US author’s penning old rubbish for inert people (8)
I believe the answer is:
potatoes
'inert people' is the definition.
Although both the answer and definition are plural nouns, I can't understand how they can define each other.
'us author's penning old rubbish' is the wordplay.
'us author's' becomes 'Poe's' (Edgar Allan Poe).
'penning' is an insertion indicator.
'old' becomes 'o' (abbreviation).
'rubbish' becomes 'tat' (tat can mean rubbish or poor-quality material).
'o'+'tat'='otat'
'poes' enclosing 'otat' is 'POTATOES'.
'for' acts as a link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for potatoes that I've seen before include "Murphies" , "Odd oat pesto for vegetables" , "Source of chips" , "Vegetables in the strange oat pesto" , "Root vegetables" .)