Guardian Prize 26,543 by Paul

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A very straightforward prize puzzle from Paul this week, with two mini-themes.

Although at first glance I couldn’t see any answers at all, it didn’t take long before they started to fall into place.  Lots of charades, very few anagrams, and some nice surfaces combined to provide an entertaining puzzle, which was over all too soon.  Many thanks, Paul.

completed grid
Across
1 POP ART
Commercial designs go alongside flower (3,3)

PO (river) PART (leave or go).
4 RACKET
Sharapova’s weapon, loud noise (6)

Double definition; a reference perhaps to the loud grunts that Sharapova and other (particularly female) tennis players make when striking the ball – according to her Wikipedia article, she was recorded as reaching 101 decibels at Wimbledon in 2005.
9 EGAD
At first disgusting, time to withdraw Shakespearean oath (4)

D(isgusting) AGE (all rev).
10 BAKED BEANS
With starters for Bed and Breakfast, sneaked off to get tinned food (5,5)

*(B A B SNEAKED).
11 MERLOT
Cut fruit about right, then time to make wine (6)

R in MELO(n) T(ime).
12 TENNYSON
Recall curious novel’s introduction, a source of information for poet (8)

NOSY N(ovel) NET (all rev).
13 STOCK CUBE
Flavoured item in farm animals, 8 say? (5,4)

A simple charade of STOCK CUBE – no reference to 8 down, but to the fact that the number 8 is a cube.  What with this, baked beans and Merlot, I thought that there was something of a culinary theme developing, but it petered out.
15 OPAL
Round pearl regularly seen as gem that’s white, perhaps? (4)

O P(e)A(r)L.
16 GEAR
Cloth from the East includes Eastern clothing (4)

E in RAG(rev).  The first East in this across clue is the reversal indicator.
17 LAKE NYASA
Touring the country, capital drained of hot African water (4,5)

KENYA in L(h)ASA.  The first example of the second mini-theme.
21 GARFIELD
US president, a two-dimensional pussy (8)

Double definition.  President James Garfield is not particularly well-known, this side of the pond anyway, partly because he only served 200 days before being assassinated.  The cartoon cat is probably better known.
22 RIDDLE
Puzzle that’s full of holes? (6)

Cryptic definition.  It’s a large coarse sieve of the sort used by gardeners to remove stones from their soil.
24 SAINT-DENIS
Byzantine daintiness in Paris commune (5-5)

*DAINTINESS.  Another capital reference, Saint-Denis being exactly what the clue says, namely a commune in Paris.
25 WHOA
Question, then answer — stop! (4)

WHO A(nswer).
26 ATHENS
Capital putting contents of case in order? (6)

A THEN S (A and S being the “contents” of CASE).  Took me a while to work this out; very clever.
27 MADRID
Not all there, free capital (6)

MAD RID.  The final reference to the theme.
Down
1 PIGMENT
Male chauvinists on tele­vision initially in colour (7)

PIG MEN T(elevision).  Another clever clue.
2 PEDAL
Ring around last quarter of yard — this under a foot? (5)

(yar)D in PEAL.  The definition is a little loose, but is justified by the surface reading and the question mark.
3 ROBOTIC
Alumnus tucked in to Indian bread on top of chicken jerky (7)

OB in ROTI C(hicken).  OB is short for Old Boy, or alumnus.
5 ARDENT
Forest close to desert, hot (6)

ARDEN (deser)T.
6 KEEPY UPPY
Privileged youth supporting the board — that’s a footballer’s skill (5,4)

YUPPY under KEEP.  ”Board” in the clue is used here in the sense of “provision of meals”.  Chambers has this as hyphenated which seems to make more sense as neither is a word in its own right.
7 TINFOIL
Work to hold in food, primarily, as food wrapper (7)

IN F(ood) in TOIL.
8 SKATEBOARDING
Swimmer getting on in sport (13)

SKATE BOARDING.
14 CHAFFINCH
Refuse to move slowly, as winger (9)

A simple charade of CHAFF and INCH.
16 GRANADA
Relative almost passing round a European city (7)

A in GRANDA(d).
18 EURASIA
Extraordinary area is covering Uzbek capital — that’s a lot of land! (7)

U in *(AREA IS).  Here the reference to a capital is rather different to those in the across clues.
19 SALMOND
Pink Floyd’s last member standing in Scotland (7)

SALMON (Floy)D.  Alex Salmond is currently a Member of the Scottish Parliament but is standing for the UK Parliament at Westminster in the General Election.  Other candidates are available.
20 LEADEN
A third of debris in tip is heavy (6)

DE(bris) in LEAN.
23 DEWAR
Inventor of the vacuum flask, part inside warmer? (5)

Hidden in “inside warmer”.  The definition rather gives it away.
*anagram

24 comments on “Guardian Prize 26,543 by Paul”

  1. Thanks bridgesong. Thirty minutes for this until the last two – the truly weird 6D, and the parsing of 26A which was too clever for me.

  2. Unlike some of you I usually measure the time it takes to complete these things in days rather than minutes, but this did seem to come together more quickly than usual.
    6D took some time as it is a phrase I wasn’t familiar with and one that I’m now trying hard to forget. In contrast I thought 19D was a gorgeous clue and 26A very clever.

  4. Thank you Paul & Bridgesong,

    I enjoyed this greatly and made rapid progress until the SW corner, where it took an inordinate length of time for my brain to realise that Byzantine was an anagram indicator and that Paris Commune nothing to with the events of 1871. LoI for me was Granada, which I eventually put in on the grounds that it fit , I couldn’t parse it !

    Btw there is a tiny typo in the explanation of 20D , should be LeaN not leaD I think .

  5. Thanks Paul and bridgesong
    I think that the compiler has made an error in the clue for EGAD. SOED and, in the references I have found online, give it as dating from 1673 (from memory, without looking it up again), hence not Shakespearean. (I looked it up as I associated the word with a later period.)

  6. Another good Paul puzzle, IMHO, even though it wasn’t one of his toughest as others have already said. In view of Greece’s financial troubles I think it was a shame Paul couldn’t have somehow used “cash” rather than “case” in the clue for ATHENS.

  7. Thanks Paul and bridgesong.

    Put PERVERT in at 1d, well, ‘vert’ is green in French, but of course it is not plural. Just could not find a four letter Shakespearean oath (see muffin @5). In the end realised that PIGMENT parsed, so assumed EGAD for EGADS was probably all right. As for KEEPY UPPY, that was the last in.

    STOCK CUBE and ATHENS were good and the two-dimensional pussy made me smile.

  8. Thanks bridgesong and Paul. As someone who usually relishes a Paul puzzle, I found this somehow less enjoyable than normal. Not helped by being stumped by the parsing of ATHENS, and the possible themes of capitals, and Scottish politicians, which came to nought.

  9. I completed this one in under half an hour, much to my surprise. I didn’t fully parse 6d, though, missing why “board” = KEEP. My favourites were 4a, 21a and 26a.

    Thanks, Paul and bridgesong!

  10. Thanks all for your comments; not much controversy this week, perhaps. I have amended my error at 20D: thanks Epee @4. And muffin @5 I suspect that you’re right about EGAD, although I didn’t check the OED myself.

  11. 6d Why would a Yuppy be a privileged youth?

    As I remember it, a Yuppy was someone in their 20s or 30s, and so hardly a youth.
    Also they were not privileged but upwardly mobile i.e. succeeding on their own merits.

  12. This took me longer than half an hour but with the exception of KEEPY UPPY -of which I’ve never heard and would never have got from the wordplay-this was both quick and enjoyable. Even DEWAR who I’d never heard of either was easy to get.
    As I finished the puzzle quickly I had no excuse not to mow the lawn!
    Still, thanks Paul.

  13. Why on earth would anyone need to trawl a list of Shakespearean oaths to try and solve 9ac when the wordplay and checkers are so helpful, notwithstanding the fact that the eventual answer turns out to be a word first put down in print many decades later.

  14. Thanks Paul and bridgesong. The two mini-themes are separated in the grid, with The foodie answers all in the top half and the capitals at the bottom.

    There is also an unlikely coalition of two Scottish first ministers in the southeast!

  15. AndyB @13
    I don’t know if you are referring to my post @5, but I certainly solved it as you suggest, then thought “I think that is more recent than Shakespeare”; SOED then confirmed that thought.

  17. This was relatively straightforward for Paul. Didnt finish it at one go as, like Brownphel@2, I tend to savour (or wrestle with) the Saturday Guardian puzzle over the week.
    AndrewT@11 queries “Yuppy” – as far as I recall this was an 80s acronym for “Young Upwardly-mobile Professional”, so seems fair enough.
    Thanks to Bridgesong for his customary excellent blog and Paul for a well-crafted and entertaining puzzle.

  19. muffin @15, probably Andy B was referring to my post, at first I had PERVERT at 1d which gave me -R-D. By the way, I believe there was a law prohibiting swearing on the stage and swear words in print in Shakespeare’s time.

  20. Thanks to Paul and bridgesong. I had trouble with 8 as CUBE and PIGMEN but did catch the THEN in Athens. BOARD as KEEP and a term new to me in 6d kept me going for a long time.

  21. Cookie@19 – maybe my comment @13 was a little harsher than it could have been. What I was trying to say was knowledge of the etymology of EGAD wasn’t necessary to solve the clue, although your first stab at 1dn obviously didn’t help.

  22. Thanks all.
    I enoyedthis.
    Last in was merlot since I ha been obsessed with claret from the start.
    Favourites were13ac and especially 1down (superb).

  23. Paul has been very busy recently – 3 in 2 weeks is productivity not seen since Araucaria’s heyday. This one passed my train test, but only once I realised DEWAR was a simple hidden answer – I hadn’t heard of him so it was last in for me and without Google not a giveaway. Enjoyable as ever.

    Thanks to bridgesong and Paul

  24. I misled myself in SW corner by inserting Lake Nyare – it sounded convincing enough as an African water body and parses very well from Kenya and Lahore (without the ho for hot!)

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