Toughie No 3431 by Kcit
Hints and tips by Gazza
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ***
About the right level of difficulty for a Thursday I thought – thanks to Kcit for the challenge.
Please leave a comment telling us how you fared and what you liked about the puzzle.
Across Clues
1a Small group getting over instrumentalist (5)
CELLO: a small group (of subversives, perhaps) and the crickety abbreviation for over.
4a Long-standing foe, heartless, as seen in historical records (8)
ARCHIVAL: a term for one’s main long-standing foe or opponent without its central letter.
10a Two varieties of the same drink united vineyard estate (7)
CHATEAU: two words for the same non-alcoholic drink and the abbreviation for united.
11a Being at fault, Parisian is abandoning religious leader in fake religion (7)
CULPRIT: drop the French word for ‘is’ from a religious minister and insert what remains into a fake religion.
12a Encourage man to secure a PR rep (5,5)
PRESS AGENT: a verb to encourage and a synonym of man bracket A.
13a Source of justice in a social media platform? It’s a bad influence (4)
JINX: assemble the first letter of justice, IN and Mr Musk’s platform.
15a Auntie reads RLS novel – this one? (8,6)
TREASURE ISLAND: an anagram (novel) of AUNTIE READS RLS. Very neat.
17a Wait and see what I say to the examiner (3,4,2,5)
YOU MARK MY WORDS: how I might confirm the role of someone checking my exam.
20a Bustles around producing drink (4)
SODA: reverse a word for bustles or flurries.
21 A hint about Tory’s initial opinion – it’s less than right (5,5)
ACUTE ANGLE: A and a type of hint contain the initial letter of Tory. Add a synonym of opinion or viewpoint.
23a A lot of damage around a depression in Pacific island (4,3)
RAPA NUI: this, I discovered, is the Polynesian name for Easter Island. A verb to damage or devastate without its last letter contains A and a depression or hollow in the ground.
24a Company taken aback about moist flowing in regard to liquid transfusion (7)
OSMOTIC: the reversal of our usual abbreviated company contains an anagram (flowing) of MOIST.
25a Put off following American writer after inclusion of name (8)
POSTPONE: a prefix meaning following and a US writer of the macabre containing the abbreviation for name.
26a Quantities of paper associated with a submission to publisher? (5)
REAMS: join together a preposition meaning ‘associated with’, A and the abbreviation for what might be submitted to a book publisher.
Down Clues
1d Turns up on the edge of racetrack area offering positions for drivers (8)
COCKPITS: a verb meaning turns up (one’s little finger when raising a cup to the lips, perhaps) goes round an area at a racetrack where the Kwikfit fitters do their stuff.
2d Don’t mess with holidays, getting place for night, not day (5,2)
LEAVE BE: a synonym of holiday and your nighttime place without the abbreviation for day.
3d Tournament seems to struggle without a way to dissolve barriers (4,6)
OPEN SESAME: a type of tournament with no restriction on who may enter and an anagram (to struggle) of SEEMS containing A.
5d Company engaged by one actor in adapting further establishment (14)
RECONFIRMATION: a word for a company (4-letters, not 2 which was my initial thought) is contained in an anagram (adapting) of ONE ACTOR IN.
6d Sacred loch in Orkney island (4)
HOLY: insert the abbreviation for loch into an Orkney island best known to most people for having an Old Man.
7d A lot of poetry, very popular, gaining nothing in translation (7)
VERSION: most of a synonym of poetry and an adjective meaning very popular containing the zero-resembling letter.
8d Remiss to clothe half of team in rubbery material (5)
LATEX: an adjective meaning remiss or negligent containing half of the word team.
9d Father blocking rude behaviour – there’s a line to be drawn here (6,8)
VULGAR FRACTION: an abbreviation for father goes inside rude behaviour (6,6).
14d Instrument beginning to capture former pop group in Debussy classic (4,6)
CLAW HAMMER: start with the first letter of capture then insert a male duo of the 1980s into a Debussy classic work.
16d Intrinsic qualities enclosed in letters (8)
ESSENCES: the abbreviation for enclosed is contained in curvy letters.
18d Name of complex notion mostly thrown up in work (7)
OEDIPUS: reverse a synonym of notion without its last letter inside an artistic work.
19d Hint of raw power, passing leader, coming up in rowing event (7)
REGATTA: start with the first letter of raw then reverse a word for electrical power without its first letter.
20d Bridge player’s stumble in form of poker? (5)
STRIP: the abbreviation for a bridge player and a verb to stumble.
22d Bargain flags hoisted (4)
SNIP: reverse a word for the flags found on the greens on golf courses.
For my podium I’ve selected 11a, 15a and 9d. How do they differ from your choice(s)?
A steady solve and most enjoyable.
I knew the Debussy classic at 14d and I even remembered the pop group! I would probably call the solution a tool rather than an instrument, but maybe I am missing something here.
Plenty of ticks, with the RLS novel at 15a making it to the top of my podium.
Thank you Kcit and Gazza.
Blunt instrument maybe? I thought club to begin with
I found this to be fairly gentle but very enjoyable.
The only couple I struggled with were the Pacific Island, and the Debussy classic.
All good stuff. 2*/4*.
Many thanks to Kcit and to Gazza.
Just right for a Thursday
Thanks to Kcit and Gazza
Mercifully much easier than yesterday’s Prime beast which occupied the bulk of the evening between C4 news & Newsnight. Still a DNF though, or at least not without cheating & looking up the Pacific island, having missed pan as the depression synonym. Not sure I’d have been confident defining 24a without the context of the clue. Top 2 for me were 9&14d.
Thanks to Kcit & to Gazza – will now read the review & enjoy the cartoons.
Definitely a proper Thursday Toughie needing a two-pronged attack with Mrs PJ. A most enjoyable solve. Favourites today were 15A and 17A.
Many thanks to Gazza for the blog and the laughs and of course to Kcit for the challenge.
I agree this was much easier than yesterday’s Prime, which I only finished this morning with massive recourse to the hints .
Today was a steady logical solve, but I had to check the existence of the island, and also had to read up about Debussy’s works. So a technical dnf although I bunged the answers in! I liked 21a best.
Thanks Gazza and Kcit
Excellent puzzle for a Thursday Toughie slot with 11a my pick of several fine clues. I a slight raising of the eyebrows with 1a, as the answer is an instrument, not the player, which the clue suggests. That aside, all good fun though it took a tad longer to solve than I might have expected.
My thanks to Kcit and Gazza.
I wondered that, but then you don’t refer to the first violin as a violinist
Fair point
I did do a reverse parse on 14d although the answer presented itself readily enough from the checkers I had in place. I also needed to check on the Pacific Island as I wasn’t familiar with that name for what I’ve always known as Easter Island.
Most enjoyable solve with personal favourites being 17a plus 6,7&9d.
Thanks to Kcit and to Gazza for the review and cartoons – I did smile at the mouse waving a white flag.
I had the same criticism as YS [above] re 1a but, on reflection – “He’s first Cello with the Halle” sounds reasonably commonplace. Aligning the solution to 5d with its definition also took a bit of thinking about. Otherwise plain sailing and at least I had today’s gen nol, unlike yesterday. Top clues for me were the neatly done 15a and the line to be drawn at 9d.
Thanks to kcit and Gazza.
Cracking puzzle from bottom to top, finishing in the NE. A couple of “it’s obviously X” biffs did me no harm, but I did appreciate Gazza’s kind parsings of those clues. Good surfaces, a decent work-out for the LGCs. Highlights for me were 15a, 10a & 14d.
Many thanks to Kcit, and also to Gazza – especially for the great cartoons!
Great level of difficulty and a real pleasure to solve. We guessed that some people would struggle with the Polynesian name in 23a but we, like the setter who lives in NZ, are familiar with it. We’ll make that one our favourite.
Thanks Kcit and Gazza.
Couldn’t see 23a and couldn’t be bothered to use google. I liked 9d and 21a. Thanks to Kcit & Gazza.
1a was a bung in, needed the hints to parse 11a, 1d and 14d and the hint to solve and parse 23a. The rest I just found difficult. So my second dnf in a row but I got a lot further than I did with yesterday’s which I finished off this morning with a copious amount of help. Favourite was 18d. Thanks to Kcit and Gazza.
Just to say that a cellist is the instrumentalist…a cellos is an instrument.
The name of an instrument can be used to identify its player, e.g. “He was the first violin in the LSO”.