Imogen provides this week’s prize puzzle.
Apologies to those expecting to see Eileen’s name at the top of the blog: she is still recovering from recent emergency surgery (see her comment #27 on last week’s blog) so I am standing in for her this week.
Timon and I enjoyed this puzzle; the grid was friendly and the perimeter entries were all fairly straightforward, so we finished it in good time. There were some tricky parsings, e.g. SIMPATICO, IGNORAMUS and OCCIPUT, but also some relatively easy cryptic definitions, such as ROCK OPERA. My only quibble relates to the use of CILIA in the answer to 25 across.
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | CHARIOTS OF FIRE |
A historic offer to edit film about race (8,2,4)
|
| *(A HISTORIC OFFER). | ||
| 8 | ALBAN |
Vestment taken by a new saint (5)
|
| ALB (a vestment) A N(ew). | ||
| 9 | INCREASE |
As precaution, banking extremely rare profit (8)
|
| R(ar)E inside IN CASE (as precaution). | ||
| 11 | HARD ROE |
Pregnant fish has this laborious progress through water, we hear (4,3)
|
| Sounds like “hard row”. Can fish be said to be pregnant, we wondered? | ||
| 12 | PUDENDA |
Naughty bits of dessert to finish at end of tea (7)
|
| PUD (dessert) END (finish) (te)A. | ||
| 13 | ASSAM |
Gather in numbers for cycling, then drink (5)
|
| AMASS (gather in numbers) cycled (letters moved from front to back, or vice versa). | ||
| 15 | SATIRISES |
Pokes fun, having posed by van Gogh painting (9)
|
| SAT (posed) IRISES (this is one of the paintings) | ||
| 17 | DAMP SQUIB |
Swear non-stop: question in pub is ridiculous non-event (4,5)
|
| DAM(n) (swear non-stop), *(Q IS) inside PUB. Timon originally entered this as DAMP SQUID! | ||
| 20 | CANON |
In author’s works, chapter is not by her? (5)
|
| C(hapter) ANON(ymous). | ||
| 21 | NIAGARA |
Across Aegean regularly terrible rain falls (7)
|
| *RAIN, alternate (regular) letters of AeGeAn. | ||
| 23 | CHOC-ICE |
Bar is excellent but cold inside (4-3)
|
| C(old) inside CHOICE (excellent). Do choc-ices still exist, or have they been entirely supplanted by Magnums (or similar brands)? Incidentally, I can find no evidence to support the claim that it was Pierce Brosnan who first came up with the idea of a choc-ice on a stick. | ||
| 25 | SICILIAN |
Islander wrong to coat eyelashes (8)
|
| CILIA (eyelashes?) inside SIN. Any experts out there care to comment on whether eyelashes can be defined as cilia? Chambers defines them as “hair-like structures …. on the surface of a cell”. | ||
| 26 | EPICS |
Spice up the Iliad, etc (5)
|
| *SPICE. | ||
| 27 | COMMON OR GARDEN |
Choice of grassy areas, nothing special (6,2,6)
|
| Cryptic definition. | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 1 | CRASH LANDING |
Have to sleep outside bedroom, it may appear, a disastrous comedown (5,7)
|
| CRASH (have to sleep) LANDING (outside bedroom). | ||
| 2 | AMBER |
Light warning room has no central heating (5)
|
| (ch)AMBER. | ||
| 3 | IGNORAMUS |
Fool, I sound hesitant to wear skirt when getting up (9)
|
| I, UM (sound hesitant) inside SARONG (skirt, all rev) | ||
| 4 | TRICEPS |
One extending journeys round continental Europe in the first instance (7)
|
| C(ontinental) E(urope) inside TRIPS. The triceps is an extensor muscle. | ||
| 5 | OCCIPUT |
Still up in Ohio canal? Head back (7)
|
| O(hio), PIC(ture, or still, rev) inside CUT(canal). The definition (it’s the back of the head) looks like wordplay. | ||
| 6 | FREUD |
Analyst runs into protracted quarrel (5)
|
| R(uns) inside FEUD (protracted quarrel). | ||
| 7 | RISING SUN |
Students suggested national flag design (6,3)
|
| NUS (National Union of Students, rev). The clue is self-referential; reversing (or raising, as this is a down clue) NUS suggests the rising sun, which is the design of the Japanese national flag. | ||
| 10 | HANS ANDERSEN |
Husband to Anne Sanders, novel author (not Christian) (4,8)
|
| H(usband) *(ANNE SANDERS). In fact Hans Christian Andersen never married. | ||
| 14 | SIMPATICO |
Congenial, so admitting I love my country, suppressing riot (9)
|
| S(I’M PAT(riot)IC)O. | ||
| 16 | ROCK OPERA |
Concept album from Gibraltar? (4,5)
|
| Cryptic definition. | ||
| 18 | URANIAN |
Middle Easterner gets a new leader, one who is out of this world (7)
|
| IRANIAN, with U for the initial I. | ||
| 19 | BACONER |
Pig slaughtered once in pub (7)
|
| *ONCE inside BAR. | ||
| 22 | AXIOM |
Maxim: one not the first that’s empty? (5)
|
| O (nothing, or emptiness) inside (m)AXIM. | ||
| 24 | IVIED |
One short film about castle finally covered in greenery (5)
|
| (castl)E inside 1 VID. |
According to Google Cilia is the anatomical word for eyelashes, whereas in biology they are the hairs on cells.
As you said the four long answers went in fairly quickly, but the south-west corner held out the longest, but was a very satisfying solve.
Thanks B & I
Cilium is Latin for eyelid. Merriam Webster gives eyelash as 2nd meaning.
Nice to see Imogen in the prize slot with her usual flair and wit. The four long clues proved quite accessible with CHARIOTS etc. our FOI, but not leading immediately to any of the down clues! Our LOI was TRICEPS with NIAGARA, CHOC-ICE, AMBER, OCCIPUT, SIMPATICO and RISING SUN (last parsed) highly recommended. We do have a reservation with the double use of AXIM in 22dn, but otherwise is was most entertaining.
Thanks to I and the gallant b, with best wishes to E.