PHSSTHPOK kicks off the week…
Apologies for the late blog… had some technical issues.
A fun bank holiday Monday solve. I particularly liked 1a.
Thanks PHSSTHPOK!
ACROSS
1. Being too involved in social media campaign, ill orc’s moody letters are returned (13)
DOOMSCROLLING
(campai]GN ILL ORCS MOOD[y] (letters))< (<returned)
9. These connect victim with government department (7)
BUTTONS
BUTT (victim) with ONS (government department, Office for National Statistics)
10. Dissolve nasty mark below lid of glass tumbler (7)
GYMNAST
(NASTY + M (mark))* (*dissolve) below G[lass] (lid of)
11. Fracture jaw with edge of knife (5)
CHINK
12. Incorporated and consumed when genetic material is injected in the flesh (9)
INCARNATE
INC (incorporated) and ATE (consumed) when RNA (genetic material)
13. Provoke hollow emotion meeting man or woman (8)
ENGENDER
E[motio]N (hollow) meeting GENDER (man or woman)
15. It preserves member of lost civilisation following end of conquest (3,3)
TIN CAN
INCAN (member of lost civilisation) following [conques]T (end of)
18. Spin dry finally shred clothes (6)
GYRATE
[dr]Y (finally), GRATE (shred) clothes
19. Can idiots swallow uranium? That sounds annoying (8)
TINNITUS
TIN (can) + NITS (idiots) swallow U (uranium)
22. Odd Finnish characters ignored critical protester (9)
INSURGENT
[f]I[n]N[i]S[h] (odd characters ignored) + URGENT (critical)
24. Sulphur extracted from sugar supply (5)
CATER
CA[s]TER (sugar, S (sulphur) extracted)
25. Strip club’s opening corrupted Ontario after I left (7)
CARTOON
C[lub] (opening) + (ONTAR[i]O (after I left))* (*corrupted)
26. Dug up King Edward (7)
LEARNED
LEAR (king) + NED (Edward)
27. Gourmet gazpacho starter’s very expensive (13)
GASTRONOMICAL
G[azpacho] (starter) + ASTRONOMICAL (very expensive)
DOWN
1. Adjust cable depth to finally salvage wreck (7)
DEBACLE
(CABLE + D (depth))* (*adjust) to [salvag]E (finally)
2. Where in France to get fuel for canoe (9)
OUTRIGGER
OU (where, in France) to get TRIGGER (fuel)
3. Vulcan caught swapping with old Phantom (5)
SPOOK
SPOCK (Vulcan, C (caught) swapping with O (old))
4. Free press bottles up rage and produces energy (8)
RESPIRES
(PRESS)* (*free) bottles up IRE (rage)
5. Like some underwear kept, for example, as a gift (6)
LEGACY
LACY (like some underwear) kept EG (for example)
6. Memorising inaccurately, lacking good concentration (9)
IMMERSION
(MEMORISIN[g] (lacking G (good)))* (*inaccurately)
7. Drone’s gear unevenly wrapping tropical fruit (5)
GUAVA
UAV (drone, Unmanned Aerial Vehicle), G[e]A[r] (unevenly) wrapping
8. Broadcast news is unreliable without translator (6)
STREWN
(NEWS)* (*unreliable) without TR (translator)
14. Shady spot marked with this in horrible changes to endless storm (9)
NOTORIOUS
NO[x]IOUS (horrible, X (spot marked with this) changes to [s]TOR[m] (endless)
16. Sleeping lion perhaps needs a stimulant (9)
CATATONIC
CAT (lion perhaps) needs A TONIC (stimulant)
17. Not straight before Irish town cut short event (8)
BIATHLON
BI (not straight) before ATHLON[e] (Irish town, cut short)
18. Girl’s skin gets creeping sensation from bug (6)
GLITCH
G[ir]L (skin) gets ITCH (creeping sensation)
20. Pastry dough’s surface lustre deteriorates (7)
STRUDEL
(D[ough] (surface) + LUSTRE)* (*deteriorates)
21. Raising ingredient in cheese or some dough (6)
TENNER
(RENNET)< (ingredient in cheese, <raising)
23. Show indifference to jacket (5)
SHRUG
24. Is this a refined version of charisma? (5)
CHARM
CHARM
(Is+this(charm)+a)= (refined version of) charisma*
Is that what the blogger says?
KVa@1: I was not sure what to make of 24dn. After all the answer can be obtained by removing “is” and “a” from the clue word “charisma” without any rearrangement of the letters. I do not think the anagram was intended.
11ac: I had CHINE, taking the unintended edge of “knife”, and it never occurred to me to try the other edge. It seems natural for me that the “edge” of a word should be its last letter at least as easily as its first, and Collins 2023 p 361 gives us chine³ Southern English dialecct “a deep fissure in the wall of a cliff”, so CHINE fits the clue in isolation just as well as CHINK does – I would say slightly better. Of course, it left me with no hope of getting 3dn.
Thanks Phssthpok for the rest of the puzzle and Teacow for the blog.
Thanks for the blog , very clever set of clues , lots of switching in or out . I learned about DOOMSCROLLING and drone=UVA .
CHARM is very neat and my favourite type of clue , the very rare &Lit using a compound anagram .
PB@2
(IS this (CHARM) A)’s refined version=Charisma
Or the other way round as I mentioned @1.
It’s a compound anagram and &lit as Roz@3 has noted.
For the def: Is this (CHARM) a refined version of charisma?
Enjoyed the puzzle a lot. Thanks both.
Is the idea that refining removes the impurities, resulting in something similar but stronger? Sorry, better explanations appeared while I was writing. Another CHINE for a while.
I could not figure out noxious for NOTORIOUS, so thanks for clarifying.
GYMNAST was originally intended to be a DOWN clue, probably.
24dn revisited in reply to KVa@4: I can see how the whole clue gives the definition, and I can see how the compound anagram structure could work, but it seems unduly complicated when the letters of the answer are already in the right order in the clue word “charisma”. To me, “refined version of” naturally indicates removal of unwanted letters without rearrangement. Collins 2023 p 1674 gives us refined adj 3 “freed from impurities ; purified”, which seems to work here. On the other hand, the compound anagram structure certainly explains the specific words “Is” and “a” at the start of the clue. Perhaps Phsshtpok is teasing us.
Pursuing the line of thinking in comment 8, I am coming to the view that Phssthpok has deliberately written a clue in which the whole clue can be read in three different ways: as a compound anagram, as the removal of letters of “charisma” without rearrangement, and literally as a definition.
Incidentally, the main reason that I dislike seeing “& lit” written without the space is that it hides the fact that “& lit” stands for the two words “and literally”, where in my view the “and” is the more important of the two words. Just writing “&lit” makes the ampersand look like a meaningless character such the @ sign on a twitter (or X) handle or the # sign on a hashtag.
We found this quite challenging but did get it all in the end. Not being Star Trek aficionados we had to check Spock’s antecedents online for 3dn, and it also took us ages to see the reverse anagram in 1ac.
We also thought GYMNAST should have been a down clue, and thought it a little unfortunate to have two entries starting ‘tin…’ close to each other in the grid, particularly as ‘can’ was part of the answer to 15ac and used in the same sense in the clue to 19ac.
Thanks, though, Phssthpok and Teacow.
I agree with almost all the above.
I found many nice clues. In particular, I liked the surfaces of GLITCH, CATATONIC, CATER, and INCARNATE, and agree with Roz@3 that CHARM is a great clue
In addition to comments above, some made me wonder and I have some questions:
11 ac Is “chin” not the front of the jaw, not the jaw itself?
22ac Is a protester equivalent to an INSURGENT?
26ac And dug up means discovered to me and my dictionary. In what sense does that mean LEARNED?
20d could “dough’s surface” be either d or h (along the lines of knife’s edge@2) or does surface always mean first letter in crossword land?
I could not find dictionary justification for the first three. Did anyone?
Thanks p and Teacow