Time: 46 minutes. Very enjoyable with no unknown words.
As usual definitions are underlined in bold italics, {deletions and substitutions are in curly brackets} and [anagrinds, containment, reversal and other indicators in square ones]. “Aural wordplay” is in quotation marks. I now use a Caret sign ⁁ to indicate an insertion point in containment clues. I usually omit all reference to juxtaposition indicators unless there is a specific point that requires clarification.
 Across |
|
|---|---|
| 1 | On air row traumatised and exhausted Robert Plant (9) |
| LIVERWORT – LIVE (on air), anagram [traumatised] of ROW, then R{ober}T [exhausted]. Apparently Robert Plant was the lead singer of the rock band Led Zeppelin. | |
| 6 | Piercing, principally shrill instrument (5) |
| SHARP – S{hrill} [principally], HARP (instrument) | |
| 9 | Smashing racket crime? (8,2,5) |
| CONTEMPT OF COURT – Cryptic with reference to tennis | |
| 10 | Disease from beer we knocked back (6) |
| MILDEW – MILD (beer), then WE reversed [knocked back]. A plant disease caused by fungus. | |
| 11 | Imperative to get little George a close friend (5,3) |
| ALTER EGO – Imperative here is an instruction, so ‘to get little George ‘ / GEO you ALTER EGO | |
| 13 | Huge letters used to spell “Dad”, being popular in China (5,5) |
| GIANT PANDA – GIANT (huge), P AND A (letters used to spell PA – Dad) | |
| 14 | Knock down chap emitting cry of pain (4) |
| FELL – FELL{ow} (chap) [emitting cry of pain] | |
| 16 | Chief taking off first of the month (4) |
| ARCH – {m}ARCH (month) [taking off first] | |
| 17 | Write uninspiring incomplete ending for literary work (10) |
| PENTAMETER – PEN (write), TAME (uninspiring), TER{m} (ending) [incomplete] | |
| 19 | Italian snail unexpectedly seen around here in France (8) |
| SICILIAN – Anagram [unexpectedly] of SNAIL containing [seen around] ICI (‘here’ in France) | |
| 20 | Husky is a cracking four-legged friend (6) |
| HOARSE – A contained by [cracking] HO⁁RSE (four-legged friend). From the days of Uncle Mac and Children’s Favourites on the radio. | |
| 23 | Inspector isn’t overworked by this perfunctory luggage check? (4-3-4,4) |
| OPEN-AND-SHUT CASE – Two meanings | |
| 24 | This compiler heading west bumped into tourist (5) |
| EMMET – ME (this compiler) reversed [heading west], MET (bumped into). Cornish slang for a holidaymaker. In Devon they’re called Grockles. | |
| 25 | Turned on Conservative about regular instances of vilest infamy (9) |
| NOTORIETY – ON reversed [turned], TOR⁁Y (Conservative) containing [about] {v}I{l}E{s}T [regular instances of…] | |
| Down |
|
|---|---|
| 1 | Substitute officer upset uniform men at the start (5) |
| LOCUM – COL (officer – Colonel) reversed [upset], U (uniform), M{en} [at the start] | |
| 2 | Sweet eclair Calvin ordered each month (7,3,5) |
| VANILLA ICE CREAM – Anagram [ordered] of ECLAIR CALVIN, then EA (each), M (month) | |
| 3 | Staggers after receiving shock treatment, puts back in power (2-6) |
| RE-ELECTS – REEL⁁S (staggers) containing [after receiving] ECT (shock treatment – electroconvulsive therapy) | |
| 4 | Served up spirit, just missing king … sorry! (4) |
| OOPS – SPOO{k} (spirit) reversed [served up] [just missing king] | |
| 5 | Grotty old vagrant last seen in cave? (10) |
| TROGLODYTE – Anagram [vagrant] of GROTTY OLD, then {cav}E [last seen in…]. A troglodyte was a cave-dweller so I guess the whole clue has to be the definition here. | |
| 6 | Way to accommodate long bag (6) |
| SACHET – S⁁T (way) containing [to accommodate] ACHE (long) | |
| 7 | Cameramen used at broadcast games screened here (9,6) |
| AMUSEMENT ARCADE – Anagram [broadcast] of CAMERAMAN USED AT | |
| 8 | Post Office worker struggling to pen book, one written to raise cash (9) |
| POTBOILER – PO (Post Office), T⁁OILER (worker struggling) containing [to pen] B (book). Not sure where to place ‘struggling’ in this, but ‘toil’ suggests hard work. The definition refers back to ‘book’. | |
| 12 | Plucky wife, endlessly zealous officer in reserve (4,6) |
| GAME WARDEN – GAME (plucky), W (wife), ARDEN{t} (zealous) [endlessly] | |
| 13 | Young man’s backing good quality statesman (9) |
| GLADSTONE – G (good), LAD’S (young man’s), TONE (quality) | |
| 15 | Deceitful character put up motorway notice (8) |
| IMPOSTER – M1 (motorway) reversed [put up], POSTER (notice) | |
| 18 | Plastic factory beginning to implement cuts (6) |
| PLIANT – I{mplement} [beginning to…] contained by [cuts] PL⁁ANT (factory) | |
| 21 | Lament English cricket side, the ultimate in ignominy (5) |
| ELEGY – E (English), LEG (cricket side – as opposed to ‘off’), {ignomin}Y [the ultimate in…] | |
| 22 | Congress supporting leaders of White House a tiny bit (4) |
| WHIT – W{hite} + H{ouse} [leaders of…], IT (congress). A little weak having ‘white’ in the clue although of course it adds to the surface. | |
26 minutes for me, also with no unknown words. Wasted some time trying to justify PARK WARDEN for GAME WARDEN. EMMET is apparently the Cornish word for “ant”. It seems a bit of a stretch to call PENTAMETER a literary work rather than just a little bit of one, but the wordplay was clear enough. I liked OPEN AND SHUT CASE.
The definition of PENTAMETER is just ‘literary work’ (no a), which you can read as ‘some literary work’.
I wondered whether ’emitted’ should have been ‘omitted’ in 14a FELL, but ’emitted/sent out’ seems reasonable. Took a while to get started on this but answers started appearing and was able to get a good foothold. Don’t think I’ve heard of WHIT before but the wordplay left no doubt. GIANT PANDA had me fooled for ages. Didn’t know that meaning of POTBOILER either. Loved OPEN AND SHUT CASE but it was very slow to come. Liked TROGLODYTE but thought the anagrist was ‘old vagrant’ at first. So, the cricket side wasn’t ‘XI’ in 21d ELEGY, had me for a while.
Thanks Jack and setter.
18:55
‘Literary work’ just seems wrong for PENTAMETER.
Agreed
See above: read it as ‘some literary work’ rather than ‘a literary work’ and it seems fine to me.
I’m glad the wordplay is clear that the less-common spelling of IMPOSTER is wanted, since the E is not crossed.
19:00, enjoyable but mostly on the straight and narrow compared to today’s rather wild QC clues! ‘Games screened here’ was a very clever def, I thought.
Haven’t been doing crosswords this year much, so excited to get back into regular solving; just a bit worried as getting really into it last year correlated with being generally unhealthy and miserable, in contrast to this year. I’m sure it wasn’t the crosswords’ fault, though!
Thanks Jack and setter!
Minor correction: the leg side in cricket is also called the on side, so it’s the off side that is its opposite.
Thanks, now corrected. I knew that, but my fingers ran away from my thoughts.
I thought this was average difficulty, but there were some really good clues. I used the cryptic to get liverwort, game warden, and amusement arcade, but biffed contempt of court, notoriety, and troglodyte. Once again, I was held up because I couldn’t read my handwriting.
Time: 31:26
A great start to the working week at a tad under 30 minutes. Agree that pentameter is not a literary work but a compnent of one. But what else could it be?!
I think critics of 17ac are being unfair. Pentameter (or any type of verse) is the product of literary work as opposed to say, scientific work, and the definition is perfectly valid in my view. If the clue defined it as ‘a literary work’ they would have a point.
I should read the comments before commenting myself!
26.54, a nice puzzle with some clever clues and cunning definitions. Jack has convinced me re PENTAMETER (work, not A work) but I’m all at sea with the various Cornish definitions of EMMET. I knew it as ant from Blake (The emmet’s inch and eagle’s mile) and he was wholly a Londoner. I never figured out ALTER EGO or the panda, so thank you J.
From Romance In Durango:
Was that the thunder that I heard?
My head is vibrating, I feel a SHARP pain
Come sit by me, don’t say a word
Oh can it be that I am slain?
Another good one, this. Liked the open etc case, the panda and the plant. Robert Plant used to live down the road from my daughter in W Sussex. He and Jimmy Page bought houses near each other.
No problem with pentameter, beyond knowing what one is…
He now lives in Primrose Hill, NW London, just around the corner from my old family home. Still see him around there.
Whats going on, another PB, in 21 mins! I got the 4 long clues straightaway and the rest was plain sailing. The only slight hold up was the crossing of EMMET & PLIANT (L2I). Good fun.
I liked GIANT PANDA and the two juicy long anagrams.
Thanks Jack and setter.
Congratulations!
8:50. Nice puzzle for a Monday morning. No unknowns.
I’ve been listening to Led Zeppelin quite a lot recently. Truly one of the greatest bands.
Even though it’s Tuesday!
First day of the working week!
22 minutes for all but one clue then had to come back to ALTER EGO. My brain convinced me it was some unknown Latin phrase for imperative. Spotted it immediately when I opened up the page an hour later. Needed the blog for the word play though.
COD TROGLODYTE
Thanks blogger and setter.
I enjoyed this one. I did wonder about “emitting” as opposed to “omitting”, and also checked the surface of IMPOSTER carefully as I usually spell it with a penultimate ‘O’.
FOI SHARP
LOI NOTORIETY
COD HOARSE
TIME 6:32
About 2o minutes. Was baffled by ALTER EGO – I get it now, though I’ve never seen “Geo” as a shortened form of George – but had no other major issues.
Thanks Jack and setter (Rob Jacques, based on his Bluesky post).
FOI Sharp
LOI Alter ego
COD Liverwort
Yes you have!
https://timesforthetimes.co.uk/times-cryptic-28814
I remembered this because I commented then that I’d never seen the abbreviation, and someone mentioned Geo. F. Trumper, which is a shop I walk past almost every working day of my life! I had seen it a thousand times and just never registered it.
Ah! Thanks – clearly that hadn’t lodged itself in my brain (and I’m still not sure it ever will!)
I’m reminded of it every time I walk past the shop, so I will now never forget it!
It’s also the abbreviation used in the official title of statutes.
E.g. The Law of Property Act 1925, being 15 & 16 Geo. V, chapter 20.
12:05. Nice puzzle.
Thanks to jack and our setter.
Another 26 minute job. Great relief after yesterday’s debacle. Took a while to get a toehold but steady progress thereafter until the two long across clues. OPEN AND SHUT CASE was my COD but CONTEMPT OF COURT eluded me as I never think of it as a real criminal offence although I know it can be visited with the full range of penalties and the reference to racket had me thinking of clubs. PENTAMETER didn’t bother me, on the basis that near enough is good enough.
Thanks to setter and jackkt.
20:47 – but frustratingly I bunged in SACHEL instead of SACHET. This was just careless as I had parsed it correctly.
Otherwise enjoyable and not overly difficult, but: I did not really like emitting for omitting. To me that’s a little bit wrong, not just deceptive. On the other hand, PENTAMETER also seems wrong, but it was so obviously the answer that it didn’t present an issue.
NHO EMMET, VHO LIVERWORT.
I smiled at the Robert Plant reference – it was never going to be anything to do with him was it? And, tbh, rather focused the mind on ‘plant’ as a likely def but it was nice to encounter him. Picking up on geographical connections, he spent a goodly chunk of his early performing life just up the road from me in Worcestershire. As did John Bonham until his untimely passing. [Three of my pals bunked off school to attend the latter’s funeral and reference was made in one of the music press obituaries to the ‘…somewhat incongruous sight of three schoolboys in uniform amidst the heavy rock celebrities.’]
ELEGY, AMUSEMENT ARCADE, SICILIAN and GIANT PANDA were my other big ticks today in a 23 minute solve.
Thanks to setter and blogger
18.35, twice the time of the last two days, as nothing really came easily. Probably starting with ARROWROOT at the top didn’t help, and things went crumbly from there on.
I write my (occasional) sonnets in pentameters, and I can assure you they take work.
Pleased at the end to work out how TROGLODITE had to be wrong, and finished by realising the reserve at 12d was not some sort of GARDEN. Phew!
Cheers Jack for another precise blog!
21:59
Fun puzzle – all seemed fairly clued and gave up their answers in a smooth procession.
Thanks Jack and setter
All done in 9:34, helped by a personal appearance at 24 ac! Many thanks to the setter and jackkt.
‘If I profane with my unworthiest hand/This holy shrine, the gentler sin is this…’ Fantastic.
I should have adopted my Monday strategy of reading each clue once, wrestling with LIVERWORT took a while.
Impressed by GIANT PANDA.
15’11”, thanks jack and setter.
Had done two thirds of this after 10 mins, but was then becalmed. ARCH and GLADSTONE were my LOIs, the former taking forever even though it’s pretty easy. Not for the first time, I marvel at how the ‘hard’ ones can often seem far easier than the gimmes.
Disingenuous “apparently Robert Plant”. Reminds me of the apocryphal judge who enquired “what is a T-SHIRT?”