Independent 8,959 by Morph

by

A nice, crossword from Morph today. I found it slightly on the hard side, though now that I’ve done the blog I can’t see why. The (possibly) CDs round the middle of the acrosses were a bit of a problem, but everything else seemed to fall into place well enough.

Some would make a very mild criticism of the answers in the grid: 18dn ends with the word OFF, as does 25ac. Possibly not the best: I did 18dn and then couldn’t believe that 25ac also ended with the same word, but there aren’t many possibilities for _ _ F.

Definitions in italics.

Across
8 BUREAU
I hear you are enthralled by chap in the office (6)

U R [“you are” in textspeak, indicated by ‘I hear’] in beau
9 O SOLE MIO
I’m back after roaming loose, finding love in the air in Italy (1,4,3)

(loose)* (I’m)rev. 0
10 PORN STAR
Primarily one revealing naughty parts displayed around? (4,4)

(o{ne} r{evealing} n{aughty}) in (parts)* — the anagram indicator for ‘parts’ is ‘displayed’, not, as I initially thought, ‘naughty’, which is needed for the n, &lit.
11 RECUR
Touching wretch to appear again (5)

re [= touching] cur
12 ALL HANDS ON DECK
Emergency – everyone add what you have to common pool (3,5,2,4)

Sorry, I’m lost here and can’t see what is going on: there seems to be some sort of a link to playing cards, with ‘hands’, ‘deck’ and ‘pool’, but …
13 TEASING
Drink then chant in mockery (7)

tea sing
15 COPYCAT
Make like an ape man (7)

I think this is a CD, using the fact that to ape is to copy, but am very doubtful and will be happy to be put on the right track by some wise person
19 JOKER IN THE PACK
You don’t expect this rugby-playing comedian to be found round here (5,2,3,4)

Again I’m a bit bewildered since it all seems to be a bit vague — some sort of CD I think with the pack also referring to the scrum in rugby
23 GET AT
Launch verbal attack on grand gallery retrospective (3,2)

g (Tate)rev. — on surer ground here
24 POLYGLOT
Old college set to enrol Germany’s foremost linguist (8)

Poly (G) lot
25 KNOCK OFF
Stop lift (5,3)

2 defs — stop work and steal
26 ABSEIL
Hopelessly blasé outwardly, I let myself down (6)

(blasé)* round I
Down
1 AUTOMATE
Introduce new technology to fruit as produced in France (8)

‘au tomate’ is French for ‘to [the] tomato’ [many comments about this below; I have been misleading and should have said ‘au’ is French for ‘to [the]’ and ‘tomate’ is French for ‘tomato’; there is nothing wrong with the clue I think. This is what Morph meant, not what I said]
2 KERNEL
Sailors gathered in bottom of ship’s centre (6)

ke(RN)el
3 QUATRAIN
One in five children retaining a largely traditional verse (8)

qu(a tra{d})in
4 JOYRIDE
US soldier keeping up heartless record of crime (7)

Joe containing (di{a}ry)rev.
5 JOURNO
Hack judge’s mobile router when half-cut? I think not! (6)

j (rou{ter})* no!
6 TEA CADDY
Perhaps Indian leaves stock, as recovery ends after dead cat bounces (3,5)

(dead cat)* {recover}y — the Indian leaves refer to tea although the surface, with its ‘stock’ and ‘dead cat bounce’, suggests stockbroking
7 NITRIC
Kind of acid remark heard by those leaving Casablanca bar? (6)

“‘Night, Rick” — referring to Rick’s Café in the film Casablanca, or possibly to its modern counterpart
14 SCEPTICS
Raising of glasses involving involuntary response? We have doubts (8)

tic in (specs)rev.
16 OVERLEAF
Spare bit of salad on the other side (8)

over leaf
17 ASK FOR IT
Be at risk of getting into trouble? (3,3,2)

(at risk of)*, almost an &lit. and surely intended to be one, but it isn’t a full &lit. because of the ‘Be’, which plays no part in the wordplay
18 STOP OFF
Pay a visit to affected type, turning up surrounded by core of kinsfolk (4,3)

(to (fop)rev.) in {kin}sf{olk}
20 ORGONE
Alternative left force, in theory (6)

or [= alternative] gone [= left] — force associated with Reich, not believed by all so far as I can see
21 INTROS
Trendy up-and-coming type opening bars (6)

in (sort)rev.
22 AUGUST
American University visitor leaving Spain for a month (6)

A U gu{e}st — leaving in the sense of omitting, leaving out
*anagram

24 comments on “Independent 8,959 by Morph”

  1. There seems to be some sort of card game theme here – the first four letters in the top row of unches are A,K,Q,J and hen we have the two long answers at 12 and 19 ac. Can’t see anything else though.

  3. Nice puzzle! I had ‘citric’ for 7d but agree nitric is better. Really need the blog for several answers, though. Thanks to both.

  4. I found this very hard but did persevere to the end, a jolly good challenge. I too have no idea what is going on with 12A All Hands On Deck. I read “rugby-playing comedian” as simply wordplay for 19A Joker In The Pack, although it took me a long time to realise that. I loved the clue for 1D Automate, after about twenty minutes of trying to solve it!

    Thank you very much, Morph, for a fine diversion, and thanks to John for a fine blog on a tough puzzle.

  5. Further to Allan@1

    The remainder of the top and bottom unches give the initials of the remaining cards.

  6. Well spotted, Geebs. That explains the rest of the clue to 19ac – you don’t expect to find it round here because the Joker is not used in most games (somebody will no doubt tell me when it is used) but there is a second J in the peripheral unches.

    And Thanks to Morph and John.

  8. Paul A@7, yes, ‘une tomate’! Fortunately, the gender of my French nouns has never been particularly predictable, which made it easier for me to find the answer.

  9. Count me as another who had “citric”, as a homophone of “sit Rick” at 7dn, and I’d definitely have gone with NITRIC if I had thought of it. Very worrying as it is one of the three acids we mostly used in chemistry lessons in school (along with hydrochloric and sulphuric), although it was a long time ago and chemistry wasn’t one of my better subjects. It took me a while at the end to get the KNOCK OFF/ORGONE crossers, AUTOMATE and JOYRIDE.

  10. I got NITRIC straightaway; can’t see how CITRIC works, but I’m not going to big myself up at all because I couldn’t finish this. And that’s unusual for me and Morph. He can be tricksy, but normally if I persevere then I can get there. Maybe the theme (which of course I didn’t see) did for me.

    POLYGLOT my favourite today, but then again I do work with languages.

    Thanks to S&B.

  11. And on AUTOMATE, I will try to dig the setter out of a (possible) hole by saying that – as John has intimated in the blog – AU can be a French word for ‘to’ and of course TOMATE is French for ‘tomato’. So if you separate out the two elements, it works. Although it is indeed LA TOMATE. Many fruits (and the tomato is one) are feminine in French. But Emrys, don’t stress about getting the gender right every time: for English speakers, it’s a complete Weston-super.

  12. Thanks Morph and John

    I enjoyed this, the first time I’ve tackled Morph, I think.

    Ref the extraneous J, surely 19 and the rim are connected? The top & bottom gives the thirteen cards of a suit with the extra J for Joker, which is there because, as per allan_c @ 6, you don’t expect to find it *in* the pack, as it’s normally separated.

  15. We also had citric. K’sD – we read it as an encouagement for Ric not to leave and only noticed our error when we read the blog and checked out the rest of the cards. We’d noticed A K Q and J plus the other references to cards but not the rest.

    Thanks Morph for the puzzle – we also found the SE corner quite tricky and 20d was our LOI.

    Thanks John for the blog and the commenters for sorting out the theme.

  16. Emrys and K’sD: You should worry about the gender of French nouns. Try Welsh where there’s no indefinite article and the definite article isn’t much help either!

  17. Notwithstanding the gender of “tomate”, I think there are instances of a dish being described in French as … “au tomate”; where the “au” has a slightly different shade of meaning. K’sD to investigate. My large Collins French Dictionary impenetrable on this.

  18. Don’t suppose anyone is listening any more, but grammatically speaking, you can’t have anything other than ‘à la tomate’, since it’s feminine. Tarte à la tomate, for example. You might have seen ‘au tomate’ somewhere on a menu, gwep; but then again I have two children who are coeliacs and have come across ‘we have an extensive range of glutton-free options’. And that’s not right either.

  19. Almost sorry I spoke way back @7 🙂 , but back to the clue, which requires ‘au tomate’ to equate to ‘to fruit’, which I don’t think works, as au means ‘to the’ – or did when I was doing O level, A level, S level even (remember them?) and degree level, albeit 45 years ago…..

  20. K’sD @18: “extensive range of glutton-free options” – I like it! On a par with one I saw recently, “choose from our desert menu”. Sorry, Gaufrid, I couldn’t resist going off topic.

  21. In principle you are right, Paul A. But … Je vais au Portugal la semaine prochaine. I’m going to Portugal next week.

    We should stop now and leave Morph to dig himself out of his own hole.

  22. If I’d said what I should have said in the blog for 1dn it would have saved a lot of trouble, but perhaps all the messages from people is part of the fun. Blog amended. K’s D and others are quite right. No need for Morph to dig himself out of a hole because he was never in one; it was I who seemed to put him in it in the first place.

  23. Dont see your problem with joker in the pack comedian is joker rugby forwards are pack Still can’t work out where the deck in all hands on comes from All is everyone What you have hands on? but common pool deck??

  24. Alan@23: In retrospect I’m surprised no-one explained “all hands on deck” back in 2015.  The hands in that expression are the crew of a ship, so in an emergency the captain would call for all hands – even those off watch below decks.

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