A classic from Goliath.
Brilliant fun, excellent surfaces, with a few of Goliath’s trademark ‘lift and separate’ devices. Many thanks to the setter.
ACROSS
1. Profession of one into endemic outbreak (8)
MEDICINE
I (one) into ENDEMIC* (*outbreak)
5. Evil wicked sailor (6)
SINBAD
SIN (evil) + BAD (wicked)
9. Editor backing one engaged in opposition (8)
DEFIANCE
ED< (editor, <backing) + FIANCE (one engaged)
10. Design primarily thin metal probe (6)
STYLET
STYLE (design) + T[hin] (primarily)
12. Large river parasite (5)
LOUSE
13. Ultimately broke, funny people must take on money matters (9)
ECONOMICS
[brok]E (ultimately) + (COMICS (funny people) must take ON)
14. Keeps soup ingredients (6)
STOCKS
16. Nothing beats this old city: capital of Turkmenistan (3,4)
THE BEST
THEBES (old city) + T[urkmenistan] (capital of)
19. You and I would sound bells for such an occasion (7)
WEDDING
WE’D (you and I would) + DING (sound bells)
21. Tom’s number one wine-tasting note (3,3)
CAT PEE
23. Where youngsters may be, run back all episodes (9)
NURSERIES
RUN< (<back) + SERIES (all episodes)
25, 25 Down. A couple of other things said before bedtime (5,5)
NIGHT NIGHT
THING* THING* (a couple of THINGs* (*other))
26. Quintessential writer with a pointed shape (6)
ICONIC
I (writer) + CONIC (with a pointed shape)
27. 16, 1 across afterwards admits this is foul (8)
LAUGHTER
LATER (afterwards) admits UGH (this is foul)
The solutions from 16 and 1 across read THE BEST MEDICINE
28. Adage that Yang is failing and its opposite is in decline (6)
SAYING
(YANG IS)* (*failing) and YIN (yang’s opposite) is in SAG (decline)
Two clues!
29. State of knowledge cut back before bank holiday ends (8)
KENTUCKY
KEN (knowledge) + CUT< (<back) before [ban]K [holida]Y (ends)
DOWN
1. Seldom struck poses (6)
MODELS
2. Error indeed having failed an obligation (9)
DEFAULTED
3. Greek philosopher needs no outside help to find this box (5)
CRATE
[so]CRATE[s] (Greek philosopher, needs no outside SOS (help))
4. Sunrise over cryptic clue’s central element (7)
NUCLEUS
SUN< (<rise) over CLUE* (*cryptic)
6. Recluse is home and dry to welcome traveller (9)
INTROVERT
IN (home) + (TT (dry, teetotal) to welcome ROVER (traveller))
7. Most of seafood served in a bowl (5)
BALTI
BALTI[c] (seafood, most of)
8. Instead, sat up with record stores (8)
DATASETS
11. Value one’s life talent, initially showing some potential (4)
VOLT
V[alue] O[ne’s] L[ife] T[alent]
15. Conran’s first interior design set standard (9)
CRITERION
C[onran] (‘s first) + INTERIOR* (*design)
17. Finally vote Green: different movement, full of vigour (9)
ENERGETIC
([vot]E (finally) GREEN)* (*different) + TIC (movement)
18. Decade left in knots (8)
TWENTIES
WENT (left) in TIES (knots)
20. Network sending up brief threnody (4)
GRID
DIRG[e]< (threnody, brief, <sending up)
21. Fall of lawsuit involving rogue (7)
CASCADE
CASE (lawsuit) involving CAD (rogue)
22. Set theory ignoring the ground floor (6)
STOREY
(SET [the]ORY)* (ignoring THE, *ground)
24. Commodious jumper? That’s surprising! (5)
ROOMY
ROO (jumper) + MY (that’s surprising)
I reckon BALTI is another ‘lift and separate’ clue with ‘food served in a bowl’ as definition.
That couldn’t be the answer to 21a, could it? It was. I must say, I’ve never encountered it in oenological circles. My favourite for a dud wine is probably “Has a certain robustness that demands attention.”
I’m still not a fan of “up” as an anagrind (8d) but I should probably stop complaining by now.
Concur with Hovis. Seafood should become “sea, food”.
Good fun, and just the right difficulty level.
I must have a similar sense of humour to Goliath, as I enjoy (most of) his clues immensely. Plus, I find he can be quite inventive.
MEDICINE was FOI and a beauty, and MODELS (next one in) was pretty good too, while THE BEST was just that. And who could not love CAT PEE (indeed, I have a very good friend Tom who has a fabulous cellar). I could have ticked many more.
I thank Goliath for the learning opportunity in STYLET and BALTI, and thank Oriel for showing me how to parse TWENTIES.
Thanks to Goliath for a great puzzle and to Oriel for an impressive blog
A splendid puzzle from Goliath which, happily, falls on a public holiday so I could savour it at leisure. It was full of tricks and verve – including those ‘fission’ type clues, for instance.
In no particular order, my picks were WEDDING, MEDICINE, NIGHT NIGHT, TWENTIES, MODELS, (concise), CRATE (for expunging SOS) and for professional reasons, CRITERION (got to love a clue referencing the Conrans). Also, agree with Hovis re sea/food.
I saw a bird nina too and wondered if it was deliberate or if, indeed, there is some theme going on?
Hearty thanks to Goliath and Oriel
Somehow, it took a long time for the penny to drop on 21A, despite me being the staff of two cats.
Thanks for the blog , usual set of stunning clues , agree with Muffin@1 making three fission clues in total . For NUCLEUS I had the definition as central element .
I will just pick STOREY out of many for the flowing wordplay and a reference to the foundational issues in set theory .
VOLT has a very vague definition , just about okay for a crossword .
I couldn’t agree more with with Oriel’s introduction and Martyn and Diane’s opening sentences @3 and 4. There’s no better way to start the day than with a puzzle from Goliath.
A delightful romp from start to finish. With difficulty, I’ve pruned my list of favourites to the combination of LAUGHTER THE BEST MEDICINE, SINBAD (I’ve seen it before but many won’t have and some classics easily bear recycling), DEFIANCE (one engaged), ECONOMICS (for making it funny), the whimsical WEDDING, SAYING (for the BOGOF), CRATE, for my favourite Greek philosopher, INTROVERT for ‘home and dry’ and BALTI for ‘most of sea food’, CRITERION and ENERGETIC.
I have to confess to not having completely finished: the NE combination of DATASETS and STYLET (Goliath is much more familiar with this than I am) beat me.
Huge thanks, as ever, to Goliath for the fun and Oriel for a superblog.
A terrific puzzle. So many great clues that I find it hard to pick a favourite, but I will go for the LAUGHTER THE BEST MEDICINE trio.
I too struggled with BALTI and DATASETS but got them through guesswork. My downfall was LAUGHTER for which I made a wild guess at “gangster”. I have an idea that this idea of laughter being the best medicine cropped up in a recent puzzle where it was a NHO for me. By today I had forgotten it until I saw the blog. Thanks to all.