13:38. A moderately tricky one from Robert this week, up to the usual elegant and entertaining standard.
Definitions are underlined, anagrams indicated like (TIHS)*, anagram indicators are in italics.
| Across | |
| 1 | Phrase puzzling to a poet’s TV audience? |
| COUCH POTATOES – COUCH (phrase), (TO A POET’S)*. | |
| 10 | Requests to limit certain indulgences |
| PLEASURES – PLEA(SURE)S. | |
| 11 | Fish shell dropped by otter, perhaps |
| TETRA – TETRA |
|
| 12 | Periodically flies fly round a green |
| LEAFY – |
|
| 13 | A couple’s turn to entertain |
| DOUBLE ACT – CD. ‘Turn’ in the theatrical sense. | |
| 14 | Wrong to acquire hotel rooms for parties |
| SHINDIGS – S(H)IN, DIGS. | |
| 16 | Ruler or dictator’s one who takes by force |
| CAESAR – sounds like ‘seizer’. | |
| 19 | Rashes on the left and base of leg cause irritation |
| RANKLE – R |
|
| 20 | Working on edit, circling the French for removal |
| DELETION – (ON EDIT) containing LE. | |
| 22 | Pistol going wrong is grabbed by the German |
| DERRINGER – D(ERRING)ER. | |
| 24 | Resistance by revolutionary and others succeeding |
| LATER – reversal (revolutionary) of ET AL, R (resistance). | |
| 25 | Flower ladies reportedly press |
| LUPIN – homophone of LOO, PIN. | |
| 26 | Chairman’s new doctrine that’s against the law |
| ANARCHISM – (CHAIRMAN’S)*. | |
| 27 | Incident in quiet lift ending in unseen bliss |
| SEVENTH HEAVEN – S(EVENT)H, HEAVE, |
|
| Down | |
| 2 | Speech training is included in theatre work |
| OPERATION – O(PE)RATION. | |
| 3 | Comfortable cape reserved to cover uniform |
| CUSHY – C(U), SHY (reserved). | |
| 4 | Model soldier like many at the front |
| PARADIGM – PARA, DIG (like), M |
|
| 5 | Paper in which nothing’s left to publish |
| TISSUE – T |
|
| 6 | Tease it a little improperly |
| TITILLATE – (IT A LITTLE)*. | |
| 7 | More sketches by English turned up |
| EXTRA – reversal (turned up) of ART (sketches), X (by), E. | |
| 8 | Supper stalled to get flaky pastries |
| APPLE STRUDELS – (SUPPER STALLED)*. | |
| 9 | Gate-crashers picked up when charging for entry? |
| BATTERING RAMS – CD. | |
| 15 | Fling ending in hurried marriage |
| DALLIANCE – |
|
| 17 | Society commonly isn’t equal or virtuous |
| SAINTLIKE – S, AIN’T (commonly isn’t), LIKE. | |
| 18 | Blame for severing contact |
| REPROACH – RE(PRO)ACH. | |
| 21 | Shocked, has a G&T to get over it |
| AGHAST – A, G(HAS)T. | |
| 23 | Indian bread pulp, 60 per cent risen |
| RUPEE – PUREE with three of the five letters (60%) going up (risen). | |
| 24 | Material sent over in clear cylinders |
| LYCRA – contained reversed in ‘clear cylinders’. | |
23:48
COUCH POTATOES parsed only post-submission (COUCH was tricky); I never figured out TETRA & RUPEE, and now I see why. I have a check (all right, tick) by several clues–LEAFY, PARADIGM, EXTRA–but COD to TISSUE.
I didn’t find this that difficult, and there are a few chestnuts like dalliance, tissue, and extra to get started. I parsed rupee but not tetra.
Time: 35 minutes
49 minutes. Failed to parse TETRA but understood RUPEE as my LOI. I had AGHAST as an anagram and missed the enclosure; I hadn’t spent any time on it because it seemed so obvious, but I’d like to think that on blogging duty I’d have noticed the neater parsing.
Enjoyed this … one exclamation mark (aghast) and one question mark (tetra) ..
59m 50s
Thanks, keriothe particularly for TETRA, DERRINGER, TISSUE, BATTERING RAMS and RUPEE, none of which I could adequately parse.
I did wonder if TISSUE might be a Yorkshire version of ‘to issue’ as in t’issue.
46 minutes. I couldn’t parse TETRA – never would have worked it out – and TISSUE, which I should have been able to get. I liked the BATTERING RAM cryptic def and the amusing surface for COUCH POTATOES.
Slightly off-topic: I won’t give anything more away (even though it has been alluded to elsewhere), but if you do The Guardian crosswords regularly, can I point you in the direction of yesterday’s (Sat 10/06) Prize puzzle by Paul. As you’ll see, it’s worth doing for a very good reason.
Thanks to keriothe and Robert
I’ve never worked a Guardian puzzle, but I’ve started that one, Bletchley. Thanks. There’s a problem with my printer and I can work this online. (Apparently, you can’t work the Azed that way, although the “print” version is accessed by a different link… I don’t understand.)
27.41
Some of these surfaces are so smooth- I’d pick out those for PARADIGM and APPLE STRUDELS in particular – that you wouldn’t know they were a clue unless you saw them in a puzzle. For me that’s the greatest skill and definitely marks Myrtilus out. When the clues are also witty (SEVENTH HEAVEN) you have, well. seventh heaven.
BATTERING RAMS was also an excellent CD. I’ve read it over a few times and it really does work in both senses. Not easy to get that right
Thanks clever setter and Keriothe
I see that my LOI was DERRINGER.
I had never heard of LUPINs before seeing the Monty Python sketch… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qLkhx0eqK5w
(Sorry, I couldn’t find a version in higher res.)
Dennis Moore, Dennis Moore
Riding through the night
Soon every lupin in the land
Will be in his mighty hand
He steals them from the rich
And gives them to the poor
Mr Moore, Mr Moore, Mr Moore
I got through this, but never understood TETRA, and only belatedly TISSUE. I also made a fool of myself by failing to spell TITILLATE correctly, meaning I was held up for ages on 13A. Not a mistake one should ever make with anagram, given the number of Ts and Ls to fit. I thought RUPEE was clever, and AGHAST, but actually, apart from the above-mentioned TETRA, they were all great clues.
Thanks for the explanation for 11ac. I spent ages worrying over that.
Good puzzle, which I finished in 40 minutes so not especially fast this time but very enjoyable as I remember.
Thanks setter and blogger.
Steve
On first glance this looked impenetrable, but then I began to twig, and a few acrosses , like PLEASURE and TETRA ( even though I didn’t know why!) fell. Filled in 3/4 of the grid, with plenty of “aha” moments, before getting stumped on the lower half . Knew that ‘et al’ had to be involved in 24a, but couldn’t make the connection, and was convinced that the German for ‘the’ was DIE, so the pistol failed to make an appearance. Also failed to equate pin
with ‘press’ , and SEVENTH HEAVEN was way out of my league.
However, enjoyed the very clever smooth surfaces of the clues; COD to BATTERING RAMS.
Thanks Robert and keriothe
Took this to a cafe on Saturday morning and after half an hour and the coffee gone cold, had only 9 or 10 clues. Came home and finished it in another couple of sessions, taking just over the 70 mins to finish it.
Couldn’t, and wouldn’t have ever, picked TETRA(POD) to parse the fish, didn’t spot the clever charade with AGHAST (just de-anagramised it)and didn’t understand why my last one, RUPEE, worked – was too busy high-fiving myself for seeing the clever definition and finally getting the puzzle finished !