
Pries is less defendable, but you surely have to admit the surface was worth it?
Blah, thanks, I looked up tear but not pull.
No, I don’t. Even if I thought the wordplay was sound, I think it’s a surface I could have done without. The fact that the joke is forced makes it worse.
Fair enough James, I assume we can agree to differ. I must admit I laughed at the surface, and as a result didn’t even notice the pries problem until you raised it.
Just out of pure nosiness may I enquire whether it’s the smuttiness of the surface or the looseness in the wordplay you object to? Or both?
I was OK with Dora owing to RD telling me about the last Armchair Treasure Hunt – maybe that’s where our setter knows her from as well? Same could not be said for Ron Burgundy and I was rather relieved to realise that I only needed to register Ms Ratajkowski’s initials.
Like Cryptic Sue I smiled at REARREST and my favourite was CUE BALL.
Thanks to Eccles and to Duncan for the review.
PS James@6 – surely you’ve seen ‘pulled pork’ advertised?
Blah, I did ask myself that, and it’s difficult to tell. Whether I find smut funny depends on what day of the week it is, though it is generally trending down. I don’t think I even object to smut + priest. It’s probably a combination of the wrong day and less than perfect clue.
jane @10, don’t get me started on pulled pork. Do you know you can get pulled pork flavoured crisps? What is that? Are they different from sliced pork flavoured crisps?
For AYR I was thinking that cycling was a poor homophone indicator, until I finally got the right Charles. LOAN SHARK was my favourite among a raft of fine clues.
Very enjoyable, although I wasn’t familiar with Ron Burgundy.
8 Ac reminded me of the wonderful anagram “Ivanhoe by Sir Walter Scott” = “a novel by a Scottish writer”
Despite my knowledge deficits in a number of places I found this smooth sailing due to the excellent cluing throughout this crossword. Favourites included CUE BALL, LOAN SHARK, and NIT-PICKING. Thanks to both.
Nice puzzle. I enjoyed that. Even got Dora the Explorer! Liked CUEBALL and REARREST. Thanks Eccles and Duncan.
I think James, if you are like me, that a clue has to be a very good clue to justify smut, and that might be the reason you disliked this? It is not funny if it it forced, as you say. I thought pull off = pry were pretty close, although I accept it may actually be closer to pry off. I know it is poor defence to say something smutty and then pretend that any filth is in the mind of the reader, but I did think that there was an equally plausible clean surface in this case.
Thanks to Duncan, and all commenters.
We too got the Dora reference through grandchildren. And we appreciated REARREST for chair – particularly if ‘rear’ = ‘back’ since one of us needs to rest the back fairly often these days.
Thanks, Eccles and Duncan.
REARREST & CUE BALL vied for favouritism in this delightful pre lights out bedtime solve.
Thanks Eccles & Duncan