What larks! Three quarters of this little beauty done in under fifteen minutes, with occasional recourse to a sip of the grog. The north-west corner was looking odd, with a two-letter word ending in V and another V lurking in 1a. I re-checked 6d in case I’d made a typo, the anagram was clear enough. Then I dimly remembered my Merchant of Venice for O Level and popped in 4d. Back to 9a. I’m not keen on that as a two-letter word ending in V, but it had to be, unless the answer was a regnal number. I didn’t know the phrase, but it fits the word play. The light dawned on 1a, once I saw the double definition. Leaving us with 2d, H_A_T. Only one thing it could be, but as I write this a completely satisfactory explanation escapes me.
The other three-quarters of the puzzle I thought was witty in places, notably 8d, but not difficult.
The other three-quarters of the puzzle I thought was witty in places, notably 8d, but not difficult.
Definitions underlined, anagrinds in italics.
| Across | |
| 1 | Break up in manifest cold (6) |
| SHIVER – double definition. The expression ‘shiver me timbers’ dates back a few hundred years before Robert Newton in Treasure Island, where the word ‘shiver’ has the meaning ‘break up’ or shake apart, as in a cannonball or large wave hitting a ship. And if you’re shivering, you’re manifesting being cold. | |
| 5 | Give woodwork final smoothing, receiving time and a half (5-3) |
| STAND-OFF – SAND OFF = final smoothing of the woodwork, insert T for time. Stand-off being a rugby term for one of the two half-backs, the one who is not the scrum half. | |
| 9 | Fall asleep in wagon, very voyeuristic viewing (3-5,2) |
| CAR-CRASH TV – CART = wagon, insert CRASH for fall asleep, and V for very. I didn’t know the term, but I see it is in Collins and not only applied to scenes of cars getting totalled, although YouTube has no shortage of those. Somehow I don’t think of TV as a two-letter word, more of an abbreviation, or the internet domain name for Tuvalu. Which used to be a Pointless answer. | |
| 10 | Pipe suddenly lowered for sounding (4) |
| DUCT – Sounds like ‘ducked’ = suddenly lowered. Duck! | |
| 11 | In fight, large Italian twisting blade (8) |
| STILETTO – SET TO = fight, insert L IT reversed (twisting). | |
| 12 | Put off woman and survive without one (6) |
| SHELVE – SHE = woman, L(I)VE = survive, remove the I. | |
| 13 | Religion, but no Mass, for Scots girl (4) |
| ISLA – ISLAM loses its Mass. | |
| 15 | To wed money, they say, can be a bloomer (8) |
| MARIGOLD – MARI sounds like marry, GOLD = money. | |
| 18 | Cherries, see, covered in fungi (8) |
| MORELLOS – Insert LO = see, into MORELS a tasty kind of mushroom. | |
| 19 | Pressure on buzzer creates alert (4) |
| BEEP – Add P for pressure to BEE for buzzer. Seen this before recently, probably on a Sunday. | |
| 21 | A Sikh has one billion fish (6) |
| BANGLE – B for billion, ANGLE verb to fish. All Sikhs have a bangle or KARA, one of the five K’s. | |
| 23 | Concerned with opening blade, I trust (8) |
| RELIANCE – RE = concerned with, then insert I into LANCE = blade. | |
| 25 | Some beef? Wrong to eat horse (4) |
| SHIN – Insert H for horse into SIN = wrong. | |
| 26 | A detective story, the ultimate gift for cellist? (3,4,3) |
| HIS LAST BOW – Double definition, one a suggestion. Conan Doyle published a collection of Sherlock Holmes stories under this title. Not sure why our setter chose a cellist, as Sherlock played the violin! | |
| 27 | Not happy to travel regularly on such rubber? (5-3) |
| CROSS-PLY – CROSS = not happy, PLY = travel regularly. Do cross-ply tyres still exist on new cars? Maybe in India. | |
| 28 | Old guard losing heart a total failure (6) |
| TURKEY – TURNKEY loses its N, i.e. middle letter or heart. | |
| Down | |
| 2 | Enthusiasm of boxer finally ready to mate? (5) |
| HEART – MY LOI because I couldn’t parse it to my satisfaction. My current explanation of this is a little woolly, something to do with being ON HEAT = being ready to mate and R (boxer finally) being inserted. But there’s no ‘ON’ and HEAT alone doesn’t. mean ready to mate. I suppose ‘to mate’ could be doing double duty, meaning ‘mate’ the R with the HEAT? Explain. | |
| 3 | Dither, as everyone is caught up in active moving (9) |
| VACILLATE – ALL inside (ACTIVE)*. | |
| 4 | Head from court case over to business centre (6) |
| RIALTO – (T)RIAL = court case without ‘head’, add TO. ‘What news on the Rialto?’ says Salanio to Salarino in the MoV, Act 1, talking business. | |
| 5 | Son indifferent about husband, I emphasise in my case, as one dealing with children (15) |
| SCHOOLMISTRESSY – Messy wordplay for a clumsy old word. S for son, insert H for husband into COOL = indifferent, then insert I STRESS into MY. | |
| 6 | Warning notice avoids funny lines (8) |
| ADVISORY – (AVOIDS)*, RY = (railway) lines. | |
| 7 | Magistrate seizes duke in quick move (5) |
| DODGE – Insert D into DOGE. | |
| 8 | Apparently that of Helen being a thousand ships? (4,5) |
| FACE VALUE – &lit. Witty, if it’s original. | |
| 14 | Struggling actor hems old garment (9) |
| STOMACHER – (ACTOR HEMS)*. | |
| 16 | Rock, overturning large table across front of room (9) |
| GIBRALTAR – BIG reversed (overturning large), ALTAR = table, insert R(oom). | |
| 17 | In public he rubbished safe sort of investment (4-4) |
| BLUE-CHIP – (PUBLIC HE)*. | |
| 20 | Be very eager to employ Liberal, one that’s flexible (6) |
| PLIANT – PANT = be very eager, insert L and I. | |
| 22 | Kind of an Einstein? Not I (5) |
| GENUS – Einstein was a GENIUS, remove the I (not I). | |
| 24 | Cut part of bulb (5) |
| CLOVE – Double definition. | |
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