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Oh dear, the 'call round' perhaps which I haven't got. Or rather I hadn't got it but I've just got the anagram for 'inside leg' which character gave me the Call round!! And that fits with four parts. Yippee. Is there light at the end of the tunnel?

Yes, light indeed. As Prospero said, worth pursuing now you’ve come this far

Just finished this. Wow! I thought I knew this theme but there were quite a few elements I had to google. Also one answer was very similar to another possible (more important) theme word that doesn't appear in the puzzle. This threw me for a bit!

yes he did use a lot of characters beginning with victory ...

Hello all, first time poster, thanks to all for your interesting comments every week.

I was prompted to comment this time because I though this week's offering is well worth the effort, a perfect bank holiday offering. Like many others I sometimes despair at the lazy clueing and lack of brilliance in some recent Guardian Prizes and long for the good old days of Araucaria, Bunthorne, Enigmatist et al. However, I found that this puzzle absolutely hit the target.

The bank holidays puzzles were never meant to be easy, and this certainly wasn't, and nor was the theme a familiar area to me. It's absolutely 'do-able' though, the clues are fair and range widely from highbrow to lowbrow. Heartily recommended!

For the first time, I can't understand the instructions, which seem nonsensical. How can the (often short) one word solutions possibly be entered in two parts? I'd be most grateful if someone could explain to me what it is I'm failing to see . Thanks

Hi Bogdan, it’s just one of the one letter words which needs to be entered in two parts. It’s one of the six letter solutions and the letters can form two standalone three letter words. I guess it was the only way Maskarade could make it work! 🤷‍♀️

Please could someone help me with an 8 letter word beginning with B? (That's assuming I have the 10 letter word in the right place). I have two 8 letter Bs and an idea about the third but they are all 'normal' and so, as I understand it, have to be split in two, so, presumably the 8 letter B is a theme word.

there's only one word (a 6-letter one) that needs to be split. The clues are listed in alphabetical order of the solutions. 14 of them don't have definitions but are of one kind, linked to the four-part over-arch in the perimeter

Oh, like Bogdan I thought it meant all the normals had to be split! I wait to see if that makes it easier but it does mean I can stop searching for a theme 8 letter word beginning with B.