Thank you to Filbert. Definitions are underlined in the clues.
Across
1. Take boat for diving then land (8)
SUBTRACT : SUB(short for “submarine”, a boat that dives under water) plus(then) TRACT(an area of land/territory).
Defn: … (away from).
5. More expensive watch secretly returned for maintenance (6)
UPKEEP : UP(more expensive/describing an increase in price) + reversal of(… returned) PEEK(to watch secretly/furtively).
9. Shed unfashionable stockings worn by upper class (8)
OUTHOUSE : OUT(unfashionable/out of fashion) + HOSE(collective word for stockings, socks and tights) containing(worn by) U(letter signifying things upper class).
Place to go when modern plumbing isn’t available:
10. Chat and a fag (6)
GASPER : GAS(talk about trivial matters/chat) plus(and) PER(a/for each, as in $1 per minute).
Defn: …/slang for cigarette, for obvious reasons.
12. Pavarotti for one bought enormous trousers (5)
TENOR : Hidden in(… trousers/takes) “bought enormous“.
Defn: An example of which/for one, is Luciano Pavarotti.
Here’s Three of them:
13. Waterproof loose on our son that’s taken back to shop (9)
NONPOROUS : Anagram of(loose) ON OUR SON containing(that’s taken) last letter of(back to) “shop“.
14. American bangs me entering pub, initially taking offence (12)
INFRINGEMENT : [ FRINGE(front section of one’s hair hanging over and cut straight across the forehead, refered to in North America as “bangs”) + ME ]contained in(entering) INN(a pub/establishment serving drinks mainly) + 1st letter of(initially) “taking“.
18. What e.g. 8 took from a child needing protection after school (7,5)
ACADEMY AWARD : A + WARD(a child needing protection, under the care of a guardian) placed after(after) ACADEMY(a school/an educational institution).
Defn: What a movie such as/e.g. “Parasite”(answer to 8 down) took/won.
21. Doctor can rub oil in both eyes (9)
BINOCULAR : Anagram of(Doctor) CAN RUB OIL.
Defn: For or ….
23. Small bottle of very acidic beer unfinished (5)
PHIAL : PHI(pH1 with the Roman numeral substitution – in chemistry, the acidity or alkalinity of a solution is measured on the pH scale with pH1 being very acidic) + “ale”(a type of beer) minus its last letter(unfinished).
24. Touching a thousand fish repelled man unloading boat (6)
DOCKER : Reversal of(… repelled) [ RE(with reference to/touching on) + K(symbol for “a thousand” from the Greek “kilo”) + COD(a large food fish) ].
What he was before he was the Don:
25. Old Indian spinner bats ten, following the order (8)
OBEDIENT : O(abbrev. for “old”) + BEDI(Bishan Singh, former Indian cricketer who was a spin bowler) + anagram of(bats) TEN.
Defn: … or orders.
26. Stick jug by sink after emptying it (6)
SKEWER : EWER(jug with a wide mouth) placed after(by) “sink” minus all its inner letters(after emptying it).
27. Logical engineers like 1D (8)
REASONED : RE(abbrev. for the Royal Engineers) + AS(like/similar to, as used in similes) + ONE(the number 1) + D(abbrev. for “down”).
Down
1. Charming debate held in silence (6)
SMOOTH : MOOT(a debate or discussion of a hypothetical case as an academic activity) contained in(held in) SH!(exclamation demanding silence).
Defn: …/suave.
2. Scientific study every NATO battalion keeps up (6)
BOTANY : Hidden in(… keeps) reversal of(… up, in a down clue) “every NATO battalion“.
3. Current wanted for cultivation of arid region? (3,6)
RIO GRANDE : “i”(symbol for electric current in physics) deleted from(wanted for/found wanting in) anagram of(cultivation of) “arid region“.
Answer: …, a river in southwestern USA and northern Mexico that flows through arid and semi-arid land.
4. Blockbuster about Chinese locksmith with gold filling (6,6)
CASINO ROYALE : CA(abbrev. for “circa”/about/around the time of a particular year) + SINO-(prefix denoting something Chinese/related to China) YALE(Linus Jr., inventor of the pin tumbler lock and co-founder of the Yale Lock Manufacturing Company) containing(with … filling) OR(the colour gold in heraldry).
Defn: … movie … take your pick:
6. One article chamber pot contains, something next to stool? (5)
PIANO : [ I(Roman numeral for “one”) + AN(article in grammar) ] contained in(… contains) PO(informal term for a chamber pot).
Defn: …/that which is next to the stool the pianist sits on.
7. Former priest learning Dutch did survey (8)
EXPLORED : EX-(prefix indicating former/once) + P(abbrev. for “priest”) + LORE(body of knowledge held by a particular group of people, passed down from generation to generation) + D(abbrev. for “Dutch”).
8. Soldier’s the one chasing English sucker (8)
PARASITE : PARA(short for “paratrooper”, a soldier dropped by parachute into battle)‘S plus(… chasing/going after) IT(pronoun for something previously mentioned/the one) + E(abbrev. for “English”).
11. Impossible to get wife to stop drifting near bus lane (12)
UNANSWERABLE : W(abbrev. for “wife”) contained in(to stop) anagram of(drifting) NEAR BUS LANE.
Defn: …/unsolvable.
15. Brussels rent that is reduced for playwright (9)
EURIPIDES : EU(to which Brussels, its de facto capital, has become synonymous) + RIP(a rent/tear) + “id est”(ie./that is) minus its last letter(reduced).
Defn: … of Ancient Greece.
16. Island to rule out bachelor parties (8)
BARBADOS : BAR(to rule out/to exclude) + BA(one with a Bachelor of Arts degree, who can be refered to as a “Bachelor”) + DOS(plural of “do”/a party/social function).
17. Local salt on English shellfish (8)
BARNACLE : BAR(a pub, and one that is near one’s home or place of work is a “local”) + NACL(chemical formula for the salt, sodium chloride, used as a table salt) + E(abbrev. for “English”).
They can form an attachment to another creature:
19. Wolf one wild feral creature (6)
PIGEON : PIG(to wolf/to devour food greedily/to gorge oneself with food) + anagram of(… wild) ONE.
Defn: …, as opposed to the domesticated variety.
That’s them sitting and s*itting:
20. Mountain-climbing fashion-conscious youth dressed in silver, perhaps (6)
PLATED : Reversal of(…-climbing, in a down clue) ALP(a high snow-capped mountain) + TED(short for “teddy boy”/a fashion-conscious youth in the 1950s and 1960s).
Defn: Dressed/covered with a thin layer of, say/perhaps, silver.
22. Sailors on bench both losing weight, getting thin fare (5)
CREPE : [ “crew”(sailor manning a watercraft) placed above(on, in a down clue) “pew”(a long bench in a church to seat the congregation) ] minus from both words(both losing) “w”(abbrev. for “weight”).
An absolute delight. Loved the humour in clues such as those for TENOR, BINOCULAR, PIANO and UNANSWERABLE. Thought the use of ‘feral’ in 19d was a little unusual and, needless to say, have never heard of the Indian spinner in 25a.
Liked. It took me a while but seemed like a gentler Filbert. I like REASONED once the penny dropped and the connection between PARASITE and ACADEMY AWARD helped out. I didn’t realise CASINO ROYALE was a blockbuster. PIANO was my top pick. Thanks.
What a superb puzzle! And very nicely illustrated. I liked the salt in BARNACLE and PH1 in PHIAL. I had never thought of our Friday setter as being so tart. Thanks, both.
Easier than usual for Filbert, it seemed to me, but all the more enjoyable as far as I’m concerned. At 14A, surely a fringe = a bang, not bangs, but I suppose it had to be bangs for readability. Veronica Lake, an American film star of the 1940s, was known as ‘the girl with the peekaboo bang’. Thanks Filbert and Scchua.
As Hovis said, an absolute delight. Not Gilbert at his most difficult but most certainly at his wittiest.
The construction, surfaces and disguise in 3 and 4 down are worth gold amongst so many other jewels.
My top three setters now are firmly Picaroon and Serpent in all their guises along with Filbert . I wonder if he/ she has any other noms de plume?
I always enjoy a Filbert and today was no exception. Plenty of mental gymnastics required. Some very witty surfaces which I enjoyed immensely. Favourites include TENOR, PHIAL, DOCKER, SKEWER, CASINO ROYALE, PIANO, UNANSWERABLE, BARBADOS, BARNACLE and CREPE.
‘More expensive’ for UP didn’t come as easily as it should – I feel there would often be more to it that just ‘up’: ‘gone up’, ‘up in price’ etc. Eventually I convinced myself that ‘Petrol’s up’ might be an observation on prices at the pumps though I’d still feel it normal to add ‘in price’ afterwards.
I thought the double deletion of weight = W in 22d was splendid but the def for PIANO probably carries the day.
Thanks Filbert and scchua
As everyone else has said, terrific crossword and blog.
Tatrasman@4 – it does look odd, but “bangs” is “a fringe”. Apparently its likely derivation is from the cut of a horses tail. Wikipedia
Link didn’t work…
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bangs_(hair)
Excellent puzzle. I liked the chemical abbreviations. Didn’t know ‘bangs’ was an American word for a fringe. Thanks for the blog, scchua, but your parsing of PARASITE doesn’t seem to deal with ‘chasing’. I think ‘the one chasing’ is IT, as in the chidren’s game of tag. Do kids still play tag these days?
Very good set of clues today. Filbert is one I always have one or two that I need various nefarious help to complete. And even then often I don’t.
scchua there is a tiny omission in your blog. You may have purposely left it out / unexplained but the S and the E in PARASITE aren’t included in your parsing.
Thanks to both the setter and the blogger in particular for filling in the blanks in my ability. I didn’t bother trying to parse RIO GRANDE, just wrote it on from numeration and crossers and don’t think I’d have got the parsing for CREPE within any sort of sensible time frame, even though it’s perfectly obvious once it’s explained.
Quizzy_Bob @9: That is an interesting observation. For me, ‘chasing’ as a positional indicator has always felt as if it should indicate ‘going after’ the fodder but I understand many (most?) solvers take it as meaning coming before – chasing the fodder towards the end of the word If it is coming before, then the ‘chasing’ is accounted for in scchua’s parse as the IT precedes – chases – the E.
I suspect they both work but prefer your interpretation now I’ve seen it.
Thanks both. Similar to yesterday for me, in that it was a really enjoyable challenge, with unknowns such as EURIPIDES and ‘bangs’ not preventing progress. The only tiny matter I am still trying to convince myself about is that ‘up’ in itself means more expensive in UPKEEP but it certainly assists the surface
Yes, rocket. Sorry for the omission. Oversight corrected.
Quizzy_bob, yes, that’s an alternative explanation for “it”.
Thanks Filbert for your usual excellence. This was less challenging than Filbert can be but just as clever with my top picks being PHIAL (I liked PH1 for very acidic), BARNACLE (I liked nacl for salt), EXPLORED, PARASITE, and EURIPIDES. I missed GASPER, not knowing the slang term and wrote in “rapper.” Thanks scchua for the illustrated blog.
For me an absolute gem of a puzzle, not a dud in the grid
INFRINGEMENT, PHIAL, PARASITE, BARBADOS and the lol CREPE were my winners in a very strong field.
Many thanks Filbert and to scchua for an excellent review.
Excellent puzzle, thanks both Filbert and scchua.
I can’t let 15D pass without repeating the joke:
Man walks into an ancient Greek tailors with a pair of ripped trousers.
Tailor says, “Euripides?”
Man says, “Yeah. Eumenides?”
Most enjoyable. Was the appearance today of ACADEMY AWARD and a few related answers just coincidence, we wonder?
Favourites were REASONED and EURIPIDES.
Thanks, Filbert and scchua.