Whew, quite the workout from Aardvark . . .
. . . resulting in a remarkably elegant double pangram, with one set of X, Q, J, Z appearing around the central squares in the puzzle.
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | KOHLRABI |
Hotel left Scotsman to divide Oriental fish and veg (8)
|
| {H (hotel) + L (left) + RAB (Scotsman)} inside (to divide) KOI (Oriental fish) | ||
| 5 | MEKONG |
Flower from Highgrove, at rear, that’s associated with King? (6)
|
| Last letters of (at rear) [FRO]M + [HIGHGROV]E + KONG (that’s associated with King, as in King Kong), with “flower” in the crossword sense of “river” | ||
| 9 | ELOQUENT |
Some of hospital nurses see that Norman is articulate (8)
|
| ENT (some of hospital, i.e., the ENT department) around (nurses) {LO (see) + QUE (that [in] Norman [French]) | ||
| 10 | DUFFER |
Charlie with cylindrical bag, changing hands (6)
|
| DUFFE[L] (cylindrical bag) with an R (right) substituted for the L (left) (changing hands) | ||
| 12 | CHISELLER |
Fraud who’s carving out some deal maybe (9)
|
| Double/cryptic definition | ||
| 13 | EVICT |
Throw out stale Victoria sandwiches (5)
|
| Hidden in (sandwiches) [STAL]E VICT[ORIA] | ||
| 14 | AJAX |
Cleaner that initiates ‘all hands on deck’ aloud (4)
|
| First letter of (that initiates) A[LL] + homophone of (aloud) JACKS (hands on deck) | ||
| 16 | QUARTER |
Fourth coin for parking lot? (7)
|
| Double definition | ||
| 19 | GEE WHIZ |
My western greeting accepted by guy without hesitation (3,4)
|
| {W (western) + HI (greeting)} inside (accepted by) GEEZ[ER] (guy) minus (without) ER (hesitation) | ||
| 21 | JETÉ |
Spring / summer in Cannes prioritised by Juliet (4)
|
| J (Juliet) + ÉTÉ (summer in Cannes, i.e., in French) | ||
| 24 | SHREW |
Vixen somewhere in Shropshire half-hidden (5)
|
| SHREW[SBURY] (somewhere in Shropshire) minus second half (half-hidden) | ||
| 25 | TUNESMITH |
Songwriter taking drug, obsessive about Morrissey or Marr? (9)
|
| {NUT (obsessive) reversed (about) + SMITH (Morrissey or [Johnny] Marr?, i.e., members of The Smiths)} around (taking) E (drug) | ||
| 27 | EMBRYO |
Dawn trains in middle of Luxembourg (6)
|
| RY (trains) inside (in) middle [letters] of [LUX]EMBO[URG] | ||
| 28 | STITCH UP |
Trick slug covering little ‘un (6,2)
|
| SUP (slug) around (covering) TITCH (little ‘un) | ||
| 29 | LAYMEN |
Paul’s finale Let it Be entertains Yankee congregation? (6)
|
| Last letter of (finale [of]) [PAU]L + AMEN (let it be) around (entertains) Y (Yankee), with a capitalization misdirection | ||
| 30 | IRON-GREY |
Irish cross-breed’s meat having variable colour (4-4)
|
| IR. (Irish) + inside letters of (meat [of]) [M]ONGRE[L] (cross-breed) + Y (variable) | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 1 | KVETCH |
Victor probes thick sauce, discarding revolting beef (6)
|
| V (Victor) inside (probes) KETCH[UP] (thick sauce) minus (discarding) UP (revolting) | ||
| 2 | HOODIE |
Husband loves long leisurewear (6)
|
| H (husband) + O + O (loves) + DIE (long) | ||
| 3 | ROUSE |
Turn on game: entry denied! (5)
|
| [G]ROUSE (game) minus first letter (entry denied) | ||
| 4 | BENELUX |
Mountain base with measure of light somewhere in Europe (7)
|
| BEN (mountain) + E (base) + LUX (measure of light) | ||
| 6 | EXUBERANT |
Outside taxi, social creature’s in high spirits (9)
|
| EX (outside) + UBER (taxi) + ANT (social creature) | ||
| 7 | OFF-PISTE |
Oddball cricket side exercises carrying gear (3-5)
|
| OFF (cricket side) + PE (exercises) around (carrying) 1ST (gear, with “1” stylized as “I”) | ||
| 8 | GYRATORY |
Having year in Georgia, party person finds pole-dancer like this? (8)
|
| YR (year) inside (having . . . in) GA (Georgia) + TORY ([political] party person) | ||
| 11 | IRAQ |
Country artist appearing after one (Queen’s Head) (4)
|
| I (one) + RA (artist) + first letter of (head [of]) Q[UEEN] | ||
| 15 | JOHN WAYNE |
Little room on Tyneside is beneath method actor (4,5)
|
| JOHN (little room) + WAY (method) + NE (Tyneside) | ||
| 17 | EGGSHELL |
Matt’s torment supporting Spurs (8)
|
| EGGS (spurs) + HELL (torment), with “supporting” indicating the order of the wordplay, plus a capitalization misdirection | ||
| 18 | TERRIBLY |
Limitless Scriptures embraced by Waite, say, so desperate (8)
|
| [B]IBL[E] (Scriptures) minus outside letters (limitless) inside (embraced by) TERRY (Waite, say). I am not 100% sure about the adverb/adjective conflict here? | ||
| 20 | ZETA |
Mediterranean character, the heart of pizzeria, appreciated (4)
|
| Middle letters of (the heart of) [PIZ]ZE[RIA] + TA (appreciated), referring to the Greek alphabet | ||
| 21 | JANITOR |
Attendant sweeping up rubbish after holiday? (7)
|
| JAN. 1 (holiday?, with “1” stylized as “I”) + ROT (rubbish) inverted (sweeping up) | ||
| 22 | ZITHER |
Hesitate, with daughter unsettled by unknown music-maker (6)
|
| [D]ITHER (hesitate) with D (daughter) displaced by (unsettled by) Z (unknown) | ||
| 23 | CHIPPY |
Caught Woodstock attendee perhaps being belligerent (6)
|
| C (caught) + HIPPY (Woodstock attendee perhaps) | ||
| 26 | SIT-IN |
Protest from Pride possibly about pronoun (3-2)
|
| SIN (pride possibly, as in: the seven deadly) around (about) IT (pronoun), with a capitalization misdirection |
First time I’ve tried an FT, so I found this a baptism of fire. Thanks Cineraria for the blog and Aardvark for the workout.
Does including “so” into the definition for TERRIBLY (“so desperate”) resolve the adverb/adjective problem?
Faves: CHISELLER, GEE WHIZ, ZETA and SIT-IN.
Liked the puzzle. Very good blog.
TERRIBLY
Agree with the blogger that there appears to be a part of speech mismatch.
Also, doesn’t the surface require ‘so desperately’?
Thanks Aardvark and Cineraria.
Perhaps the hardest crossword I’ve completed without aids. Really pleased to finish. Like Tim @1, I had ‘so desperate’ as definition.
In 21D Jani is a Latvian holiday celebrating the summer solstice.
Does ‘so desperate’ work as an adverbial phrase?
I don’t know KVa @5… it was just a suggestion on my part. I’m struggling to come up with a sentence where “so desperate” is equivalent to “terribly”, but English grammar has never been a strong point of mine despite having been born in England and having gone to a “Grammar School” there.
This certainly was a brainteaser not helped by multiple interruptions throughout the day each time I tried to tackle it but I found it immensely satisfying to get over the line (albeit without pristine parsing).
Spotted – and was surprised by – the double pangram and I must say that suspecting a combination of X,Q,Z and J at the centre (thanks Pelham Barton) helped break through the SW quarter.
There were many great clues but I’ll nominate KOHLRABI, KVETCH and JOHN WAYNE as favourites.
Thanks to Aardvark and Cineraria on a sterling blog.
Tim C @1: I’ve been doing them for a couple of decades. In my experience, Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday puzzles are usually the most straightforward. Wednesdays are sometimes ok but if there is to be a difficult puzzle in the week then that’s when they usually arrive. Friday and Saturday puzzles tend to fall somewhere in between.
Having said that, this was the most demanding Tuesday puzzle I can remember. But what a magnificent feat of construction!
Jay @4: Like the blogger, I took it to refer to NewYear’s Day/Hogmanay. The symmetry between the start of the year and Midsummer is pleasing, but I don’t think Latvian festival names are the sort of GK that can reasonably be expected of a UK daily solver!
Challenging puzzle and great blog, very helpful to novices.
Managed to parse all except “cross-breed’s meat”.
As someone doing a lot of home decorating at the moment I can assure you that EGGSHELL and matt are not the same! But in crossword land ON and LEG are the same so we’ll gloss over that.
Many thanks to setter & blogger
What a Scrabble score!
Way beyond me
Yuk
I got over the line, but with a lot unparsed. I do not have enough time on a weekday to fully complete a puzzle as difficult as this.
My favourites were HOODIE, DUFFER, EVICT, and GEE WHIZ
Congratulations to Cineraria for a great blog
Thanks Cineraria and Aardvark
Tricky, but got there in the end, only cheating on one square to get EGGSHELL. Why does base = E in BENELUX?
Adders@13: “e” is the base of natural logarithms in mathematics.
After a lot of head-scratching and coming back to it after a break we got all the answers, but several were from definition and crossing letters only – we couldn’t parse MEKONG, TUNESMITH, IRON GREY or OFF-PISTE. But we liked KOHLRABI and ZITHER. Not sure, though, how many younger solvers would know of Terry Waite (18dn).
Thanks, Aardvark and Cineraria