28054 Thursday, 12 August 2021 In the library with a candlestick

Author   ZabadakPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
I found this toughish, taking an age to get going and scrambling through in all but 28 minutes. But it’s also a good cut above the average, with some very fine clues in the mix. One of them I failed to parse while solving – it’s a form of clue I often have a blind spot for, but should be obvious from the odd and un-cryptic-like collection of words. If I have an issue, it’s with the Irish club, which is always a beast to spell given the Irish habit of pronouncing things more or less unconnected with the way they’re spelt. The name that is used to construct the answer is not especially familiar and itself an odd looking spelling. Errors expected.
Below are my versions of the clues with their definitions also underlined, and SOLUTIONS thus.

Across
1 Make good list for auditors (4)
HEAL Should have got this quicker. Just a homophone (for auditors) of HEEL which means list as in keel over.
3 Girl outside seedy Irish club (10)
SHILLELAGH Today’s spelling test, which I repeatedly failed even with the wordplay. Some of you will just have to take my word for it, but the girl you’re looking for is SHELAGH, her name placed outside ILL for seedy. Here’s Shelagh Docherty, journalist and broadcaster, formerly of Radio 5 live, now with LBC
9 Beam as delivery arrives on time (7)
TRANSOM A crossbeam such as on a ship. Delivery is RANSOM, placed onto T(ime) The clue is (deliberately?) ambiguous about which end to put the T.
11 Bats briefly at Lord’s, overly trusting partner? (7)
CUCKOLD Bats is rendered as CUCKOO, with its last letter cut. LD is a conventional abbreviation for Lord, and I think you have to ignore the ‘s, there to give a context for the batting.
12 Rarely at rest, in haste avoiding warm-up? (4-9)
HEAT-RESISTANT An anagram (rarely) of AT REST IN HASTE
14 A leading poet’s with expedition (5)
AMAIN A in plain sight plus MAIN for leading, as in leading role. Poets use the word to mean swift (our purpose) or with great strength. I lost time trying to find a poet’s name to tag onto A to get an answer
15 Reliable English clergyman suspected of murder, somewhat taken aback (9)
EVERGREEN Fabulous clue. In Cluedo, one of the characters is Rev Green. So you have E(nglish) plus REV GREEN partly (the REV bit) reversed, taken aback
17 Crisis point returning as liquid in well includes fuel (5-4)
KNIFE-EDGE (Such) as gives you EG, and liquid in a well is INK. Reverse both (returning) and insert FEED for fuel (as a verb)
19 Undercarriage that is stuck on swamp (5)
BOGIE One you don’t have to think about,. BOG for marsh, IE for that is.
21 PC their primary rank? (7,6)
THOUGHT POLICE I’ll put this down as a CD, playing on PC both as Police Constable and Political Correctness. I think it just about gets away with it.
24 Upstart’s mean? Not the end of the world (7)
PARVENU Mean translates as PAR via average, the VENUS as a world but without its end letter
25 The state of the loos outrageous! (7)
LESOTHO An anagram (outrageous) of THE LOOS
26 Turn out policies with singular appeal (10)
COMELINESS So turn out is COME, policies is/are LINES, add S(ingular)
27 African runners, the latest to be picked up (4)
GNUS The ones I saw were moving at a sedate pace in company with zebras, but I guess they can run, if not particularly noted for it. Sounds like (picked up) NEWS for latest, of course. Loads of jokes in there.
Down
1 Design assists in production of cars (10)
HATCHBACKS Design yields HATCH as in hatch a plot, and assists gives BACKS.
2 Just like our doctors to get in a state (7)
ALABAMA I think this is just like: À LA, as in à la mode, à la Florentine, our doctors BMA (British Medical Association) getting in, including, the extra A
4 He’s fixed up with a modest country dwelling (9)
HOMESTEAD An anagram (fixed up) of HE’S plus A MODEST, one of those where the anagram fodder has to be picked out from the clue. [On edit: while I don’t know who to thank, since s/HE’S A MODEST anon contributer, you don’t need the ‘S in the anagram fodder]
5 Place that’s old, of course, periodically visited (5)
LOCUS Alternate letters (periodically visited) of oLd Of CoUrSe
6 Fight through trade winds (8,5)
EXCHANGE BLOWS Separate trade from winds, and translate each into EXCHANGE and BLOWS fine surface and misdirection.
7 A fool accepting note, one being taken in (7)
ADOPTEE A again stands in for itself, the fool is DOPE, insert TE for a note in the sol-fa scale.
8 Experienced judge’s trip of a lifetime? (4)
HADJ One-off pilgrimage to Mecca undertaken by faithful Muslims. Experienced HAD plus J(udge).
10 It’s unusual way to extend, and count, old measure (7,2,4)
STRANGE TO TELL Way is ST(reet), extend is RANGE, count is TOT, and old measure ELL< which crops up here often enough being useful for setters.
13 Giving little ground eg on run with Sue (10)
UNGENEROUS Another anagram (ground) where you first have to extract the fodder from the clue: EG ON RUN and SUE
16 Features in some crustaceans and indeed in European rabbits (9)
EYESTALKS Such as on this one. YES for indeed appears in E(uropean) plus TALKS for rabbits
18 Cockney person who suggests one’s acting? (7)
INTERIM A Cockney person who suggests is a(n) ‘INTER., and ones, or one is, gives I’M
20 Information masters are inclined to shine (7)
GLISTEN Masters is the inclusion word here: place LIST for incline inside GEN for information
22 Tiny binder supposedly at first getting lost under old notepaper (5)
GLUON “A particle thought of as passing between quarks and so signifying the force that binds them together”. Do you know, I’ve only just spotted how this works, and I’m kicking myself. First letters (at first) of Getting Lost Under Old Notepaper. Simples.
23 Risk when fungi is pulled up (4)
SPEC The reverse (pulled up) of CEPS a form of fungi.

65 comments on “28054 Thursday, 12 August 2021 In the library with a candlestick”

  1. Nice blog, as always. And mirabile dictu, I did the triple over Verlaine. First one in was BOGIE so I was worried about getting anything at all – and I never spotted the GLUON initials either while solving.
  2. I had a bad feeling about this one as I went from across to across failing to think of anything, my FOI being HOMESTEAD. The bad feeling continued as I had trouble with lots of clues. The spelling of SHILLELAGH was a problem. I never got past A followed by a poet named MAIN. Like Z, I was slow to see how GLUON worked, after being slow to think of GLUON. I don’t know if Clue (the US version of Cluedo) has a Rev. Green; in any case, I never thought of the game, and assumed that there was a famous murder suspect of that name; as with the poet Main, it worked, anyway. I took forever (well, 5-6 minutes) to figure out LOI COMELINESS. I have “def?” at GNUS. And I didn’t care much for SHILLELAGH, for the reasons Z gives, and HADJ, although it was easy enough; I don’t care for foreign words written in non-Roman script, where there’s variation in the Romanization (a Mephisto trait)–ODE, for instance, doesn’t even list HADJ as a variant of HAJJ (or HAJ). But there were a number of good, albeit hard, clues, and I can’t blame the setter for my slowness in catching on.
  3. ..as I stopped after about 15 minutes to have dessert, then resumed but received a phone call. Three hours later, I continued and finished.

    I had to parse them all to make sure they were right – I nearly biffed apostle for adoptee. It took a while to remember the Rev Green, I haven’t played that game for 55 years.

  4. Failure on shillelagh which I thought of but it didn’t fit. Because embarrassingly I had focus for locus – focus the place where rays converge – where I had O(ld) visiting F C U S from “of course” periodically. Without checking, obviously. Random names my second-least favourite clue type, but they’re easily worst when they’re obscure random names, worse again when obscure foreign ones.
    Also took a long time to see how gluon worked, the definition clearly the first two words and then had to drop S (supposedly at first) from another longer word. Did figure it out, but post-solve.
    Nevertheless a fine puzzle, much enjoyed. Liked Thought Police best. Thanks setter and blogger.
    Edit: even with locus in place I might not have been able to spell shillelagh correctly, with the NHO name leading to guesswork.
    And… first guess for 18dn was implier… person who suggests, with cockney I’m player being pronounced as I’m plier. As appeared only a month or two ago: Cockneys pronouncing their short As as short Is, same as Australians.

    Edited at 2021-08-12 01:10 pm (UTC)

  5. This was a corker! And but for heavy traffic in the south west I was set for a good time. However 26ac COMELINESS didn’t come quickly and I wasn’t entirely sure of exactly what kind of police were being sought! I ploughed on with the arriviste at 24ac and my LOI became 18dn INTERIM, which was something of an anti-climax.

    FOI 3ac SILLELAGH – a word I learnt to spell from the nights when I used to out clubbin’.

    COD 24ac PARVENU

    WOD 21ac THOUGHT POLICE primary? But, I didn’t think the clue quite got away with it.

    I did like 15ac’s Cluedo reference to the bad Reverend Green – I was then hoping for a Nina but no mention of scarlet women et al. Shame!

    Edited at 2021-08-12 04:01 am (UTC)

    1. Ugh – this one was well beyond me, I had about 8 or 10 filled at the 30-minute mark, and realised there was no chance whatsoever of completion inside the hour I allow for the puzzle, so I resorted to using the Reveal button and parsing the answers for learning purposes. When I revealed SHILLELAGH I was very relieved that I hadn’t wasted my time trying to solve it unaided. A word I think I may possibly have seen written down before, but basically NHO, along with AMAIN.

      The spelling Shelagh always reminds me of Ms Delaney, and the wonderful 1961 movie starring Rita Tushingham and Murray Melvin.

      FOI LOCUS, COD (of the ones I solved unaided) EYESTALKS

      Somewhat deflated – but as a relative newbie I guess these days are to be expected …this one came 24 hours early.

  6. Very, very slow to get this one out. Time so far off the scale as to be meaningless (= too embarrassing to report). SHILLELAGH was the one that gave me most trouble but others like AMAIN and RANSOM for ‘delivery’ didn’t go in straight away either. I blame Flanders and Swann for taking so long to get G NUS.

    I’ve never played Cluedo and only know the characters and weapons from themed crosswords elsewhere (mentioned only yesterday in the FT puzzle) but remembered enough to see what was going on with EVERGREEN. I also liked THOUGHT POLICE even if I could only just parse it, like our blogger. That question mark at the end though can excuse almost anything.

  7. I took forever getting started (with UNGENEROUS at 13dn) and made very slow progress. There came a point where I had four or five answers that I knew were correct but was unable to parse, and that sort of thing saps one’s confidence so that as my target 30 minutes passed with barely a third of the puzzle completed my interest began to wane. I filled the grid eventually but resorted to aids enough times so that I can’t claim to have solved the puzzle.

    I won’t detail all my problems but just mention that I NHO AMAIN and elsewhere there were too many leaps of faith required over shades of meanings of words, at least for my taste.

    z8, I don’t think 8ac is ambiguous as it follows the ‘on’ rule as it applies to Across clues.

    I think the apostrophe s at 11ac stands for ‘is’ and I would interpret the clue as ‘Bats briefly at Lord is (a word meaning) overly trusting partner’.

    Now off to lick my wounds from this and hope that the Grauniad puzzle is a little kinder to me than yesterday’s was. I need a confidence-booster!

    Edited at 2021-08-12 05:33 am (UTC)

  9. Very rare indeed for me to give any negative feedback to setters as I think they do an amazing job. And there were some fine clues here (SPEC, EXCHANGE BLOWS) But…as Jackkt says, when you get the answer and are still scratching your head, it’s not a good sign.

    Is RANSOM really a delivery? Is “overly trusting partner”a synonym for CUCKOLD? Think Z was being v generous about the POLICE CD. And AMAIN … well I’m used to the poet’s reference thing in the Azed but wasn’t expecting it here and that was the one I couldn’t get after an hour

    I’ll await the grief I’m probably about to get!

    Thanks (sort of) setter and very much so for the enlightening blog Z

    1. I don’t see why you should get grief, dvynys, as your critical remarks are balanced and constructive. We’re not averse to that sort of thing around here, unlike some crossword blogs that contain little short of lavish praise which frankly makes for very dull reading.

      Edited at 2021-08-12 07:46 am (UTC)

    2. In the context of sacred music I think RANSOM can work as delivery. “Ransomed healed restored forgiven” “I know that my redeemer liveth” etc.
      1. Well well I know that line so well and have never thought to wonder what the first word really meant. Thank you
        1. You never know when singing in the school choir decades ago will come in handy!
    3. If you’re going to criticise the setter, how about treating fungi as a singular?
  10. GLUONs are how matter is glued
    A great word, most amusingly clued
    COD for this fogey?
    Well I might pick a BOGIE
    But people would think i was crude
  11. Challenging, but apart from AMAIN quite fair. I had a vague idea about an Irish club beginning with ‘n’, which held me up. As discussed, GLUON very well disguised.

    THOUGHT POLICE still makes me uneasy, still can’t see how it works apart from the allusions — rank? COD to EVERGREEN. Miss Scarlet was my favourite, for unknown reasons.

    25′ 04″, thanks z and setter.

  12. 45 minutes with LOI AMAIN put in without belief. I’d just biffed ALABAMA so I was surprised both were right. COD to EVERGREEN for the happy memories of the homicidal clergyman. I liked THOUGHT POLICE too but I wasn’t sure that the surface reading stood up to scrutiny. I came to SHILLELAGH via Shelagh Delaney. Our setter seems to have some doubts about the Standard Model with ‘supposedly’ in the GLUON clue. O ye of little faith! A toughish challenge. Thank you Z and setter.
    1. Our setter is presumably following the Chambers definition, which is where I got mine from. Perhaps if you could post off a couple of gluons to them, they might change the entry.
      1. I’ve just turned it up and see the word used is hypothetical. But then everything is only a hypothesis, including our own existence.

        Edited at 2021-08-12 09:11 am (UTC)

  13. I struggled to get started, with only ALABAMA and BOGIE going in in the first 5 minutes. I eventually began to fill in some blanks in the SE corner, with UNGENEROUS and a posited BLOWS helping me along. Fortunately I have a friend who uses the SHELAGH spelling of her name, so was able to get the club without too much of a struggle. STRANGE TO TELL allowed me to make some progress in the remaining NW corner until I was left with 14a, where I was still trying to insert a poet after the initial A, until I gave up and used a word finder. I’d never heard of that meaning, and only worked out how the parsing worked when I saw its definition. That spoiled the puzzle for me after what had been a challenging and enjoyable 42:40. Thanks setter and Z.
  14. Slow to start, fast in the middle, then very slow at the end.

    Took a while to work out how to spell (and parse) SHILLELAGH. Then held up for ages on STRANGE TO TELL and AMAIN, not helped by having entered APACE initially.

    FOI BOGIE, LOI AMAIN. Liked GLUON (probably because I saw the derivation immediately).

  16. …and straightway gave her chase;
    Was never seen in forest green, so fierce, so fleet a race!

    After 30 mins I’d only filled half — but I liked it and kept going. After another 30 mins I had the NHO amain unfilled. Of course I went through every poet I know about a zillion times.

    Thanks setter and great blog Z.

  17. Too difficult for me.

    Feel like I can handle these things when the SNITCH is below 100 but with a tricky one like this, just feel like a beginner again and scrabble round getting about half the clues before collapsing in a heap.

    More practice needed!

  18. Similar experience to others — slow to get going and ending with much dithering over SHILLELAGH. With all the checkers in it looked like the most likely spelling to me but I don’t recall ever seeing Shelagh which gave me considerable cause for doubt. In the end I threw it in and awaited the pink squares which never came. Always nice to have an unexpected success.

    Edit — now realised I did know the name Shelagh Delaney from my years of The Smiths fandom. She was a big influence on Morrissey, which led to me watching A Taste of Honey.

    Edited at 2021-08-12 08:10 am (UTC)

  19. …do do ‘n do. Apologies. I didn’t spot that you’d already mentioned Shelagh Delaney before writing my bit. I’ve seen that you are from Lanky too. Which part?
    1. Hi Wanderer – no apologies necessary (sespecially since I forgot to actually name the film). Truly one of the high water marks of Brit cinema IMHO.

      A few months ago, I actually sought out the stone stircase, a few steps form the Holt Town Metrolink station, where the young lovers say their goodbyes, unaware that Jo is pregnant.
      Him: “Why do ya love me?”
      Her: “Because you’re daft!”

      I spent my chioldhood on the Fylds coast (Cleveleys) and still visit quite frequently for family reasons, as I did yesterday. Attended schools in Poulton and Fleetwood, worked in variious William Hill branches in Blackpool before decamping to Manchester to spend my student grant (I won’t call it study, coz it wasn’t).

      Best wishes, Denise

      1. Small world. My Dad’s family were the Boltonians, and he introduced me to the lifelong privilege of supporting the Wanderers and Lancashire cricket. (O my Lofthouse and my Statham long ago.!) Dad went to Baines’s in the twenties/ thirties, if that was one of your schools.Mum was from Poulton-le-Fylde, making the 1953 Cup Final a personal nightmare, but I was actually born in Blackpool Victoria Hospital as the war finished. We lived in Blackpool Old Road just off Poulton Square, where the stocks are, for the first six years of my life and I was christened in St Chad’s church. I went to the Church of England school in Hardhorn Road, usually called Sheaf Street. We moved to Southport in 1952 where I was fortunate to go to the excellent King George V Grammar School. I’ve lived in Liverpool and worked in Manchester too. My Uncle Jimmy lived in Thornton Gate, Clevelys and worked at Grundy’s Ironmongers. Grandma moved to Kings Walk, Clevelys in her later years too.
        1. (with apologies to other posters on this forum – please indulge us just this once)

          Thanks for the details, Wanderer, that’s really quite a delightful coincidence!. Yep, I know those Cleveleys roads, having spent periods living on Green Drive (Rossall Beach) and Derby Road by the bus station. Not a bad place to grow up, I remember starting a paper round, and thinking that the Manchester Evening News, which a few customers took, was from somewhere distant and exotic. Cleveleys town centre now has a somewhat run-down feel, a the family-run shops like Grundys mostly gone, replaced by cut-price chain outlets. (the arrival of B&M Bargains when I was 15 or 16 began that long descent). Looking on the bright side, at least it’s not Fleetwood.

          Can’t confirm or deny your suspicions about Baines, for fear of blowing my already-flimsy cover 😊…

            1. My Grandparents were married at Poulton on 17 November 1917. He was at Blackpool Aiport, and at a nearby officers hospital, then up at an airfield north of Fleetwood. After their wedding they went to the new RAF Cranwell. They never went back to Poulton! Spent many happy days in Blackpool on hols. In the early eighties we shot a film on the crazy golf course for Whitbread Trophy. All Yates’s Wine Lodge and Kiss me quick ‘ats. Couldn’ finda chippy in Fleetwood!
                1. Since everyone’s talking about Lancashire, I’ll just add that they did produce a wonderful cricketer in Haseeb Hameed, although they let him go; Nottinghamshire have gained a gem. And so I hope have England.
      2. Piece of trivia re Taste of Honey – the later Labour MP Hazel Blears ( Alan Coren once said her name was like a type of biscuit) is one of the little children playing at the beginning of the film.
  20. 37:06
    Nice puzzle – good challenge.
    Thanks, z. I think it’s Shelagh Fogarty, btw 🙂
    1. It is indeed. Should I apologise to Shelagh Docherty, who I seem to have conjured out of thin air and wiki misreading, or Shelagh Fogerty for a gross misspelling of her name?
  21. That were proper ‘ard!
    I must have spent at least 15mins on AMAIN. Like Z i was looking for a poet I could fit into A?A??N. I wanted to put APACE but the E would have ruined 10d.
    Thanks, Z, for GLUON. Didn’t spot the initial letters thing.
    As far as HADJ is concerned, I believe many people do more than one pilgrimage in their lifetime.
    FOI: SHILLELAGH (As others have said, SHELAGH Delaney wrote “A Taste of Honey”. I thought Ray Brooks, who was one of my favourite actors of that time, was also in the film but he was with Rita Tushingham in “The Knack”)
    LOI: AMAIN
    COD: KNIFE EDGE.

    Edited at 2021-08-12 09:18 am (UTC)

  22. I’m being completely bamboozled by the Snitch this week, as I finished this faster than yesterday’s effort.
    I thought it was a first-rate puzzle with EVERGREEN and CUCKOLD the pick of a fine crop.

    We used to have a shillelagh hanging in our house when I was a boy, but as it had “Present from Killarney” and a shamrock stamped on it, I doubt if it had ever seen any meaningful action.

    Thanks to z and the setter.

      1. I agree with your quibble, Isla3, but it didn’t trouble me, as a puzzle of this difficulty had already presented many dodgy definitions as others have mentioned — eg RANSOM in 9a. My quibble is that the surface was ungrammattical: IS should be ARE. This led me to wonder whether
        the setter had used wrong grammar deliberately, and that IS was not actually the link word which it appeared to be.
        1. I deleted my comment when I realised it was totally wrong… but then you replied a moment later. So just to fill the gap: totally agree with you, the grammar is wrong in the clue. Though I didn’t see it during the solve, not until you mentioned it.
  23. Mostly enjoyed, with many clever clues, but I struggled with 23d “FUNGI IS”. I have only come across Fungi in the plural, as indeed has the COED. Perhaps the setter is (unusually in this puzzle!) trying to help by telling us it is the word rather than the mushrooms being pulled up, but I found it unfairly misleading.
  24. The one I failed to parse was PARVENU – thanks Z. That reference to planets as worlds gets me every time. DNK that word for undercarriage (it just conjures up the well-known colonel) but the answer was clear. EVERGREEN was certainly worth the price of admission. A hard-fought 27.44
  25. Wasn’t quite sure about some answers as they went in – for good reason as it turned out. Finally got there with LOI, SHILL-thingy, which by some miracle came out right from the unlikely-looking Scrabble rack of available letters. Like the Cluedo reference, but didn’t see it until coming here. No time, but it was slow, around 45 mins.
  26. but I had to confirm the spelling of SHILLELAGH as I had no idea. AMAIN could have been AGAIN for all I knew, and it was only coming here that I found out about how it worked. I’m sure there must be a poet called GAIN in some universe.
    COD EVERGREEN. I always play my games with yellow, so I’ll go with Colonel Mustard.
  27. 14:49. I didn’t think much of this. SHILLELAGH is awful, and there was a lot of general looseness: delivery=RANSOM, seedy=ILL, ‘overly trusting partner’, ‘avoiding warm-up’, ‘rank’, mean=PAR, ‘runners’, risk=SPEC.
    The Cluedo clue is very good though.
    Nothing unknown for me at least, although I needed the (thoroughly 13dn) wordplay to spell the club and I’m not sure I’d have been able to tell you exactly what a BOGIE is in this context.

    Edited at 2021-08-12 11:46 am (UTC)

  28. I was defeated by “Amain” which I may have seen in the Times xwd before, but had evidently forgotten. So DNF.
    Lots to enjoy in this puzzle but agree with various comments above that some of the clueing is tricky, bordering on obscure. To those already mentioned, I would add: why the question mark after Upstart’s Mean? It’s a straightforward clue so no question mark required, methinks.
    Thanks for the blog.
  29. I think the question mark is a case of deceptive punctuation. One of the most useful tips I was given in my early days of cryptic solving was to ignore punctuation.
  30. After 15 mins I gave up trying to figure out what the Irish word / girl’s name combo was, and plumped for SHILLERAGH. So close! Like many others I don’t really enjoy it when random people’s names are included, and when the name is quite as random as SHELAGH I’m not convinced it’s fair play. And I’m afraid I agree that THOUGHT POLICE was very weak.

    GNUS was quite funny (even if I don’t pronounce it like that), ALABAMA was good and INTERIM was nicely put together. I wasn’t aware of that definition of SPEC so that was a late one when I couldn’t come up with anything better.

  31. Gave up after 38 mins totally defeated by amain, nearest I got was awain and eyestalks which I wouldn’t have got in a month of sundays. Well, one lives and learns I suppose.
  32. Nope, not anywhere near it. Completely bamboozled by a number of clues all of which have been mentioned above. Essayed in three sessions, one on a train, but just couldn’t see the tricks being played. In the end HADJ to give up with three clues left to do. Bah. Too clever for me. Well done setter and thanks Z for the explanations. Ps I’m a G nu man too.
  33. ….took as long again as the first 3/4 of this one.

    FOI SHILLELAGH
    LOI HEAL
    COD THOUGHT POLICE
    TIME 18:48

  34. DNF. Gave up after an hour with amain unsolved despite a couple of alpha-trawls. Was looking for a followed by a poet rather than a followed by leading. The definition meant nothing to me in any event. I got shillelagh but only because I knew the Irish club, doubt I would’ve got it from Shelagh as a girl’s name and ill as seedy. I liked the Reverend Green Cluedo clue. Plenty of good and clever clues but a couple of flies in the ointment which spoiled and frustrated the solving experience.
  35. Got EVERGREEN, but with no idea about the reverend; I wondered if some historical personage were referenced. For SHILLELAGH, last heard in Bob Dylan’s rendition of the ballad of Arthur McBride, I couldn’t for the life of me find a girl’s name… “Sheila” didn’t work!

    Edited at 2021-08-12 07:55 pm (UTC)

  37. Lots of excellent clues but I agree with the several above who referred to unsatisfactory looseness in places. What seemed oddest to me was the definition of a gnu as a runner: what next? A gnu, like most animals, can run, but surely one doesn’t think of running as being a special characteristic of a gnu. It also breathes. So are we to have any old animal clued as a breather?
    1. Yes it is odd. The only explanation I can think of is that gnu is a type of antelope and I’ve an idea that ‘runner’ for ‘antelope’ is standard crossword fare. Collin has this under antelope: Antelopes are graceful and can run fast. There are many different types of antelope.

      Today’s clue is still a huge stretch though.

  38. I think we have a new curmudgeon to take over Dorset Jimbo’s mantle. Why complain about the clues when you have managed to solve them correctly?
  39. Didn’t know or get Amain, the rest was exactly what was needed this afternoon to occupy the front of my mind while the baseball played out in the background.

    I was pleased to see Shillelagh right off; I had no idea how to spell it until all the crossers were in; unlike with some words which pop up in the puzzle from time to time it seems very unlikely that I learned from today how to spell it for next time.

  40. …on the hour and glad i did as some of this was impenetrable. Seeing the answers came with the relief that i did not persist with SHILLELAGH nor GLUON. Did not really understand THOUGHT POLICE though of course know of its origin.

    Lifetime hours clawed back: 1

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