(Please click here for this same blog but with a picture quiz added. Please do NOT post hereinbelow any comment relating to the picture quiz. Thank you.) Thanks to Pasquale for an enjoyable puzzle. Definitions are underlined in the clues.
Across
1 Greasy stuff very foolish for American writer to eat (6)
POMADE : MAD(very foolish, as in “you’d be mad to try this!”) contained in(for … to eat) POE(Edgar Allan, American writer).
Defn: … for your hair.
4 Girl needs a soft drink, somehow going from do to do (8)
DIATONIC : DI(short for the girl’s name Diana) plus(needs) A + TONIC(short for tonic water, non-alcoholic and carbonated, or, in New England, a non-alcoholic carbonated sweet drink).
Defn: … on the major or minor musical scale, from do/doh/doe? through re, me, fa, so, la, ti, and back to do.
9 Walk by river? (6)
RAMBLE : AMBLE(to walk leisurely) plus(by) R(abbrev. for “river”). “Walk” does double duty.
10 Distress when train set gets damaged (8)
STRAITEN : Anagram of(… gets damaged) TRAIN SET.
11 A little comic, he contrived something lavatorial (8,6)
CHEMICAL TOILET : Anagram of(… contrived) A LITTLE COMIC, HE.
13 Theatrical demand for silence right in manner of ancient Greeks (10)
HISTRIONIC : HIST(an expression demanding silence;sh!) + R(abbrev. for “right”) + IONIC(in the manner of the ancient Greeks of Ionia).
14 Irishman given a spooky experience abandoning church (4)
SEAN : “séance”(a spooky experience, though the only spooky one present is probably the medium) minus(abandoning) “CE”(abbrev. for the Church of England).
16 Snide comment of Spain against its neighbour (4)
GIBE : E(abbrev. for for Spain) placed after(against, in an across clue) GIB(short for Gibralter, Spain’s southern neighbour).
18 Solemnly declare situation when donkey had insatiable appetite (10)
ASSEVERATE : ASS(a donkey) + [ EVER(always, as in “you’re ever so busy”) ATE ](had an insatiable appetite, if one always ate).
21 Potentially wretches with a gram being gained? (14)
WEIGHTWATCHERS : Anagram of(Potentially) [WRETCHES WITH A plus(… being gained) G(abbrev. for “gram”) ].
Defn: Those who would be feeling wretched, if they as much as gained a gram in weight, instead of losing kilos.
23 Those out for pleasure wanting seductive lady start to finish? (8)
TRIPPERS : “stripper”(a seductive lady) with the 1st letter of(start) moved to the end(to finish).
24 One to criticise smallest cut with little hesitation (6)
SNIPER : SNIP(a very small cut) plus(with) ER(an expression of hesitation).
25 Cover with new trees for trees destroyed (8)
REFOREST : Anagram of(… destroyed) FOR TREES.
26 Bold attack in which one must keep quiet (6)
FLASHY : FLY(to attack suddenly, as in “he flew at me for no apparent reason”) containing(in which) [ A(the singular article;one) + SH!(imperative to keep quiet) ].
Down
1 Headlong fall when important lady drops off edge (4)
PURL : “purler”(a spectacular headlong fall) minus(when … drops off) “ER”(that important lady, Elizabeth Regina, the Queen).
Defn: In knitting or sewing, a decorative border.
2 Male facing stress when leaving US city (7)
MEMPHIS : M(abbrev. for “male”) plus(facing) “emphasis”(stress;special significance or importance placed) minus(… leaving) “as”(when, as in “as you leave the room…”).
3 Author in a state, one of the characters flipping over (2,2,4)
DE LA MARE : “Delaware”(the US state) with “w”(one of its characters) inverted(flipping over) to an “m”.
Answer: Walter, English author and poet.
5 Brilliant batting, say – one little old-style amateur? (11)
INTELLIGENT : IN(describing the team that is batting in a cricket match) + TELL(to say;to inform) + I(Roman numeral for “one”) + GENT(short for;little “Gentleman”, a player in the first-class cricket matches, Gentlemen, consisting of amateurs v. Players, consisting of professionals, which were played from 1806 to 1962;old-style).
6 Each party’s beginning with trifle around small table (6)
TEAPOY : [ EA(abbrev. for “each”) + the 1st letter of(…’s beginning) “party” ] contained in(with … around) TOY(a trifle or to trifle with).
7 Whip up a story to deceive girl (7)
NATALIE : Reversal of(… up, in a down clue) TAN(to whip;to thrash) + A + LIE(a story to deceive;a fabrication).
8 City woman offering opposing position (9)
CONSTANCE : CON(opposing, as in “pros and cons”) + STANCE(a position;a stand). Double defn: 1st: .. in S. Germany; and 2nd: A woman’s name.
12 Ultimately, ambiguities in puzzles may make one argue (5,6)
CROSS SWORDS : The last letter of(Ultimately) “ambiguities ” contained in(in) CROSSWORDS(puzzles like this one).
Defn: …, something which occurs in crossword blogs like this.
13 School servant I dismissed may have left a mark (4,5)
HIGH WATER : HIGH(short for “high school”;a grammar school in the UK) + “waiter”(more a server than a servant, I thought) minus(… dismissed) “I“.
Defn: … on the sea-shore, say.
15 Hotel man mixed something very dangerous for drinker (8)
METHANOL : Anagram of(… mixed) HOTEL MAN.
Defn: Poisonous liquid used as a solvent, fuel and antifreeze.
17 Officer in trouble caught by punch (7)
BAILIFF : AIL(to trouble, as in “what ails you?”) contained in(caught by) BIFF(a punch;a blow).
19 A mainstay thus set up is to the purpose (7)
APROPOS : A + PROP(a support, the chief of which is the mainstay) + reversal of(… set up, in a down clue) SO(thus;in this manner).
20 In some measure bullish, a person who would set the pattern? (6)
SHAPER : Hidden in(In some measure) “bullish, a person “.
22 Carrier to deviate, avoiding double bend (4)
TRAY : “stray”(to deviate from) minus(avoiding) “s”(prefix to denote something in the shape of a double bend, as in “an s-bend on the road”)
(Please do NOT post hereinbelow any comment relating to the picture quiz. Thank you.)
12d Was Pasquale reading yesterday’s debate? And several others? Thanks, scchua. I struggled with this one.
Thanks Pasquale and scchua
Fairly straightforward except for the NW, where I failed on PURL and didn’t understand it even when I cheated – thanks, scchua. TEAPOY was a new word for me, but clearly clued. Favourites were DIATONIC for the nice misdirection of “do”, and GIBE.
[btw the Guardian published an apology for the “1 is a prime” error from a few days ago in its corrections column today. The clue had already been altered online.]
(scchua – misprint in 14a. SEANCE is losing “ce”, not “ch”)
Thank you sschua, look forward to the finished article.
Enjoyable puzzle again from The Don with a few less well-known entries such as ASSEVERATE.
I didn’t know purl as an edge, only as a beer so that took a fair while.
Also, although it went in easily enough, I didn’t recognise CONSTANCE as the city although I have visited that beautiful town (Konstanz) a number of times.
Failed on TRAY entering DRAY and being unable to parse either. I couldn’t get past U = bend.
Splendid job, thank you you, Pasquale.
Nice week, all.
MikeP @1 Yes, I wondered about that, I think it was a comment by Rishi. Using the ‘s’ off the end of a plural just seems a bit feeble.
Thank you Sschua and Pasquale. I’m a knitter and didn’t know a purl was an edge, so, like Muffin@2, I couldn’t understand it after cheating either! I liked 12d best.
(Apologies, scchua – I’m out for the rest of the day, so won’t be able to attempt your picture quiz.)
Very enjoyable – thanks to scchua & Pasquale.
I liked the hungry donkey at 18a.
For 26a I had SH in FLAY.
Many thanks to Pasquale and scchua.
Re 26a I too parsed like jkb_ing @9: I thought it was FLAY (“one”, i.e. a type of attack) containing SH.
Enjoyable puzzle, on the easier end of the scale for a Pasquale. As a follower of the turf, I’d never heard of ‘purler’, or, if I had, I’d imagined it was spelt ‘pearler’, as in the Aussie slang for something excellent. DIATONIC and INTELLIGENT were my favourites, the latter because it evoked memories of my Dad, who played a couple of times for Minor Counties v the touring side (those were the days) and knew all about the distinction between Gents and Players, having been invited to captain Warwickshire in 1955, in the days when the county skipper was still an amateur.
Thanks, muffin. 14a now corrected.
Thanks Pasquale and scchua.
I am convinced Ps crosswords are getting easier.
I took 9ac to be the R + AMBLE ie river Amble (in Northumbria)
Sorry, in Cornwall, not Northumberland
Thanks Pasquale and scchua.
Quite hard going for me, I must have met ASSEVERATE before, but it did not come to my mind. Should ‘may’ be included in the definition for HIGH WATER since it does not always leave a tidemark?
I especially liked PURL, MEMPHIS and DE LA WARE!
jkb_ing & Giudice, I think you’re right about 26across. The containment indicator would then be “in which one must keep”. I was fixed on giving an explanation for “one”.
Count me as another who needed aids to get PURL. I didn’t know it was an edge, and I didn’t know that meaning of “purler”, only ever having come across it before as “something very good” (I’ve never seen ulaca@11’s “pearler” spelling).
PURL was my LOI. I didn’t know it meant “edge” but once you’ve got two crossers in a four letter word, it didn’t take much to guess the answer. Otherwise I found this rather easy which is certainly not meant unkindly because there was a lot of fun to be had in solving this. Liked SEAN and DIATONIC amongst others.
Thanks Pasquale.
I thought there was a River Amble too – thanks Dave Ellison for the confirmation.
Without the checker, 18a could just as easily, if not more plausibly, be ASSOVERATE from the wordplay – this is what I first entered, which did me no help at all. Happened to be online so ‘check’ showed me wrong, but in the olden days I would have run to Chambers.
I’m putting myself down as a failure as PURL simply did not yield – like muffin I needed the blog to make sense of it.
Thanks to Pasquale and scchua. I had trouble getting started with this puzzle (at first nothing clicked) though eventually things improved. I’m yet another who had difficulty with PURL (my last in) because “purler” was new to me and FLASHY gave me trouble. ASSEVERATE was familiar from previous puzzles (though not from common usage) but I took a while seeing STRAITEN as a verb. All in all, a challenge but well worth the effort.
Not Pasquale’s most difficult, apart from PURL – PURLER was new to me in that sense, so that took some guessing and checking. TEAPOY at best vaguely familiar but fairly clued. Liked WEIGHT WATCHERS and DIATONIC
Thanks to Pasquale and scchua
Completely defeated by PURL, and aslo very glad that I didn’t sleepwalk into TEAPOT (but it was a close run thing)…
Thanks all
Tough but gettahle, although I failed with purl since I had no idea it meant edge!
There were some clever anagrams eg 21 ac ,11 ac.
Re 14A: ‘Church’ can be ‘CE’ can’t it? (Church of England)
I thought this rather weak compared to the usual Guardian standard – too many contrived surfaces for my liking and loose cryptic clueing e.g. FLY = attack in 26A.
Oddbod @25, I parsed 26a as SH in FLAY.
Loved ASSEVERATE. Hated HIGH as a synonym for school.
Thanks Pasquale and scchua
This one stayed one clue short from finished for a few weeks – yes … it was PURL. Finally, last night I found that it did mean edge … and looking up purler as a headlong fall confirmed it !
Now that there is a River Amble, 9a sits better with me – don’t know why I didn’t look it up myself – it would have been unusual for the Don to leave a loose one like that.
Lots of variety in the clue devices used here, especially liked DE LA MARE and TRIPPERS.