A tough challenge from Bradman this morning, which I made heavy weather of.
Had to look up a couple of references to parse the clues.
FF: 9 DD: 9
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | SCOFFS |
Meals getting jeers (6)
|
| double def | ||
| 5 | TALISMAN |
Charm of eccentric A-list gent (8)
|
| [ A LIST ]* MAN ( gent ) – my FOI | ||
| 9 | LAWYER |
A professional wife wearing coat (6)
|
| W ( wife ) in LAYER ( coat ) | ||
| 10 | ADVOWSON |
Notice solemn promise made by boy, right? (8)
|
| AD ( notice ) VOW ( solemn promise ) SON ( boy ) | ||
| 11 | MEANTIME |
One laid into sloppy team men in the interval (8)
|
| I ( one ) in [ TEAM MEN ]* | ||
| 12 | TURN TO |
Seek help from Occupational Therapy as result of this instruction? (4,2)
|
| reverse clue; TURN TO = OT -> Occupational Therapy | ||
| 13 | CLAP |
Applaud recognised player collecting half-century (4)
|
| CAP ( recognised player ) containing L ( 50 in roman numerals, half-century ) | ||
| 15 | AFTER ALL |
Trying to get everything in spite of expectations (5,3)
|
| AFTER ( trying to get ) ALL ( everything ) | ||
| 18 | TAWNY OWL |
Bird that’s brown going round end of meadow with wail (5,3)
|
| [ TAN ( brown ) around W ( end of meadoW ) ] YOWL ( wail ) – the tawny owl is also called the brown owl , so ‘brown’ in the clue could be considered doing double duty | ||
| 19 | PUCK |
Mischievous character, one on a slippery path? (4)
|
| double def | ||
| 21 | SHUT UP |
Say nothing, being confined (4,2)
|
| double def | ||
| 23 | WELL NIGH |
Almost completely healthy person associated with NHS, we hear? (4-4)
|
| WELL ( healthy ) NIGH ( sounds like nye – referring to nye bevan who passed the nhs act in 1946; thanks to geoff for helping with this reference ) | ||
| 25 | COMEDIAN |
Firm with a particular value, one seeking to provide entertainment (8)
|
| CO ( firm ) MEDIAN ( a particular value ) | ||
| 26 | CRANNY |
Depression? Woman in family needs new start (6)
|
| gRANNY ( woman in family, with the starting letter replaced with C ) | ||
| 27 | DERRIERE |
Seat in Moulin Rouge (8)
|
| cryptic def; french for buttocks | ||
| 28 | EATERS |
A tree’s rotten apples (6)
|
| [ A TREES ]* – chambers tells me that the word can mean a variety of fruit or vegetable that can be eaten uncooked | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 2 | CHASE |
Court has to be held in church (5)
|
| HAS in CE ( church ) | ||
| 3 | FRYING PAN |
Spooner’s snooping enthusiast – is found in the kitchen (6-3)
|
| spoonerism of PRYING ( snooping ) FAN ( enthusiast ) | ||
| 4 | STRAIT |
Channel not wiggling around by the sound of it (6)
|
| sounds like STRAIGHT ( not wiggling around ) | ||
| 5 | TRAVEL ALLOWANCE |
Bread ration for journeys (6,9)
|
| cryptic def | ||
| 6 | LEVITATE |
Priest with hint of transgression had to be suspended (8)
|
| LEVITE ( priest ) containing A T ( hint of Transgression, the ‘A’ is implied ) | ||
| 7 | SEWER |
Vessel connected to second pipe (5)
|
| S ( second ) EWER ( vessel ) | ||
| 8 | APOSTOLIC |
Like a succession of ministers? (9)
|
| cryptic def; wiki here | ||
| 14 | LOATHSOME |
Horrible hot meal, so disgusting (9)
|
| [ HOT MEAL SO ]* | ||
| 16 | REPENTANT |
Hospital department keeping troubled parent outside is sorry (9)
|
| [ PARENT ]* around ENT ( hospital department ) | ||
| 17 | COMPRISE |
Form with school rebel (8)
|
| COMP ( school ) RISE ( rebel ) | ||
| 20 | CLOCHE |
Cold, having short hair, the fellow gets hat (6)
|
| C ( cold ) LOCk ( hair, short ) HE ( fellow ) | ||
| 22 | THEIR |
That group’s taking time – one expected to succeed (5)
|
| T ( time ) HEIR ( one expected to succeed ) | ||
| 24 | GONER |
Good person of exceptional quality? One on the way out (5)
|
| G ( good ) ONER ( person of exceptional quality ) |
I just had ‘bird’ for the definition in 18a. For 6d, I had LEVI = priest + T (hint of transgression) + ATE (had). The blog entry doesn’t really explain the A.
I missed the Nye Bevan reference at 23a and had to take a not to difficult stab at the ‘apples’ at 28a, but otherwise didn’t find this too hard. Glad that I had come across ADVOWSON and CLOCHE before which were the only words I found obscure – there can sometimes be more in Bradman puzzles. Same parsings for 18a and 6d as Hovis @1.
The ‘Seat in Moulin Rouge’ was “première” for me today.
Thanks to Bradman and Turbolegs
I thought 10 was rather Peculier
Favourites: DERRIERE, WELL-NIGH, TURN TO.
New ADVOWSON, and ONER = a remarkable person or thing.
I parsed 18ac and 6d the same way as Hovis and WordPlodder.
Thanks to Bradman and Turbolegs. I agree about LEVITATE and enjoyed the slippery path for PUCK. I parsed both EATERS and ADVOWSON but was dubious about the results but could not do the same for WELL NIGH..
This was tough but fair from Bradman. Completed today’s grid, which I don’t always manage with this setter, finishing in the NE with the obscure (to me) ADVOWSON, a correct guess.
A good Spoonerism at 3d was my favourite, along with EATERS, PUCK, CRANNY and DERRIERE.
Thanks Bradman for the workout and Turbolegs.
Scuppered my chance of completion with 26a as Crater, ie new start for Mater. So 24d remained unsolved.
We found this quite straightforward – our first pass gave us about half the answers in a few minutes and the rest followed without too much difficulty. We did puzzle a bit over 23ac thinking at first that ‘almost completely healthy’ meant dropping the second L from ‘well’ before we twigged the nigh/Nye homophone.
Favourites were TAWNY OWL and COMEDIAN.
Thanks, Bradman and Turbolegs.
Rapid progress for me until lower R.. CRANNY didn’t come to mind for anything other than a narrow cleft, ONER being new to me in that sense left a big hole… at least ADVOWSON clued without a problem altho never heard of before..
Thanks BRADMAN n Turbolegs
A solid crossword with everything steadily falling in place except ADVOWSON, a new word for me — thanks Bradman. PUCK , TURN TO, and TAWNY OWL were favourites. Thanks Turbolegs for the blog — I saw your intro before I started the crossword and was expecting it to be a much tougher solve; I found this on the easier end of his spectrum.
That was a bit of a stretch in places Bradman, so thanks.
I agree with Hovis@1 for the parsings.
Seems the SE corner caused the most problems today as I had never heard of that Nye.
Thanks for the explanations Turbolegs.
Thanks all, for stopping by.
Hovis@1: Ref 6d, this is the ‘making heavy weather of’ bit. 🙂
Regards,
TL
I gave up with just a few to go. Some of the clues were disappointingly easy while others deeply, deeply impenetrable.
What with new words words, this puzzle was always going to be a struggle for this solver.
Ps. I generally back myself to solve Bradman, so for me this was a harder one.
I’ll bet I’m not the only one in Australia who couldn’t parse 23a!
I’m not an experienced or particularly strong solver, so I hesitate to criticise, but I felt advowson was just a bit too obscure (and no-one above has disabused me of that view). Also in 27a I felt the French indicator needed more of a link to the definition or the answer than I could detect in Moulin Rouge. I suppose it’s a theatre so has seats in it? And maybe it’s a delicate word in keeping with the teasing nature of the venue? (Might be talking myself into it here…) Okay, but I still didn’t like advowson (or apostolic … maybe should go to church more…)
Thanks Bradman and Turbolegs
Finished this inside my average time, but there were some moments when I thought it wouldn’t. Was able to complete the grid, although needing the blog to properly understand the word play with AFTER ALL. Was another who parsed 6d as did Hovis / Wordplodder, although was hard to find LEVI as a ‘priest’, was more of a patriarch with his descendants being more in the priesthood – based on dictionaries rather than any religious knowledge.
Ended the puzzle with COMPRISE (where had to look up comp=comprehensive school) and DERRIERE (that took time to sink in … and was one of my favourite clues when it did).