Bell town in Longfellow poem / TUE 8-30-16 / Vegas resort with musical name / What hath gardener wrought / Electric keyboard heard on I am walrus

Constructor:Roland Huget

Relative difficulty:Medium-Challenging (on the slow side *for a Tuesday*)


THEME:CHEMICAL SYMBOLS (36A: This puzzle's circled letters, for the words that precede them)— first word chemical, opening letters of second word, that chemical's symbol:

Theme answers:

• COPPER CUPS (17A: Flower plants from Australia) (?? ..... if you say so)
• IRON FENCE (26A: What hath the gardener wrought?) (ugh, man, this clue...)
• SILVER AGE (51A: Second-greatest period in something's history) (comics; that is the only "something" I know where this phrase applies)
• CARBON COPY (58A: Antiquated office duplicate) (and George Segal / Denzel Washington film of 1981)
  

Word of the Day:ATRI(42A: Bell town in a Longfellow poem) —

Atri (Greek: Ἀδρία or Ἀτρία; Latin: Adria, Atria, Hadria, or Hatria) is a comune in the Province of Teramo in the Abruzzo region of Italy. In 2001, it had a population of over 11,500. Atri is the setting of the poem, The Bell of Atri, by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Its name is the origin of the name of the Emperor Hadrian. (wikipedia)

Oh my no. So ... revealer is unnecessary / anticlimactic / lacking in any sort of wordplay or cleverness. If I didn't get premise of theme from first themer, I sure as heckfire got it from the second. So revealer = dead / pointless. Theme itself is simply "who cares?" except it's slightly worse than that because COPPER CUPS are fantastically outlier-ish, familiarity-wise. The other themers are, to their credit, things. I'm sure COPPER CUPS are too, but ... just less so. I will say that I think the puzzle squeezed every possible theme answer out of the periodic table. But there remains the question of "to what end?" Surely not entertainment. And what the hell was up with that IRON FENCE clue? It appears to be trying both to pun (?) on the phrase "What hath God wrought?" while also doing some kind of misdirect with the word "wrought" where it is used adjectivally in relation to an IRON FENCE instead of verbally, as it appears on the surface. But the result is a nonsensical disaster. The connection between gardeners and wrought-iron fences is fantastically loose, and the connection between gardeners and God is non-existent. Yikes.


Then we arrive at the real problem today, which is the fill, much of which REEKS of mothballs. If your (Tuesday!) puzzle has ATRI in it, something has gone very, horribly wrong and you need to fix it immediately (ATLI is worse, but the less spoken about that, the better). ATRI crossing ARIA (a "Vegas resort," really?) will be many people's last letter. Here, look:

But there was also PSEC and BEDECK and RIVE and PIANET (33D: Electric keyboard heard on "I Am the Walrus") and other olde-timey crud as well as new-timey crud like INHD. The clue on ACRES feels like the NYT trying to be inclusive but instead falling on its face yet again (15A: Forty ___ and a mule (post-Civil War allotment)). The clue needs a Lot (!) more context. "Allotment" leaves a lot (!!) out. Like, it was only ever theoretical and never actually got "allotted." Black people never got that allotment, just as they never actually get mentioned in this clue. "False promise" would've at least been closer to reality. Come on, now. [Sigh]. Shred this, start over.

Good day.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and Facebook]