We cannot believe that it is Friday again and we have another Phi to solve and blog – no complaints here.
A fairly straightforward grid fill today despite putting the wrong answer in for 12ac before we had looked at the parsing. There were references to music and composers in the clues and grid but we couldn’t sort them into a theme. Perhaps we are barking up the wrong tree.
M (Frenchman – Monsieur) ILES (French for islands – maritime locations)
PARIS (French city) after A (article) in CON (study) – a new word for us – to cover a horse with an ornamental cloth.
GOSS (chitchat – short for gossip) around or ‘about’ VERNE (French novelist)
QUIT (leave) around or ’embracing’ N (new). Not sure about the role that ‘after’ is playing.
An ‘ALTERNATIVE’ or ‘different’ spelling of veto is VOTE
Joyce quickly entered NICOTINE before realising that the anagram didn’t work – it’s actually an anagram (‘dodgy’) of ACTION, R (runs) and C (cocaine). Thanks Hovis for the correct parsing here – we had missed ‘in’ (the inclusion indicator).
J (justice) O (old) STyLE (fashion) missing middle letter or ‘heartless’
SP (special) RUE (regret) around or ‘taking’ C (first letter or ‘top’ of coconut)
CREE (native American) around or ‘welcoming’ TON (fashionable people) and N (new)
An anagram (‘out’) of LOCAL MAN WIFE LAY – Family Allowance is now called Child Benefit
Hidden (‘accepted’) in EurOPE RAdical
An anagram (‘various’) of THINGS about ROW (dispute)
GR (Greek) in AGE (time) + GATE (people attending)
GO (leave) SS (ship) with R (king or queen – ‘monarch’) inside or ‘boarding’
An anagram (‘crashed’) of MINI GEARS
EV (electronvolt – ‘measure of energy’) in LAT (back muscle) OR
F (female) missing or ‘abandoning’ SURfER (water sportsman)
Swapping the ‘e’ and ‘i’ (‘small switch’) changes CLIMATES (‘range of growing conditions’) into the climbing plant
A reversal (‘circling’) of MAP (plan) around or ‘keeping’ ISS (International Space Station – ‘orbiting craft’)
ROUE (libertine) ‘around’ Q (Queen) + FORT (castle)
SPOUT (talk) ‘about’ IN (home)
Hidden (‘some’) in spurN IT REligiously
An anagram (‘after disruption’) of ITS LOCALE
EVEN (still) inside or ‘interrupting’ ELSE (other) + S (first letter or ‘opening’ of shop)
PRUE (short form of Prudence) around or ‘storing ‘ O (old) LOG (record)
ROM (memory) BERG (Austrian composer)
NETT (after reductions) with NOOn (twelve) ‘around’ missing last letter or ‘almost’
I inside or ‘presented in’ PATNA (area where rice is grown)
I’D (I had) missing or ‘eradicated’ from FLORidA (US state)
W (weak) R (king) ON (working) G (Government)
Not my absolute favourite Phiday puzzle. A few bum notes in my opinion. Will go back and look for themes etc as I feel I am missing something. Still a great puzzle just not as Phi’s usual astonishing level
Thanks Phi and Bert and Joyce
The theme is Britten’s OPERA The Turn of the Screw (based on the novella by Henry James), which has characters PROLOGUE, Peter QUINT, FLORA, MILES, the GOVERNESS (and Mrs GROSE).
Thank you Andrew
I’m not familiar with the opera so no theme-spotting for me today. I got on OK with this though GK let me down at the end: nho LEVATOR or NONETTO and did not recognise Patna as a rice-growing area so PATINA also escaped me. And I did need Google to find out if the composer was ROMBERG or RAMBERG. NARCOTIC, SPRUCE and PASSIM were my podium today. MILES was nearly there too – I just couldn’t bring myself to put it on the podium, given that the Frenchman would probably be travelling kilometres to reach his iles!
Thanks Phi and B&J
I think the parsing for 12a needs a minor alteration. It is RC inserted into an anagram of ACTION.
Spotted the theme. The OPERA received its Venice (La Fenice) premiere in 1954 (a 70th (Platinum) anniversary), with a 12-year-old David Hemmings as MILES.
“Britten’s interest in Hemmings ceased very abruptly from the moment his voice broke, which occurred unexpectedly while singing the aria ‘Malo’ during a performance of The Turn of the Screw in 1956 in caPARISon. Britten was furious, waved Hemmings away and never had any further contact with him.”
10a QUINT – “Leave after embracing new” = Leave, when it has embraced new.
Thanks all. B&J – your ‘straightforward’ was my ‘difficult in a number of places’, forbiddingly so in PATINA and LEVATOR wherein I did not recognise the answer or part(s) of the wordplay. At least ELEVENSES lives on, and CLEMATIS is a plant I know, though I was half-expecting not to.
I guess it’s obvious… why does fashionable people = TON? I don’t think I’ve seen that before.
Opera, especially English opera is a look away now topic for me so no idea of the theme. We couldn’t have a ballet one week could we to give me a 50/50 chance? 😊
As often with Phi some unknown words for me but clearly enough clued for me to add to my vocabulary.
Thanks Phi and B&J.
Thanks Bertandjoyce and Phi.
Patna = rice production centre?
Give me a break!
The worst Phi puzzle I have seen in recent times.
Pete HA3: TON is one of those words I now only see in crosswordland Apparently it dates from Regency times and meant the fashionable set. Made popular in the works of Georgette Heyer, it seems. Might have turned up in Bridgerton, but I’ve never seen it. The talk page on Wikipedia is quite interesting.
JOSTLE was the nearest I could get for Miss Jessel.
All the characters turn up in the James original, of course (so it’s his fault for the unhelpful names), but it was the opera I was thinking of.
According to Wikipedia’s page on Patna:
Its largest exports are grain, sugarcane, sesame, and Patna rice, a local medium-grained variety.
Seems reasonable to see it as a rice production centre.