I found this one trickier than average. I was taken back to when I first started doing these during my first pass through the across clues. Nothing yielded until 17a and I ended the pass with only 2 of the acrosses done. Fortunately the down clues were more tractable and I was able to finish in 17:55, beyond my target 15:00, but not by much.
My COD goes to PILOT. I do love a good pun.
Definitions underlined, synonyms in round brackets, wordplay in square brackets and deletions in strikethrough.
| Across | |
| 8 | Woodland plant, one with unusual name (7) |
| ANEMONE – Anagram [unusual] of ONE NAME.
edit: thanks to Kevin for pointing out that the parsing should be ‘anagram [unusual] of NAME, + ONE’. I got this right on paper and then switched the M and the last N when submitting online. Rats. |
|
| 9 | Onset of primitive impulse to eradicate (5) |
| PURGE – First letter [onset of] P |
|
| 10 | Plain retired vicar dipping into Holy Writ (5) |
| OVERT – REV (vicar), reversed [retired] inside OT (Old Testament, Holy Writ). | |
| 11 | Gourmet cooked pie to preserve (7) |
| EPICURE – Anagram [cooked] of PIE + CURE (to preserve, like meats). | |
| 12 | Study horse’s previous record — and go with the stream (7) |
| CONFORM – CON (study) + FORM (horse’s previous record).
“Form” for “previous record” is from horse-racing. |
|
| 14 | Support part of UK backing Asian republic (5) |
| INDIA – AID (support) + NI (Northern Ireland, part of UK), all reversed [backing]. | |
| 15 | Clear-headed law lord covering island group (5) |
| LUCID – LUD (law lord, as in “m’lud”) outside [covering] CI (Channel Islands).
Knowing my audience, I’m not even going to try to explain who gets called “m’lud” in British courts. No doubt it will all be explained in the comments. |
|
| 17 | Some retired people wear one near formal strip (7) |
| NIGHTIE – NIGH (near) + TIE (formal strip (of material)).
That’s “retired” in the sense of “gone to bed”. |
|
| 19 | Take courses in shelter? That’s most clever (7) |
| NEATEST – EAT (take courses) in NEST (shelter). | |
| 20 | Sanctimonious bunch making TV try-out (5) |
| PILOT – PI (sanctimonious) + LOT (bunch). | |
| 22 | Go-between — a pukka fellow! (5) |
| AGENT – A + GENT (pukka fellow).
“Pukka” has evidently entered British English in the 30 years since I left the UK. I needed all the crossers before I saw this one. |
|
| 23 | Oscar, writing half-heartedly, finds opportunity (7) |
| OPENING – O (Oscar in the NATO phonetic alphabet) + PEN I’m going to be a bit pedantic here and say that “half-heartedly” should mean to find the middle letters and remove half of them. Which means you can only do that to words with even numbers of letters: the two Ns in PENNING are not in the middle: only the second N is in the middle. Not my favorite clue, but one that I was happy to bung in and move on while solving, less happy with when writing the explanation. |
|
| Down | |
| 1 | Starchy cereal principally served in the past (4) |
| SAGO – First letter [principally] of S I don’t think I’ve ever eaten sago. Which confirms the truth of the surface reading, I suppose. |
|
| 2 | Small number crossing river, the UK’s longest (6) |
| SEVERN – SEVEN (small number) crossing R for River.
The Severn is indeed the UK’s longest river. Although (say) seven children is not a small number of children to have, I think “small number” for seven is OK, as numbers go on for ever and seven is, well, the eighth smallest natural number. |
|
| 3 | Club accommodating old vessel (4) |
| BOAT – BAT (club) containing [accommodating] O for old.
Didn’t we have “club” for “bat” just yesterday? |
|
| 4 | Resolve to put off race crossing major road (13) |
| DETERMINATION – DETER (to put off) + NATION (race) containing (crossing) MI (M1, a motorway in England). | |
| 5 | Leader of union forcing rebellion (8) |
| UPRISING – First letter [leader] of U |
|
| 6 | Dry land reduced to powder (6) |
| GROUND – Double definition. | |
| 7 | Purchase cheap newspaper during formal reception (8) |
| LEVERAGE – RAG (cheap newspaper) inside [during] LEVEE (formal reception).
I knew LEVEE from reading the Patrick O’Brian books. Apparently it originates from the practice of the French kings granting audiences as they got up in the morning. |
|
| 12 | Stop, for example, in Hebridean island (8) |
| COLONSAY – COLON (stop, as in punctuation) + SAY (for example).
I cheated on this one and looked up a list of Hebridean islands. I didn’t know the island, and I had the clue all backwards, trying to fit EG into an island’s name to get something that means ‘stop’. |
|
| 13 | Strange chaps originally transmitting such miscellaneous items (8) |
| ODDMENTS – ODD (strange) + MEN (chaps) + first letters [originally] of T |
|
| 16 | Alcoholic drink a girl takes to begin with (6) |
| CLARET – CLARE (a girl) + first letter [to begin with] of T |
|
| 18 | Story about king, one in early film (6) |
| TALKIE – TALE (story) outside [about] K (king), I (one). | |
| 20 | When speaking, beg for quarry (4) |
| PREY – Homophone [when speaking] of PRAY (beg for). | |
| 21 | Going north, obtained a historical garment (4) |
| TOGA – GOT (obtained), reversed [going north] + A. | |
Only got about60% of them, so record falling off a bit.I thought a levee was a sort of dam across a lake or marshland, so no chance there, disappointed, but note others found it trickyas well
Please would someone explain why PI =sanctimonious??
Pi is very old slang for pious.
Thank you Chabuduo
Please could someone explain why CON=STUDY?
Thanks.