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I read 8d as an anagram of the letters 'held' between the first and last letters of the preceding, hyphenated word. Perhaps that was a happy coincidence! I certainly feel , increasingly, that the anagram indicators go well over my head.

Opt0, perhaps you are still thinking of each cell as a letter rather than a binary component of a letter. Does that help?

0pt0, take whistler's hint with my backwards one. Replace letters in rows 5&6 with marks using what's in grey, applying the instruction in the hidden message. Translate that, google the result with the contents of the grey cells, and you will find the dedicatee.

Smellyharry, the stuff in circles was my favourite bit. With 11/6, it constitutes the entire repertoire. I took there to be one theme, with the other just a nice familiar way to get to it. The two rows of gibberish appear messy, but a) that's part of the fun and b) they are doing a phenomenal amount of work.
On - I'm with you. Trying to justify that to someone who doesn't do crosswords would be embarrassing.

I wasn’t defending “on” or “red” as anagrinds, merely explaining that they were how the clues parse. Anyone who begs to differ is more than welcome to offer something better. As an aside, Bradford’s gives “on” under drunk and “red” under tidy. Both have been used in the Listener before

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Whistler, Jamesm, many thanks for your help. I had made things impossibly difficult for myself by making an error in 2 down. Once I had resolved that, replacing the letters in rows 5 and 6 was straightforward. All I need to do now, is work out what to enter in circles 1, 2 and 5. I think I know what may go in circle 5 to provide the "sole letter", but I do not see how it relates to the clashes in 5 down. As for the 6/11 clashes, I haven't a clue.

I have now worked out how 5 down provides the "sole letter". Only the 6/11 clash to resolve now.

Still can't resolve 11/6. My OED is an old version and does not contain the phrase I am looking for. I might have to visit my local library, unless some kind soul can give me a hint.

Google the dedicatee and 11/6