BOBCAT kicks off the week…
A pleasantly challenging solve with a couple of feline guests.
Thanks BOBCAT!
ACROSS
1. Fashion house turned back on woman dressing softly rounded figure (8)
SPHEROID
(DIOR)< (fashion house, <turned back) on (SHE (woman) dressing P (softly))
5. Dingy quiet place for monks lacking energy (6)
SHABBY
SH (quiet) + ABB[e]Y (place for monks, lacking E (energy))
8. Short docked dog (3)
CUR
9. Starting afresh — compensation for divorce? (10)
SEPARATION
REPARATION (compensation, starting afresh (i.e. replacing the leading R with an S))
10. Discharge space flight without leader (8)
EMISSION
EM (space) + [m]ISSION (flight, without leader)
11. Una’s cycling around South American capital (6)
NASSAU
NASU (UNAS cycling) around SA (South American)
12. Giving this story an urban setting would make sense (4)
SAGA
SAGA[city] (sense) so, adding CITY (giving an urban setting) to this story (SAGA) makes sense
14. Entitlement of Trump’s to deliver justice? (10)
BIRTHRIGHT
BIRTH RIGHT (deliver justice)
17. Cook desperately short of seconds time and again (10)
REPEATEDLY
(DE[s]PERATELY (short of seconds))* (*cook)
20. Exchange seat vacated by learned cleric (4)
SALE
SA[dd]LE (seat, vacated by DD (learned cleric))
23. Fascinating woman liberates priest in sacred text (6)
MANTRA
MANTRA[p] (fascinating woman, liberates P (priest))
24. Suspicious absence of papers dogs soldier (8)
PARANOID
NO ID (lack of papers) dogs PARA (soldier)
25. Swimming in and out in deluge (10)
INUNDATION
(IN AND OUT IN)* (*swimming)
26. Member displaying European dedication (3)
TOE
TO E (displaying E (European) dedication)
27. Taunt the French with a form of hell (6)
HECKLE
LE (the, French) with HECK (a form of hell)
28. Conscious of millions not holding opinion? The opposite (8)
SENTIENT
SENTI[m]ENT (opinion, not holding M (millions), the opposite of millions not holding opinion)
DOWN
1. Doctor Seuss created odd characters, originally encountering resistance. Who will replace him? (9)
SUCCESSOR
(SEUSS C[reated] O[dd] C[haracters] (originally))* (*doctor) encounters R (resistance)
2. Fish served by mother catering in half portions (7)
HERRING
[mot]HER [cate]RING (in half portions)
3. Stand up to retired sibling bores (6)
RESIST
RET (retired), SIS (sibling) bores
4. Speak off the cuff , taking line from Primo Levi’s novel (9)
IMPROVISE
(PRIMO [l]EVIS (taking L (line) from))* (*novel)
5. Firm to stop water leaking? (7)
STAUNCH
6. MAs and PhDs, two in Rome, exploited position on board (9)
AMIDSHIPS
(MAS and PHDS, II (two in Rome))* (*exploited)
7. High point in the Cairngorms, riverless ground below (7)
BENEATH
BEN (highpoint in the Cairngorms) + EA[r]TH (ground, R (river) less)
13. Where setter goes in a Rugby gathering to be stunned (9)
AWESTRUCK
WEST (where setter goes, where the sun sets) in (A + RUCK (rugby gathering))
15. Short story about musical enthrals king. That’s saying a lot (9)
TALKATIVE
(TAL[e] (story, short) + (EVITA)< (musical, <about)) enthrals K (king)
16. Most funky object irritates crowds over time (9)
TRENDIEST
(END (object), TRIES (irritates) crowds) over T (time)
18. Survey area enclosed by defunct colliery (7)
EXAMINE
A (area) enclosed by (EX MINE (defunct colliery))
19. I denied involvement in play with entertaining adult nonsense (7)
TWADDLE
TW[i]DDLE (play with) entertaining A (adult)
21. One of a dozen supper guests put up beer bottles (7)
APOSTLE
POST (put up), ALE (beer) bottles
22. Attractive piece, often game, a bit stuck-up? (6)
MAGNET
([of]TEN GAM[e] (a bit))< (<stuck up)
A few tricky clues, I thought, as one would expect from this setter. I didn’t manage to parse SALE but got the rest.
I didn’t parse SALE either!
Spotted the two felines though -indeed, I guessed something was cracking off there early on so they did help. Some lovely surfaces today of which INUNDATION was one. IMPROVISE and AMIDSHIPS had some creative wordplay too.
Very diverting overall so thanks to Bobcat and nice work, Teacow!
Solving this required some thought. I am still not a big fan of clues such as for SEPARATION, in which the solver has to infer some replacement letter that is otherwise unclued, except from general context.
Either I’m getting worse or the puzzles are getting harder. Took a while to get there, by hook or by crook. Liked apostle, but a lot of filling in and hoping it would become clear, at least from the blog.
I finally spotted a Nina (Puma) and was so excited that I stopped looking and missed lion. Grrrr!!!
Well the Divine Doc isn’t as frequent as the Rev — or even the Right Rev (who competes with “luxury car”) — but s/he does occasionally show up, so sa[dd]le was fine. Otoh, “crowds” meaning “surrounds”, while perfectly clear, escaped me, so trendiest was a shrug. Actually I think I was too busy going “Hmm, does funky really = trendy?” to do the parse. All good healthy exercise, thanks Bob LiPu and Teacow.
I solved SADDLE sort of backwards: since we specifically have a “learned” clergyman, DD sprung to mind (that being the one abbreviation in that space that specifically indicates educational rather than clerical attainment); then I thought of probably the only word that contains DD and means “seat” to delete it from.
I agree with Cineraria about disliking vague substitution clues. I also agree with the general tenor that this was tricky, but not tricky enough that I didn’t get there in the end.
Thanks Bobcat. Aside from missing the nho AMIDSHIPS & failing to parse SALE, this went in without much problem. I had many favourites including SPHEROID, REPEATEDLY, PARANOID, INNUNDATION, HERRING, AWESTRUCK, TALKATIVE, MAGNET, & the two cats. I thought Trump in BIRTHRIGHT was an unnecessary distraction. Thanks Teacow for the blog.
Cineraria @3 and mrpenny @6 What is vague about the clue for SEPARATION? How many words other than SEPARATION and REPARATION are there which take the form ?EPARATION? If there were to have been more than one possible candidate I agree that it would have been necessary to specify what the replacement letter had to be. But in any case where there is just one there is nothing unfair about not specifying what the first letter is changed to.
Tony @7 I think the parsing of 14A is “Trump’s to deliver” = BIRTH, as that is a US meaning of “birth”, and that TRUMP does not form part of the definition.
Rudolf. I’m sure you’re right about 14a. I was surprised to see in Chambers (my go to dictionary [apart from ‘fornicate’, which isn’t in, as I remarked recently]) that ‘birth’ as a verb is listed as US. I thought it was UK as well.
Rudolf @8: in this case, yes, there is only really one possibility, once you have enough to know what word it’s being replaced into. But in a vacuum (i.e., without crossing letters), that isn’t much information, and it feels a little lazy.
As to Trump, I agree that it’s there primarily to signal an American usage. But there may also be a vague reference there to some annoying recent US news–Trump has asked the courts to end BIRTHRIGHT citizenship, ignoring the tiny detail that birthright citizenship is spelled out in no uncertain terms in the Constitution. (If he wins that one, this is no longer a republic; fortunately, so far he has lost.)