More of the good stuff from Julius. Thank you again.
There is a phonetic alphabet theme, in the grid and appearing a few times in the clues too.
Thanks to Steven for pointing out that very appropriately the puzzle is a pangram, every letter of the alphabet used at least once.
| Across | ||
| 1 | BEHOLD | Look at what’s carried by strong type (6) |
| EH (what?) inside (carried by) BOLD (strong type) | ||
| 4 | NOVEMBER | In love, Amber’s all for going topless for a month (8) |
| iN lOVE aMBER missing first letters (all going topless) | ||
| 10 | EXTEMPORE | Old-time engineers like making it up as they go along (9) |
| EX (old) TEMPO (time) then RE (Royal Engineers) – “like” here indicates the definition is an adjective | ||
| 11 | GRAFT | Reversing a long way in sports car is hard work (5) |
| FAR (a long way) reversed in GT (sports car) | ||
| 12 | KILO | Almost murder Oscar, arch-enemy of the metric martyr? (4) |
| KIL (murder, kill almost) then O (Oscar, phonetic alphabet) | ||
| 13 | VICTORIOUS | Triumphant as Sid embracing the symbol of Glastonbury? (10) |
| VICIOUS (Sid Vicious, of the Sex Pistols) contains (embracing) TOR (Glastonbury Tor, a prominent landmark by Glastonbury) | ||
| 15 | UNIFORM | Regular college student group (7) |
| UNI (college) FORM (student group) | ||
| 16 | SIERRA | I wander off course in South American mountain range (6) |
| I ERR (wander off course) in SA (South American) | ||
| 19 | QUEBEC | Visiting Martinique, because French is spoken there (6) |
| found inside (visiting) martiniQUE BECause | ||
| 21 | CHARLIE | Snow, ice spread around fish in Scotland (7) |
| anagram (spread) of ICE contains (around) HARL (to fish, Scottish) – cocaine | ||
| 23 | NORTH WALES | Mother-in-law’s drunk; I’m leaving for Gwynedd’s home (5,5) |
| anagram (drunk) of mOTHER iN LAW’S missing (leaving) I’M – Gwynedd is a county in North Wales | ||
| 25 | JAVA | Far eastern island regularly ignored V-J Day, V-Day (4) |
| every other letter (regularly ignored) of vJ dAy V dAy | ||
| 27 | LEMUR | Madagascar resident throttling bird with both hands (5) |
| EMU (bird) inside (throttled by) L R (left and right, both hands) | ||
| 28 | INABILITY | I arrest one sozzled Yankee; it’s a lack of control (9) |
| I NAB (arrest) I (one) LIT (sozzled) then Y (Yankee) | ||
| 29 | GEOMETRY | Little George encountered the Head of Rugby, having a yen for some mathematics (8) |
| GEO (Geo. George, little) MET (encountered) Rugby (head of, first letter) having Y (a Yen) | ||
| 30 | BERGEN | Nothing escapes Russian egg producer, new in the city (6) |
| faBERGE (Russian egg producer) missing (escapes from) FA (nothing) then N (new) | ||
| Down | ||
| 1 | BREAKOUT | Escape from jail for a holiday abroad? (8) |
| BREAK (a holiday) OUT (abroad) | ||
| 2 | HOTEL-DIEU | Old Paris hospital building with rooms due for renovation about 4th. of April (5-4) |
| HOTEL (building with rooms) then anagram (for renovation) of DUE containing (about) aprIl (4th letter of) | ||
| 3 | LIMA | Julius is visiting the Spanish capital (4) |
| I’M (Julius is) inside (visiting) LA (the, Spanish) | ||
| 5 | ORESTES | Forest escapade featuring Electra’s brother (7) |
| found inside (featured by) fOREST EScapades | ||
| 6 | EDGAR DEGAS | Totally revolting green transvestite clothing of French artist? (5,5) |
| SAGE (green) DRAG (transvestite clothing) and DE (of, French) all reversed (totally revolting) | ||
| 7 | BRAVO | Supporter: “Five nil? Good!” (5) |
| BRA (something that supports) V (five) O (nil) | ||
| 8 | RETEST | On further examination, setter comes unstuck (6) |
| anagram (comes unstuck) of SETTER | ||
| 9 | PODIUM | Stage Unionist Independence Party uprising in May? (6) |
| U (unionist) I (independence) DO (party) all reversed (uprising) in PM (Theresa May) | ||
| 14 | HOBBYHORSE | Laugh about baby dropping a coarse, half-eaten toy (10) |
| HO-HO (laugh) contains BaBY missing (dropping) A then coaRSE (half missing, eaten) | ||
| 17 | RELEASING | Rev. Al Green is putting out a new record (9) |
| anagram (rev. – revision) of AL GREEN IS | ||
| 18 | VERA LYNN | National treasure very nearly upset navy (4,4) |
| anagram (upset) of V (very) and NEARLY then N (navy) | ||
| 20 | CRAZIER | Extra: Barking Herald with street map insert (7) |
| CRIER (herald) contains (with…insert) AZ (A to Z, a street map) – extra barking mad | ||
| 21 | CRETAN | Like the Minotaur coming out of trance? (6) |
| anagram (coming out of) TRANCE | ||
| 22 | UNCLOG | Free up diary following endless lunch (6) |
| LOG (diary) following lUNCh (endless, no first or last letter) | ||
| 24 | ROMEO | Read Ovid’s Metamorphoses, essentially outlining first appearances of tragic scion (5) |
| first letters (first appearances) of Read Ovid Metamorphoses Essentially Outlining | ||
| 26 | MIKE | Korean leader turned on English chap (4) |
| KIM (Korean leader) reversed (turned) on E (English) – a man’s name | ||
definitions are underlined
I write these posts to help people get started with cryptic crosswords. If there is something here you do not understand ask a question; there are probably others wondering the same thing.
Spotted the theme for once.
Thanks to PeeDee and bravo to Juliet, I mean Julius.
Thanks setter and blogger. I did not see the phonetic alphabet theme but did notice this was a pangram (which helped me get 10ac).
FOI 26d, LOI 21ac as I did not know the Scots word harl.
Good to have both a theme and pangram. I was a bit unsure about CHARLIE, both the def and the ‘fish in Scotland’ part of the wordplay, but it wasn’t too hard to guess it correctly. The term ‘metric martyr’ was also new; interesting to read something about the group. I have some sympathy as I still think in feet and inches and in miles, although we’ve been metric here for well over a generation.
My favourite was the ‘Extra: Barking’ def followed by ‘Herald’ in 20d.
Thanks to Julius and PeeDee
Julius, as usual, provides a really entertaining crossword. Ta awfully.
Thanks to Peedee as well.
Didn’t know HARL, and I’m Scottish! Got 2d easily enough, as I was in Arles last week going round the Van Gogh sites. Great stuff as usual from Julius.
Well done Julius for managing both a theme and a pangram, both missed by me! (again) But the puzzle was plenty of fun already. Liked Bravo and Bergen, of course, and also enjoyed Behold, Quebec, Lemur, Hobbyhorse and plenty more. Didn’t know the fish in scotland or the paris hospital, though easily deciphered. Where does Julius pick up all this knowledge?
many thanks also PeeDee
I don’t think your parsing of 6d works – I parsed it as SAGE (green) + DRAG (transvestite clothing) + DE (of French) all reversed (totally revolting) – I think that ‘clothing’ is a misdirection to suggest an inclusion when there isn’t one.
Thanks to both setter & blogger.
shikasta@7. That was my reading also. Didn’t notice the blog said differently.
Thanks for spotting that shikasta. The blog is fixed now.
Thanks Julius and PeeDee
Really struggled with this one over multiple sittings but was finally able to get the last 3-4 out this morning. With all of the trouble getting answers, the theme and pangram just passed me by, I’m afraid.
Lots of interesting clue devices and an increase in the amount of general knowledge to be able to work though both answers and the associated parsing. Didn’t end up parsing EDGAR DEGAS at all and messed up the parsing of PODIUM.
Finished in the SE corner with RELEASING (simple anagram when it finally twigged), CHARLIE (didn’t know charlie was slang for cocaine and didn’t have a clue about HARL) with BERGEN (did think about Faberge quite early on, but still took ages to settle on BERGEN and then work through the extraction of FA from the egg-maker). Was pleased to at least have filled out the grid correctly, eventually !