Financial Times 17,175 by AARDVARK

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I found this tricky, continually struggling to make progress. Got there in the end, I think! Thank you Aardvark.

The grid contains a double pangram.

picture of the completed grid

ACROSS
1 BOGART
Old Hollywood actor can work in a creative style (6)

BOG (can, a toilet) then ART (work in a creative style)
4 E-JOURNAL
Blog Joe broadcast before noon entering mountain range (1-7)

anagram (broadcast) of JOE then N (noon) inside URAL (mountain range)
9 APNOEA
Stoppage of breathing happens one day, occasionally (6)

every other letter (occaisionally) of hApPeNs OnE dAy
10 CHENILLE
Fabric woman laid up in church (8)

HEN (woman) ILL (laid up) inside CE (Church of England)
12 ROUT
Republican getting unpopular after severe defeat (4)

R (republican) followed by (getting…after) OUT (unpopular)
13 DERBY
Classic porcelain (5)

double definition – horse race and pottery
14 BOZO
Goon in New York, over with sketch writer (4)

O (over) following (with) BOZ (Charles Dickens, sketch writer)
17 COMMENDATION
Remark about lawyer, one earning praise (12)

COMMENT (remark) contains (about) DA (lawyer) then I (one) and ON (earning, on £3000 per month)
20 FIGURE SKATER
Reckon fish right for winter sportsperson? (6,6)

FIGURE (reckon) SKATE (fish) and R (right)
23 AVOW
American car recruits love to maintain (4)

A (American) VW (Volkswagen, car) contains (recruits) O (love, zero score)
24 WREAK
Feeble limiting radius needs exercise (5)

WEAK (feeble) containing (limiting) R (radius)
25 QUIZ
Grill squid, edging removed by unknown (4)

sQUId missing outer letters (edging removed) then Z (an unknown)
28 BERLINER
Maybe Dietrich’s key part of script involved in sin (8)

B (key, in music) then LINE (part of script) inside (involved in) ERR (error) – Marlene Dietrich, born in Berlin
29 ALLIUM
Pan one initially used, mixing onions, garlic etc (6)

ALL (pan, as a prefix) I (one) then first letters (initially) of Used Mixing
30 BIG HOUSE
Villa perhaps given penalty (3,5)

I'm not sure about this, BIG HOUSE is US slang for a prison, so perhaps given a penalty (penal servitude)?
31 OXYGEN
Element of info on beef curry at the back (6)

GEN (info) following (on) OX (beef) with last letter (at the back) of currY
DOWN
1 BOAT RACE
Olympic officials on track for sports event (4,4)

BOA (British Olympic Association) with TRACE (track)
2 GIN RUMMY
Ring Dicky, Greek character, about my card game? (3,5)

anagram (dicky) of RING then MU (Greek character) reversed (about) and MY
3 RHEA
When cycling, hear South American runner (4)

HEAR with the letters cycled – a flightless bird, one that has to run not fly
5 JOHN BETJEMAN
Private room, with Elizabeth meeting Jeremy, an author of poems (4,8)

JOHN (private room, a toilet) then BET (Elizabeth) with JEM (Jeremy) and AN
6 ULNA
Part of body captured by Paul Nash (4)

found inside (captured by) paUL NAsh
7 NELSON
Hold salt over vessel (6)

I'm not sure abut this, perhaps Admiral Nelson was a sailor (salt) in charge of a vessel?
8 LIE LOW
Hide mattress in auditorium (3,3)

sounds like (in auditorium) "Lilo" (an inflatable mattress)
11 HEADQUARTERS
Big cheese, four ounces, on small base (12)

HEAD (big cheese) QUARTER (a quarter-pound, four ounces) on S (small)
15 REMIX
Update of Hound Dog, say, fast track covered by the King (5)

MI (the M1 motorway, a fast track) inside (covered by) REX (king)
16 WONKY
Bent Asian money disheartened Kathy (5)

WON (Asian money) then KathY missing middle letters (dis-heartened)
18 ATTUNING
Visiting fanatic up in Greenland’s capital, acclimatising (8)

AT (visiting) NUT (fanatic) UP (reversed) IN then first letter (capital) of Greenland
19 PRIZEMAN
Winner from Belize, half grabbed by press agent (8)

belIZE (half of) inside (grabbed by) PR MAN (press agent)
21 BAOBAB
It’s on the agenda to cut most of little tree (6)

AOB (any other business, it's on the agenda) inside (to cut) BABy (little, most of)
22 TOERAG
Ruffian’s long time encased by some thermal insulation (6)

ERA (long time) inside (encased by some) TOG (thermal insulation, rating for)
26 VINO
Seconds of TV dinner – and booze such as this? (4)

second letters of tV dInner aNd bOzze
27 FLAX
Fine loose linen shirt sourced here? (4)

F (fine) LAX (loose)

20 comments on “Financial Times 17,175 by AARDVARK”

  1. Yes, this was tough but very satisfying. Spotted the double pangram but, like our blogger, really wasn’t sure about BIG HOUSE or NELSON, relying solely on crossers or definition. There were a few more for which I required PeeDee’s knowhow in parsing.
    A surfeit of great clues though and well worth the effort. I liked LIE LOW and 3d’s poet best of all.
    Many thanks to Aardvark and PeeDee.

  2. Vlad in the Guardian is on my “Don’t attempt” list, so I was looking forward to a good experience here. But I didn’t like this. I only got about three quarters out, and most clues were more likely to elicit a groan than a smile. Perhaps I got out of the wrong side of the bed this morning.

  3. I agree that this was much more difficult than yesterday’s offering. My last one in was 19D as I have never heard this word before, although its meaning is obvious after the cross letters go in.

    Re 30A – isn’t a villa a small house? It usually is down here in Australia. I couldn’t parse it better than PeeDee did so will be interested in other opinions. Likewise for 7D.

    Re 13A – I had never heard of this as a type of pottery so I had to cheat by resorting to an Internet search to confirm. Likewise for 22D – TOG – which I don’t know, apart from a slang word for clothing.

  4. Oops, I meant 5d’s poet, naturally.
    Like Peter, I knew ‘togs’ primarily as clothing but it’s used as a measure for quilts, I believe. As for the pottery, I’m well versed in those Midlands potteries, so I knew to nix Denby in favour of Derby – no Denby races as far as i know.

  5. Hi Peter @3 – yes indeed. Chambers lists a villa home as an Australian small single storey terraced house. The opposite of villa as a substantial detached house in British English.

  6. PeeDee!
    BIG HOUSE:
    Your parsing is almost convincing (there seems to be a part of speech mismatch). ‘Given penalty’ should be ‘In the big house’. Shouldn’t it be? Sorry. Only adding a question. Not helping.
    NELSON:
    Unable to parse it.
    If we take salt and vessel as two separate definitions, we still have ‘over’ left to deal with.
    Was even looking for NOSLEN to flip it, if I found it. Not there. 🙂

  7. Not quite as difficult as today’s Vlad in the G but there wasn’t much in it. I marked five clues as “Hard” with another few unparsed. Amongst others I didn’t know QUARTER (by itself) for ‘four ounces’, WON as ‘Asian money’, the AOB abbreviation at 21d and just couldn’t work out the wordplay for ATTUNING. Doesn’t seem like it now, but I found BERLINER the most difficult to solve at the time.

    Worth the effort though and good to be rewarded at the end with a pangram; I’ll take spotting one of the two as a glass half full.

    Thanks to Aardvark and PeeDee

  8. Steady progress until the bottom left hand corner which was a DNF. Thought of Big House but couldn’t possibly see why it was the answer to 30A and that really left me stuffed.

  9. Thanks Peedee, I didn’t understand 30a nor 7d (tried something involving inverted NaCl at first for the latter!) and think you have them right – just happy to win on points after failing withVlad! I thought there were quite a few very good clues here, thanks Aardvark.

  10. A challenging solve but I enjoyed it – thanks Aardvark, and Peedee for the blog. I think 7d is the wrestling hold (the half-nelson was commonly attempted in the playground when I was a kid) and then the role of Lord Nelson as the ‘salt’ in charge of (over) a vessel….

  11. In Roman Britain, a villa was typically a big house, and I remember going to a shop to buy a quarter of something, meaning a quarter pound, or, four ounces. Also, quarter and half were used as divisions of stone (fourteen pounds), usually for potatoes.

  13. Aardvark’s never a cakewalk but I usually get there in the end but not today. I found little joy in this and I abandoned my effort. Thanks PeeDee for the blog.

  16. A double pangram is an achievement, but you know something’s amiss when even the blog and the comments cannot shine any light on undecipherable clues. Not fun.

  17. M1 = fast track? You’re having a laugh, Aardvark! Have you travelled along it recently? What a ridiculous portion of a clue. I wonder what Jem Clarkson would make of it?

  18. Got through most of this with a little help from my e-friends. I’m pretty sure a nelson (and half-nelson) is a wrestling hold.

  20. me @ 18. Of course it is! Apologies for the rubbish first post. Thank you to the blogger and setter though.

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