I found this easier by Bradman’s recent standards – some clues gave me reason to quibble but otherwise a pleasant smooth experience.
FF: 6 DD : 7
| Across | ||
| 1 | CHARLADY | Tea boy with yen for older female worker? (8) |
| CHAR (tea) LAD (boy) Y (yen) | ||
| 5 | TOO BAD | Words of reluctant acceptance not good enough (3,3) |
| 9 | HEADIEST | Fades in preliminary race that’s most exciting (8) |
| DIES (fades) in HEAT (preliminary race) | ||
| 10 | STAYER | Saint and philosopher who won’t give up? (6) |
| ST (saint) AYER (philosopher) | ||
| 12 | RATED | Admired artist, rebel of the fifties (5) |
| RA (artist) TED (rebel of the fifties) | ||
| 13 | APENNINES | A writer’s traversing square in the mountains (9) |
| A [PEN’S (writer’s) across NINE (square) ] | ||
| 14 | ABASED | Humbled, like journalist encountering a bishop (6) |
| [AS (like) ED (journalist)] containing [A B (bishop) ] | ||
| 16 | PLOTTER | Schemer to amble outside back of hall (7) |
| POTTER (amble) outside L (back of halL) | ||
| 18 | MATTERS | Affairs make a difference – the end of faithfulness (7) |
| MATTER (make a difference) S (end of faithfulnesS) | ||
| 20 | MUTTER | Grumble coming from maiden given voice (6) |
| M (maiden) UTTER (voice) | ||
| 22 | REFORMING | It could be grim for one losing love, making a new start (9) |
| GRIM FORoNE* (losing love i.e. without ‘o’) | ||
| 23 | FORCE | Agency supporting the established church (5) |
| FOR (supporting) CE (established church) | ||
| 24 | PHONEY | Call by made by unknown character – one attempting a scam? (6) |
| PHONE (call) Y (unknown character) – an out-of-place ‘by’ in the clue. | ||
| 25 | ETHERNET | Enter the new computer system (8) |
| ENTER THE* | ||
| 26 | RAKISH | Jaunty queen and king half hidden in wood (6) |
| R (queen, Regina) [ KI (KIng, half) in ASH (wood) ] | ||
| 27 | KNOTWEED | Edge of bank by river containing no troublesome plant (8) |
| [ K (edge of banK) TWEED (river) ] containing NO | ||
| Down | ||
| 1 | COHORT | Firm animated having collected right group of people (6) |
| CO (firm) [ HOT (animated) containing R (right) ] | ||
| 2 | A NASTY BIT OF WORK | An unpleasant task for a villain (1,5,3,2,4) |
| double def | ||
| 3 | LAIRD | Scot of some means in den with daughter (5) |
| LAIR (den) D (daughter) | ||
| 4 | DISCARD | One got rid of blemish, managed to hide it (7) |
| DID (managed) hiding SCAR (blemish) – doesnt the clue translate to ‘DISCARDED’? | ||
| 6 | OUT AND OUT | In every respect unfashionable, aunt moved around party (3-3-3) |
| OUT (unfashionable) [ AUNT* around DO (party) ] | ||
| 7 | BEYOND THE FRINGE | Hefty drunk with no breeding in satirical show (6,3,6) |
| HEFTY NO BREEDING* | ||
| 8 | DERISORY | Ridiculous order is changed before end of day (8) |
| ORDER IS* before Y (end of daY) | ||
| 11 | HEEP | Uriah is an unthinking follower heading off (4) |
| sHEEP (unthinking follower, without starting character) | ||
| 15 | SHEERNESS | Quality of cliffs in Kent location (9) |
| cryptic clue | ||
| 17 | IMPROPER | This person’s given support with little hesitation – it’s wrong (8) |
| I’M (this person’s) PROP (support) ER (little hesitation) | ||
| 19 | SKID | Snow now melting and child makes dangerous move (4) |
| S (Snow without ‘now’) KID (child) | ||
| 20 | MEGATON | Not a stone to raise – big weight (7) |
| reverse of NOT A GEM (stone) – Not a big fan of this clue either | ||
| 21 | BELTED | Moved quickly with trousers unlikely to fall down? (6) |
| cryptic clue | ||
| 23 | FLEET | Ships going full steam ahead? (5) |
| cryptic clue | ||
*anagram
‘Discard’ as a noun means ‘anything that is discarded’ and the def in 4ac, ‘one got rid of’, leads to a noun. ‘One got rid of’ may be taken as ‘one that is got rid of’.
Rishi@1 – That does work. I owe the Don one.
Cheers
TL
I think 5ac is TOO BAD – works for me.
I liked CHARLADY, BEYOND THE FRINGE and FLEET. Definition and wordplay seemed a bit close in MATTERS.
Thanks to Turbolegs and Bradman.
Found this fairly straightforward, but enjoyable nevertheless. 1ac made me pause; couldn’t see how the “older” fitted in but guess that it’s implying that the word isn’t regularly in use nowadays.
Thank you Bradman & Turbolegs.
Thanks Bradman and Turbolegs
Like Muffyword @ 3, I had TOO BAD for 5A. “That’s too bad” seems more like reluctant/grudging acceptance than NOT BAD, whch for me has more connotations of approval than acceptance. It will be interesting to see the published solution tomorrow (or if The Don is watching, maybe he could clarify).
PS to me @ 5
It also seems most unlike The Don to give half the solution verbatim in the clue.
Always do the FT over weekday breakfast and this one was done by the time the coffee was finished. Good straightforward start to the day.
Thanks Bradman and Turbolegs
No obscure words today made for a bit of an easier solve today. I had an issue with 5a – originally wrote in TOO BAD but when I did my final parsing run, changed it to NOT BAD. Think that they are both right or wrong – because each satisfies only half of the clue (in fact, I’d plump that the clue has slipped through editing). Simon@5 – the phrase “that’s NOT too bad” is more the one for grudging acceptance I would have thought.
Don’t regard ETHERNET as a computer system as such – it is more a network or a networking protocol that joins computer systems into a local area network (LAN).
Reckon that a few of the down clues that have been classified as cryptic definitions are more like double definition clues:
SHEERNESS – is a quality of all cliffs AND it is seaport resort in Kent;
BELTED – means rushed, dashed or moved quickly AND secured the trousers so that they don’t fall down;
FLEET – is a group of ships AND means to go fast or go ‘full steam ahead’ – although this one could be interpreted as cryptic def as well I guess.
Finshed in the NW corner with COHORT, RATED and A NASTY BIT OF WORK the last few in.
brucew @ 8
I was thinking along the lines of “It’s too bad that x happened”, meaning “It’s happened and we have to accept it, however reluctantly”.
Whatever the outcome, I think it’s an unusually ambiguous clue from The Don.
See that the official answer to 5a is TOO BAD and I assume that the parsing is as Simon says. Not one of the Don’s best clues.
Late to this but I’ve been away. The clue and answer are fine. Good lord have I defended the Don?
Thanks Turbolegs and Bradman.
I also had TOO BAD at 5ac so pleased to see I went the right way for a change.
I too assumed that the extra “by” in the clue for 24 was a typo.
On the subject of which I had been unable to fully parse HEAP at 11dn. All because of my cretinous spelling. And to make matters worse, I’m listening to the classic album Very ‘Eavy, Very ‘Umble (I commend it to any of you not familiar with it) even as I type.
Just got to fixing the blog finally (brucew@aus – Apologies, missed your message earlier on the non-fixing of errors and will try to be more timely going forward).
My take on 5ac is that ‘..not good enough” seems to imply that there is some good but not good enough. I know that when used in the sentence, “that’s just not good enough”, it suggests that the subject under question is actually bad – now whether that qualifies as “too bad” or not is open to interpretation. Hence my dilemma when solving 5ac. Also, I think “not bad” does count for words of reluctant acceptance, especially in these parts of the world (Asia / south-asia).
Regards,
TL