Solving time: 15:58
Yikes! I found this quite tricky in places, and was not helped by a brief spousal ’emergency’ (Mrs H wrestled a mouse from the jaws of one of our cats – named Roary, though he probably tells other cats his name is Night Prowler – and while releasing it in the nearby park at stupid o’clock in the morning, managed to get poked in the eye by a sharp stick – she’s OK, thanks for asking, but I lost my solving mojo briefly).
A bigger issue was yet to come though as I struggled with my L2I 17d and 22a – fine clues both, but I am reckoning on the crossword equivalent of a huge pile-up as several solvers come to grief on the same pair of answers.
As for 3d, did he make it in America or Australia? Do tell…
Definitions are underlined in bold italics, {deletions and substitutions are in curly brackets} and [directions in square ones]. I have also adopted jackkt’s use of the tilde sign ~ to indicate an insertion point in containment clues.
| Across | |
| 1 | Perhaps Robinson Crusoe players off on tour (8) |
| CASTAWAY – CAST (players) AWAY (off on tour)
‘Perhaps’ implies that Robinson Crusoe is an example of a CASTAWAY. Fewer people will have heard of Chuck Noland… The full title of the novel Robinson Crusoe, originally published in 1719, was: The Life and Strange Surprizing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, of York, Mariner: Who lived Eight and Twenty Years, all alone in an un-inhabited Island on the Coast of America, near the Mouth of the Great River of Oroonoque; Having been cast on Shore by Shipwreck, wherein all the Men perished but himself. With An Account how he was at last as strangely deliver’d by Pyrates. Written by Himself. |
|
| 5 | Beautiful female with distinctive appearance (4) |
| FAIR – F (female) with AIR (distinctive appearance) | |
| 8 | Grand car here, ordered for the duchess (3,5) |
| HER GRACE – Anagram [ordered] of G (Grand) CAR HERE
An example of Grand abbreviated to G can be found in the nickname of the Republican Party of the USA – Grand Old Party (GOP) |
|
| 9 | Quickly turn page in grave error (4) |
| SPIN – P (page) inserted into S~IN (grave error) | |
| 11 | Strum balalaika, holding a dance (5) |
| RUMBA – Hidden [holding] in Strum balalaika | |
| 12 | Tons of tarnish replaced with very glossy coat (7) |
| VARNISH – Replace the T (Tons) of |
|
| 13 | Text message about father’s cramps (6) |
| SPASMS – S~MS (Text message i.e. abbreviation for Short Message Service) about PA‘S (father’s) | |
| 15 | Worries before small stroke (6) |
| CARESS – CARES (Worries) before S (small) | |
| 18 | One taking a trip may have a generous whisky here (7) |
| TUMBLER – Mildly cryptic double definitions
TUMBLER (aka Rocks Glass, Lowball or Old Fashioned) is one of the four basic types of glass from which whisky is usually drunk. The others are Highball (for whisky cocktails), Shot Glass (for whisky shots), and Nosing Glass (for whisky tasting – aka Tulip, Snifter or Copita). |
|
| 19 | Takes hot drink, unfinished in hurry (5) |
| HASTE – HAS TE |
|
| 21 | Skin: what it does after too much sun? (4) |
| PEEL – The ‘it’ of the second part of the clue refers back to the definition…
…though arguably ‘skin peels’ or ‘it peels’ (both with an ‘s’ on the end) might be more grammatically correct answers than simply answering ‘peel’ |
|
| 22 | Coaxed with caution, came to the front (8) |
| WHEEDLED – W (with) HEED (caution) LED (came to the front)
My LOI following a lengthy think. WHEEDLE meaning “to entice by soft words; get by flattery” is from the 1660s, and is perhaps connected with a survival of Old English wædlian “to beg” from wædl “poverty”. |
|
| 23 | Appealing to reduce energy (4) |
| CUTE – CUT (reduce) E (energy) | |
| 24 | Mother more dapper becoming seductress (3-5) |
| MAN-EATER – MA (Mother) NEATER (more dapper) | |
| Down | |
| 1 | In centres of reactors, high explosive holds together (7) |
| COHERES – Insert HE (high explosive) into CO~RES (centres of reactors) | |
| 2 | Get out first piece of stored stuff (5) |
| SCRAM – First letter [piece] of S{tored} then CRAM (stuff)
SCRAM meaning “depart quickly,” often as an interjection, comes either from: 1920s U.S. slang, as a shortened form of scramble (i.e. a rapid take-off of a group of aircraft); or from German schramm, imperative singular of schrammen “depart”. |
|
| 3 | Crazy idea, normal for teenage diarist (6,4) |
| ADRIAN MOLE – Anagram [Crazy] of IDEA NORMAL
There probably aren’t too many teenage diarists to choose from, but I did wonder whether this might be a bridge too far for our overseas solvers… Sue Townsend wrote eight books about ADRIAN MOLE. The first book The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole Aged 13 3/4 (published 1982) sold more than 20 million copies worldwide and was translated into 48 languages. |
|
| 4 | A sweetheart embraces Charlie in quiet corner (6) |
| ALCOVE – A L~OVE (sweetheart) containing [embraces] C (Charlie – NATO phonetic alphabet) | |
| 6 | Advise of a very quiet pay increase (7) |
| APPRISE – A PP (very quiet i.e. musical notation pp = pianissimo) RISE (pay increase) | |
| 7 | Was responsible for church estate (5) |
| RANCH – RAN (Was responsible for) CH (church) | |
| 10 | Sportswoman excited at her title (10) |
| TRIATHLETE – Anagram (excited) of AT HER TITLE | |
| 14 | Holster, could one say, that may be beside you as you sit down? (7) |
| ARMREST – One might say that a Holster is a resting place for one’s gun i.e. an ARM REST.
Within the mildly cryptic definition part of the clue, ‘that’ refers to the answer. I am not sure that everyone is going to enjoy this clue… |
|
| 16 | Fine line intercepted by transmitter (7) |
| SLENDER – L (line) inserted into [intercepted by] S~ENDER (transmitter) | |
| 17 | Composer finally changes into a god (6) |
| BRAHMA – The final letter of BRAHM My second last in, crossing with 22a – tough with only vowel checkers in place. BRAHMA (the Creator) is a Hindu god, part of the Trimurti, the trinity of supreme divinity that includes Vishnu (the Preserver) and Shiva (the Destroyer). He is prominently mentioned in creation legends. |
|
| 18 | Subject to snap (5) |
| TOPIC – TO PIC (snap i.e. snapshot) | |
| 20 | Relax around place for break (5) |
| SPLIT – S~IT (Relax) around PL (place) | |
Enjoyed the comments, as usual, especially about the cats, rather than the clues which we found hard going.
15:51 here. COD to ARMREST, which I totally failed to parse. Reading people’s cat stories has made me appreciate our very unmartial pair.
Thanks to Teazel and Mike.
Feeling pretty pleased with myself until I got the south-east corner. I had Foreward in place of Wheeled (hoping for a parsing that eluded me and explain the extra e). But it made Split and Brahma even more difficult. Resigned @ 20 mins. Thanks all
Ps still don’t understand the parsing of Coheres
Centre of a nuclear reactor is its CORE. You should be able to get it from there.
Quick for me. I was left with 17D, 22A and 9d before finishing first cup of coffee. Wordplay for 17D was obvious so alpha trawl of composers Alkan, Brahms ta ta! 22A then took a while, and LOI 9A took ages until I realised that answer to 6D was not APRAISE (I wondered what the “very” was doing in the clue), Doh! Very enjoyable, thanks to Teazel and Mike.
No time to report as I struggled with the new format.
Oh Teazel. So good, so difficult. 23:39 to complete this. As usual, though, looking back it seems much easier than it did while solving. HASTE my favorite. ADRIAN MOLE only VHO (so yes in the US but never read it myself), so very grateful for the anagram. My recent resolve to look for hiddens sooner tripped me up when I, too, fell for “veer” at 9a; thank goodness RANCH was straightforward. And lucky for me, BRAHMs/A came to mind quickly.
Thanks Teazel, great blogging and title Mike.
Now had time to read the comments – great cat stories 😺
What a total nightmare – 36 minutes, capped off by taking 10 mins to realise I had misspelt APPRISE and so couldn’t get SPIN. I am useless.
My day of misery was made complete by failing to finish 15 x 15. One clue off. It will doubtless be easy when I look at the blog, but I spent 30 mins looking at it in total confusion. Couldn’t recognise the type of clue or spot the word play and the straight definition. Useless again.
No sense of satisfaction or accomplishment today.
Found it harder than most QCs but surprised from blog that nobody else put in ROTINA for 17d which held me up until I realised 18a just had to be TUMBLER.
Like others, all was going swimmingly until we were breeze-blocked by 1D, 17D and 22A. Tried to to fit CT into 1D; we thought of Brahms but NHO Brahma; which didn’t help WHEEDLED.
Also constantly get the Error 500 message – even when trying to post this.
Thanks Teasel, but joined the pile-up for the last three; thanks for the helpful blog Mike.