Non-prize puzzle from the Weekend FT of July 4, 2020
This is a curious Mudd for me in that there is one clue that I am not sure I am parsing correctly. It is 9dn (A BIT OF ALL RIGHT). My top clues are 1ac (STRAIGHT), 14ac (ANNE OF CLEVES) and 19dn (STAMEN).
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | STRAIGHT | Right hand (8) |
| Double definition | ||
| 5 | PHAGES | Viruses hard to find in leaves (6) |
| H (hard) in (to find in) PAGES (leaves) | ||
| 10 | AGAINST | In contact with cooker, tins cooked (7) |
| AGA (cooker) + anagram (cooked) of TINS | ||
| 11 | BARONET | Stick figure ending on portrait, titled individual (7) |
| BAR (stick) + ONE (figure) + [portrai]T | ||
| 12 | POLAR | Frozen pieces of lamb and rabbit for starters (5) |
| P[ieces] O[f] L[amb] A[nd] R[abbit] | ||
| 13 | AUTOMATON | First of ugli fruit fed to an inanimate machine (9) |
| U[gli] TOMATO (fruit) together in (fed to) AN (an) | ||
| 14 | ANNE OF CLEVES | Eleven cans of rum, here’s the fourth of six! (4,2,6) |
| Anagram (rum) of ELEVEN CANS OF. Anne of Cleves was the fourth wife of Henry VIII. | ||
| 18 | SILVER BULLET | Second dismissal, magical solution (6,6) |
| SILVER (second) + BULLET (dismissal) | ||
| 21 | OLD MASTER | Work of art lost, dream shattered (3,6) |
| Anagram (shattered) of LOST DREAM | ||
| 23 | ENTER | Key chippy without fish (5) |
| [carp]ENTER (chippy without fish). In addition to a fish-and-chip shop, ‘chippy’ is an informal term for a carpenter. | ||
| 24 | TRIVIAL | Mickey Mouse I have briefly put in trouble (7) |
| IV[e] (I have briefly) in (put in) TRIAL (trouble) | ||
| 25 | GOODMAN | Jazz great, saint? (7) |
| GOOD MAN (saint?) with the jazz great being Benny Goodman the American jazz clarinetist and bandleader also known as the “King of Swing”. | ||
| 26 | DIGEST | Summary gets amended after papers reviewed (6) |
| ID (papers) reversed (reviewed) + anagram (amended) of GETS | ||
| 27 | STUDENTS | Always missing Sunday test, failing members of class (8) |
| Anagram (failing) of SUND[ay] TEST. ‘Ay’ is an archaic English term for ‘always’ (as is ‘aye’). | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 1 | SCAMPI | Seafood is knocked up: party tucking in (6) |
| CAMP (party) in (tucking in) IS (is) backwards (knocked up) | ||
| 2 | REALLY | So, you have yet to convince me (6) |
| Double definition | ||
| 3 | IGNORANCE | It’s supposedly bliss canoeing madly round river (9) |
| R (river) in (round) anagram (madly) of CANOEING | ||
| 4 | HOT-WATER BOTTLE | Warmer soup served with spirit (3-5,6) |
| HOT WATER (soup) + BOTTLE (spirit) | ||
| 6 | HAREM | In this, concubines are incarcerated by sovereign (5) |
| ARE (are) in (incarcerated by) HM (sovereign) | ||
| 7 | GENITIVE | Holding tooth up, provide case (8) |
| TINE (tooth) backwards (up) in (holding) GIVE (provide). The genitive, also called the possessive, is a case of noun forms in some languages, notably Latin. | ||
| 8 | SATANISM | Positioned with bad man is black magic (8) |
| SAT (positioned) + anagram (bad) of MAN IS | ||
| 9 | A BIT OF ALL RIGHT | Lovely, fine taste? (1,3,2,3,5) |
| A BIT OF (taste) + ALL RIGHT (fine). Do I have this right? It does not work well as I see it.
“A bit of all right” is informal British usage for someone who is very sexually appealing which, I guess, could equate to LOVELY. |
||
| 15 | LIEGE LORD | Story on lodger upset feudal nobleman (5,4) |
| LIE (story) + anagram (upset) of LODGER | ||
| 16 | ASSORTED | Mixed, while fixed (8) |
| AS (while) + SORTED (fixed) | ||
| 17 | SLEDGING | Underhand sporting practice in winter sport (8) |
| Double definition with the first referring to the uncouth technique of making ones’ opponents uncomfortable by means of verbal comments, an art perfected, I am told, by the Australian cricket team. | ||
| 19 | STAMEN | Bit of a bloomer cutting top people (6) |
| STA[r] (cutting top) + MEN (people) | ||
| 20 | URANUS | World leader in uniform led fifty states (6) |
| U (uniform) + RAN (led) + US (fifty states) | ||
| 22 | ADIOS | Top broadcasters for so long (5) |
| [r]ADIOS (top broadcasters) | ||
This was a really enjoyable challenge taken over several sittings. Many were solved by guesswork or definition alone, like my favourite, A BIT OF ALL RIGHT, though I can’t improve on Pete’s explanation.
Some I could only parse long after the fact.
I was amused by the wordplay in ANNE OF CLEVES and HOT WATER BOTTLE. Once the two 15-letter clues down the centre were solved, the lower half of the grid fell into place quickly. There was much to like, such as TRIVIAL and SLEDGING which seems to permeate all Australian sports and politics too! My FOI was POLAR and my last, STRAIGHT, because though it seemed to fit with the letters in and half the definition, I just couldn’t work out the HAND part of the equation. I’m still unsure now!
Anyway, thanks to Mudd for a puzzle to chew over and Pete for the enlightenment.
STRAIGHT – it’s a poker hand, as in straight, flush, full house etc. I’m not sure about A BIT OF ALL RIGHT either – the def seems to be in the reverse order. Enjoyed the puzzle very much overall though. Thanks all.
Thank you, Tony.
9a. I read the clue as you did and saw the question mark as Mudd’s indication of its ambiguity.
Thank you both.
Thanks Mudd and Pete
Quite challenging puzzle I thought that took three increasingly longer sessions to get it out – but able to get there in the end without referential help. A couple of tricky parsings to negotiate – including AUTOMATON (clever construction when it came out), ASSORTED (tricky definitions of the component parts) and the long 9d (which I needed the blog to get the idea … and trying to think of another example of how this might work).
Scurrilous comment on our cricket team … they’d never dream of such underhanded behaviour … now underarmed is a whole different story !!! :)
Finished in the SE corner with STAMEN (after initially writing in NATION (people, with [CAR]NATION)) and the excellent ANNE OF CLEVES (which took ages for the penny to drop and raised a grin when it did !)
Diane, Thank you for commenting. I should have explained the STRAIGHT clue better. Thank you, Tony Dee, for doing so.
Thanks Mudd for another clever crossword. Favorites included AUTOMATON, DIGEST, HAREM, and URANUS. Thanks Pete for the blog and explaining BULLET as dismissal, the first definition of SLEDGING, and parsing ADIOS.
Just like brucew@aus, I had (car)NATION for 19d, which prevented completing 25ac GOODMAN. Realised it was wrong with 23ac (carp) ENTER.
Set it aside incomplete until this very helpful blog – thanks Pete.