A typical BRADMAN offering this Friday. Thanks BRADMAN.
FF: 8 DD: 8
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | BRIGANDS |
Criminals in equipment-carrying gangs (8)
|
| RIG ( equipment ) in BANDS ( gangs ) | ||
| 6 | REBECS |
Instruments exist in sports grounds (6)
|
| BE ( exist ) in RECS ( sports grounds ); new word for me and had to confirm with google | ||
| 9 | FLORET |
Stories in our paper constituting a bit of a bloomer (6)
|
| LORE ( stories ) in FT ( our paper ) | ||
| 10 | LAMASERY |
Monastery being dissolved could create alarm, yes? (8)
|
| [ ALARM YES ]* | ||
| 11 | TYRE |
Something reconditioned maybe in old city (4)
|
| double def | ||
| 12 | RAP SESSION |
Criticises awful noises in informal discussion (3,7)
|
| RAPS ( criticises ) [ NOISES ]* | ||
| 14 | PROPOSER |
Professional person putting on an act as one making suggestion (8)
|
| PRO ( professional ) POSER ( person putting an act on ) | ||
| 16 | RIAL |
Money found in den that’s been turned over (4)
|
| reverse of LAIR ( den ) | ||
| 18 | AGAR |
A fish jelly (4)
|
| A GAR ( fish ) | ||
| 19 | RELAPSED |
Pals getting drunk in grass fell back (8)
|
| [ PALS ]* in REED ( grass ) | ||
| 21 | BABYLONIAN |
Infant left on island by an ancient city dweller (10)
|
| BABY ( infant ) L ( left ) ON I ( island ) AN | ||
| 22 | ORGY |
Party men generally lacking any heart (4)
|
| OR ( men ) GY ( GenerallY , without heart, i.e. without inner letters ) | ||
| 24 | ROUSSEAU |
Famous Frenchman rues a sou being wasted (8)
|
| [ RUSE A SOU ]* | ||
| 26 | ELIJAH |
What about nasty jail for one opposing idolatry? (6)
|
| EH ( what ) around [ JAIL ]* | ||
| 27 | DECAMP |
Run off, departure being across English river (6)
|
| DEP ( departure ) around CAM ( english river ) | ||
| 28 | ESTIMATE |
Rough calculation of what’s left in will – about one million (8)
|
| ESTATE ( what’s left in will ) around [ I ( one ) M ( million ) ] | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 2 | RALLY |
King and friend meeting (5)
|
| R ( king ) ALLY ( friend ) | ||
| 3 | GARDEN PARTY |
Social occasion with fancy pageantry, road being blocked in (6,5)
|
| [ PAGEANTRY ]* containing RD ( road ) | ||
| 4 | NOTARISE |
Sanction an increase in salary? Not given priority! (8)
|
| NOT ahead of [ A RISE ( increase in salary ) ] | ||
| 5 | SELF-PORTRAITURE |
Prof’s literature embellished with a form of art (4-11)
|
| [ PROF’S LITERATURE ]* | ||
| 6 | RUMMER |
Stranger sort of glass (6)
|
| double def | ||
| 7 | BUS |
Vehicle second-rate, unserviceable (3)
|
| B ( second rate ) US ( unserviceable ) – new one for me ref US | ||
| 8 | CORPORATE |
My quiet talk befitting firm’s entertainment at event? (9)
|
| COR ( my ) P ( quiet ) ORATE ( talk ) – not entirely sure of the ‘entertainment at event’ part. that would be corporate hospitality as chambers tells me. | ||
| 13 | SCRIPTORIUM |
Court rips ‘im apart – the clerk records things here? (11)
|
| [ COURT RIPS IM PART ]* | ||
| 15 | RIGMAROLE |
Complicated series of actions getting a girl more agitated (9)
|
| [ A GIRL MORE ]* | ||
| 17 | PLANGENT |
Mournful chap undermines scheme (8)
|
| GENT ( chap ) below PLAN ( scheme ) | ||
| 20 | BO-PEEP |
Dance around water in a children’s game (2-4)
|
| BOP ( dance ) around PEE ( water ) | ||
| 23 | GRAFT |
Good series of measures produced with hard work (5)
|
| G ( good ) RAFT ( series of measures ) | ||
| 25 | SPA |
Country home being demolished in spring (3)
|
| SPAin ( country, without IN – home ) |
In the US, GRAFT (except in the horticultural sense) now means corruption/bribery, so I was scratching my head about 23D until I looked it up. (We might have used the UK meaning in the puzzle archaically, but I don’t know.) I think we also pretty universally call BO-PEEP “peekaboo,” (or maybe that is regional?), so 20D also took me a few minutes to translate. ORGY and SPA were obvious from the crossers, but it took me a while to figure out the parsing. Thanks to BRADMAN and Turbolegs.
I think the definition in 8d is the whole phrase “befitting firm’s entertainment at event”, as in “corporate entertainment”
The expected smattering of less common words from Bradman, helped by having come across REBECS and RUMMER before. Not sure I’d ever heard of a LAMASERY, but the word made sense even if the ‘dissolved’ in the clue seemed to be referring to the answer. Can’t say I knew that ELIJAH had a thing about ‘idolatry’ but apparently he did. I also thought a RAP SESSION specifically referred to music but I see Chambers has the ‘informal discussion’ sense.
I agree with Andrew @2 re the def for 8d.
Thanks to Bradman and Turbolegs
Thanks Bradman and Turbolegs
8dn: I am sure I have heard entertainers (on radio and television) talking about “doing corporates” meaning doing performances specifically commissioned for companies. That definition is not in Chambers 2014 – perhaps other dictionaries have it?
13dn: This should of course be simply [ COURT RIPS IM ]*, with “apart” as the anagram lead. I would take the last five words as the definition.
A slight quibble on 24a: Jean-Jacques Rousseau was Swiss, not French.
Thanks for the blog, I agree with CORPORATE , think it is quite modern, maybe not made the dictionaries yet. Often used by museums , galleries etc and often leading to lots of criticism.
The less famous artist Henri ROUSSEAU was French.
A nice little divertissement, and for the first time in a while I had no “Huh?” list. Regarding 8d, I thought it would have worked just as well as “My quiet talk befitting firm”, but on second thoughts this would have implied a noun, so perhaps not. I learnt today that Tyre is an old city. And RUMMER was new to me. I thought 7d was a bit tame; I too had never known US to mean “unserviceable”. And I’ve never known sports grounds to be “recs” … perhaps that’s uniquely British?
Geoff@7 I do not not know if it is just British but RECREATION GROUND is a type of large park with play areas for children, football pitches etc. We always call them “The Rec” .
This use of US is often in Azed as an alternative to America, the States etc for US .
Not seen a solution for 17,214 yet.
Should have been out this week no?