In the words of 3dn, another nutty dish from Filbert
I’m a great admirer of this setter, for the precision and concision of their cluing. In this instance, however, after completing the grid, there appeared to be a couple of quibblesome infelicities that I thought let it down somewhat, namely in 14ac and 8dn. Further reflection, however, revealed that what I had thought was imprecision was in fact my own failure to parse the clues properly. Apologies to Filbert for the momentary lapse of faith.
If I want to quibble at all, I’ll say that the surface reading for 2dn is a little awkward, though it does just about make grammatical sense. As we’ve come to expect from Filbert there were delightful clues all through this puzzle, but for the podium I’m going to nominate SERAPH (for the surface, which is very cheeky indeed and made me laugh), the lovely SPECTATOR SPORT and … gold medal to TSARIST, which is quite brilliant.
Moh’s patently fabricated hardness scale rating: Quartz
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | GHOSTBUSTERS |
Dispiriting picture? (12)
|
| Cryptic definition. At first read through I thought it’d be a great clue if the answer was The Exorcist – it was only when I came back to it near the end that I realised how close to the right idea I’d been | ||
| 9 | HYDRATED |
Moisturised skin you hear admired (8)
|
| Soundalike (skin you hear) of ‘hide’ + RATED | ||
| 10 | ACUMEN |
Ability to discern Caesar’s head among gold pieces (6)
|
| C (Caesar’s head) inside AU (gold) + MEN (pieces, as in chess) | ||
| 11 | FLATLY |
France in recent times barring English outright (6)
|
| F (France) + LAT[e]LY without the E (barring English) | ||
| 12 | ANECDOTE |
Narrative one acted out (8)
|
| Anagram (out) of ONE ACTED | ||
| 13 | SPAM |
Plans to review unopened emails? (4)
|
| Reversal (to review) of MAPS (plans). One of those awkward reversal clues where the indicator is in the middle so, in theory, either way could be correct until the crossers tell you otherwise | ||
| 14 | CARGO PANTS |
Wheels turn – factory turning out large and small trousers (5,5)
|
| CAR (wheels) + GO (turn, as in taking turns in a game) + P[l]ANT (factory/plant without L) + S. I have to admit that my first parsing had ‘wheels turn’ as cluing ‘car go’, but of course Filbert would never be such a grammatical barbarian | ||
| 16 | PROSECUTOR |
Lawyer‘s basic writing cleverer when spoken (10)
|
| PROSE (basic writing, by contrast with verse, with the same sense as ‘prosaic’) + CUTOR (sounds like – when spoken – ‘cuter’, cleverer. Or possibly ‘acuter’ when the whole word is spoken, but then the E would be clued twice) | ||
| 18 | PURE |
Son pinched from mom’s handbag without guilt (4)
|
| PUR[s]E minus S (son pinched from) – in American usage, the word purse denotes what we Brits call a handbag, hence the US spelling of ‘mom’ | ||
| 19 | VENDETTA |
500 gatecrashing ground at event prolonged antagonism (8)
|
| Insertion (gatecrashing) of D (500) in an anagram (ground) of AT EVENT | ||
| 21 | SERAPH |
Angel shaves around front of her … (6)
|
| Reversal (around) of PARES + H (front of her). Cue schoolboy snigger… | ||
| 22 | BORZOI |
Dog bin unfinished pasta goes in (6)
|
| BI[n] (bin unfinished) around ORZO | ||
| 23 | IDOLATRY |
Worship as bride and groom agree, initially like a shot (8)
|
| I DO (as bride and groom agree) + L (initially Like) + A (from surface) + TRY (shot) | ||
| 24 | DERWENTWATER |
Wetter wander around part of the Lake District (12)
|
| Anagram (around) of WETTER WANDER | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 2 | HARD TIMES |
Book with Romeo in kept by (4,5)
|
| Insertion of R in HAD (kept) + TIMES (multiplied by) | ||
| 3 | SATAY |
Nutty dish dropped onto chair, alas (5)
|
| SAT + AY (alas, as in ‘ay me’). Which makes me think that’s what I’ll be cooking for dinner tonight | ||
| 4 | BID FAIR |
Promise boyfriend with cramped identity breathing space (3,4)
|
| BF (boyfriend) around (cramped) ID + AIR (breathing space) | ||
| 5 | STAGE DOOR |
Wrinkly torso brought about elderly actor’s exit (5,4)
|
| Anagram (wrinkly) of TORSO around AGED | ||
| 6 | EQUID |
Horsey type last to imitate nicker (5)
|
| E (last letter of imitatE) + QUID (slang for pound sterling, as is ‘nicker’) | ||
| 7 | SPECTATOR SPORT |
Prescott tangling with prat, so fun to watch? (9,5)
|
| Anagram (tangling with) of PRESCOTT PRAT SO. A reminder of the time the UK’s deputy prime minister punched a protester. It’s still quite fun to watch, which I think makes this pretty much a CAD | ||
| 8 | CYCLE PER SECOND |
Hertz essentially opposed to driving on the left behind bike (5,3,6)
|
| PER SE (essentially) + CON (opposed to) + D (Driving on the left) under (behind) CYCLE. D=driving (my first attempt at parsing) isn’t sanctioned by Chambers, but of course ‘driving on the left’ is telling us to take the first letter – ie, the one furthest to the left of the word | ||
| 14 | CICATRICE |
Scar from treacherous Arctic floes? (9)
|
| Anagram (treacherous) of ARCTIC + ICE (floes) | ||
| 15 | ASPARTAME |
Equally mild, sub-standard additive (9)
|
| AS (equally) + TAME (mild) under (sub, in a down clue) PAR (standard) | ||
| 17 | TSARIST |
One supports aristocratic bears? (7)
|
| Contained in (bears) ‘supporTS ARISTocratic’. Clue as definition, with ‘aristocratic bears’ also referencing the Russian royals. A mighty clever clue | ||
| 20 | DOZER |
Pushing tractor, one rests briefly (5)
|
| Double definition | ||
| 21 | SKODA |
Bill allows inverted badge on boots (5)
|
| Reversal (inverted) of AD (bill) + OKS (allows). For Americans, of course, the badges in question would be on the trunk |
Absolutely agree with MOH about the quality of this crossword. I was completely bamboozled by the parsing of Hertz, though the solution was clear enough. Anyone who has holidayed in the Lake District will attest to the aptness of the WETTER WANDER anagram. I spent too long in the closing stages trying/expecting to find J and X.
Thoroughly enjoyable!
Thanks to Filbert and MOH
Super puzzle. Super blog. Double treat.
Thanks Flibert and MOH.
Top faves: CARGO PANTS, VENDETTA, CYCLE PER SECOND and TSARIST.
PROSECUTOR
I think PROSE+sound-alike of CUToR works all right.
Another great puzzle from Filbert, though I needed help to complete. I liked the way “trousers” was the definition, rather than an insertion indicator in CARGO PANTS and TSARIST was a gem.
Finished but had to reveal 3 letters at the end, when I had 15D and 24A left unanswered. I had forgotten TAME as a synonym of mild, and I simply had no idea 24A existed.
I like 12A ANECDOTE (simple but nice) and 17D TSARIST. Honorable mention to 22A BORZOI – I like to see an unordinary word within another unordinary word.
Thanks Filbert and m.o.h.!
Great puzzle from Filbert and blog from MOH. Thanks to both. I needed a little help to complete so agree with the difficulty rating of quartz. But otherwise very enjoyable and my top clue would be HARD TIMES for its precision and economy. Kept by? Kept by? Masterful from the maestro.
It’s all been said above but just want to add my praise and thanks to filbert for another super puzzle.
Fantastic puzzle filbert, many thanks, that hertz essentially bamboozled me in to looking for a bike somehow. Cheers MOH
Thanks both. A little restricted for time, as between trips to Edinburgh followed by Budapest, so needed help with the nho BORZOI as I also didn’t know the pasta, and had sought the definition for Hertz knowing it related to CYCLE (PER MINUTE was escaping me) though I habitually miss ‘per se’ for ‘essentially’. Was also obsessive about The Exorcist, which is of course more seriously dispiriting than GHOSTBUSTERS which for me was on little more than the Scooby Doo level.
Hard for us because of some things we found very obscure. Cicatrice, orzo and aspartame unknown to me, and I have no idea we
what “bid fair” means (well I do now but it’s new on me).
Thanks Filbert. This was a slow solve for me & I revealed HARD TIMES (an uncharacteristically poor surface) and HYDRATED. Most of the clues were excellent with my top picks being ACUMEN, PURE, VENDETTA, and CICATRICE. Thanks MOH for the blog.
Thanks Filbert and MOH. Tops for me was CICATRICE, with its deceptively plural “floes”. (I do agree that the surface in 2 is a bit clunky. Book owned by Romeo is boring?)