Solving time of 21:50, so this was definitely on the straightforward side for a Jumbo. The odd word which isn’t quite everyday vocabulary, but I think all were clued pretty fairly. Other than that, not much to say, really.
With Jumbos, which attract a far smaller audience than daily puzzles, I generally confine myself to discussion of answers which I think are a) less straightforward for inexperienced or non-UK based solvers, or b) especially elegant / questionable. In other words, unless it’s an exceptionally interesting puzzle, the coverage is unlikely to be 100%; however, as always, if a particular clue is not discussed, please feel free to raise it in comments for explanation or discussion.
| Across | |
|---|---|
| 1 | TIGHT-FISTED – TIGHT(=pie-eyed), [IS in F.T.], ED. |
| 14 | SAN REMO – SAN{atorium}, ROME with the last three-quarters reversed. |
| 16 | EGGCUP – a nice cryptic def. |
| 17 | IMMATURE – UR, the setter’s favourite ancient city, in “I’M MATE”. |
| 18 | HIDALGO – HI!, (LAD)rev. + GO. |
| 20 | AT THE END OF ONE’S TETHER – because a “nanny” can be a goat, which would often be tethered, lest it butt passers-by. |
| 23 | FLEXURE – LEX(=Roman law) in FUR, {rob}E. |
| 24 | ROSTRUM – (OR)rev. + STRUM. |
| 28 | OVER – O{ccupying} + (REV)rev. It took a while to spot the definition “ancient history” rather than find a way of inserting H into something. |
| 32 | ORDINANCE – O.R.(=soldiers), IN in DANCE(as the Charleston is). |
| 35 | PROPAGATE =”PROPER GAIT”. |
| 36 | NORSEMAN – RiSkEd in NO MAN; Donne wrote “No man is an island, Entire of itself”, some years after the Vikings troubled this one. Very nice compact clue. |
| 37 | DOVE – pronounced one way, the bird, pronounced the other way, the American version of “dived”. |
| 45 | LEAVE NO STONE UNTURNED – where the “flags” are flagstones. |
| 49 | ACCRUAL =”A CRUEL”. |
| 50 | SERENADE – [ERE N{oon}] inside the Marquis de SADE. |
| 51 | ADMASS – D{iamonds} in A MASS; a word I know solely from crosswords. |
| 55 | EXCAVATOR – EX CAV{E}AT minus E{nergy}, O.R. |
| 56 | TRENT BRIDGE – the Test cricket venue in Nottingham, where the Ashes takes us next; {crickete}R in TENT (along with sack, a wine which really only exists in crosswords today), and the game of BRIDGE. I spent Friday at Lord’s with a good bottle of wine, and can confirm that the two still mix perfectly. |
| 57 | DISCOURTESY – (CORESTUDYIS)*. |
| Down | |
| 1 | TIPPET – again, the setter misdirected me to looking for a word for cape with an R in it; in fact it’s the composer Sir Michael Tippett, who needs his final T knocked off to get the furry cape. |
| 2 | GEORGE THE SECOND – GEORGETTE, with H{usband} instead of the second T{ime}, and SECOND(=back). |
| 4 | IMAM – 1, MAM, that being the Geordie colloquial term for one’s mother. |
| 5 | THERMIDOR – THE R.M., as the Royal Marines are a part of the army, + I (ROD)rev. One of the months of the French revolutionary calendar, but preserved in the modern vocabulary as a lobster dish. |
| 6 | DISTAFF – (I’D)rev., STAFF. The literal distaff is a spinning implement, so the secondary definition of “women’s work” arose through years of usage in less egalitarian times. These days I think it’s a bit of a golf-clubby thing to refer in jocular fashion to “the distaff side”; it’s how I think Denis Thatcher referred to Margaret in Private Eye’s Dear Bill letters, which is probably where I’ve got that idea. |
| 7 | GUNRUNNER – where “piece”=gun; {consumin}G, UN, RUNNER. No sign of the haricot I was looking for. |
| 8 | OXEYE – OX(=neat), EYE(town in Suffolk) gives a flower even I can remember hearing before. |
| 9 | TROCHLEAR – (HOTELCAR)* + {chauffeu}R; unknown to me, but reasonably easy to deduce, from the wordplay, and the fact it’s very like COCHLEAR, even though the two are anatomically unconnected. |
| 10 | ROUND THE BEND – because Roman roads were proverbially built very straight, doubtless for the benefit of their marching legions. |
| 11 | TUMBLER – double def., one of them being a pigeon known for its acrobatic flying style, apparently, though not by me. |
| 12 | RANDOM – computer memory can be ROM, which, id broken down into its constituent letters, is R AND OM. |
| 19 | DEMERARA – DEM{ocrat} + “A RARER”. |
| 21 | SOMEONE – ME(=this writer), in SOONE{r}; as in “I’d sooner be in Australia’s shoes in this Test match”. |
| 22 | IDLENESS – more horticultural knowledge which I have acquired from crosswords – there is a pansy called “love-in-idleness”. |
| 23 | FOOT PUMP – (Michael) FOOT + PUMP(=”grill”). |
| 27 | KING OF THE CASTLE – F{ine} in [O{ld} THE], all inside a KING and a CASTLE. Chess purists will raise an eyebrow at calling it a castle and not a rook. The game known as “King of the Hill” across the Atlantic. |
| 33 | DRAUGHTY – AUGHT(=anything at all) in DRY(=impassive). |
| 34 | CARICATURIST – R.I. in (CAUSTICART)*; something of a semi&lit., I think, as caricatures tend to be on the pointed side. |
| 46 | NUNHOOD – N{ark}, UN HOOD (Thomas, writer of “I remember, I remember, the house where I was born”. |
| 47 | SACHET – A CHE (Guevara) in ST{reet}. |
| 50 | SHRED – SHARED minus the A. |
| 52 | ECHO – H{usband} in ECO; lovely surface. |
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