A tough one from BOBCAT. Apologies for the late blog as I could only get to my comp now.
FF: 8 DD: 9
13a needs some help, and maybe another couple of parsings
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | RAPT |
Dressed warmly to be picked up and transported (4)
|
| sounds like WRAPPED ( dressed warmly ) | ||
| 3 | ERADICATES |
A teaser CID actively roots out (10)
|
| [ A TEASER CID ]* | ||
| 9 | AROUSED |
Woke peer denied skirting American journalist (7)
|
| bAROn ( peer, denied skirting i.e. without end letters ) US ( american ) ED ( journalist ) | ||
| 11 | SUNDIAL |
Star, evidently easy-going, that may give one the time of day (7)
|
| SUN ( star ) DIAL ( evidently easy-going, reverse clue for LAID BACK ) | ||
| 12 | SQUARE ONE |
Original position of Romanesque grotesque lacking marks (6,3)
|
| [ ROmANESQUE ( without M – marks ) ]* | ||
| 13 | TROUT |
Swimmer in River Test? That’s not unknown (5)
|
| T ( test ) R ( river ) OUT ( not unknown ) ; i am sure i am missing a trick here as this parsing doesnt quite fit the word sequence in the clue | ||
| 14 | SLEEPING PILL |
Dizzy Gillespie curtailed plans to release a stunner? (8,4)
|
| [ GILLESPIE PLaNs ( curtailed, without last letter and without A ) ]* | ||
| 18 | VICTORIA PLUM |
Fruit, sort of cross, precisely delivered (8,4)
|
| VICTORIA ( sort of cross ) PLUM ( sounds like PLUMB, precisely ) | ||
| 21 | EPOCH |
What about returning officer’s age? (5)
|
| EH ( what ) around POC ( officer = COP, reversed ) | ||
| 22 | TRADITION |
Facility withdrawn by inspector (initially to improve working customs) (9)
|
| TRA ( reverse of ART, facility ) DI ( inspector ) TI ( starting letters of “..To Improve..” ) ON ( working ) | ||
| 24 | BURRITO |
You are overwhelmed by most of UK national dish (7)
|
| UR ( you are ) in BRITOn ( uk national, most of ) | ||
| 25 | VENISON |
Foremost of VIPs fronting New Orleans function sent back meat (7)
|
| V ( Vip, starting letter ) [ reverse of NO ( New Orleans ) SINE ( function ) ] | ||
| 26 | GARAGE SALE |
Domestic market in recycled beers launched by petrol station (6,4)
|
| GARAGE ( petrol station ) SALE ( beers = ALES, with S moving to the front ) | ||
| 27 | ISLE |
Man possibly controlled by Doris Lessing? (4)
|
| hidden in “..dorIS LEssing” | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 1 | REASSESS |
Make fresh evaluation with reference to Jenny? (8)
|
| sounds like RE ASSES ( jenny ) | ||
| 2 | PROCURER |
Solicitor supporting therapist? (8)
|
| PRO ( supporting ) CURER ( therapist ) | ||
| 4 | RADIO |
Broadcast sound part of withdrawn tabloid article (5)
|
| hidden reversed in “..tablOID ARticle” | ||
| 5 | DISTEMPER |
Infernal place to soften paint (9)
|
| DIS ( infernal place ) TEMPER ( soften ) | ||
| 6 | CONSTELLATION |
Cell 15 rocked — brilliant group (13)
|
| [ CELL NOTATIONS ( answer to 15d ) ]* | ||
| 7 | TRIPOD |
Tear into one’s own supporter (6)
|
| RIP ( tear ) in TOD ( one’s own, british slang ) | ||
| 8 | SALUTE |
Sailor pinching uniform given base gesture (6)
|
| [ U ( uniform ) in SALT ( sailor ) ] E ( base ) | ||
| 10 | STRIP LIGHTING |
Unsteady girl tips things in absence of special illumination (5,8)
|
| [ GIRL TIPS THINGs ( without S – special ) ]* | ||
| 15 | NOTATIONS |
Symbolic stuff in religious texts adopted by states (9)
|
| OT ( religious texts ) in NATIONS ( states ) | ||
| 16 | ELLIPSIS |
Ecstasy tablet elevating family member? Or... (8)
|
| E ( ecstasy ) LLIP ( reverse of PILL, tablet ) SIS ( family member ) | ||
| 17 | EMINENCE |
Distinction rising setter’s awarded in Florence after run (8)
|
| MINE ( setter’s ) in ENCE ( florENCE, after R – run ) ; best i could do and hopefully someone else can do better | ||
| 19 | TEA BAG |
A case of thieves from Bow going to pot? (3,3)
|
| cryptic def; cockney slang for thieves is TEA LEAF, a case of them would be a TEA BAG ? | ||
| 20 | HORROR |
Dread Henry catching queen being bedded by two lots of men (6)
|
| H ( henry ) [ R ( queen ) in OR OR ( two lots of men ) ] | ||
| 23 | ANVIL |
Exhausted Aston Villa losing heart in play. Pounding from The Hammers here? (5)
|
| AN ( AstoN, exhausted i.e without inner letters ) VILla ( without LA, central letters of pLAy ) |
TROUT = swimmer in river , then TRYOUT minus Y .
EMINENCE = Distinction . rising setter = me upwards = em etc
Same as Roz @1,2. Also a jenny is a female ass so, whimsically (not sounds like), an assess. Oh, and don’t forget the obligatory feline nina.
Thanks for the blog , really good set of clues , tricky and intricate with a lot of clever wordplay .
SUNDIAL , ELLIPSIS , CONSTELLATION , SLEEPING PILL all very neat .
Thanks Bobcat and Turbolegs. I had 13ac and 17dn the same way as Roz. (TRYOUT could of course be either try-out (noun) or try out (verb): it makes no difference.)
1dn: This must be as indicated by Hovis@3 – the soundalike would give a voiced final S instead of an unvoiced SS.
16dn: Punctuation must not be ignored.
Well done Hovis@3 for REASSESS , I was wondering if Jenny was a plural like sheep but still an S short .
Thanks Bobcat for a somewhat challenging but ultimately solvable crossword with my only stumble being TEA BAG. Some of the clues were the guess-first-parse-later variety as I found some of the wordplay a bit complex. My top picks were RAPT, SLEEPING PILL, PROCURER, and the hidden ANGORA, the resident cat this time around. Thanks Turbolegs for the blog.
Bobcat’s inventory of felines is so extensive that I’m never confident that I will have heard of the nina. I’ve heard of ANGORA. I also wondered whether there might be some rare creature called an ERIMEDE or an ARTINOPE
We didn’t find this too taxing, possibly because we had a hunch that 6dn was CONSTELLATION, from which we worked backwards to 15dn, giving us plenty of crossing letters and putting us on course to get 13ac. The only one we couldn’t parse was BURRITO. Nice to be reminded from the usual Bobcat feline nina that ANGORAs can be cats as well as rabbits. Favourite was ELLIPSIS.
Thanks, Bobcat and Turbolegs.
10dn: I think this works best if “in absence of special” is applied to “things” before assembling the anagram fodder as GIRL + TIPS + THING, so there is no worry about removing just one S.
I liked Dizzy Gillespie and the way Bobcat used words that we expect to be wordplay (broadcast, river) as part of the definition. There are, of course, sea trout, loch trout and fjord trout, but I suppose they all start in a river.
1dn further to the earlier discussion on this:
While solving, I thought of the construction Jenny = ASSESS as an old crossword staple. It looks as though the last time it was used in an FT crossword was FT 17,686 by GOZO, with this clue:
Evaluate Jenny? (6)
FrankieG in the discussion referred to this as an old chestnut and cited an earlier puzzle also by Gozo. More recently, FT 18.001 by Bobcat had “sign of female” = ESS in the wordplay for LESSEE. In the discussion of that puzzle, mrpenney mentioned that he remembered Paul doing a clue in which ASSESS was a female donkey.
Links (or should I do a pun on LYNX here?):
https://fifteensquared.net/2024/03/21/financial-times-17686-gozo/
https://fifteensquared.net/2025/03/17/financial-times-18001-by-bobcat/
Thanks to @Roz for tryout:TROUT. Not sure why “evidently” means “reverse” for DIAL:LAID. I liked TRIPOD, although I’m not sure non-Brits would get the “on-yer-tod” reference. Thanks BOBCAT & Turbolegs.
Grazer@13 In 11A, “evidently” does not mean “reverse”. The construction is as follows: “easy-going” means LAID BACK, and if that is construed cryptically (reading “back” as a reversal indicator) we get DIAL.
Comment #15