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OTHING to hold up regular
solvers this month on their way to the clue-writing competition; not even Azed’s singles-bar fantasy at 20 across should get in the
way of the grid-fill. A French abbreviation may be unfamiliar to some and not quickly
verified, while Rabbie Burns’ and Dr Johnson’s
appearances are easy references by Azed’s standards.
13. The old own
up to wrongdoing recalled in later years
AGNISE (sin, rev., in age) It takes little more than a quick glance in
Chambers to confirm the solution, and so it’s easy to overlook how neatly the clue’s
components are dovetailed into a convincing surface.
16. Grass hidden
by some lichen MELIC
(hidden)
The definition refers to melic2, a type of fescue grass. The
clue’s device is anything but hidden, though it would take some pretty rampant
lichen to obscure anyone’s lawn.
20. Succeeded
beside fireplace with loosening bras in pick-up joint! SINGLES BAR (ingle + s, all in anag.) Experiences differ, but let’s assume this one
comes from Azed’s imagination!
22. Speed in net
ploy misplaced? I’m yearning for the unattainable NYMPHOLEPT
(mph in anag.) Dr Watson was
delighted to discover ‘nympholept’, even though as a word it suggests more than
it delivers. Maybe the clue is a riposte to 20 across?
26. Staff cheers
about new dish in trattoria? POLENTA (n
in pole ta) Students of the
competition may know that Ximenes set POLENTA
in a 1956 competition. Azed doesn’t borrow from any of the clues in that Slip, many
of which focus on the exoticness at that time of Italian food.
29. Spurious word
member of choir has left in
ALL-TO (l in alto) A scan of
Chambers reveals that ‘all-to’ is indeed a word with no meaning of its own,
created from a false division of an expression that contains it.
32. Recoil
shocked about e.g. Johnson backsliding – or his namesake perhaps? COMPILER (PM, rev., in anag.) The backsliding
of the Prime Minister might be the cause of more eye-rolls than double-takes,
confirming the definition of ‘politician’ chosen by his namesake and dictionary
compiler Samuel Johnson: “A
man of artifice; one of deep contrivance”.
33. Does it
suggest a coin from ancient times, and where one may be found? ATHENS (i.e. a then s) An allusive wordplay based on the notion that a coin from
ancient times could be ‘a then-shilling’. Athens is of course one of many
places you could find one. Others have offered a different and perhaps better explanation
as a reverse cryptic clue, with ‘A then S’ suggesting as3,
the low-denomination Roman coin, perhaps dropped by an ancient visitor to Athens.
34. Young apache
if having quit existence in form of farming ARABLE (arab
+ l(if)e) Azed chooses the lower-case ‘apache’ deliberately. An arab and an apache are street hooligans at different stages
of their career.
1. Cervine
organ in part of face, soft inside INCHPIN
(in + p in chin) This unusual word means a deer’s sweetbread or pancreas.
3. Hitmen,
brothers engaging French lawyer BRAVOS (Av. in bros) The
solution is an Italian or Spanish term for a hired assassin, while Av. is a
French abbreviation for ‘Avocat’, not found in Chambers or that easily on the
anglophone internet.
6. What’s posh
about money? It’s given out for distributing METING (tin in meg) Regular solvers
of this sort of cryptic will know that there are many slang terms for a
halfpenny. ‘Posh’ and ‘meg’ are but two of the ten listed in Bradford’s. ‘Meting
(out)’ is usually reserved for punishment nowadays.
21. Dried
out in bar, like Rabbie’s love? ROSE-RED (sere in
rod) The reference is to Burns’s “O, my Luve’s like a
red, red rose”.
22. Nothing to
elicit, I shut up, being indolent OTIOSE
(0 + I in tose)
It took Dr Watson a while to parse
the wordplay, as it looked like the I was contained in ‘to se(e)’
or similar, but in fact it’s in ‘tose’ meaning to
draw out wool strands from fleece.
29. Oven Lalique
emptied, right, hot inside LEHR (h in L(aliqu)e r) Azed finds a
suitable glass-maker for his glass-annealing oven.
Other solutions:
Across: 5. AMPHIPOD (anag. in anag.); 12. NIRLIE (in, rev. + r, l + i.e.); 14. CLAUSTRA (a in anag.); 15. HAVEN (have + n); 17.
PROPS (3 mngs.);
19. NACRITE (anag.); 27. LARES (L Ares; see lar); 30. STIPE (I in anag.); 35. SEREVENT (ser. + event).
Down: 2. ZILA (hidden); 4. BLUE PIPE-TREE
(anag. + E); 7.
PARIAL (aria in PL (Poet Laureate)); 8. INTERSPATIAL
(anag.); 9. PILL
(2 mngs.); 10. OSCITATE; 11. DE-ICE (e in dice); 18. RHYOLITE (anag.
in rite); 24. LAWMAN
(ma in lawn2); 25. TRILBY (I lb. in try); 26. PALAS (a for m
in palms); 31. PELA (l in pea).
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