Anyway, many thanks to the setter for this fine Friday fare, which managed to be a tough challenge without resorting to any real obscurity of reference or vocabulary (though I expect there will soon come a day when we’ll have to accept that no young person on the planet is still reading Jerome K Jerome). I would also like to draw everyone’s attention to the really, really impressive artistry of this setter’s surfaces – a common complaint in this little world of ours is that clues end up being in Crosswordese rather than English, but I think you’d be hard pressed to find anything in this puzzle that doesn’t pass muster as a sensible English sentence, and I know from bitter experience that that’s way harder than it looks. FOI 11ac, last 23ac; in fact the whole SW gave me a lot of trouble, partly because I’d put in KEEP A CLEAN HOUSE for 3dn, my notorious illiteracy as regards sporting matters biting me in the bum yet again. Not sure anything massively stood out from the pack today, but I’ll give me COD to 24ac just for being such an HP Lovecraft word. Now there was a writer whose first language often appeared to be Crosswordese…
Across
1 Bar offers beer, about a litre (5)
BLOCK – BOCK about L
4 Causing dissension about point that’s not serious (9)
FACETIOUS FACTIOUS about E
9 Patsy succeeded with attack on head (9)
SCAPEGOAT – S with GO AT on CAPE
10 Otto getting endless stick for turning back (5)
ATTAR – reverse of RATTA{n}
11 Ointment makes mark on light wood (6)
BALSAM – M on BALSA
12 Discard light cover, unfashionable (5,3)
THROW OUT – THROW [light cover] + OUT [unfashionable]
14 Noble treetop twisted into a corkscrew? (6-6)
BOTTLE-OPENER – (NOBLE TREETOP*)
17 Give up television? That could surprise the children (4-2-3-3)
JACK-IN-THE-BOX – JACK IN [give up] THE BOX [television]
20 Forcibly take too much that’s picked up abroad (8)
OVERSEAS – homophone of OVER-SEIZE
21 One member of boating party returned to old address (6)
SIRRAH – reverse of HARRIS (one of the Three Men In A Boat)
23 Temperature rising in a heatwave at last, finding shade (5)
TAUPE – T + UP in A {heatwav}E
24 Conceal wings of priory, roughly made with huge slabs (9)
CYCLOPEAN – (CONCEAL P{rior}Y*)</b>
25 Made fast, but eating egg under supervision (9)
MONITORED – MOORED eating NIT
26 Glutton necessarily consuming a large mass (5)
TONNE – {glut}TON NE{cessarily}
Down
1 Primate hard at work overcoming phobia regularly meeting bishop (8)
BUSHBABY – BUSY overcoming {p}H{o}B{i}A + B
2 A polenta may be so served? (2,1,5)
ON A PLATE – (A POLENTA*), &lit
3 Do not concede order to reserve some fresh laundry? (4,1,5,5)
KEEP A CLEAN SHEET – footballing parlance for “not get scored against”, plus a more literalistic interpretation of the words
4 The game’s up: sell! (4)
FLOG – reverse of GOLF
5 Land girl is superficially attractive (10)
CATCHPENNY – CATCH [land] PENNY [girl]
6 Be frustrated by what bad barber may do? (4,4,4,3)
TEAR OUT ONE’S HAIR – again, a metaphorical phrase followed by a more literal interpretation
7 Choice brew — head spinning (6)
OPTION – {P<->O}TION
8 Fairy ring abandoned in vernal ceremony (6)
SPRITE – SP{ring} RITE
13 Lend a frock to rock performer cutting a traditional figure (4,6)
FOLK DANCER – (LEND A FROCK*)
15 In the city want bear to be beaten up (8)
ABERDEEN – reverse of NEED + (BEAR*)
16 Replace half-crown and shilling, for example (8)
EXCHANGE – modern change would be 1ps and 2ps; old coins are EX-CHANGE
18 Saw bachelor turning over in bed (6)
BOTTOM – reverse of MOTTO B
19 Try again to operate this key? (6)
RETURN To operate a key you TURN it, to try again you RE-TURN it; RETURN is also another type of key on a computer keyboard
22 Competed on track, losing the lead, and beaten at tennis (4)
ACED – {r}ACED
… but about 40mins for all but ATTAR (never heard of it). Couldn’t parse SPRITE (didn’t think to separate vernal and ceremony), so wasn’t even sure that the R was correct. ‘pull’ (rather than TEAR) at 6dn held me up for a while. BUSHBABY and TAUPE biffed. dnk CATCHPENNY. I’ll have to ‘fess up to not really ever noticing the surfaces, my brain just seems to seek out the cryptics, but yes, now you mention it, can see what you mean…
Up most of the night… my teens certainly weren’t happy when they learnt the news…
Thanks setter and Verlaine, what an interesting day in the UK.
A few of them, though, — perhaps about 51.9%? — I’d probably never have worked out. DNK “otto” or ATTAR, DNK CATCHPENNY, never read Three Men in a Boat and had only a vague recollection of SIRRAH. I’d come quite close on 4a, thinking of “fractious” but not “factious”. Sigh.
CYCLOPEAN my COD as well; as a Lovecraft fan this is definitely my kind of obscure vocabulary. Cthulhu fhtagn!
Thank you, as always, for the education.
Edited at 2016-06-24 08:41 am (UTC)
Curiously, I did actually think this on the easy side, though the only thing I actually knew about CYCLOPEAN was the optical deficiency thing.
And yes, they were indeed beautiful surfaces.
Edited at 2016-06-24 09:10 am (UTC)
I’ve wondered idly a few times about resurrecting the Christmas Turkey with a ‘cryptic definitions only’ format. What do people think?*
* you’ll notice I’m putting the decision to the people and I shall respect the TfTT nation’s wishes, regardless. Almost certainly.
Edited at 2016-06-24 12:27 pm (UTC)
The only hesitation was in the usual decision between “one’s” and “your” in 6d
“Three men in a Boat” is one of the few books to make me laugh out loud – full of wit and drollery. I would recommend it as a superior form of Wodehouse.
Edited at 2016-06-24 09:50 am (UTC)
Wow, that’s high praise indeed. I do remember enjoying Three Men In A Boat a lot when I read it as a young ‘un. Not sure I ever dared to venture into the pages of Three Men On The Bummel though!
But do try “Three Men on a Bummel”; Radio 4 Extra serialised it last year and it contains the same beautifully dry insoucient humour.
However, if you read Oliver Kamm’s columns in the Saturday Times, you would see his cogent arguments that “one’s” is just as acceptable both historically and grammatically albeit not in tune with the Times’ style guide.
Gandolf 34
Right, I’m off to the pub now. Here in the City everything is cancelled until further notice.
Who will now fix the overflow, plant the beet and pick the potatos? I forecast an influx of Scottish plummers for the time being!
The Times Crossword has changed a lot since 1977 – as we saw yesterday. Today’s was a good work out. However, I messed up by making 3dn a (4,4,4,3) as per 6dn – it should have
been(4,1,5,5)! This ruined my time – which should have been around 50 minutes.
FOI 2dn ON A PLATE LOI 18dn BOTTOM COD 20 ac OVERSEAS
WOD 24ac CYCLOPEAN
horryd – Shanghai
Mind was not on the job this morning when watching the TV, had PULL not TEAR for 6d, until saw what 4a had to be. Never heard of an attar being an OTTO. Otherwise we were done in half an hour or so.
My house is now somewhat cheaper, for UK buyers, let me know if you’re interested!
Thanks V for the usual high standard blog, and agree about the super surfaces.
I thought the clue for Aberdeen was a bit odd (reversing an anagram).
Taupe is one of those colours that only women can differentiate from beige (like ecru, sand and champagne).
So I assumed that after a couple of days finishing ahead of your esteemed self, I was going to be knocked for six today (if you’ll forgive the sporting metaphor), but was amazed to find I hadn’t been.
An interesting and enjoyable puzzle.
on edit: London, and Brussels … but mainly London
Edited at 2016-06-25 02:55 pm (UTC)
FOLK DANCER illustrated the impact of different formats (digital versus pencil-and-paper) on my thought processes. I could not get it for the life of me, until I wrote it out. At one stage I had “fork candle”, and then wasted several minutes trying to get Ronnie Barker out of my head.