Luckily I didn’t do this electronically, and sadly I didn’t even time myself, though I feel somewhere around the ten minutes mark is probably right, especially after the bogging down around 13ac. My clue of the day is definitely 14ac, superbly concise and an excellently relatable surface, 10/10 would happily solve again. Many thanks to the setter!
ACROSS
1 Thus America carrying burden becomes dozy (10)
SLUMBEROUS – SO US [thus | America] carrying LUMBER [burden]
7 River that’s more beautiful between banks? (4)
AIRE – {f}AIRE{r}
9 A special moment in which one’s collected fossil (8)
AMMONITE – A + (MOMENT*) [“special…”] in which I [one] is collected
10 Block Yankee, creating stir (6)
CHOKEY – CHOKE Y [block | Yankee]. Stir as in “prison”.
11 River, Charlie? You and I will catch that fish (6)
WRASSE – R ASS [river | Charlie] – WE [you and I] will catch that
13 Group entering train to get drier (3,5)
TEA CLOTH – LOT [group] entering TEACH [train
14 European seriously drunk in bar (12)
BYELORUSSIAN – (SERIOUSLY*) [“drunk”] in BAN [bar]
17 Female home full of love attended by stars who bring good news? (12)
MISSIONARIES – MISS [female] + IN [home] full of O [love], attended by ARIES [stars]. Good news as in the “gospel”.
20 Haggard female beset by fairies passes away (8)
PERISHES – SHE [(H Rider) Haggard female] beset by PERIS [fairies]
21 Naval officer’s clique drink (6)
POSSET – P.O.’S SET [naval officer’s | clique]
22 An element of singular dislike (6)
SODIUM – S ODIUM [singular | dislike]
23 Not terribly keen about final decision-maker? Precisely! (2,3,3)
ON THE DOT – (NOT*) [“terribly”] + HOT [keen] about ED [final decision-maker]
25 Gladstone’s epithet’s recalled in a haze (4)
SMOG – Gladstone being the G.O.M. (Grand Old Man); GOM’S recalled.
26 Provider of printed notes for performers (5,5)
SHEET MUSIC – cryptic def
DOWN
2 More than one bloodsucker strikes to secure victim (8)
LAMPREYS – LAMS [strikes] to secure PREY [victim]
3 Order set up to imprison a Communist leader (3)
MAO – O.M. [order] set up to imprison A
4 Boy climbing tree with minimal energy (5)
EMILE – reverse LIME [“climbing” tree] + E for energy
5 See sort that could turn out murderer in mythology (7)
ORESTES – (SEE SORT*) [“…that could turn out”]
6 Conservative in group, heretical and bigoted (9)
SECTARIAN – C [Conservative] in SET ARIAN [group | heretical]
7 A star drinking nothing, overturning fizzy water (11)
APOLLINARIS – A POLARIS [a | star] drinking NIL reversed [nothing, “overturning”]
8 Dish of fish eggs: it’s served up (6)
ROESTI – ROE [fish eggs] + IT’S reversed
12 Seriously performing only, I warble about heartless fellow (11)
SOLEMNISING – SOLE I SING [only | I | warble] about M{a}N [“heartless” fellow]
15 Hospital in Somerset redone as accommodation for the elderly (4,5)
REST HOMES – H [hospital] in (SOMERSET*) [“redone”]
16 Famous Argentinian tucked into cooked pie and sausage (8)
PEPERONI – PERON [famous Argentinian] tucked into (PIE*) [“cooked…”]
18 Coming soon as a sale item? (2,5)
IN STORE – double def, if something’s IN a STORE it’s presumably intended for sale
19 Umpire, old, with room for improvement (6)
REFORM – REF O [umpire | old] with RM [room]
21 Small cat or dog, the one giving chase (5)
PETIT – PET [cat or dog] + IT [the one giving chase]
24 Bird in science unit (3)
EMU – double def, an E.M.U. being an electromagnetic unit
With a title like that, however, the book may well have been banned some time ago for reasons of PC.
Kind regards, Bob K.
PS I see from Wiki that Pears is still published, but only just: 2018 is its final edition.
Some nice words — CHOKEY the best of them, but something about WRASSE makes me happy, too.
On today’s menu at the Setter’s Arms — baked lamprey or wrasse, garnished with roesti and peperoni, paired with a posset and washed down with Apollinaris water. yum
I see from its Wikipedia entry that Apollinaris is mentioned in Three Men on the Bummel. I should probably get further than chapter two!
Edited at 2018-04-20 06:38 am (UTC)
For me, an EMU is (like a DMU) a boyhood disappointment, a set of tin boxes trundling along the track with rather pointless numbers to collect. Not a proper engine in sight. Without looking it up, I bet there’s a proper name for an Electromagnetic Unit derived from a famous (to his colleagues) scientist. Jim?
POSSET has turned up here before, I think, accompanied by complaint by people who knew not The Scottish Play with the unforgettable line “I have drugged their possets” (Mrs The Scottish Person). Otherwise in my family it’s what overfed babies discharge onto your shoulder.
Best of luck with the chemistry remedial classes, V. SODIUM was my favourite clue today
Edited at 2018-04-20 07:38 am (UTC)
I had 22ac as IODIUM (doh!) and almost dried-up with 13ac TEA TOWEL fortunately 8dn ROESTI (DNK and my LOI) and 7n APOLLONARIS (my WOD) led to finding the TEA CLOTH and mop up.
FOI 1ac SLUMBEROUS
7ac AIRE fine but why fr=banks?
COD 17ac MISSIONARIES Initially I thought it was going to be FASHIONISTAS!
I believe King John died of a surfeit of lampreys.
And it was a reason to be cheerful although I spent too long wondering what to do with the Y in the xxxRussian, which delayed lampreys, and therefore slumberous, etc.
DNK GOM’s nor my penultimate Apollinaris, which unlocked (LOI) Aire.
Mostly I liked all the food/drink references and best of all Peron tucking in to Peperoni.
Thanks tough setter and V.
Great fun, as hardly any were gotten just from the definition. Never heard of ROESTI, but it had to be right… As did AMMONITE (not a member of an ancient Middle Eastern tribe). TEA CLOTH is also an addition to my vocabulary. Took the Gladstone reference on faith. Also that Charlie is an ass.
Edited at 2018-04-20 08:15 am (UTC)
I understood the principle at 7ac before I came up with the answer but thought ‘between banks’ was going to be more specific, and following on from our recent discussions here about rivers having left and right banks I was expecting L and R to be the letters required to complete the wordplay.
Edited at 2018-04-20 07:25 am (UTC)
:-))
Edited at 2018-04-20 08:58 am (UTC)
Thanks, V, for the well-detailed blog. And congratulations for avoiding the electronic record of your result 😉
P.S. So the new prize for “best newcomer” at the champs won’t be awarded to any of the old lags here since some of us have been around the block before?
Edited at 2018-04-20 08:57 am (UTC)
Also biffed ON THE DOT, where I thought keen was “het” without its up, and couldn’t understand why DO was the arbiter. Thanks V !
EMU was obvious despite not knowing the science unit (but was familiar with the loathsome form of rail transport).
15:43 is a decent Friday time for me. Thanks to the setter for a generally good offering.
FOI PERISHES
LOI PETIT (my French is practically dead)
WOD WRASSE
COD SECTARIAN (beautifully parsed)
Next best BYELORUSSIAN
Agree with many about the expected banks of the AIRE. DNK SLUMBEROUS but it yielded easily.
Fine blog and fine puzzle — thanks.
CoD the chap from Minsk.
good luck with the schoolboy science, V. I think there have been a few additions to science knowledge since 1951 especially the messing aorund with names of units, but good luck with it.
Any ideas for a similar novice guide to Classical nonsense? I have some huge books on it (a 3 vol Greek Antiquities bought for pennies from daughter’s prep school library sale) but nothing easy and concise.
pip
22ac:
Sir Humphry Davy
Abominated gravy.
He lived in the odium
Of having discovered sodium.
Mmmmmmm, 2p sausage.
The only holdups were the unusual (but valid) spellings of rosti and pepperoni, which others have commented on.
Thanks for the blog V, but I’m not sure I understand your parsing of 20a. I assumed the “haggard female” must be HES (anagram of SHE) being beset by peris at the front?
I’m normally quite strong on food & drink but I’ve never heard of Apollinaris and assumed it was some stupid ancient fizzy river in some stupid ancient country that would be well-known to all the classicists hereabouts.
There was plenty of other stuff I didn’t know but the fact that I solved it all indicates that the setter did his or her job very well.
I’ve had a look back over the site to see where I got my apparently mistaken view on diacritics (basically, I thought you ignore them, as you would an apostrophe in an answer) and in my defence there seems to have been a lack of consistency over the years. Röntgen always has the extra E (in which cases I suppose the definition might be the scientific unit, which definitely needs it), but Schrödinger never does, and neither does Mönchengladbach, on its understandably infrequent appearances.
Edited at 2018-04-20 03:57 pm (UTC)
I wasn’t sure where to put the Y in BYELORUSSIAN but LAMPREYS (collective noun: a surfeit) sorted that out.
The unknown APOLLINARIS was my last in by some margin (probably 5 minutes) and required careful construction from the wordplay.
I avoided the TEA TOWEL trap and for a time provisionally fell into TEA PARTY (it’s a group, and there used to be wets and drys, and the tea party was on the dry end…it seemed plausible until it wasn’t).