Father victim of Oedipus / MON 6-6-11 / 1836 battle site / 1971 Jane Fonda/Donald Sutherland film / Poem with exactly 17 syllables

Constructor: Gary Whitehead

Relative difficulty: Easy-Medium

THEME: WEST POINT (56A: School whose motto consists of the last words of 17-, 25- and 45-Across) — last words of theme answers are, in order, DUTY, HONOR, COUNTRY; CADET sits in the middle of the grid (38A: Enrollee at 56-Across); bonus theme answer of USMA (1A: Initials for 56-Across).


Word of the Day: LAIUS (53A: Father and victim of Oedipus) —

In Greek mythology, King Laius, or Laios of Thebes was a divine hero and key personage in the Theban founding myth. Son of Labdacus, he was raised by the regent Lycus after the death of his father. (wikipedia)

• • •

Dull theme with a livelier-than-average grid. There's gotta be a zingier DUTY answer than CIVIC DUTY. I like BACK COUNTRY quite a bit, both because it's interesting / unusual, and because it changes the meaning of COUNTRY, taking it away from the sense it has in the West Point motto. I also ADMIRE the Zs and the Ks and the X, all in a grid that remains solidly Monday-level with one major, glaring, outlying exception: LAIUS (53A: Father and victim of Oedipus). If you lined all today's answers up on a "General Familiarity" scale, from Universally Known to Obscure Beyond Belief, I don't know where this answer would fall, but I do know the other answers wouldn't be anywhere near it. Completely valid answer, a nice bit of mythological trivia, but comparatively arcane in this environment. Not that that's so bad—at least it's a piece of trivia that seems worth knowing. And it's not as if it slowed me down much. I might have lost 5-10 seconds trying to piece it together from crosses. Not sure why I can remember JOCASTA but not LAIUS. I think her name is just more interesting.

I wonder if there was really no possible theme answer that could have symmetrically balanced out USMA. Or if there isn't a thematic way to clue ALTO (65A: Sax type).


Theme answers:

• 17A: Serving on a jury, e.g. (CIVIC DUTY)
  
• 25A: Bride's attendant (MAID OF HONOR)
  
• 45A: Rural area (BACK COUNTRY)
  

I love that CUMIN (18D: Curry ingredient) and ACUMEN (43D: Keenness of mind) are in the same column. My CUMIN ACUMEN is quite high, I think. You don't see the CZ- spelling of TSAR much in puzzles, if only because "TS" are so much more common letters. I'm happy to see the "Z" restored to its rightful place in GIZMO (34D: Thingamajig). I'm reading Tina FEY's book "Bossypants" right now, and it's unsurprisingly fantastic (8D: Tina of "30 Rock"). The chapter about her father is particularly great: simultaneously touching and hilarious.


There's some bonus military answers in the puzzle, which I suppose you could count as thematic were it not for the fact that they are answers that appear in puzzles all the time (NO SIR, SGTS, TROOP). I had TESTY for NASTY (19A: Mean-spirited), but other than that, and the mini-struggle with LAIUS, no trouble anywhere to be found.

Bullets:

• 48D: 1971 Jane Fonda/Donald Sutherland film ("KLUTE") — on my To-Watch list for this summer, my To-Watch list consisting of every crime movie, mystery, and thriller from 1960-1976, i.e. "Psycho" to "Taxi Driver." I've only just started with 1960, but I can already tell you that "Never Let Go" (w/ Peter Sellers in a non-comic role as a sadistic garage owner) is Brilliant. My first great accidental discovery.
  
• 42A: Jug band instrument (KAZOO) — great answer, great clue, though I have to admit that my first thought was "... jug?"
  
• 31D: Poem with exactly 17 syllables (HAIKU) — apparently today's "Bullets" are devoted exclusively to five-letter K-answers. Love them all.
  

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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