The news in clues
The amended early parliamentary general election bill was a rare parliamentary success, so this clue from Knut …
… becomes less ambiguous in its surface reading en route to the answer NOTE. For solvers who like to imagine what might have happened had the leadership race gone differently, Azed makes, as far as I have seen, crosswords’ first reference …
… to Rory Stewart, en route to the Scottish-only word (because Azed is allowed those) ROARIE.
Another first from Tees, though not a flattering one …
9ac/6d Being extorted translates to Johnson’s mantra (3,6,4)
[ wordplay: anagram (‘translates to’) of BEINGEXTORTED ]
[ definition: Johnson’s mantra ]
… in a clue for the do-a-decade’s-work-in-a-week slogan GET BREXIT DONE. On the off-chance that the phrase may turn out to be hubristic, maybe we shall see it again?
Latter patter
Here’s Brummie:
18ac Nark about rifles and stuff, taking a long time (5-6)
[ wordplay: synonym for ‘rifles’, reversed (‘about’) + synonym for ‘stuff’ + word for ‘a long time’ ]
[ LOOTS reversed + PIG + EON ]
[ definition: nark ]
… cluing STOOL-PIGEON with the splendid-sounding Romany word ‘nark’, which means ‘nose’, whether or not spelled with a leading K. It’s regrettable that we keep finding English-language words of Romany origin with a tang of the detention cells about them, such as ‘shiv’ from chive, a knife; there are also, it must be said, happier terms.
‘Pal’ is from phral, a brother; ‘wonga’ from angar, coal (possibly via the use as currency of coal fallen from trains) and the subject of our next challenge is from British and Scandinavian Romany, popularised through the lexicon of Derek Trotter and means just what it says. Reader, how would you clue CUSHTY?
Cluing competition
Many thanks for your clues for NEWS. The word lent itself to some truly unexpected surface readings, such as Porcia’s “crosswords-about-crosswords”-style “Word play with definition lets clue flow, ultimately” and Catarella’s quaint, if not fusty “the latest wife is boring unless taken out regularly”.
The audacity award of course goes to Cmiall, who wants you to look at your keyboard layout in order to solve “Reports of Mr Ed shifting to the left”. Well.
The runners-up are Wellywearer22’s charming “Tailless amphibian has small juicy morsel” and Croquem’s tremendous “All points bulletin” (does a hyphen belong here? I’m sure we shall discuss); the winner is DeetotheGee’s plausible evocation of frustration “Index was oddly missing information”.
Clue of the fortnight
Nominated by Catarella, a Times clue …
… in which, whether the surface refers to the artist himself doing a spot of form-filling, or to one of his works, it takes a pleasing while before you see the SPANIARD. ¡Bien hecho!
