Tees is in the Friday slot this week.
And I’m standing in for bertandjoyce today. I found this tricky going in parts, as Tees often is, with some quite fiddly bits of parsing, but all in all an enjoyable puzzle. I have a couple of quibbles here and there, as noted below. Favourites today include TABLE WINE, RESORT TOWN, SCRIPTED and EMANATION. Thanks to Tees.
Moh’s Yuletide cruciverbial hardness rating: Naughty and nice
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | EMPORIA |
Great guy from East needs minute inside shops (7)
|
| Reversal (from East, in an across clue) of AI (A1, great) + ROPE (guy rope) around M (minute inside) | ||
| 5 | RUFFIAN |
Punk‘s green hair pushed back (7)
|
| Reversal (pushed back) of NAIF (green, inexperienced) FUR | ||
| 9 | VEINS |
English invested in wine initially stored in vessels (5)
|
| E inside VIN + S (initially stored). Perhaps it would have been better to indicate that we’re to use the French word for wine? | ||
| 10 | PETULANCE |
Pamper uncle with a ruptured spleen (9)
|
| PET (pamper) + anagram (ruptured) of UNCLE A. ‘Spleen’ seems to me considerably stronger than petulance, but perhaps it’s close enough | ||
| 11 | SUBTRACTED |
Withdrawn journalist clutching pamphlet (10)
|
| SUB ED (sub-editor, journalist) around (clutching) TRACT | ||
| 12 | ET AL |
And others towards the end returned (2,2)
|
| Reversal (returned) of LA TE (towards the end) | ||
| 14 | THE THIRD MAN |
24 6 19 16 for 2? (3,5,3)
|
| Double definition. Writing out the solutions referred to in the clue, we get REED FILM GREENE SCRIPTED for PHILBY?, which leads us to the 1949 film, written by Graham Greene, directed by Carol Reed, as well as to the real-life Cambridge spy ring of which Kim Philby was identified as the third man in 1963 | ||
| 18 | COME WHAT MAY |
Old PM with Larry say devouring old gull hearts regardless (4,4,3)
|
| MAY (Theresa, former UK prime minister) after (‘with’ – really?) CAT (Larry the cat is the feline who hangs around 10 Downing Street – he used to have a great Twitter account in the pre-Musk era) around (devouring) O (old) MEW (a rather archaic term for a gull – only familiar to me from Thomas Hardy’s poem “Beeny Cliff’) H (hearts, as in the suit). This strikes me as an extraordinarily contorted clue | ||
| 21 | INNS |
Scandinavians not loud boozers (4)
|
| [f]INNS (Scandinavians without F for loud). I’m raising a rather severe eyebrow at this one – Finns aren’t classed as Scandinavians for reasons of geography, language, culture and ethnicity. ‘Nordic people’ would have done fine | ||
| 22 | LAST HURRAH |
Review ultra-harsh for final performance (4,6)
|
| Anagram (review) of ULTRA HARSH | ||
| 25 | TABLE WINE |
Drink to Scots having arrived unexpectedly (5,4)
|
| TAE (Scots for ‘to’) around (having) BLEW IN (arrived unexpectedly) | ||
| 26 | LEEDS |
Elland Road team tops league did you say? (5)
|
| Soundalike (‘did you say?’) of ‘leads’. Leeds United’s home ground is Elland Road. Mrs Moh and I trepidatiously await the outcome of the current football season to see which of our teams (Leeds or West Ham) will be relegated. Quite possibly both. | ||
| 27 | DRESDEN |
Prepare without finishing study in China (7)
|
| DRES[s] (prepare without finishing) + DEN (study) | ||
| 28 | TITTERS |
Teetotaller in bank finally gets giggles (7)
|
| TIER (bank) around TT + S (final letter of ‘gets’) | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 1 | ELVISH |
Hard to follow The King’s Speech (6)
|
| H (hard) after ELVIS (the King). It’s far from clear to me how ‘speech’ defines the solution. OK, I’ve just searched. AI tells me: ‘In JRR Tolkien’s mythology, “Elvish” can mean “speech” because the Elves’ very name for themselves – Quendi – literally translates to “the speakers”. This linguistic connection reflects their history as the first beings in Middle-earth to develop articulate language.’ Well, you do indeed learn something new every day. | ||
| 2 | PHILBY |
Agent X after stuff on radio (6)
|
| Soundalike (on radio) of ‘fill’ (stuff) + BY (x, or times) | ||
| 3 | RESORT TOWN |
Rotten Row recreated outside small place like Margate? (6,4)
|
| Anagram (recreated) of ROTTEN ROW around (outside) S | ||
| 4 | ASPIC |
Snake one caught in savoury jelly (5)
|
| ASP (snake) + I + C | ||
| 5 | ROTHERHAM |
Rook — different meat in northern town (9)
|
| R (rook in chess notation) + OTHER HAM (different meat), for the town in South Yorkshire | ||
| 6 | FILM |
Skin flick (4)
|
| Double definition | ||
| 7 | IN NO TIME |
Is it pub-o’clock before you know it? (2,2,4)
|
| INN (pub) + O + TIME (clock, though I can’t immediately think of a sentence in which these words could be interchangeable) | ||
| 8 | NEEDLING |
Irritating being short of Liberal dons (8)
|
| L (liberal) inserted into (dons) NEEDING (being short of) | ||
| 13 | GREY MULLET |
Hairstyle associated with old school member? (4,6)
|
| MULLET (the 80s hairstyle that, unaccountably, seems to have made a comeback in recent years) after (associated with) GREY (old -hm, I’m quite old but not grey…). ‘School’ in the sense of a bunch of fish | ||
| 15 | EMANATION |
Male in each community coming out (9)
|
| Insertion of M (male) in EA (each) + NATION (community) | ||
| 16 | SCRIPTED |
Like some speeches in part Sweeney’s source yelled about? (8)
|
| S (first letter – source – of Sweeney) + CRIED around PT (part) | ||
| 17 | AMENABLE |
Flexible girl taking walk outside (8)
|
| AMBLE around (outside) ENA (girl’s name) | ||
| 19 | GREENE |
Emerald Isle’s ultimate writer (6)
|
| GREEN (emerald) + E (last letter of ‘isle’) for the writer Graham Greene | ||
| 20 | THESIS |
Article One’s written about singular subject (6)
|
| THE (definite article) + IS (one is, or one’s) around (about) S (singular). Alternatively it could be THE + reversal (about) of IS + S. | ||
| 23 | TRENT |
Flower Romeo dropped into Spanish wine (5)
|
| R (Romeo in the Nato alphabet) inside TENT (an old name for a red wine from Galicia) | ||
| 24 | REED |
Ancient arrow point bloodied all around (4)
|
| RED (bloodied) around E (east, point of the compass) |
Liked ET AL, ROTHERHAM, IN NO TIME, EMANATION and THESIS.
Good puzzle. Great blog. Thanks Tees and moh.
IN NO TIME
Try to time/CLOCK your sprint —-works?
What a great crossword . I loved the connection between the two third men.
Thanks to Tees and moh.
Thanks Moh for standing in for us – we have just returned from our travels.
Yes, there were some good clues which you would expect from Tees. We also always expect some obscure ones but felt that 1d was a step too far. We guessed it from the parsing and after checking in Chambers, we decided to come here to find out what was going on. Thanks for the detailed explanation.
18a an extraordinarily contorted clue indeed, given I have never heard of Larry the cat, or that mew is a gull, or Beeny Cliff for that matter. Still I got 97% complete, which seemed impossible with about a third to go. In desperation I guessed THE OTHER MAN for 14a, being wrong obviously, but then the second guess was right and the rest fell into place. Thanks for the explanations.
18a is a bit contorted, but I had no trouble with Larry the cat. My blind spot is the revolving door of Tory occupants of no. 10 between 2010 and 2024.
25a went in with no idea how or why. I’ve tried but I still can’t get the two to sound remotely similar.
To be Blunt, this was a Paine. Naff entwined themelets, giving rise to some really clumsy clues.
2(d), PHILBY, is just gummf.
GREENE, TRENT, REED, SCRIPTED…..and the list goes on.
18(ac) is simply awful. No excuse for a clue which is ” [ 24 6 19 16 for 2 ] ” (14ac).
Not my cup of tee. Thanks , MOH.
E.N.Boll& I beg to disagree. I enjoyed the theme (it’s a great film) and it was fun to work back the answers to 24, 6, 19 and 16 once I had got 14ac.
I agree with the quibbles
raised above, but I enjoyed this nonetheless.
Like Kva I read TIME in7d as a verb: ‘I timed / clocked the lap at 1m 29s’
Thanks Tees and moh, especially for the parsing of 18a which I’m glad I didn’t waste time trying to work out – NHO mew=gull and would never have got there.
I have no problem with 18A being considered extraordinarily contorted. It is. It’s complete nonsense really but I absolutely loved putting it together for you all, my lovely fans. And as for the Finns, mea culpa. A show of real ignorance. Bit late, but I have amended the Tees Database Server so as to excise this error. I’m afraid I cannot concur with the idea that 24 6 19 16 for 2 is in any way a bad clue though: numbers only clues are great IMO, and huge amounts of fun. Especially for their compilers.
Have a nice Crimbo. I might see you in the New Year. Thanks MOH et al.
Thank you for a fun puzzle Tees, it’s always pleasing when a setter pops in – and I always enjoy arguing/quibbling with a puzzle (some strange psychological quirk of mine, no doubt), so I enjoyed this one very much. Thanks to all commenters, and happy crimbonewyear shenanigans.
I think some of the above quibbles are unfair. I did find some of the clues difficult, but put that down to my own slowness. I loved The Third Man mini-theme, and thought inn-o’time for pub-o’clock was brilliant. Thank you Tees.
For the record, I thought this puzzle was an excellent challenge, which is why I was surprised and delighted to (almost) complete it after a struggle. 18a went straight in, and didn’t hold up any crossers, so not being able to parse it even after the fact is no big deal. Thanks Tees.
My comment was almost a note to self, or perhaps the odd beginner, that if you are really stuck, and it seems impossible, bung in a guess or two, and you just might salvage a victory of sorts, or at least a completion. It doesn’t have to be perfect to be enjoyable.