EV 1728 (Hints)

Enigmatic Variations 1728 (Hints)

Short Kind of Party Dress by The Ace of Hearts

Hints and tips by Phibs

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Today, in the words of Bonnie Tyler, “It’s the Heart Ace.” I decided to give Claude something specific to get his virtual teeth into, so I asked, “A themed crossword puzzle involves a single keyword which could be cryptically described as ‘short kind of party dress’. What might this word be?”

Claude talked us through his thought process:

I need to think about this cryptically. The clue is “short kind of party dress.” Let me break this down:

“short” could mean an abbreviation or shortened form
“kind of party” could refer to a type of party
The result should relate to a dress

The word is likely COCKTAIL (as in cocktail dress). Here’s why:

A “cocktail” is a kind of party (cocktail party)
A “cocktail dress” is a type of party dress
“Short” describes the cocktail dress style (typically knee-length or shorter, less formal than an evening gown)

So COCKTAIL fits as the themed keyword that could be cryptically described as “short kind of party dress.”

I can’t help feeling that he lost his way somewhere along the line there.

Preamble: All but five clues must have a letter added to enable solving. These letters spell out the first two definitions of a keyword (nine cells in a straight line) that must be highlighted in the completed grid. The five remaining clues consist of wordplay only and their answers are examples of the third definition of the keyword, which could be cryptically described as SHORT KIND OF PARTY DRESS. Chambers Dictionary (2016) is recommended.

All clues that include a definition have lost a letter which must be reinstated prior to solving, in other words the clue cannot properly be solved while that letter is missing. So if a clue were “Suit and tie bagged by her as rubbish (6)”, ‘tie’ has the letter M reinstated to produce ‘time’, the wordplay has T (‘time’) being contained by an anagram of AS HER, the answer is HEARTS, and the letter contributing to the message is M. This clue illustrates a classic setter’s device for the ‘missing letter’ gimmick – always be on the lookout for words which with the addition of one letter can be turned into a word with a single-letter abbreviation, eg ‘cubs’ for ‘clubs’. The other common device relates to indicators, so ‘flaking’ could become the containment indicator ‘flanking’, while ‘but’ could produce the anagram indicator ‘bust’.

I’ll be keeping a note of the reinstated letters alongside the clues; if I find a clue that has no definition, I will enter the answer and put a dash against the clue to make clear that the message will bypass it.

Across

13a  Agree to talk at first (6)
No underlining means no definition, and the word ‘to’ needs to be ignored, its sole purpose being to join the two wordplay elements. The first of these yields a five-letter word which at one time meant ‘agree’; a more familiar sense would be ‘come to an end’.

15a  Having hinged support, dusty pot with pin (7)
Like me, you may have to work back from the answer to the components of the 4+3 charade, and from there to the missing letter. The qualifier ‘dusty’ indicates in this instance not that the first part of the answer is obsolete, rather that it is a familiar word which is an obsolete meaning of the word qualified (once that word has been suitably enhanced); the second part is an informal sense of a word in the clue.

19a  Ancient musers beheaded censors at random (6)
The wordplay here is straightforward, but suggests five possible answers. The right one is (similarly to 15a) an archaic (‘Ancient’) meaning of the other word in the definition, after it has received a letter.

25a  Dutchman is gracious, not ever baring rear in church (7)
A two-letter interjection is followed by a four-letter word containing a single letter. This is one of those clues where adding a letter to a word rarely seen in cryptic clues produces an indicator.

31a  Lone veteran diver round Thailand (6)
Having worked out that this must be an anagram including a single-letter IVR code, the challenges are (i) to reconcile the answer with the definition (it is very loose), and (ii) to work out how to modify the remaining word to produce a credible anagram indicator. I opted for an adjective, which seemed vaguely feasible, but the setter expects us to find an imperative verb which strikes me as rather unconvincing.

35a  Prince to keep stable after Easter removals (8)
A three-letter word containing a four-letter word follows a single-letter abbreviation.

Down

3d  Brad in Nigeria, an elevated watchful man (5)
It’s pretty clear which word is missing a letter, and that may guide you to the answer. The wordplay involves a word from the clue that has been ‘elevated’ and a man’s forename which Chambers shows as meaning ‘watchful’, ie ‘watchful man’, and which you might associate with a Gershwin brother (although it wasn’t his real name).

10d  Tibet, say, although second on exercise, waiting for right moment to attack (11)
In this 3+3+2+3  charade you may wonder how ‘Tibet’ can be modified to produce something useful. The answer is that it can be turned into the name (in Chambers) of an animal in a story, and it is then a definition by example of the first chunk of the answer. Remember that in barred puzzles hyphenated answers are enumerated as single words, so SISTER-IN-LAW would be shown as “(11)”.

18d  Coarse person drinking ale on raised seat to lose letter (8)
The ‘add a letter to make a word with a familiar abbreviation’ trick might seem to be in play here, but in the event the word thus formed yields a two-letter word rather than its single-letter abbreviation. A three-letter word contains this word along with a reversal (‘raised’) of another three-letter word (‘seat’ in the cryptic reading being a verb, as in “She chose to seat the child on a stool”). The answer is actually a transitive verb, and means ‘to remove a letter from’.

20d  Rare South African huntsman essentially reacting with hesitant sound (7)
No definition, and a charade of a word for “a member of an almost-extinct nomadic race of huntsmen in S Africa”, two letters selected from a word in the clue, and a two-letter interjection.

23d  Cold water damages chips (6)
The word ‘water’ is a distraction in this clue, where a single-letter abbreviation is followed by a five-letter word for ‘damages’. The definition must have a letter reinstated, and you may well need to refer to Chambers, the answer being an alternative spelling of a word which itself is not in common use (Collins gives it as ‘archaic, dialect’).

27d  Show disapproval of wife returning rupee (5)
While the word meaning ‘to show disapproval of’ will be very familiar, this two-letter spelling of it may not.

Definitions in clues which contain them are underlined

After solving all the clues, you should have two precise definitions of the keyword; even if you’re wrong about a couple of the missing letters, you should be able to make enough sense of the rest to correct them. You will also have a pretty good idea of the two significant words in the third definition. If you can work out the keyword from the definitions, or you’ve got an electronic version of Chambers that allows you to do a search on the text of entries, then you’ll know what to look for in the grid. If not, then it’s ‘wordsearch time’ – I would always start by looking at horizontal/vertical lines of cells before resorting to the diagonals. See it, shade it, sorted.

The gimmick made some of the clues quite tricky, and on more than one occasion I found myself working back from the answer to identify the missing letter. The endgame was brief.

Here’s to a happy, healthy 2026 🍷🍪

Phibs Toughness Rating : 🥾🥾🥾 (All the difficulty is in solving the ‘missing letter’ clues)

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