The Sunday offering this week from the Independent is a crossword from Italicus. I found this to be a pleasing puzzle which fell out nicely after I made initial inroads into it.
Abbreviations
cd cryptic definition
dd double definition
cad clue as definition
(xxxx)* anagram
anagrind = anagram indicator
[x] letter(s) removed
definitions are underlined
Across
1 Ordinary, mundane job essentially lacking in colour
OCHRE
A charade of O and CH[O]RE
4 Are their bananas more nutritious?
HEARTIER
(ARE THEIR)* with ‘bananas’ as the anagrind.
11 Circus entertainer regularly exhibiting a score of beasts
ACROBAT
The odd letters of A sCoRe Of BeAsTs.
12 Ne’er-do-well exposed following closure of British barracks
HECKLES
A charade of H for the final letter of ‘British’ and [R]ECKLES[S].
13 Nonsense about United’s humiliating defeat
ROUT
An insertion of U in ROT. The insertion indicator is ‘about’.
14 Remember Marine shot in twenty-nine
BEAR IN MIND
An insertion of (MARINE)* in BIND, a synonym for TIE, the solution to 29d. The anagrind is ‘shot’ and the insertion indicator is ‘in’.
17 Resolute female, having captured two Germans, died
DOGGED
An insertion of GG in DOE followed by D. The insertion indicator is ‘having captured’.
18 Fanatics from Northern Ireland initially admitted hacking computers
MANIACS
An insertion on NI and A in MACS. The insertion indicator is ‘hacking’.
21 Trust article on European food
POLENTA
A charade of POLE, NT for National Trust and A.
22 Echo fills empty brothel with deep, booming sound
BELLOW
An insertion of E for the phonetic alphabet ‘Echo’ in BL for the outside letters of ‘brothel’, followed by LOW. The insertion indicator is ‘fills’.
25 Brains behind putting curbs on motorway in Maryland
MASTERMIND
An insertion of MI for the Leeds-London ‘motorway’ in ASTERN, all inserted in MD. The two insertion indicators are ‘putting curbs on’ and ‘in’.
26 Discovered android with electronic instrument
OBOE
A charade of [R]OBO[T] and E.
28 Open University stirred up great indignation
OUTRAGE
A charade of OU and (GREAT)*
30 Prisoner put on parole ultimately gets pardon
CONDONE
A charade of CON, DON and E.
31 Ran through gardens in Home Counties visibly embarrassed
SKEWERED
An insertion of KEW in SE for ‘Home Counties’ followed by RED. The insertion indicator is ‘in’.
32 Several feet behind sailor’s quarters
ABODE
A charade of AB and ODE. The second particle is referring to the ‘feet’ in a poem.
Down
2 Miserable people scrounged off accommodating Greek character
CURMUDGEONS
An insertion of MU in (SCROUNGED)* The insertion indicator is ‘accommodating’ and the anagrind is ‘off’.
3 Rustic American protected by upstanding state bureaucrat
RUBE
Hidden reversed in statE BUReaucrat. A derogatory US slang word for someone uneducated, who comes from the countryside. Harsh. And even harsher on those called Rueben, from which the term is apparently derived.
5 And everything else about this place is otherworldly
ETHEREAL
An insertion of HERE in ET AL. The insertion indicator is ‘about’.
6 Appeased Unionist leaves assembly in rush
RECONCILED
An insertion of CO[U]NCIL in REED. The insertion indicator is ‘in’.
7 Evil bishop redacted from account
ILL
[B]ILL
8 Resume abandoned party in lodge
RESIDE
A charade of R[ESUM]E and SIDE.
9 Artist runs into elegant youths; they are quintessentially straight
RAMRODS
A charade of RA and R inserted into MODS. The insertion indicator is ‘into’.
10 Swimmer wildly exaggerated finale of race on river
OTTER
A charade of OTT, E and R.
15 Ruthlessly incorporated elderly relatives
IN COLD BLOOD
A charade of INC, OLD and BLOOD.
16 Eccentric grandee touring Spain with extremely talkative deviant
DEGENERATE
An insertion of E in (GRANDEE)* followed by TE for the outside letters of ‘talkative’. The insertion indicator is ‘touring’.
19 Put one’s foot down over energy charge
STAMPEDE
A charade of STAMPED and E. ‘Over’ works because it’s a down clue.
20 Sugar daddy’s first to forsake Scandinavian ex, say?
SWEETEN
A charade of SWE[D]E and TEN, which would be X (or ‘ex, say’) in Roman numerals.
23 Decorate Bond’s superior sounding superior
EMBOSS
A charade of EM, a homophone of M, who was ‘Bond’s superior’ and BOSS.
24 Knight stops looting for a quick bite
SNACK
An insertion of N in SACK. The insertion indicator is ‘stops’.
27 Pretentious type has no business taking part
SNOB
Hidden in haS NO Business.
29 Link that is attached to end of text
TIE
A charade of T and IE for id est, or ‘that is’.
Many thanks to Italicus for this Sunday’s puzzle.
Thanks Italicus and Pierre.
Enjoyed this.
12a, I parsed it using feckless.
DOGGED
POLENTA
RECONCILED
IN COLD BLOOD
SWEETEN, make my list.
Thanks Italicus and Pierre. I also enjoyed the puzzle. Tops would be HECKLES and SKEWERED across with CURMUDGEONS and SWEETEN down.
Very enjoyable. Glad to get my final 2, POLENTA & SWEETEN, without having to resort to a word fit.
I thought this was excellent with HECKLES and CURMUDGEONS the top of the pile.
I am not entirely convinced that “more nutritious” is a synonym for HEARTIER but that is a very minor point.
I’ve never heard of RUBE. However, it was easily found from the wordplay, and correctly indicated as an Americanism.
Many thanks to Italicus for the fun and to Pierre for the review.
For HECKLES thought FECKLESS rather than RECKLESS
as ilippu@1 – didn’t notice the lower case, sorry
I found this quite difficult. Neither POLENTA nor SWEETEN came easily, but I then became stuck in the NE corner. I just couldn’t see RECONCILED, not helped by not having the first crossing C. In this part of the world, ‘barracks’ as a verb is used more often in the sense of cheering for or supporting eg a sporting team rather than for HECKLES, so this one took a long time. (Incidentally, another one for [F]ECKLES[S] for the adjectival ‘Ne’er-do-well’, but six of one I suppose). To top it off, I couldn’t parse RESIDE, having CON as the ‘abandoned party’ for “reconsider”, but of course this doesn’t work.
All in all, I felt a bit CURMUDGEONLY about my performance here, but no fault of the setter!
Thanks to Italicus and Pierre
I concur with FrankieG @5.
Thanks all round.
Beaten by POLENTA! Not a dish that comes rapidly to mind and I was trying to parse something completely different! Apart from the somewhat unfriendly grid which spilt the puzzle into two halves, I enjoyed this with the same four favourites as Sofamore @2.
Thanks Italicus and Pierre
The wiktionary etymology of FECKLESS is rather boring – ‘variant of Scots fectless (“ineffectual”) (an aphetic variant of effectless)’
But the Irish FECK is much more interesting, with citations from James Joyce and Father Ted
‘Father Jack Hackett: Tea? Feck! […]
Mrs. Doyle: I’ll tell you what, Father. I’ll pour a cup for ye anyway and y’ can have it if ya want. Now… And what do you say to a cup?
Father Jack Hackett: Feck off, cup!’
‘Usage notes – In Ireland, the term feck does not have a sexual connotation and is not typically used to mean “to have sex with”‘
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/feck
Thanks I&P
Anyone else have “honesty” (trust?) for 21 ac? That’ll teach me to check the parsing!
Gerry @ 11: ‘honesty’ did cross my mind, but ‘polenta’ soon chased it as I can’t stand the stuff! I needed a word list to find ‘rube’. 12A had to be ‘heckles’ but I struggled to parse it. Great stuff, so thanks Italicus and Pierre.
Relieved to see that I wasn’t alone in not knowing that term for a rustic American, all I could think of was a redneck.
Very enjoyable puzzle from our setter and my biggest ticks went to SKEWERED & CURMUDGEONLY – such an expressive word!
Thanks to Italicus and to Pierre for the review – nearly but not quite a couple of opportunities for a bird link today!
I was aware of the phrase “Hey Rube” used by carnival workers in the States but not the use referred to here so I learned something.
Thanks Italicus for an excellent crossword. I was beaten by SWEETEN but all else fell into place and made sense. My top picks were ACROBAT, MANIACS, POLENTA (that took longer to solve than making the dish), OBOE, OUTRAGE, SKEWERED, CURMUDGEONS, ETHEREAL, and OTTER. Thanks Pierre for the blog.
Cheers Pierre a couple I couldn’t or couldn’t be bothered to parse. So thanks. Quite a fun thing to do though away from the stress of home.