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1a: three letter curse word meaning rats.

1a: letters 4 - 6 mean a very old Shakespearean curse word.

Thanks Mathi. Not a word or phrase I was familiar with but I will attempt to use from here on.

I'm stull struggling on this, so came hee for some inspiration / nudges.
But for 1a, I thought the "rats" was letters 5 - 7, not 4 - 6 as Mathi posted earlier

Minty

Sorry. Yes, I counted it wrong. It is a popular word in Shakespeare's works.

My last ones to go are the crossing 17d and 24a, both poets I assume?
Any gentle nudges for these?
Thanks
minty

Yes. 17d: use the four letter ‘closer’ found on a door. The first letters mean novel.

17d: the first three letters mean novel, I meant.

Thanks mathi
I had the "novel" part but couldn't think of the "closer", so ended up going through the Wikipedia list of poets starting with "novel". And now also got the crossing 24a

minty

All done by 9am, was hoping for something meatier to fill a rainy Saturday, oh well. Didn't massively enjoy this either as I know nothing about poets, and probably wouldn't have been able to do it without the list of them in my dictionary. I did however like 10a even though it wasn't a full Pauline, it reminded me that he still loves to include a mention of a "John", I also liked how that was then used in 7d. Look forward to hearing everyone's thoughts on the puzzle.