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Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium (?) (untimed)
Word of the Day: Edward Thomas (6D: Trees that "at the crossroads talk together," in an Edward Thomas poem (ASPENS)) —
Philip Edward Thomas (3 March 1878 – 9 April 1917) was a British poet, essayist, and novelist. He is commonly considered a war poet, although few of his poems deal directly with his war experiences, and his career in poetry only came after he had already been a successful writer and literary critic. In 1915, he enlisted in the British Army to fight in the First World War and was killed in action during the Battle of Arras in 1917, soon after he arrived in France.
"Aspens"
All day and night, save winter, every weather,
Above the inn, the smithy, and the shop,
The aspens at the cross-roads talk together
Of rain, until their last leaves fall from the top.
Out of the blacksmith's cavern comes the ringing
Of hammer, shoe, and anvil; out of the inn
The clink, the hum, the roar, the random singing—
The sounds that for these fifty years have been.
The whisper of the aspens is not drowned,
And over lightless pane and footless road,
Empty as sky, with every other sound
Not ceasing, calls their ghosts from their abode,
A silent smithy, a silent inn, nor fails
In the bare moonlight or the thick-furred gloom,
In tempest or the night of nightingales,
To turn the cross-roads to a ghostly room.
And it would be the same were no house near.
Over all sorts of weather, men, and times,
Aspens must shake their leaves and men may hear
But need not listen, more than to my rhymes.
Whatever wind blows, while they and I have leaves
We cannot other than an aspen be
That ceaselessly, unreasonably grieves,
Or so men think who like a different tree.
• • •
I moved really slowly through this one, but I don't think that had anything to do with difficulty. I was just being methodical, and I had just woken up, or rather I was just being methodical *because* I had just woken up. Trying to speed just after waking is a doomed enterprise. I took a look at this grid and didn't like it one bit, but as I solved, I warmed to it, surprised that those isolated corners weren't much more dire (both in difficulty and quality). Most of what annoys me about this puzzle has to do with the cluing voice, which ... whaddyagonna do, that's the editor's responsibility, and there's nothing to be done about that. We're never gonna agree (as often as I'd like) on what's clever or funny. For instance, 42A: "Abyssinia" (TATA). I first learned about this pun ... today, because even my embarrassingly pun-fond friends wouldn't touch this one (which only works in ... writing?). If you are still baffled, it's supposed to sound like "I'll be seeing you" (hence "TATA!"). So my knowledge that Abyssinia was the name of modern-day Ethiopia, well that did me no good. Plus, I already had TTYL ("talk to you later") in the grid (15D: "Until next time," in a text), so I was sort of surprised to see the puzzle bidding me farewell yet again. I heard you the first time, puzzle. Speaking of clueless cluing, please enjoy the following brief conversation about how women have been completely edited out of (or in no way edited in to) this puzzle:
Not a fan of teeny tiny passageways between grid sections (aggressive quadranting!), but since every section had *two* ways in today, I didn't mind as much (though TATA blocked one entryway to the SE, for sure, and PHAT blocked the other (28A: Dope). I had DIRT before PHAT, which is very much a "bygone" term and should be clued as such. There were a decent number of gimmes, which meant that no one corner every got very crushingly hard. First three Downs, all gimmes (AZTEC, REESE, TRACY). Did not like at all the clue on ZEROES OUT (14A: Eliminates), which I think of something you do to scales or odometers, nor did I like "OUT"'s appearing twice not just in the same puzzle, but in the same quadrant (see LEAP OUT, 5D: Be immediately obvious). But that is a very solid if unglittery NW corner, fine. Couldn't get into SW because of the whole PHAT phiasco, so went in to the middle to discover that my cheese knowledge was poor (Leyden? Boerenkaas?), that it was JAM UP not DAM UP (35A: Clog), and that it was REMIT not REPAY (26D: Compensate for something?). Stil, it could've been worse. Out of there and into the NE, which was the easiest section of all (once I changed YENTES (??) to DISHES (9D: Gossips)).
Not too hard to get into the SE. Somehow BANTAMS came to me with only a little effort (39D: Little chickens), off just the "B," and then I got ENROBE easily, with my brain activity going something like this: "Hmmm [Get ready for court, maybe] ... ugh, they're going to want ENROBE here, aren't they? Why do they insist on cluing justices as if they were chocolate-covered treats!?" Managed to dodge the MESA trap (53D: Tabletop, perhaps was actually SLAB). Just now realizing that this is the corner I finished in, so I must've had a go at the SW earlier. Very much the most daunting, as I couldn't get in from the top and could only back in from ARGUED and MJOLNIR, one of which I didn't know right away and the other of which I forgot how to spell: "... OK there's def a "J" in there and it ends in "-IR" ... stars with "M"? ... and that vowel? ..." (44A: Thor's hammer). I have never been so happy to see an ENERGY drink in my life (41D: ___ drink). From there I could see ICING, which, with the "J" from Thor's hammer got me the JUICE part of PEAR JUICE (lol whaaaaat who is drinking that a. at all, or b. as an [Apple cider alternative]. Apple cider is everywhere this time of year, esp. in these parts (gestures to all of central NY). I've literally never seen PEAR JUICE offered anywhere, or heard anyone utter the words PEAR and JUICE in succession, for that matter. But again, corner after corner, this one was structurally sound and irksome only in its faux-winsome cluing flourishes. Enjoy your last day of November.
P.S. BAKER Street (49D: Renowned London street in literature) is "renowned" because that's where Sherlock Holmes lived, 221B BAKER St. (I had a tabletop game with that exact name as a kid)
