Jumbo 1190

Author   mohn2Posted on Categories Jumbo Cryptic
A gentle offering this week, with the unknowns (for me) clued with little ambiguity.

Solving time: 14m 49s

* = anagram, {} = omission

Across
1 WITH-PROFITS – PROF (Top academic) in WIT (intelligence) + HITS (successes). Chambers: “Denoting an insurance policy which attracts a bonus based on the company’s profits during the year”
7 MASTERCLASS – (SLAM ACTRESS)*
13 AMBERGRIS – AM (American) + BERG (mountain) + {or}RIS (orris, not otherwise)
14 A PRIORI – A + PRIOR (religious head) + I
15 NOVEL – V (See) in NOEL (Christmas)
16 TOECAP – TO + reversal of PACE (walk)
17 SAVOYARD – reversal of OVA (Eggs) in DRAYS (nests, for squirrels). Chambers: “A performer in, or devotee of, the Gilbert and Sullivan operas produced at the Savoy Theatre”
18 MAIL VAN – ANIMAL* around V (five), defn: “letters move in this”
20 SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST – SURVIVAL (Relic) + (FIFTH TOE)* + TEST (prove)
23 TOURISM – reversal of OT, + URIS (writer of Exodus, i.e. Leon Uris) + M (mass). I only knew the author because another book of his had an Arab dagger on the front cover, which had caught my eye in a library in my youth.
24 REVISER – E (key) + V (velocity), all inside RISER (vertical pipe)
26 CHAMISO – HAM (radio operator) + IS, all inside CO (company). Chambers: “A rosaceous shrub of California”. Didn’t know this.
28 PUTT – PUT (Place) + T (time)
29 BRACELET – BRACE (Steel, as a verb) + LET (allowed)
32 MISTLETOE – MIST (Steamy film) + LET (allowed) + {h}O{m}E (home regularly). Two consecutive clues with the let=allowed equivalence? C’mon, Ed!
35 STIMULATE – {Effec}T inside SIMULATE (fake)
36 THRENODY – THY (your) around reversal of DONER (kebab)
37 DRIP – D (daughter) + RIP (tear). Chambers: “A weak, pathetic person”. Non-Brits might not know that a “big girl’s blouse” is the same thing.
39 ROSETTE – ROTE (Mechanical way of learning) around SET (mounted). The definition is “shape for diamonds” – it’s not in (my edition of) Chambers or Collins but ODO has “a rose diamond”, which it further defines as “a hemispherical diamond with the third part cut in triangular facets”.
41 PIGMENT – PIMENT{o} (Pepper that’s cut) around G (good)
44 TOUGHEN – TO + {h}UG + {w}HEN (hug when topless)
45 FOREIGN CORRESPONDENT – (REPORT ON ENDING FORCES)*
49 FILM SET – FILET (“cut”) around M{ost} S{cenes} (leads in most scenes)
50 ACROSTIC – ACROS{s} (over endless) + TIC (muscular spasm)
51 TAVERN – TAVERN{er} (Composer shows no hesitation), referring to the Renaissance composer John Taverner
53 CACAO – C{h}A{n}C{e} A{t}O{p} (Regularly taking chance atop)
54 NO-HOPER – NOH (Japanese drama) + OPER{a} (Western drama, not a). In case any fans of Chinese opera are raising their eyebrows, one of Collins’ definitions of opera is “(mass noun) Operas as a genre of classical music”.
55 ILLEGIBLE – hidden reversed in NovEL BIG ELLIngton
56 THANKLESSLY – TH{e} (Trimmed the) + ANKLES (joints) + SLY (cunning)
57 ENDORSEMENT – END (Target) + OR (other ranks) + MEN (soldiers) in SET (prearranged)
Down
1 WEALTH – W (Wife) + {h}EALTH (welfare without husband)
2 TABLEAU CURTAINS – TABLEAU (Picture) + CURTAINS (a disastrous outcome). Chambers: “Theatre curtains drawn back and up, to give a draped effect when opened”. Didn’t know this but the wordplay was clear enough.
3 PORTAL VEIN – (TO LIVER PAN)*. Chambers: “The vein that conveys to the liver the venous blood from intestines, spleen, and stomach”. Another one I didn’t know.
4 OKRA – O (old) + reversal of ARK (ship)
5 INSTALLER – (STILL NEAR)*, definition “New software program”, i.e. a program for new software rather than a software program that’s new (though I suppose it could be both).
6 SEAL OFF – SEA (main) + L (line) + OFF (office). ODO has the OFF=office abbreviation.
7 MARIACHIS – CHARISMA* around I (current)
8 SCOLD – SOLD (peddled) around C (clubs)
9 ENIGMATIC – (GIN + IT CAME)*
10 CONSIDERABLE – CON (Conservative) + SIDE (team) + RAB{b}LE (half-hearted mob)
11 AKVAVIT – A + K (king) + VI (six) inside VAT (large vessel). I’m more used to seeing this as aquavit.
12 SILENT – reversal of IS, + LENT (fast)
19 AVE MARIA – {s}AVE (to rescue missing sons) + MARIA (distant seas, i.e. those on the Moon or Mars)
21 FIREMAN – FIRE (Dismiss) + MAN (fellow), with a cryptic definition where “tender” has the vehicular meaning
22 HOMESPUN – H (hard) + SOME* + PUN (wordplay)
23 TAPESTRY – TRY (Attempt), around APES (primates) + {lef}T (left finally)
25 VALET – VALET{a}
27 INTERCHANGEABLE – INTER (Bury) + CHANGE (coins) + A + B (British) + L (pound) + E (note)
30 CHEAPEN – CHE (Revolutionary) + PEN (writer), around A
31 TORTE – TT (dry) around OR (otherwise), + {juic}E (juice at the end)
33 SEDITION – S (Second) + EDITION (printing)
34 CULTURE SHOCK – CULTURES (Growths of bacteria) + HOCK (wine)
38 QUADRANGLE – {s}QUAD + {w}RANGLE (Losing their heads, group of soldiers argue at length)
40 EXISTENCE – SIXTEEN* + CE (official church)
42 GEOGRAPHY – GO (progress) around E (European), + GRAPH (plot) + Y (years). The usage of Y for years is in ODO.
43 TESTIFIED – TESTED (examined), around IF (providing) + I (iodine)
45 FELUCCA – FE (iron) + LUCCA (Italian city – in Tuscany). My sister dated a chap from Lucca for a while – otherwise I’m not sure I’d have heard of it.
46 RESERVE – RE (Concerned with) + SERVE (wait)
47 OFFCUT – OF + F (fine) + CUT (joint)
48 UNREST – UNREST{rained} (far from controlled when getting rained off)
50 APHIS – first letters of Actors’ Phone Handsets In Secret
52 BLUR – BLUR{b} (Short description of a book)

5 comments on “Jumbo 1190”

  1. Lots of DNKs, most of them, I’m relieved to find out, mohn’s also; although I also didn’t know 1ac, DRAY (although I think we may have once had ‘drey’), VALETA, RISER, and I’m sure the list goes on. None of them posed a problem, though. What did pose a problem was me, stupidly writing an R for the M of CHAMISO (another DNK); typos are one thing, but write-os? I had it parsed and all, but I suppose I had ‘chorizo’ floating around in my head. A pleasant puzzle, though, despite the own goal.
  2. 44:38. I found this quite tricky. There was lots in here I didn’t know, but the wordplay was mostly clear. However there were a couple of the double-obscurity clues I dislike so much in SAVOYARD and FELUCCA, which I found annoying even though I got them both right. I happened to possess the required knowledge for the first, but the second was a bit of a guess.
    1. I knew the word SAVOYARD but not that it had this meaning, however it sprang to mind from the checkers and I could then see the parsing (though I would normally spell dray as drey). FELUCCA – I’d seen them on the Nile plus, as mentioned, my sister dated a guy from the city in the wordplay. As I find is often the case with “odd” words that I know, they are familiar to me because of some chance occurrence in my life and hence they don’t seem obscure, even if a moment’s thought would make me realise that encountering them only via a low probability event makes it much more likely that they actually ARE obscure.
      1. I happened to know this meaning of SAVOYARD from past Times crosswords, but I have missed the chance occurrences that would have enabled me to get FELUCCA with confidence. Neither is a great clue, IMO.
  3. ‘Big girl’s blouse’ l have never heard of, so Oxford came in handy, SAVOYARD took ages but completed this eventually. (Ong’ara, Nairobi )

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