Guardian 29,233 – Philistine

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I started slowly on this, but it all came together nicely in the end. Thanks to Philistine.

 
Across
1 CHELSEA TRACTOR Empty large car? Earth cost appalling! (7,7)
Anagram of L[arg]E CAR EARTH COST, and the whole clue defines this slang expression for an oversized and overpowered 4×4 car
9 OUTDO Better garden party? (5)
A garden party might be an OUT[side] DO
10 DIAPHRAGM Helper turned to describe complicated graph for birth control (9)
GRAPH* in reverse of MAID. I initially got this by reversing AID, but that’s not the intended “helper”
11 PLANE TREES Forest dwellers seeing prophet come back to Earth? (5,5)
PLANET + reverse of SEER
12 SATIRE Posed with indignation and mockery (6)
SAT + IRE
14 ALPHABETICAL ORDER A patch liable to emerge from this feature of first floor letters (12,5)
Reverse anagram – ALPHABETICAL is a reORDERing of A PATCH LIABLE. The letters of “first” and “floor” are in alphabetical order
18 ENHANCEMENTS Contents of menu binder covered by German improvements (12)
[m]EN[u] + CEMENT (a “binder”) in HANS
22 NANOSECOND Brief time in fashion, a nose condom (10)
Hidden in fashioN A NOSE CONDom. It’s also close to being an anagram of A NOSE CONDOM, which had me confused for a while
25 SLOW-PACED Leisurely moo in field getting loud at the end (4-5)
LOW (moo) in SPACE + [lou]D
26 TOKEN Representation is fine in net returns (5)
OK (fine) in reverse of NET
27 SYNERGY At last, it’s my turn: give your blessing, try working together (7)
Last letters of it’S mY turN givE youR blessinG trY
28 RESTYLE Others yelled regularly for transformation (7)
REST (others) + alternate letters of YeLlEd
Down
1 CHOPPY Cutty’s type of sea (6)
“Cut-ty” could mean “like a cut”, as can CHOP-PY
2 ENTRAP Catch mate briefly on the way up (6)
Reverse of PARTNE[r]
3 SHOVELLING Using a digger as weapon to secure poor-quality residence (10)
HOVEL in SLING. Shovelling the is perhaps not the same as digging, but it’s certainly something that mechanical diggers do
4 ADDER Summer snake (5)
A summer is one who sums, or an ADD-ER
5 TRACEABLE A bracelet designed for future identification? (9)
(A BRACELET)*
6 ACHE Long–suffering (4)
Double definition
7 TRANSACT Deal using diplomacy to secure managed end of hostilities (8)
RAN (managed) + [hostilitie]S in TACT
8 REMOTELY Turn up volume in bank from elsewhere (8)
Reverse of TOME in RELY (to bank)
13 STATUETTES Nice and within the rules to show small busts? (10)
ET (“and” in the French city of Nice) in STATUTES
15 HIERARCHY Order hot items for starters and a cherry pudding (9)
H[ot] I[tems] + (A CHERRY)*
16 GENIUSES Fancy seeing us as clever people! (8)
(SEEING US)*
17 SHOEHORN Insert implement in cut (8)
HOE in SHORN
19 DONKEY Essential wear first and foremost for Shrek character (6)
DON (wear) + KEY (essential). The donkey is a character in the animated film Shrek, voiced by Eddie Murphy
20 ODENSE After love, packed for Danish port (6)
O + DENSE
24 SPAR Pole in a fight (4)
Double definition

74 comments on “Guardian 29,233 – Philistine”

  1. Great and straightforward start to the day. Thanks to Setter and Blogger

    Chelsea Tractor was superb. Loved it.

  2. Many thanks for the puzzle and blog. I always think of plane trees in French town squares or London avenues rather than forests, lol.

  3. Enjoyably quick today. Only ‘out’ for ‘garden’ had me scratching my head a little. And a little groan for CHOPPY (nothing wrong with a little groan here there). I could have done without Plus the unpleasant image of a ‘nose condom’ and what it might gather! Favourites for their smooth surfaces and some misdirection were ALPAHBETICAL, ENHANCEMENTS, GENIUSES and SHOEHORN. Many thanks Philistine and Andrew.

  4. Thanks Philistine and Andrew
    When FOI, taken in order, was TOKEN I thought I might struggle, but in fact it went quite smoothly after that, though I was held up in the SW – still not sure how “field” gives SPACE in 25a.
    Lots of good clues. OUTDO just favourite.
    A couple I didn’t like as much. ENHANCEMENTS was very much a “guess, then parse” – HANS and CEMENT aren’t the first things that come to mind for German and binder. DONKEY would be obscure if you haven’t seen Shrek.
    PLANE TREES are more often seen in London streets than forests!

  5. Enjoyable puzzle.

    New for me: CHELSEA TRACTOR (but have heard of urban farmers and similar terms).

    I did not fully parse 14/23 although I saw it was probably an anagram, and also 19d (never saw Shrek movie).

    Favourites: STATUETTES, REMOTELY.

    Thanks, both.

  6. I enjoyed this for the CHELSEA TRACTOR, known in the Land of Oz as a Toorak Tractor (in Melbourne) and a Balmain Bulldozer/Bronte Buggy/North Shore Kingswood/Turramaurra Tractor in Sydney among a lot of other names (usually not polite when I can’t see round them).

  7. CHELSEA TRACTOR is brilliant – a great start!

    I also enjoyed 10ac DIAPHRAGM (same first thoughts as Andrew), 11ac PLANE TREES, 12/21 SATIRE, 14/23 ALPHABETICAL ORDER, 18ac ENHANCEMENTS, 27ac SYNERGY, 7dn TRANSACT, 13dn STATUETTES, 15dn HIERARCHY, 16dn GENIUSES and 17dn SHOEHORN – a particularly pleasing variety of clue types and plenty of wit, as ever.

    Many thanks to Philistine and Andrew.

  8. I don’t think of PLANE TREES as forest dwellers: perhaps more accurate would be “shady city dwellers”! The rest of that clue was very good.

  9. Lots to enjoy here. As Tim has pointed out, we’re more used to Toorak tractors (Melbourne), which has the added bonus of a spot of alliteration.

    The only clue that slowed my pace was the one to do with Shrek, as I’d not seen the film. Favourite clue was STATUETTES, with its cleverly misleading surface.

  12. Like our blogger, I also took a while to get into this puzzle, but then I loved it. Lots of enjoyable clues, several of which have already been mentioned. Eileen@7, I nodded at all the ones you listed. In my case, “a nose condom” at 22a also cracked me up, especially when when that clue was revealed to be hiding NANOSECOND.
    Philistine is one of the best of the Guardian setters I reckon: his touch is so deft and his sense of humour so droll. Thanks to both Philistine and to Andrew. [Feeling particularly blessed to participate in this hobby on days like today – how fortunate we are to have so many excellent setters and faithful, thorough bloggers!]

  13. Presumably PLANE TREES are found in natural forests somewhere in the world, but in the UK they are planted as city and parkland trees, so the def is slightly misleading.

    This took me longer than Philistine usually does, but no complaints, apart from an entirely personal dislike of split-word clues like SAT IRE. I missed the ALPHABETICAL ORDER of first and floor, and took time to spot the well-hidden NANOSECOND and SYNERGY. Favourites GENIUSES, STATUETTES, CHELSEA TRACTOR. I’m surprised at how many people have never seen any of the ubiquitous Shrek movies, but then I’ve never seen Titanic…

  14. Over 60% of these went straight in from the definition / crossers. Not the setter’s fault – super friendly grid maybe?

    Wasn’t convinced by the “empty” in CHELSEA TRACTOR. and if only they were confined to Chelsea 🙂

    Ticks for NANOSECOND, STATUETTES, & ALPHABETICAL ORDER

    cheers P&A

  15. Great stuff. I like HIERARCHY among many others. I think PLANE TREES are naturally riparian rather than forest trees, but it doesn’t matter. I was thinking of a Sarky comment about 1 down, but decided against it.

  18. Petert 🙂 I also was wondering about forest dwellers, plane trees lining my local Wandsworth Park, drooping into The Thames. I thought I would never finish this but CHELSEA TRACTOR (brilliant) finally clicked and I was away. Thanks for parsing the other brilliant ALPHABETICAL ORDER. Nice sentiments JinA @12.

    Ta Philistine & Andrew.

  20. Needed Andrew’s help for parsing a few, thanks.
    And thanks Philistine, for one of my all-time favourite clues, CHELSEA TRACTOR. Brilliant.

  21. Would someone please explain pudding as an anagram indicator? I did manage to complete this with a bit of a struggle, however, that generally makes it feel like more of an achievement

  24. Thanks for the blog, brilliant puzzle , where do I start ? CHELSEA TRACTOR a superb & Lit , ALPHABETICAL ORDER a great reverse anagram and such a clever definition, STATUETTES nearly fooled me for once with the capital N of Nice hidden at the start. I could go on and on. I have seen PLANE TREE forests in Greece and they must exist elsewhere .
    NANOSECOND a minor quibble for brief time, actually a very long time indeed for particle interactions.

  25. Steffen@10. Andrew our blogger has given a clear explanation of this. empty large tells us to use what’s left of large when you empty it, ie get rid of all the letters in the middle, leaving us with LE. Then add that to the all the following words, and mix in the anagram, as Andrew said.

  27. As always, a pleasure whatever the level of difficulty to tackle a Philistine puzzle. Greatly helped by the anagrams today, but having said that I was held up for some time at the very end, caused by me having Want instead of ACHE at 6d, and Trowelling instead of SHOVELLING at 3d. Meaning I couldn’t indentify the CHELSEA TRACTOR until I realised the error of my ways. Nice to see an appearance for ODENSE, where the inlaws lived for a while, and which the Danes pronounce Oh-Ensa, without the D…

  30. Good enjoyable solve where I failed to get 1A for a long time as I confidently put ‘itch’ in 6D.

    I particularly liked the popular (as a crossword answer) CHELSEA TRACTOR, the well-hidden NANOSECOND (like Andrew, at first I thought it was an anagram), the wordplay in REMOTELY, and the good anagram for GENIUSES. [There are not many muddy 4x4s around here. I can only conclude that most people who own them don’t care about the environment. Our general selfishness is propelling us into an avoidable climate catastrophe.]

    Thanks Philistine and Andrew.

  31. So to resolve some confusion here, apparently there are several species of plane trees. The London plane (presumably the type familiar to most here) is a hybrid that was designed for cultivation–so yes, more common on avenues than in forests. The western plane (plantanus occidentalus), better known as the American sycamore, is widespread in North American deciduous forests, particularly here in the Midwest. There are still other plane trees with other habitats. But the point is that it’s fine to call it a forests dweller, because some of them are.

    I hadn’t heard the term Chelsea tractor, but I like it, and we need a term for it here. Living here in a city where no one has any business owning such a vehicle, it is annoying seeing so many of them. They always seem to be owned by the worst drivers, too.

  32. …meant to say that I thought ENHANCEMENTS clue of the day for me, and also to correct my spelling of identify@27. Like Robi@31 with Itch, I had the incorrect Want instead of ACHE. Both erroneous efforts not too wide of the mark, however, until those crossers became part of the grid and proved us wrong…

  34. Liked CHELSEA TRACTOR but is that not just UK centric, but a bit South of England centric? Thought the clueing of the ORDER was a bit clunky. It seemed to take me ages but I look back the blog there wasn’t anything too difficult – maybe I was being a bit slow this morning

  35. Previous clues for CHELSEA TRACTOR had these anagrams: SHATTER CORACLE, CHARLOTTE RACES, CHARACTER STOLE – twice.
    This one was better.

  37. Steffen @46; it’s a reverse clue i.e. ‘A patch liable to emerge from this‘ means that if you take the answer (this) and anagram it, you get ‘a patch liable’. Whenever you see ‘this’, it invariably means ‘the answer’.

  41. Brilliant. This was Philistine with a light touch – I usually have to think more over his puzzles. (I’m glad I had time for it after a tip-off from a friend.) CHELSEA TRACTOR was a great start, and NANOSECOND, STATUETTES and GENIUSES were other highlights in a very good set of clues.

    Thanks to Philistine and Andrew.

  42. Great puzzle. All elegantly clued. CHELSEA TRACTOR, DIAPHRAGM, GENIUSES, NANOSECOND and SHOEHORN all brilliant.

    Thanks Philistine and Andrew

  43. Fabulous.Loved some great cluing .(Frankie G @45. Chelsea Tractor became fashionable about the time of the Sloane Rangers. Huge cars often Discoveries Beemas Mercs etc driven by rich young mothers with their brood on the school run and where I live park atrociously outside schools! Still happens! )

  45. I didn’t know that the UK and Oz make fun of big fat SUVs as mock-agricultural. In the US, they’re mock-military — “suburban tanks.”

    14ac Andrew, thanks for parsing ALPHABETICAL,
    I totally missed the added note in “first floor.”

    6dn I dithered between ACHE and ACHY. Neither seemed to work with both halves of the clue. Apparently “suffering” has to be a noun.

    13dn I don’t think busts are statues. And in 10dn I think “don” doesn’t mean “wear,” it means “put on.”

    muffin@4 I haven’t seen SHREK, but I put DONKEY together from the wordplay — with the objection above.

    17dn SHOEHORN Anybody else try to use MOWN for the “cut” part? Held me up some.

    I wouldn’t know a plane tree from a pork chop myself, but surely they were all in forests long before there were any cities.

    Thanks to Philistine and Andrew.

  46. Very nice. A lot of clever wordplay constructions. Nobody’s mentioned RESTYLE I think, I like how “rest” isn’t obviously a part of that word until you see it. (At least for me!)

    Fortunately I’d seen CHELSEA TRACTOR in a puzzle years ago so the phrase wasn’t new to me. [Valentine@45, the phrase I’ve heard in the US is “suburban assault vehicles”!]

  47. Thanks Philistine for a superb crossword. On my “must do” list, Philistine never disappoints. I had many favourite clues including CHELSEA TRACTOR, SYNERGY, ENTRAP, STATUETTES, and the simple but sublime GENIUSES. I couldn’t parse ENHANCEMENTS. I had no problem with “forest dwellers” for PLANE TREES; imagine the complaints if it were clued “city dwellers”! Thanks Andrew for the blog.

  48. An excellent puzzle with some clever clueing and a nice level of difficulty. CHELSEA TRACTOR was very good and ALPHABETICAL ORDER only slightly too clever for me, I got it without parsing the ‘first floor’ part.

    If I may permit myself one tiny quibble, it would be that ACHE is perhaps a little same-sidey as I always assumed the etymology of the word being used as a synonym for ‘to long (for)’ is the figurative suffering it causes, which would make the clue basically a verb and noun of similar provenance.

    Thanks both!

  49. NHO of CHELSEA TRACTOR but it eventually went in with the crossers and the hint from “appalling” and confirmed by Google. I shall be adopting the phrase from now on.

    Otherwise, a very slow start turned into a sprint to the finish. All very enjoyable with thanks to Philistine and Andrew.

  50. [ludd @21: Check out cryptics.fandom.com There’s a long list of anagram indicators. Pudding’s not listed but anything that can be mixed or cooked is fair game.]

  52. Can someone please explain this “The letters of “first” and “floor” are in alphabetical order”

  54. As usual with Philistine there is much here to enjoy. I share the appreciation of CHELSEA TRACTOR, DIAPHRAGM, STATUETTES, HIERARCHY, GENIUSES and NANOSECOND, with its bizarre reference to nasal sex. Isn’t this defined as the time elapsed in NYC between the lights changing and the guy behind sounding his horn? 🙂

    I wondered as others about the habitat of PLANE TREES – woodland perhaps rather than ‘forest’

    Thanks to the Levanter and Andrew

  55. [Gervase @54
    Of course the original meaning of “forest” had nothing to do with trees – it was an area set aside for hunting. I wonder how and when the tree isea crept in?]

  57. The Forest of Bowland has hardly any trees and very few hen harriers although the grouse shooting estates are completely innocent.

  61. What Eileen@7 and JinA@12 said, in spades. A great example of why Philistine is on my top-three list.

    For those of you who haven’t seen Shrek, it’s a fantastic film to watch with your kids or grandkids – fun for all ages (and possibly Eddie Murphy’s best performance, as 19d DONKEY). The first sequel is pretty good as well.

    Thanks to Philistine for the brilliant fun, and Andrew for the insightful blog.

  62. [I know it well, Roz – well, not the more inaccessible parts, but I’ve driven, cycled and walked in the Forest of Bowland. We honeymooned – some years ago! – at the Inn at Whitewell.]

  63. [Cellomaniac @61
    Good point about Shrek. It’s the same reason why Winnie-the-Pooh remains so popular; children like having it read to them, and parents enjoy reading it.]

  64. In 11A, isn’t it clumsy to make a SEER be a “seeing prophet”? Surely the clue would be improved if it used a synonym for “seeing” rather than literally repeating the underlying verb.

  65. This had much to like – hard to pick a favourite but I just had to love CHELSEA TRACTOR (no I don’t mean I love those egregious gas-guzzlers; I mean I love the clue for it!). Also ticks for ALPHABETICAL ORDER (super reverse clue), DIAPHRAGM, NANOSECOND (I spent ages wondering about a superfluous letter in “a nose condom”), HIERARCHY (nice misdirection – but I think I’m now wise to the many meanings of ‘order’).

    I had to guess at DONKEY but the wordplay was clear enough. Perhaps either “first” or “foremost” is redundant in the clue?

    I agree with the comments above that the PLANE TREE isn’t really a ‘forest dweller’. The familiar London Plane is a hybrid and found mainly in urban areas – and performing worthy service as a carbon sink to counter the pollution from those CHELSEA TRACTORS….

    Thanks to Philistine and Andrew.

  66. @ 27 ronald

    Living in Jylland, Odense always sounds like ‘oh thense’ when I hear the DSB announcements when I’m on my way to Kbh.

    Odense, interesting city. Well worth a detour

    Ha’ en go’ aften.

  67. @66 me. Meant to say this was a lovely puzzle. Thoroughly enjoyed. Thank you for a smiling morning, Phil, and a helpful blog Andrew.

  68. Laccaria @65: As someone who has begun writing clues myself I am very careful to avoid redundant words as you describe in the clue for DONKEY. However, seasoned setters like Philistine and Brendan will sometimes include them to give a better surface reading. I don’t have an issue with that.

  69. Like matt w @46, I’ve heard “suburban assault vehicle” as the US equivalent of “Chelsea tractor”.

    I loved the nose condom. What a gloriously, disturbingly vivid image!

    This was a very entertaining, inventive crossword. Bravo Philistine!

  70. [Perhaps it says something about our two cultures that the US jumps to the military metaphor, while the UK goes agrarian.]

  71. A very enjoyable puzzle. Thanks Philistine and Andrew. As the site engine reveals, Chelsea tractor has appeared in quite a few previous puzzles including 2 by the present setter (in 2020 and 2014).

  72. Slow start for me this evening, got going after 1ac, took me 7min38s in total. Was slowed down by the fact that my printer cut off 1-3 down, and had to work them out inductively. Thanks philistine for an enjoyable 11 minutes.

  73. [muffin @55: That original sense is first recorded in Carolingian documents as ‘foresta silva’. The etymology is uncertain – it may be from the Latin ’foris ‘(outside), or perhaps from a Frankish expression meaning ‘place with firs’. In any case, the hunting area would be extensively wooded or there wouldn’t have been any deer or boar to hunt. And it is notable that the modern French ‘forêt’ and the Italian ‘foresta’ both refer to extensive areas of woodland]

  74. AndrewTyndall @64, I don’t think “seeing prophet” is the clue for SEER. I think [literal clue] seeing [cryptic clue] is a standard formula — if you look at PLANE TREES, you _see_ a prophet (SEER) coming back to Earth (PLANET). It’s no different from how words like ‘for’ and ‘by’ and ‘as’ are used in clues.

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