I did warn you there might be puzzles some days! Today, the puzzle involves a type of clue called “Printer’s Devilry.” In a Printer’s Devilry clue, one word has been removed from a reasonably sensical sentence and you must figure out what that word is. However! The removed word was originally hidden across multiple words, and the punctuation/capitalization/spacing for the remaining words may have been shifted around after the word is removed.
For example, consider the following clue, in which a 5-letter word must be added back in to make sense of the sentence:
Whip or twill have the best lounges? (5)
If we add back in the word CHAIR within the word “whip”, we can shift the spacing of the words to make the reasonably sensical question:
Whi[CH AIR]port will have the best lounges?
In the puzzle below, each word that needs to be added back in will be some type of chair or seating. After you’ve found the word to solve each of the 5 Printer’s Devilry clues, use them to find the final answer - the ultimate chair.
Puzzle:
Hound played dead; found rabbi talking it (4) [1]
Roasting Ed Brown like hemp (3) [3]
Mat merging as a coffee competitor (6) [4]
Alex tries to phat but Ivan wore it better (5) [5]
Kou ard (shooting, specifically) played for the Lakers (7) [7]
Answers to Printer's Devilry Clues:
As in the example, the first number in the parentheses indicates the length of the word that should be added back in.
Hound played dead; found rabbit al[SO FA]king itRo[PE W]as tinged brown like hemp
Mat[CHA IS E]merging as a coffee competitor
Alex trie[D IVAN']s top hat but Ivan wore it better
Ko[BE, A NBA G]uard (shooting, specifically) played for the Lakers
(My apologies for the funky grammar on this last one)
Now we use the last piece of info we haven't yet used from the clue - the number in \[square brackets]. Take the nth letter of each clue's answer in order:
SOFA [1] = SPEW [3] = W
CHAISE [4] = I
DIVAN [5] = N
BEANBAG [7] = G
And so we find, the ultimate chair is...a SWING!