EV 1661 (Hints)

Enigmatic Variations 1661 (Hints)

Pig Latin by Chalicea

Hints and tips by Phibs

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As I understand it, translation into Pig Latin involves an initial consonant (or group of consonants) being moved to the end of a word, and the suffix -ay being added, so Phibs becomes Ibsphay and crossword is osswordcray.

The rules for words starting with a vowel are less clear, but you’re sure to be understood by other Pig Linguists if you just add -way on the end, so today we’re dealing with the Enigmaticway Ariationsvay set by Aliceachay. Apparently, two words from Pig Latin have made the transition into American English, ‘ixnay’ meaning ‘nothing’ and ‘amscray’ meaning ‘go away’. Thus does our language become enriched. I don’t remember coming across Pig Latin at school, but I clearly recall a craze for Egg Language (or Egg Latin), where every vowel sound is prefixed by -eg, pronounced ‘ayg’. This would give us the Aygen-aygig-mayga-taygic Vaygar-aygi-ayga-shayguns by Chayga-laygi-saygi-ayga. Uffnay sayged.

Preamble: Four statements made by 13 across circle the grid in a clockwise direction beginning at cell 13. A final S is ignored in one of them. Extra letters produced by the wordplay in 27 clues, read in clue order, give another of his statements. The PIG LATIN is not in Chambers Dictionary (2016) which is recommended.

Just one gimmick to deal with here, the wordplay in 27 clues delivering an extra letter, so if the clue were ‘Cooked no small fish (6)’, the answer would be SALMON and the letter left over from the anagram of NO SMALL would be an L, which can be noted next to the clue. Eight clues are normal – when you solve one of these, I suggest putting a dash or similar alongside the clue instead of the extra letter, which will help when identifying the statement. When there is a mix of gimmicked and normal clues, setters often try to place the normal clues such that they occur at breaks in the message, but that cannot be relied on.

Across

9a  Increase and no longer change shoemaker’s strengthened thread … (6, two words)
When two clues are ‘joined’ by a pair of ellipses, they sometimes have to considered together, but other times, as here, the link is purely for the benefit of the surface reading(s) and the clues can be solved independently. The wordplay in this one involves a charade of two verbs – these days the first is almost invariably applied to the moon, and the second to one’s way, although among its obsolete meanings (hence the ‘no longer’) is ‘to change’.

15a  Old gossips admitting sign of hesitation for exciting experiences of long ago (7)
The ‘old gossips’ refers to an obsolete sense of a familiar word for the type of people literarily exemplified by Sally, Agatha and (in Darkest Peru) Lucy.

17a  Dull, British male, originally not university material – second rate! (6)
There are four components to piece together here, of 1, 2, 3, and 1 letters respectively, although the second only provides a single letter of the answer.

25a  Fortification of constructed mansion-house sons abandoned (7)
In a subtractive anagram, where the letters of the element to be removed are not consecutive in the initial fodder, setters often include a second anagram indicator. Arguably this is unnecessary – in a clue such as ‘Drove train recklessly without it’ for RAN, the letters of TRAIN can be rearranged to form RANIT and the IT from the clue then removed ‘intact’. Here we similarly have just a single anagram indicator.

32a  Wheat gluten having lustre surrounding it (6)
Getting the right five-letter synonym for ‘lustre’ (also the surname of several well-known actors) is the key to solving this one.

Down

2d  Firearm‘s weight is carried by member (French one) (8, two words)
There are four elements in the wordplay here, too, arranged as (1+2) inside (3+2).

4d  Large African animals mounted indeed in exhibition hall (6)
The ‘exhibition hall’ into which a short word meaning ‘indeed’ must be inserted before the whole lot is ‘mounted’ would most likely contain paintings or sculptures, but the word is often used of a drawing room, or indeed a cutting room.

6d  Live in Libya uneasily abandoning clandestine bisexuality (5)
In this subtractive anagram we have the more conventional pair of anagram indicators, while the element (a single word) to be removed appears before the starting fodder. Incidentally, I can’t find any precedent for the use of ‘clandestine’ in George Ho’s impressive database of indicators.

30d  Disentangles Scottish revolutionaries (4)
Since either of the definitions in a double definition clue can be treated as wordplay, the first one here could potentially provide an extra letter, but the spelling to be chosen is the one whose length matches that of the answer.

Definitions in clues are underlined

As the solve progresses, the ‘extra letter’ statement will start to emerge (our setter has indeed kindly used the normal clues as word separators), as will the unclued name. If you can identify the speaker, the rest will be straightforward through the use of the web (ODQ won’t help much, since only one of the statements is in there). Alternatively, googling the last two words of the extra letter statement along with ‘quote’ will guide you to their name. The omitted final S occurs in the second of the perimeter quotations.

Some of the clues were quite tricky, and made a little harder by several entries having only half their letters checked by other clued solutions, while the theme certainly didn’t leap out at me. This was certainly at the upper end of the Chalicea difficulty spectrum, but still very accessible. The title turned out to be pleasingly apposite.

Phibs Toughness Rating : 🥾🥾 (Suitable for all)

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