Gozo is this morning’s setter.
I was about to type that this was a trademark pangram from Gozo, but actually there is no P among the solutions as far as I can see). There were, however, some excellent clues, including those for SOCRATES and GLOUCESTERSHIRE, and fewer obscurities than the last Gozo puzzle I blogged. I wasn’t convinced by the QUAD part of QUADRANGLE, as the two come from the same root, the prison being short for quadrangle, but let that pass. However, I think the definition of D-DAY is wrong, as D-Day was the start of an invasion of France by Allied forces which may eventually have ended the war, but it was not the end of the war per se.
Thanks, Gozo.
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | QUADRANGLE |
Prison dispute heard in courtyard (10)
|
| QUAD (old slang for “prison”) + homophone [heard] of WRANGLE (“dispute”) | ||
| 7 | OHMS |
Resistance units — I see thousands (4)
|
| OH (“I see”) + Ms (M is 1000 in Roman numerals)
The ohm is the SI unit of resistance in electronics. |
||
| 9 | D-DAY |
Unknown tot turning back at end of war (1-3)
|
| <= (Y (unknown, in maths) + ADD (“tot”))
I think this is a mistake by the setter – D-Day was not the end of any war. I wonder if Gozo originally meant V-DAY, but couldn’t find an appropriate clue. |
||
| 10 | FLORENTINE |
Like the Medici family’s chocolate-covered biscuit (10)
|
| Double definition | ||
| 11 | BRONCO |
Ella goes and breaks collarbone on rough ride (6)
|
| *(corbon) [anag:breaks] where CORBON is CO(lla)RBON(e) without the letters ELLA [Ella goes] | ||
| 12 | CLEANSED |
Freed from sin, is inclined to enter church that’s deserted (8)
|
| LEANS (“is inclined”) to enter CE (“Church” of England) + D (deserted, on a military record) | ||
| 13 | SOCRATES |
Old philosopher inside an emergency call box (8)
|
| CRATE (“box”) inside SOS (“an emergency call”) | ||
| 15 | QUAY |
Landing-stage is vital, we hear (4)
|
| Homophone [we hear] of KEY (“vital”) | ||
| 17 | BERG |
Tailless diver comes back to composer (4)
|
| <=GREB(e) (“diver”, tailless (i.e missing its final letter), comes back)
Alban Berg (1885-1935) was an Austrian composer. |
||
| 19 | ETAGERES |
Very dry wicket perhaps upset the stands (8)
|
| [upset] <=(SERE (“very dry”) + GATE (“wicket perhaps”)
An étagère is a sheved display stand for ornaments. |
||
| 22 | WINNINGS |
Spoils Warwickshire opener’s time at the crease (8)
|
| W(arwickshire) [opener] + INNINGS (“time at the crease”, in cricket) | ||
| 23 | DVORAK |
Composer, having drunk vodka, runs inside (6)
|
| *(vodka) [anag:drunk] with R (runs, in cricket) inside | ||
| 25 | REVOLUTION |
Spin doctor live, on tour (10)
|
| *(live on tour) [anag:doctor] | ||
| 26 | GRAZ |
Eat snacks during the day, mostly in Austrian city (4)
|
| GRAZ(e) (“eat snacks during the day”, mostly) | ||
| 27 | UTAH |
State of posh hat that’s returned (4)
|
| U (upper-class, so “posh”) + <=HAT that’s returned | ||
| 28 | THE BRONTES |
Shorten bet about literary family (3,7)
|
| *(shorten bet) [anag:about]
Very topical given the recent release of the new Wuthering Heights film. |
||
| DOWN | ||
| 2 | UNDERGO |
Subject to vitality, gains experience (7)
|
| UNDER (“subject to”) + GO (“vitality”) | ||
| 3 | DOYEN |
Party craving senior member (5)
|
| DO (“party”) + YEN (“craving”) | ||
| 4 | AFFRONTS |
Insults workers holding very loud unending argument (8)
|
| ANTS (“workers”) holding FF (fortissimo, so “very loud”) + [unending] RO(w) (“argument”) | ||
| 5 | GLOUCESTERSHIRE |
Home patch for the Avon lady? (15)
|
| Cryptic definition – the river Avon runs through Gloucestershire,
Avon ladies were women who sold Avon cosmetics and skin care products door-to-door. |
||
| 6 | ELEVEN |
Number of personnel eventually included (6)
|
| Hidden [included] in “personnEL EVENtually” | ||
| 7 | ORTANIQUE |
Fruit cultivated near Quito (9)
|
| *(near quito) [anag:cultivated]
A cross between an orange and a tangerine. |
||
| 8 | MANDELA |
Former President from island meeting endless hold-up (7)
|
| MAN (“island”, Isle of Man) meeting [endless] DELA(y) (“hold-up”) | ||
| 14 | ROGAN JOSH |
Jo, in new sarong, has hot Indian dish (5,4)
|
| JO in *(sarong) has H (hot) | ||
| 16 | GARDENER |
One who goes to bed to work (8)
|
| Cryptic definition, referring to flower beds. | ||
| 18 | EXIGENT |
Demanding leave to absorb information (7)
|
| EXIT (“leave”) to absorb GEN (“information”) | ||
| 20 | EDAMAME |
Bean-cheese and pheasant, say. No good (7)
|
| EDAM (“cheese”) and (g)AME (“pheasant, say”) with no G (good) | ||
| 21 | UNHURT |
King in a French shack, not harmed (6)
|
| R (Rex, so “king”) in (UN (“a” in “French”) + HUT (“shack”)) | ||
| 24 | ORGAN |
The church keys? (5)
|
| Cryptic definition |
Liked Socrates, but not d-day ((1-3) surely, not (4), and not the end), or etageres (obscure word clued by obscure). Nevertheless enjoyable overall. Thanks both.
I also wasted time trying to cram in a p
I’m still not familiar enough with FT solvers to know who often has themes, pangrams etc so I missed that this was a lipogram, in spite of the obvious signs of all the high-scoring Scrabble letters! I was also puzzled by the errors in D-Day (definition and enumeration) which I dismissed as a possible answer prior to having the crossers. I guessed “quad” must be a slang term for prison, though a new one to me, and confirmed it with a dictionary search which gives the normal form as “quod” but “quad” as an alternative, so all’s fair.
I am more familiar with the word “etagere” in a gardening sense – it is a stand for small pots such as herbs with several levels.
Thanks Gozo for some crisp cluing, especially the cryptic definitions which I usually find very ambiguous but here were clear. And thank you loonapick for the parsing.
Thanks Gozo and loonapick
9ac: I agree with others about the error in the definition, but it was given as (1-3) on the pdf which I printed out at about 10am UK time.
5dn: I took this as a reference to the former county of Avon, which was formed out of parts of Gloucestershire and Somerset and apparently existed from 1974 to 1996. In any case, the question mark on the end of the clue is required, since there is more than one River Avon in England, including the one that gives part of the name of Stratford-upon-Avon in Warwickshire.
I agree with Pelham Barton #4; there are Avons all over the place. I’m told incidentally that the word “Avon” means “river” so that “River Avon” is something of a tautology. (Today’s useless fact.)
I was stumped by ETAGERES which meant I also failed to get EDAMAME, which is a bean unknown to me. I assumed from the hyphen in “bean-cheese” that such a foodstuff existed, and that it must be something like bean-curd. I should have checked it in the dictionary but was too lazy. Was it fair to put a hyphen there where a dash would have been more appropriate?
Dday is still showing as (4) on line @PB.
When I lived in Bath in the 80’s a lot of locals utterly refused to put Avon in their address.
I’d associate Gloucestershire more with the Severn personally. And there loads of Avons, which is just an old word for river if I’m not mistaken.
Babbler, we crossed 🙂
I am struggling to parse the cryptic reading of the clue for BRONCO at 11A. First, the letters of ELLA do not appear in the order E, L, L, A in COLLARBONE, so an anagram indicator is required to justify the intended reference to L, L, A ,E. Second, the word “breaks” should surely follow, rather than precede, COLLARBONE in order for it to have effect as a grammatically correct indication to rearrange the letters of CO[lla]RBON[e]. Third, “on” appears to have no cryptic function. It cannot act as a link word because “wordplay ON definition” makes no sense.