The puzzle may be found at https://observer.co.uk/puzzles/everyman/article/everyman-no-4135 in the interactive form, or at https://cdn.slowdownwiseup.co.uk/media/documents/obs.everyman.20260118.pdf as a pdf.
The grid highlights the usual Everyman trademanks – 8A WHITER THAN WHITE and 22A GET OUT OF MY SIGHT, with the latter doubling as the personal reference; 4A SOBA as the ‘primarily’ clue; 3D ANTIGUA as the geographical reference, and no less that three one-word anagrams, at 13A HURRICANE, 2D DIETITIAN and 14D OPPRESSOR. There is also more than the usual quota of good double definitions.
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | IDEA |
In retrospect, ChatGPT etc destructive, vacuous at heart? There’s a notion (4)
|
| An envelope (‘at heart’) of DE (‘DestructivE, vacuous’) in IA, a reversal (‘in retrospect’) of AI (Artificial Intelligence, ‘ChatGPT etc’). | ||
| 4 | SOBA |
Strings of buckwheat, Asian primarily? (4)
|
| First letters (‘primarily’) of ‘Strings Of Buckwheat Asian’ with an &lit definition. | ||
| 8 | WHITER THAN WHITE |
In the raw with the bananas – extremely chaste (6,4,5)
|
| An anagram (‘bananas’) of ‘in the raw with the’. A distinctly improbable-looking anagram. | ||
| 11 | TOPPING |
Knocking off chocolate sauce perhaps (7)
|
| Double definition. | ||
| 12 | FLEAPIT |
Give gratuity to a little fellow over in seedy venue (7)
|
| A reversal (‘over’) of TIP (‘give gratuity to’) plus ‘a’ plus ELF (‘little fellow’). Note that there is no reason to treat ‘a little fellow’ as a unit, which would give AN ELF. | ||
| 13 | HURRICANE |
Raunchier, but laughably so? That’s a big blow (9)
|
| An anagram (‘but laughably so’) of ‘raunchier’. | ||
| 14 | OVOID |
Empty after having had nothing – like an egg? (5)
|
| A charade of O (‘nothing’) plus (‘after having had’) VOID (’empty’). | ||
| 15 | PLAIN |
Unattractive lowland? (5)
|
| Double definition. | ||
| 16 | OENOPHILE |
Merrily I open butts of French Pomerol to imbibe? (9)
|
| An anagram (‘merrily’) of ‘I open’ plus HLOE, last letters (‘butts’) of ‘FrencH PomeroL tO imbibE‘), with an &lit definition (kind of). Pomerol is a village in Bordeaux, and the wine produced there (and not to be confused with Pomeroy’s). | ||
| 19 | LEECHES |
Third character in John Cleese play, Drains (7)
|
| An anagram (‘play’) of H (‘third character in JoHn’) plus ‘Cleese’. | ||
| 21 | WEEPING |
Small, small sound: sound of sorrow (7)
|
| A charade of WEE (‘small’) plus PING (‘small sound’). | ||
| 22 | GET OUT OF MY SIGHT |
Avoid Everyman’s daft appearance: begone! (3,3,2,2,5)
|
| A charade of GET OUT OF (‘avoid’) plus MY (‘Everyman’s’) plus SIGHT (‘daft appearance’ – “he looked a sight in top hat and tails with his nose ring”). | ||
| 23 | ISLE |
Geographical feature that is around small lake? The reverse! (4)
|
| An envelope (‘around’) of S (‘small’) plus L (‘lake’) in IE (id est, ‘that is’). ‘The reverse’ here is not, as usually, part of the wordplay, but to indicate that in the ISLE is more likely to be in the small lake, rather than the other way round. | ||
| 24 | NERO |
Tyrant, somewhat ungenerous (4)
|
| A hidden answer (‘somewhat’) in ‘ungeNEROus’. | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 2 | DIETITIAN |
Food guru initiated reforms (9)
|
| An anagram (‘reforms’) of ‘initiated’. | ||
| 3 | ANTIGUA |
Short time enthralled by wild iguana somewhere in W Indies (7)
|
| An envelope (‘enthralled by’) of T (‘short time’) in ANIGUA, an anagram (‘wild’) of ‘iguana’. | ||
| 4 | STAFFIE |
Man alternately bites dog (7)
|
| A charade of STAFF (‘man’, verb) plus IE (‘alternately bItEs’). A STAFFIE is a Staffordshire bull terrier. | ||
| 5 | BOWIE |
What musician may take regularly: mike for musician (5)
|
| A charade of BOW (‘what musician may take’, which is probably intended as an acknowledgement of audience applause, but it could be a violinist about to play) plus IE (‘regularly mIkE‘), for the musician (and actor) David BOWIE. | ||
| 6 | SWITCH |
Exchange whip (6)
|
| Double definition. | ||
| 7 | PELTED |
Rained heavily – wearing fur? (6)
|
| Double definition. | ||
| 9 | IMPERMANENT |
Grim perm an entertainer hides in passing (11)
|
| A hidden answer (‘hides’) ib ‘grIM PERM AN ENTertainer’ | ||
| 10 | IMPROVISING |
I’m in favour of six heads of state issuing numbing generalisations departing from script (11)
|
| A charade of ‘I’m’ plus PRO (‘for’) plus VI (Roman numeral, ‘six’) plus SING (‘heads of State Issuing Numbing Generalisations’) | ||
| 14 | OPPRESSOR |
Proposers involved tormentor (9)
|
| An anagram (‘involved’) of ‘proposers’. | ||
| 15 | PHLEGM |
Cool Prime Minister circumventing hot Member (6)
|
| An envelope (‘circumventing’) of H (‘hot’) plus LEG (‘member’) in PM (‘Prime Minister’). The definition is in the sense of impeturbability. | ||
| 16 | ONSHORE |
Riding, it seems, with son going up to the coast (7)
|
| ON HORSE (‘riding, it seems’) with the S (‘son’) advanced (‘going up’ in a down light). | ||
| 17 | NEWSMAN |
Journalistic chap seen in every direction: gee! (7)
|
| A charade of NEWS (compass points, ‘every direction’) plus MAN (‘gee’). | ||
| 18 | EIGHTS |
In the E End, loathes rowers (6)
|
| With the H dropped (‘in the E End’ of London) sounds like (unannounced) HATES (‘loathes’). | ||
| 20 | HOURS |
Time for you and me, did you say? (5)
|
| Sounds like (‘did you say?’) OURS (‘for you and me’). |
Enjoyable; glad that all the hallmarks are there 🙂 favourites WHITER THAN WHITE, IMPROVISING and OENOPHILE. Thanks Everyman and PeterO!
Quite good I thought. STAFFIE not in Chambers and perhaps could have benefited from an indication of the colloquialism.
Thank you Everyman for an enjoyable crossword which I finished but did not fully parse three clues. So, thank you PeterO for fully explaining 16a, 19a, and 4d.
Great crossword. Didn’t quite manage to parse 16D, but was pleased to get an anagram of a word I didn’t know, i.e., 16A. Always a nice feeling to look up something you hope is a real word in Chambers and find out that it is.
Very enjoyable. My favourite was ‘raunchier’ as an anagram of HURRICANE.
Jay@2: agreed. I bunged this and had to look it up. Never heard of it before.
Entertaining crossword. 8a conjured up an interesting picture in the mind. Failed to consider 16a as an &lit so tried OTNOPHILE in my browser & the real answer sprung out.
Do you have to be a paid subscriber to access the online Everyman version?
I’ve been doing Everyman for about 7 years. The link at the start of Fifteensquared worked once since the subscription demand started, but it looks like the link only goes to the subscription page now.
Thanks.
Oh! I just needed to reset a password!
It’s working now!!
Maybe it’s a US/UK difference, but “drains” would be LEACHES for us, not LEECHES.
Pianola, 10
I agree. In fact I wrote in LEACHES anyway, thereby giving myself an unnoticed spelling error in IMPERMANENT.
pianola @10
to leech: to apply a leech to drain blood from a patient. Not recommended. Chambers gives drain directly as a definition of leech in this sense.
DNF. Never heard of 16A and I can never get clues where a random letter moves up or down. Pelted was a nice word but odd surface
I don’t think cool works as a definition of phlegm. Different parts of speech. Phlegm is a noun, cool is an adjective. Cool means phlegmatic. If phlegm is the answer, coolness should be the definition. I cannot think of a sentence where you could sensibly substitute phlegm for cool. I got it, but I didn’t like it.
Welcome Susan. Keep your cool. It is a bit slangy I agree..
I liked the two long phrases going right across, fleapit and leeches. The Soviets used to use the word for people who didn’t do useful work. I’m probably showing my age.
We seem to be getting fewer comments than we used to.
I finished with the help of a wildcard dictionary but with 16A being the last one in solved by dictionary and crossers, I wondered which word indicated the definition. Or is the whole sentence something an oenophile would do? I agree with you Susan except that there is a saying “keep your cool”.
Happy enough and learned two new words.
Susan, I agree with you. I got the answer but couldn’t fathom why!
A good brain workout for a Saturday morning.
Thanks to all
Oh and I didn’t put Staffie in because it’s a shortened term, which I didn’t think worked!
Never knew we were oenophiles. So that was a positive outcome from an obscure clue.