Independent 10,512 by Tees

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Tees makes his regular appearance in the Monday slot, this time with (I thought) a tougher puzzle than usual.

A few references might be unfamiliar to some readers. I wasn’t entirely convinced by 5a (I think I understand but it doesn’t pass the test of “clearly right when you see it”) or 25a (both an uncommon word and a debatable definition). But I enjoyed the extended definitions at 26a and 8d, and the marvellous surface of 4d (with the clever misdirection of two possible anagram indicators). Thanks Tees as always.

Definitions are underlined; BOLD UPPERCASE indicates letters from the clue used in the wordplay; square brackets [ ] indicate omitted letters.

ACROSS
1 HALE-BOPP Oil firm going about work on well, rapidly moving object (4-4)
BP (oil firm) around OP (short for opus = musical work), after (on) HALE (well).
A comet that made the news in the 1990s. If you missed it, tough – it won’t be back for a couple of millennia at least.
5 ESSAYS Bacon pieces? (6)
Cryptic definition: I think this refers to writings by Francis Bacon, an early advocate of what became known as the scientific method. But there are others with the same name who might be relevant.
9 CLARINET Instrument at home opening red wine (8)
IN (at home) inserted into (opening) CLARET (red wine).
10 BELUGA Bartok perhaps eating sides off enormous whale (6)
BELA (Hungarian given name: perhaps the composer Bartok or the actor Lugosi), containing (eating) [h]UG[e] (enormous, with the side letters taken off).
Beluga can mean either a “white whale” or a type of sturgeon (and the caviar obtained from it).
12 EQUAL As in Rome to stop the Spanish getting even (5)
QUA (Latin for “as”, so “as in Rome”), inserted into (to stop) EL (masculine singular “the” in Spanish).
13 OTHERWISE Mum, not married, sensible under different conditions (9)
[m]OTHER (without the M = abbreviation for “married”) + WISE (sensible).
14 MASTERSTROKE Tour de force from principal oarsman (12)
MASTER (principal) + STROKE (oarsman: the rower seated at the stern of a boat, who sets the rhythm for the other rowers).
18 COUNTERPUNCH Knock back drink on bar (12)
PUNCH (mixed drink containing fruit juice and/or alcohol) + COUNTER (bar = serving area).
21 SAGEBRUSH Wise man having confrontation in plant (9)
SAGE (wise man) + BRUSH (confrontation, as in a brush with the law).
Plant of the genus Artemisia, not related at all to the herb sage (Salvia).
23 EULER English monarch beheaded calculating Swiss (5)
E (English) + [r]ULER (monarch: beheaded = first letter removed).
Leonhard Euler, 18th-century Swiss mathematician.
24 ASLEEP Please to be cooked like kippers (6)
Anagram (to be cooked) of PLEASE.
Kip (verb) = slang for sleep, so kippers = people who are asleep.
25 BARONAGE Lowly nobles in pub on time (8)
BAR (pub) + ON + AGE (time).
I’m not sure about the definition: a baron is one of the lower levels of the nobility (below a duke, marquis or count), but “baronage” historically refers to all levels of the nobility and not just barons.
26 EDWARD Longshanks in some measure unleashed war dogs (6)
Hidden answer (in some measure) in [unleash]ED WAR D[ogs].
Extended definition: nickname for King Edward I of England, also known as “Hammer of the Scots” because he decided he wanted to be king of Scotland too. That’s after he’d already taken over Wales.
27 BEEFCAKE Gateau served with red meat in hunks (8)
CAKE (of which gateau is an example) alongside BEEF (red meat).
Hunks = beefcake = slang for men showing off their muscles.
DOWN
1 HOCKEY Game and wine upset old solvers (6)
HOCK (wine, specifically German white wine) + YE (solvers = people solving this crossword = you; ye = old form of you, so “old solvers”) reversed (upset = upwards in a down clue).
2 LEAGUE French article put forward case: right to leave union (6)
LE (French for the definite article “the”) + A[r]GUE (put forward a case) leaving out the R (right).
League = union as in “League of Nations” or “in league with”.
3 BRILLIANT Fantastic fish brought to one worker (9)
BRILL (a type of flatfish) + I (Roman numeral “one”) + ANT (worker).
4 PREPOSTEROUS Ridiculous trousers start to expand, and pop undone (12)
Anagram (undone) of TROUSERS + starting letter of E[xpand] + POP.
6 SPEAR Bayonet in male side (5)
Double definition: bayonet (verb) = spear = stab, or “spear side” = the male line of a family tree (as opposed to “distaff side” for the female line).
7 ABUTILON Flowering maple left in U-boat at sea (8)
Anagram (at sea) of L (left) IN U-BOAT.
Abutilon is a genus of flowering plants, including some varieties known as “flowering maple”.
8 SEA LEVEL Rise in this? Flood barriers up to protect nearly everything (3,5)
LEVEES (flood barriers) reversed (up, in a down clue), containing (protecting) AL[l] (everything; nearly = last letter dropped).
Extended definition: flood barriers may be needed for protection from high tides.
11 THOROUGHFARE After wasted hour go a long way in the road (12)
FAR (a long way) after an anagram (wasted) of HOUR GO, all inside THE.
15 TICKED OFF Reprimanded and removed from list (6,3)
Double definition: think of a pupil called into the head teacher’s office for the first, and tasks on a to-do list for the second. The phrase also means “annoyed” in US English.
16 ICE SKATE Fish beneath rocks to glide on frozen pond (3,5)
SKATE (a fish) after (beneath, reading downwards) ICE (rocks = slang for diamonds).
17 BUNGALOW House one French girl in Cockney district (8)
UN (French for “one”) + GAL (girl), all inserted into BOW (Cockney district in London).
A single-storey house, or one where the upper storey is built into a sloping roof. One of many words that the English adapted from Indian languages, in this case from the Gujarati term for “Bengali” or “a house built in the Bengal style”.
19 ALPACA Mountain, cold in two areas, and beast there? (6)
ALP (a mountain, as in the Alps mountain range), then C (cold) in A A (two areas).
Extended definition: alpacas are indeed mountain beasts, from the Andes.
20 BREEZE Picnic in light wind (6)
Double definition: the first is breeze = picnic = something easy. Curiously, British English seems to use this meaning of “picnic” only in a negative sense: “it was a breeze” (it was easy) but “it was no picnic” (it was difficult).
22 BLEAR Dim market speculator holds onto pound (5)
BEAR (one who sells stock-market shares in the hope of buying them back later at a lower price), containing L (abbreviation for pound sterling, from the Latin libra).
Blear (verb) = dim = to make (eyesight) unclear, as in bleary-eyed.

 

8 comments on “Independent 10,512 by Tees”

  1. I saw 5A straight away, assuming it referred to the writer or the artist, and the former seemed most likely.  25A seemed fine to me, though I agree with Quirister that it’s slightly debatable as ‘baronetcy’ applies to the lowliest rank.  Although ‘distaff’ is common enough, I didn’t know ‘spear’ as male side – it will be a useful word to throw into the conversation to confuse listeners!  Didn’t know ‘abutilon’ either, and spent too long trying to see how ‘ablution’ fitted the clue.  Excellent, so thanks Tees and Quirister.

  2. 25A BARONAGE – the order of peers in the UK from top down is Duke, Marquess (not Marquis), Earl (there is no Count), Viscount, Baron.

    I think Bacon is sufficiently well known for his essays.

    Like Quirister, I found this the toughest Tees for some time and DNF.

    Thanks to Tees and to Quirister for the blog.

  3. We’d agree that this was a bit tougher than some of Tees’ puzzles but none the worse for that and we solved it all with just the occasional confirmation of our guesses in Chambers.  We puzzled for a while over the anagram in 7dn but eventually came up with ABUTILON, remembered from a previous crossword (Tyrus, 28/12/2019 – the clue there simply shifted the L in ‘ablution’).

    Plenty to enjoy but we’ll go for PREPOSTEROUS as out CoD.

    Thanks, Tees and Quirister.

  4. Pretty tough, too many holes in my general knowledge to get any momentum going. NW corner was fine, the rest patchy, NW a total bust. 1a my favourite for today. Thanks Tees and Quirister for a most informative blog.

     

  6. Thanks for blogging, Quirister, and especially for the breeze/picnic difference in usage.  Never thought about that, but you are quite right.

    The General Knowledge requirements here fitted fortuitously today with my capabilities (or I might even have been paying attention in a previous class), so I didn’t struggle too much.  EULER was a good addition, since mathematicians tend to be under-represented in Crosswordland.  It will be Francis BACON that Tees was thinking of as the essayist, as gwep says.

    The boy done good, as always.

  7. Nice crossword, 5a held me up a little because I thought there might be a term which referenced Francis Bacon’s art – “do’h” as they say.

    Those of Bow have less claim to be “cockney” than those of Mayfair.

    Thanks to Quirister and Tees

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