Independent 11,857 by Filbert

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Filbert provides our regular mental exercise this morning.

There were a few unfamiliar but guessable words, along with one or two quibbles – but overall a fun puzzle. I liked the Leaning Tower of Pisa reference, the aunt telling all to the tabloids, and the gal with her vest on. 21a is outrageous but it made me laugh. Thanks Filbert for the fun.

Definitions are underlined; BOLD UPPERCASE indicates letters used in the wordplay; square brackets [ ] indicate omitted letters.

ACROSS
1 PARTISAN
Beautiful creation Pisan admits is leaning to one side (8)
PISAN containing (. . . admits) ART (beautiful creation), with a surface referring to the Leaning Tower of Pisa.
6 BEHEST
That man breaks first commandment (6)
HE (that man) inserted into (breaking) BEST (first).

Archaic word for a command or authoritative request.
9 AGOG
Back with girlfriend, initially excited (4)
AGO (back, as in “that happened a while back”) + initial letter of G[irlfriend].
10 MASTERMIND
Plan part of Christmas term in detail (10)
Hidden answer (part of . . .) in [christ]MAS TERM IN D[etail].

Mastermind, as a verb = make detailed plans to achieve something.
11 HONEST BROKER
Mediator interrupted Republican, mad he’s not up front (6,6)
BROKE (interrupted) + R (abbreviation for Republican), with an anagram (mad) of HE’S NOT at the start (up front).

I didn’t know this phrase but the dictionaries did: an impartial mediator who attempts to resolve a dispute.
13 HANSOM
Workers having day out order a cab (6)
HAN[d]S (workers, as in “all hands on deck”) without the D (abbreviation for day), then OM (abbreviation for Order of Merit).

Horse-drawn cab.
14 LIGAMENT
Play wearing medical dressing that’s really strong tissue (8)
GAME (play) inserted into (wearing) LINT (cotton fabric used as a dressing for injuries).

Strong body tissue that connects bones.
16 FORENSIC
Dodgy coins ref used for evidence in court (8)
Anagram (dodgy) of COINS REF.
19 LOATHE
Hate word in clue that requires alternate letters to be removed (6)
OATH (word, as in “I give you my word” = a promise), inserted into [c]L[u]E with alternate letters removed. This seems a rather obvious way to indicate the construction, but there may be some reason for it.
21 DIRTY WEEKEND
New trike Eddy bust in two f****** days (5,7)
Anagram (bust) of NEW TRIKE EDDY.

Slang for a weekend break for lovers, especially an illicit one.
24 THERMOSTAT
Automatic control which bags queen the largest share (10)
THAT (which, as in “the house which Jack built”), containing ER (the late Queen Elizabeth) + MOST (the largest share).
25 NAIF
50% of brides-to-be flipping innocent (4)
50% of FIAN[cees] (brides-to-be), reversed (flipping).

Masculine form of “naive” = innocent; for some reason the feminine form of the French word is much more common in English, applied to both men and women.
26 INGEST
Eat for a laugh when talking (6)
Homophone (when talking) of IN JEST (for a laugh).
27 CONVERGE
Meet Charlie by the side of the road (8)
C (Charlie in the radio alphabet) + ON VERGE (on the verge = in the grassy area by the side of a road).

Mathematicians may use “converge” to mean “get closer and closer but never actually meet”, but the rest of us probably use it to mean “come together in one place”.
DOWN
2 ANGLO-SAXON
Blunt language of slogan upset nervous conductor (5-5)
Anagram (upset) of SLOGAN, then AXON (part of a nerve cell that conducts nerve signals around the body = nervous conductor).

Slang for plain blunt speaking, especially the traditional four-letter swear words that come from early English.
3 TIGRESS
Cat hair covers Irving’s coat (7)
TRESS (a long lock of hair: generally used in the plural “tresses”), covering the outer letters (coat) of I[rvin]G.
4 SOMETIMES
Occasionally battlefield’s full of English climbing it (9)
SOMME’S (the WWI battlefield is), containing (full of) E (abbreviation for English) + IT reversed (climbing).
5 NOSTRIL
New Barking riots left hole under bridge (7)
N (abbreviation for new) + anagram (barking = crazy) of RIOTS + L (abbreviation for left).

A hole below the bridge of the nose.
6 BLEAK
Bill catches large fish (5)
BEAK (bill = a bird’s projecting jaws) containing (catching) L (abbreviation for large).

Following the usual crossword principle that almost any English word could be a type of fish: here’s another one (thanks to Wikipedia). Various genera of fish related to carp and minnow.
7 HUMDRUM
Smell that’s iffy probed by doctor without interest (7)
HUM (slang for an unpleasant smell) + UM (that’s iffy = expression indicating doubt), containing (probed by) DR (abbreviation for doctor).

Humdrum = boring or routine = without interest.
8 SEND
Ship back from Calais on purpose (4)
Last letter (back) of [calai]S + END (as in “to that end” = purpose = objective).

Ship, as a verb = send (by some means of transport, not necessarily by sea).
12 UNTHINKING
Inconsiderate aunt exposed family in article (10)
[a]UN[t] without the outer letters (exposed), then KIN (family) in THING.
15 GALVESTON
Song recalling Texas girl with underwear on (9)
GAL (informal pronunciation of “girl”) + VEST (underwear) + ON.

Nostalgic song about a Texas city, written by Jimmy Webb and probably best known in a recording by Glen Campbell.
17 ENDORSE
Back last runner at ‘aydock? (7)
END (last) + [h]ORSE (for example a runner at Haydock racecourse in Merseyside) with the initial H dropped.
18 CRYPTIC
Lean brainbox who collaborated with Watson heard from Spooner, with mystery (7)
Spoonerism of TIP (lean = slant away from the vertical) + CRICK (no, nothing to do with Sherlock Holmes: it’s Francis Crick, who worked with James Watson on the first published description of the double helix structure of DNA. In fact they relied on the work of a number of others, notably Rosalind Franklin, who didn’t get nearly enough credit at the time.) Some readers will no doubt complain that this isn’t a real Spoonerism because TIP CRICK isn’t a thing; I tend to agree.
20 ASKANCE
Like a neck twisted sideways (7)
AS (like) + anagram (twisted) of A NECK.

As in “look askance” = look with a sideways glance, or (metaphorically) imply mistrust.
22 ROOST
Place to sleep, temperature requiring jumpers on (5)
T (abbreviation for temperature), with ROOS (slang abbreviation for kangaroos = animals that jump) before it (above, in a down clue = on).
23 SHIN
Body part Henry trapped in vice (4)
H (abbreviation for henry, the SI unit of electrical inductance) contained in SIN (vice = something one shouldn’t do).

11 comments on “Independent 11,857 by Filbert”

  1. Thanks Picaroon and Quirister

    I managed to get cryptic whilst thinking of Mycroft Holmes. Lucky. Thanks for correct parsings

  3. This was fun. LOLed at DIRTY WEEKEND, and I for one enjoyed the tongue-in-cheek surface for LOATHE, which I dare say has entered my mind from time to time when doing these puzzles!

  4. … but further down, 11 years ago, Australian setter David Astle was asking for a cryptic clue for CRYPTIC, and uha suggested “Hard to understand clue pain in the neck for Spooner (clue = tip, pain in the neck = crick)”.

  5. I too am of the opinion that the “right” side of a Spoonerism needs to be a thing in order for the clue to be satisfying. But hey ho. The surface of this one was enjoyable with its Holmes misdirection.

  6. For once, I was not misled by the obvious candy being dangled in the clue for CRYPTIC so Crick and Watson came swiftly to mind. Nervous conductor for AXON took a lot longer. Obv DIRTY WEEKEND is great fun with other highlights being ASKANCE, GALVESTON, NAIF, THERMOSTAT, LOATHE, HANSOM, PARTISAN and the splendid hidden in MASTERMIND.

    Thanks Filbert and Quirister

  7. The BBC’s science documentary strand Horizon did an excellent dramatisation of the Crick, Watson, Wilkins, and Franklin story in 1987. Details in a post here.
    [The link in the post below that -“…You can watch it here – Highly recommended.” – isn’t working today, because of a DDoS attack on archive.org.
    Maybe it’ll resume working in a few days.]

  10. Hmm.. weirdly I thought the same as PeeDee@8, but put it down to déjà vu, or maybe brain fog.. I recall NAIF, AGOG, ASKANCE, ENDORSE, n NOSTRIL especially… but not all clues were familiar, so I enjoyed this a lot.. I knew it was CRYPTIC but needed the blog to explain..
    Thanks Filbert n Quirister

  11. It’s recently been pointed out to me — en passant, and very much not on the basis of my own behaviour — that very few setters publicly pass positive comments on the (good) works of other setters. So … this was a very fine puzzle, with air-tight clues and lovely surfaces.

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