The New York Times Crossword
ACROSS
1 Skunk’s defense 5 High school exam, for short 9 Reddish-purple salad ingredient 13 Apple TV+ alternative 14 Shakespeare villain who says “I am not what I am” 15 Literature
Nobelist Alice 16 They’re long for an underdog
17 Steffi with seven Wimbledon titles 18 Church choir accompaniment 19 Temp job? 22 ___/her pronouns 24 Prevailed 25 Necklace that can be made with kukui nuts
26 Prefix with liberal or conservative 27 Union job?
31 Ones potentially contacted in “first contact”
32 Vowel sound at the end of 15- and 26-Across
33 “La Vie en Rose” singer Edith
34 End of a hairy limb
35 Watery or papery 39 Yiddish “Yikes!”
42 Have ambitions (to)
44 Flex job?
47 It sells, it’s said 48 MSNBC competitor 49 Chaired
50 Like the opening of Mahler’s Symphony No. 9 51 Dream job? 55 It travels at nearly 300 million meters per second
56 Apple Store offerings
57 Story of one’s life? 60 “Music is powered by ___”: Yo-Yo Ma 61 Olympian’s sword 62 Fuzzy bit of car décor
63 Literature
Nobelist Morrison 64 Some lab liquids 65 Like Scotch
DOWN
1 “Well, well, well!” 2 Fizzling firework 3 Encyclopedia volumes vis-à-vis Wikipedia, e.g. 4 Deceptive trick 5 Old-fashioned message carriers 6 South Asian wrap 7 Petri dish filler 8 Coming up next 9 Small town 10 Driving force?
11 One might take off a few marks 12 Spanish for “foolish”
15 What may be heard in a herd 20 Exact lookalike 21 Slim and trim
22 Give this for that 23 Lead-in to pad 28 Clear up, as ski goggles
29 Works in a theater 30 Likely to offend, in brief
34 George Eliot and George Orwell, for two
36 Really prosper 37 ___ Man, one of the Avengers 38 Wonkish sort 40 America’s Cup vessels
41 Bottleful in un ristorante
42 It was once the world’s fourthlargest lake
43 Sch. system with campuses in Buffalo and Binghamton 44 Affirmative reply to “Understand?” 45 Earth’s most abundant element 46 Bullet with a trail 47 Bad break in bowling
52 Spiced tea
53 Scruff of the neck 54 Many a cocktail mixer
58 “Rocks” in a cocktail
59 Big name in online talks