"It is ironic that Austen, the elegant, precise satirist that she was, should provoke this crude and unsophisticated and wild meanness."

"She was no stranger to anger, to simmering resentments and harsh judgments, to taking people down a notch, but her sentences were if anything the opposite of 'a bomb was placed in front of your house.'"

Writes Katie Roiphe in Slate, about the Jane-Austen-on-the-banknote controversy we were talking about yesterday.

Why is that ironic? Isn't it more exactly what you'd expect, that an elegant, precise writer's antagonists would be crude? What's ironic is that Roiphe, championing the elegant, precise writer would misuse the word "ironic."

I checked the complete works of Jane Austen to see if old Jane had ever used the word "irony" or "ironic." The answer is no, but the search turned up the uses of "iron" as well, and I was amused by this exclamation, in "Northanger Abby," about James's gig:

"Break down! Oh! lord! Did you ever see such a little tittuppy thing in your life? There is not a sound piece of iron about it....."

Tittuppy.  Is that the adjective for the phrase "tits up"? The (unlinkable) OED marks the word as colloquial and defines it to mean: "Apt to tittup or tip up; unsteady, shaky." The first recorded usage is the "Northanger Abby" one I've quoted above. It's based on the noun "tittup," which is "apparently echoic, from the sound of the horse's feet" and means "A horse's canter; a hand-gallop." I guess we'd say "clip-clop." Now, a second meaning of "tittup" is "An impudent or forward woman or girl; a hussy, a minx." You might want to try using that!

1762   D. Garrick Farmer's Return 9   Some Tittups I saw, and they maade me to stare!

We're referred to the second meaning of "tit," which is "A girl or young woman: often qualified as little: cf. chit n.1; also applied indiscriminately to women of any age (? dial.).  (a) Usually in depreciation or disapproval: esp. one of loose character, a hussy, a minx.  (b) Sometimes in affection or admiration, or playful meiosis. (Common in 17th and 18th c.; now low slang.)" This is a very old usage, going back to 1599:

1599   T. M. Micro-cynicon ii. sig. B5v,   He hath his tyt, and she likewise her gull. Gull he, Trull she....
1886   G. M. Fenn Master of Cerem. vii,   She's a pretty little tit....
1932   S. O'Faoláin Midsummer Night Madness 62   I'm sorry for his two tits of sisters, though.

Wow. The oldest meaning of "tit" is a small horse. Surprising, no?

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Why do philosophy professors call themselves "philosophers" when law professors don't call themselves "lawyers"?

I think the answer is that "philosopher" sounds loftier than "philosophy professor," but "law professor" sounds loftier than "lawyer." But it could also be that "lawyer" is a specific job that the law professor needs to signal is not what he's doing, but "philosopher" is not a job.

I'm thinking of this question because I see Instapundit linked to my post from yesterday about the philosophy professor accused of sexual harassment, and I was rereading the beginning of the post: "'There was no propositioning,' said the philosopher. 'Remember that I am a philosopher trying to teach a budding philosopher important logical distinctions.'" Boldface added. It's striking. To insiders maybe it's ordinary, but to my ear, it's either beautiful and romantic and somewhat pretentious or romantic.

The word "philosopher" was originally very broad, referring, according to the (unlinkable) OED to "an expert in or student of any branch of knowledge, including the physical and natural sciences, alchemy, prophecy, the occult, etc., but in later use applied chiefly to those versed in the metaphysical and moral sciences." Over time, it became restricted to those in the academic discipline we call philosophy. There's no one left to claim the title "philosopher" but the professors, though you do see the word applied in to nonacademics who express themselves in a philosophical manner. This seems to happen mostly sarcastically: Oh, a philosopher!

I see that in the 16th century the word "lawyer" — spelled "lawar" or "lawer" — was used to mean "A professor of law." That's obsolete, obviously.

You may be interesting to know that the word "lawyer" is used in dialect to refer to "A long bramble" and in New Zealand "to certain creeping plants."

1863   C. Kingsley Water-babies i. 34   The lawyers tripped him up, and tore his shins as if they had sharks' teeth.
1875   Sussex Gloss.,  Lawyer, a long bramble full of thorns, so called because ‘when once they gets a holt an ye, ye doant easy get shut of 'em’.

And in the United States, "lawyer" is used in some locales to refer to the black-necked Stilt (Himantopus nigricollis), the Burbot ( Lota maculosa), and the Bowfin or Mudfish (Amia calva):

c1850   S. H. Hammond Wild Northern Scenes 45   ‘What on earth is that?’ said I to the fisherman. ‘That’, said he, ‘is a species of ling; which we call in these parts a lawyer’.
1859   J. R. Bartlett Dict. Americanisms (ed. 2) ,   Lawyer..the black-necked Stilt... On the New Jersey coast it is some~times called lawyer on account of its ‘long bill.'

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"With no notice, the man stepped forward, grabbed the headband off of Dexter's head and threw it to the bottom of our shopping cart."

"He then cuffed Dexter around the side of his head (not hard, but that is not the point) and said with a big laugh, 'You'll thank me later, little man!'"

At the same time as I stepped forward, Dexter grabbed his head where the man had smacked him and threw his other hand forward, stomping his foot and shouting, "NO!" I got between my son and this man and said very firmly, "If you touch my son again, I will cut your damn hands off."

The guy snarled at me, looked at Dexter with disgust and said, "Your son is a f*cking fa***t." He then started sauntering out, but not before he threw over his shoulder, "He'll get shot for it one day."

That spiraled out of control quickly!

The things that happen to HuffPo mombloggers when they happen to go to WalMart with their 2-year-old sons wearing mommy's pink lace flower headband.

Here's the blogger Katie Vyktoriah's description of the horrible homophobe who was, I take it, monitoring WalMart shoppers for insufficiently instilling gender norms in toddlers:

The man was overly large with a bushy beard and a camouflage shirt with the arms cut off. He had tattered shorts and lace-up work boots with no laces. I could smell the fug of cigarette smoke surrounding him, and there was a definite pong of beer on him.

Smoking and shorts. And overly large. When are men overly large? Don't they know when they are taking up too much space? A camouflage shirt with the arms cut off... talk about the right to "bare" arms. And the "pong of beer"... Pong?



Pong, meaning "A strong smell, usually unpleasant; a stink" is a Britishism. OED examples:

1925 E. Fraser & J. Gibbons Soldier & Sailor Words 226 Pong, a stink.
1936 F. Clune Roaming round Darling xxiv. 257 Avoid the smell of camel. They were complete with permanent, pyramid, and perfume, commonly called pong....
1991 D. Coupland Generation X i. i. 4 Smelling the cinnamon nighttime pong of snapdragons and efficient whiffs of swimming pool chlorine.

There's a blast from the past. Not the old Atari game (whoever forgot that?) but "Generation X." Remember when everyone was reading "Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture"? I'd buy that right now and blog it for its poignant, pungent, pong-ent, obsolescences, but it's not available in Kindle? Not in Kindle! Oh! How the times pass! How the cutting edge dulls!

But, what say you? There's a lumbering, overly large man in shorts, a jack-booted thug with no shoelaces, and he's come to snatch the pink headband off your little boy. Threaten him with hand amputation, that might bridge the culture gap. Or, since he's a stinking smoker, a beer drinker, it might incite him to splutter out some warning about future bullying that will be so badly worded that in print it's good enough to make the HuffPo crowd gasp: Oh, noooooo! Homophobia rages... at WalMart. That's why I NEVER go there. That guy is always there, in his over-largeness, blocking the aisles, shuffling around, graceless... and laceless.

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The "the legions of mulleteers" don't even "seem to care."

Vogue sniffs:

You won’t find them on the designer floor at Barneys or Bergdorf’s. Neither Marc nor Karl, Phoebe nor Miuccia showed them on their 2013 runways. And yet, walk down any high street in America (and probably the world) and you will see a battalion of young women with knees free to the world in front, while calves—and sometimes even ankles—are swathed in fabric in back. These bipolar dresses and skirts, usually but not exclusively rendered in translucent chiffon, have been called “high-low” by some parties; others have saddled the poor things with the moniker “mullet,” which is not exactly a compliment.

Walk down any high street in America.... When did "high street" replace "main street"? I had to look it up:

High Street (or the High Street) is a metonym for the generic name (and frequently the official name) of the primary business street of towns or cities, especially in the United Kingdom.... The equivalent in the United States, Canada and Ireland is Main Street, a term also used in smaller towns and villages in Scotland and parts of rural Australia... 

And that was the U.S. website for Vogue, not the British. So there you have it. Don't wear that high-low skirt, and use Britishisms.

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"'Coucou, tu as pris le pain?' ('Hi there, have you picked up the bread?') is the campaign’s slogan."

"Modeled on the American advertising campaign 'Got Milk?' the bread slogan was plastered on billboards and inscribed on bread bags in 130 cities around the country."

“Eating habits are changing,” said Bernard Valluis, a co-president of the lobby. “People are too busy or work too late to go to the bakery. Teenagers are skipping breakfast. Now when you see the word ‘coucou,’ we want it to be a reflex for consumers to say to themselves, ‘Ah, I have to buy bread today.' ”

Coucou for Cocoa Puffs bread.

So the French aren't eating so much bread anymore. Too bad. Anyway, I just like knowing that "coucou" means "hi there." Coucou, to American ears, seems insulting. Hi there, by contrast, seems really nice. But it's all in the context...

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Records From My Father, Part 6: "$64,000 Jazz."

Here's the 6th selection in this series, and I've got to admit it was the silly TV-related cover that got my attention:



... but this was great. Every damn thing on the album, immensely enjoyable.  (You can download it for $7.) I will not attempt to describe this music, because, look, it has extremely extensive liner notes, including an elaborate description of the TV show, which offered the category jazz, an event that has something to do with the assembling of this collection.
If you're curious what, read this:



The track I'm least inclined to like was Erroll Garner cascading all over the piano with "Laura." It's the one track that seems corny, but I still like it. Garner is obviously committed to playing like that, and I see that it was recorded on January 11, 1951, the day before I was born. There's no singing on this album — except for that Sarah Vaughan track and a bit of Louis Armstrong on "Ain't Misbehavin'" — so if you're not familiar with the lyrics to "Laura," your enjoyment of the Garner instrumental might be heightened by listening to one of the beautiful versions of it. Here's Frank Sinatra, and here's Johnny Mathis.

My favorite track was Buck Clayton, "How Hi the Fi." I can't find it on YouTube, but it's only 89¢ to download. I don't remember ever hearing of Buck Clayton. Wikipedia says:

Buck Clayton (born Wilbur Dorsey Clayton; Parsons, Kansas, November 12, 1911 – New York City, December 8, 1991) was an American jazz trumpet player who was a leading member of Count Basie’s "Old Testament" orchestra and a leader of mainstream-oriented jam session recordings in the 1950s. His principal influence was Louis Armstrong....

From 1934 or 1935 (depending on the sources), he was a leader of the "Harlem Gentlemen" in Shanghai. His experience in the east was unique, since Clayton was discriminated against by fellow American marines who were stationed in Shanghai. On numerous accounts, he was attacked by soldiers, including an instance where bricks were thrown at him. On the contrary he was treated like an elite by the Chinese. Some of the bureaucratic social groups he was with included Chiang Kai-shek's wife Soong Mei-ling and her sister Ai-ling, who were regulars at the Canidrome. Clayton would play a number of songs that were composed by Li Jinhui, while adopting the Chinese music scale into the American scale. Li learned a great deal from the American jazz influence brought over by Clayton. A 1935 guidebook in Shanghai listed Clayton and Teddy Weatherford as the main jazz attraction at the Canidrome. He would eventually leave Shanghai before the 1937 Second Sino-Japanese War. Clayton is credited for helping to close the gap between traditional Chinese music and shidaiqu/mandopop. Li is mostly remembered in China as a casualty of the Cultural Revolution.

I wonder what my father would have thought of computers. He loved his HiFi, and built some components using Dynaco kits. I think he would have loved computers and he would have looked up these biographies and clicked through to learn about Li:

Li Jinhui (September 5, 1891 – February 15, 1967) was a composer and songwriter born in Xiangtan, Hunan, China. He is often dubbed as the "Father of Chinese popular music." He created a new musical form with shidaiqu after the fall of the Qing Dynasty-- moving away from established musical forms. Li was a very controversial figure in China. Although his music was extremely popular, the Chinese Nationalist Party attempted to ban his music, and Li was eventually silenced in death as a victim of political persecution in 1967 during the height of the Cultural Revolution....

Though Li’s early work is completely innocent and educational in content, it still met with disapprobation from some critics despite its immense popularity. This resistance may be due to the manner in which these songs were performed. Beginning in 1923, Li’s broke the taboo of not allowing women to perform on stage when he hired young girls to sing and dance in his school musical productions....

As radio became more widely accessible, so then did Li’s jazz, for which he received vicious criticism as “Yellow (or pornographic) Music.” One 1934 reviewer said of Li that he is “vulgar and depraved beyond the hope of redemption…[but] as popular as ever.” His greatest source of Jazz influence came from American Buck Clayton who worked with Li for two years. Clayton played a major role in shaping the musical scores written by Li. Li’s revolutionary Sinese jazz music dominated the nightlife scene, and it was performed at cabarets, cafes and nightclubs around southeast Asia....

Li continued to compose music the rest of his life, though he would eventually pay dearly for his fame. Classified as a founder of Yellow Music by the Communist Party of China, he became a victim of political persecution during the Cultural Revolution.

Exactly what happened? It's so sad to think even of the memories that have been lost. Googling, I find this interview with Andrew Jones, author of “Yellow Music: Media Culture and Colonial Modernity in the Chinese Jazz Age”:

Li Jinhui... had a bad reputation. He was supposed to be a bad guy who created the degenerate form of music that was called “yellow music.” “Yellow music” means, basically: pornographic, salacious, off-color music in Chinese. It was a music that had been banned by the Chinese Communist Party.  It was a kind of music that was seen as being decadent and colonial and unfit for Chinese ears after 1949, after the revolution.

But what I started to find out about Li Jinhui was actually pretty surprising. He was known as the founder of pop music but, in fact, he began his career as a nationalist and a patriot who was trying to modernize the Chinese language by instituting a new, standard Mandarin to knit together the patchwork of different dialects in China to create a stronger, more unified nation.  The way that he hit upon to do this was actually to write operas for children using Chinese folk tunes, western instruments and having scripts for the kids to sing in standard Chinese..... 

[T]he young girls that he had trained became the biggest stars in Chinese pop music and on Chinese screens. He, himself, became a very famous song writer and kind of pioneered this new style of modern jazz music, almost against his will or expectations....

In the early ’30s, the ruling Nationalist Party had a movement called the New Life Movement. It was basically a propaganda movement to instill proper virtues and morality in the people. The Nationalist Party at that time wanted to adopt or re-champion Confucian morality as a sort of ideological glue for the nation. So, they wanted to clamp down on Li Jinhui because they saw the music as being decadent. There was a lot of hypocrisy in that and, of course, once you ban something, it just means it does even better in the marketplace.

It seems like there should be a movie about Buck Clayton and Li Jinhui. Trying to remember my father, I stumble into their story, and it feels so terribly sad. And I've drifted so far from the starting point. This record has nothing to do with China. My father was always trying to engage me in conversations about anything. I'm sure China was one of his topics, maybe jazz in China, maybe black jazz men in the marines, and how the Chinese treated American black men, and how the Chinese treated their own jazz men. But all those conversations, which he sought so dearly, are eternally unspoken.

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"If a person is gay and seeks God and has good will, who am I to judge him?"

Asks the Pope.

"The problem is not having this orientation," he said. "We must be brothers. The problem is lobbying by this orientation, or lobbies of greedy people, political lobbies, Masonic lobbies, so many lobbies. This is the worse problem."

Is that a translation? If so, how did the translator get to "lobbies"? I presume what he was saying is something very similar to what conservatives in the United States say, that we're all individuals and all human, and we shouldn't have special interest groups pushing us around making special demands, seeking special privileges. Note how his list of lobbies progressed, not from gay people to race and gender, but on to "greedy people" (economic interest groups?) and the generic "political." Then before the totally generic "so many lobbies," he inserted the Masons.

3 observations:

1. What is the depth of the Pope's conciliatory tone toward gay people? Is it more than a display of love toward the human beings who feel urges that he will still teach should be resisted?

2. Are the Masons up to anything these days that is seriously troubling the Pope? (I see that last October, when Benedict was still Pope and his former butler was on trial for stealing "highly sensitive papers the pontiff had marked 'to be destroyed,'" there were headlines like "Trial reveals papal butler's interest in Masonry, Church scandals.")

3. Did Francis say "lobbies" and is he being lobbied? The meaning of "lobby" he's using is (from the unlinkable OED): "In extended use: a sectional interest..., a business, cause, or principle supported by a group of people; the group of persons supporting such an interest." Examples of this usage, going back to 1952, are all in British writings, and I think it sounds odd to Americans, who think of "lobby" more in terms of groups organized for the purpose of affecting legislation. The term goes back to the 17th century, when there was a specific entrance-hall — literally, a lobby — in the House of Commons, where people could interact with legislators. The OED marks the word "lobbyist" as "Chiefly U.S."

The Pope referred to the "gay lobby" last month. Here's a NYT article from June 12th:

For years, perhaps even centuries, it has been an open secret in Rome: That some prelates in the Vatican hierarchy are gay. But the whispers were amplified this week when Pope Francis himself, in a private audience, appears to have acknowledged what he called a “gay lobby” operating inside the Vatican, vying for power and influence.

The remarks — which the Vatican spokesman did not deny and the participants at the private audience confirmed — appeared to be part of an effort by the pope to take on the entrenched interests in the Vatican that many believe were a factor in why the previous pope, Benedict XVI, resigned unexpectedly....

“In the Curia, there are also holy people, really, there are holy people. But there also is a stream of corruption, there is that as well, it is true,” [Pope Francis] said in Spanish... “The ‘gay lobby’ is mentioned, and it is true, it is there ... We need to see what we can do,” Francis continued....

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Did the Pope say "allow ourselves to be smitten" by the love of Jesus?

Last night's "Smitten by his love" post brought email from ddh:

Your suspicion that the Pope did not say "smitten" is correct. After an introductory paragraph in Portuguese, the Pope switched to his native Spanish and said, according to the Vatican:

Pero la Cruz invita también a dejarnos contagiar por este amor, nos enseña así a mirar siempre al otro con misericordia y amor, sobre todo a quien sufre, a quien tiene necesidad de ayuda, a quien espera una palabra, un gesto.

I translate this sentence as:

But the Cross also invites us to let ourselves be infected by this love, it teaches us always to look at the other person with mercy and love, especially to the one who suffers, the one who needs help, the one who awaits a word, a gesture.

So, what he really said was "contagiar" or "to be infected." By the way, most native Portuguese speakers can understand Spanish without great difficulty, although not perfectly. I think for English speakers the effect is akin to listening to a Robert Burns poem.

Who is in a position to confirm whether the effect of Spanish on native speakers of Portuguese is like the effect of Robert Burns poetry on native English speakers? Perhaps no one, but I like the analogy anyway. It's poetic.

Also poetic — or so it feels to me, in translation — is the Pope's invitation to expose ourselves to contagious love. Love as disease is a very old metaphor. Lovesick. Fever. But here the idea is an outbreak, an epidemic of love spreading everywhere.

In English, "contagion" feels — at least to me — more positive than "infection," though "infection" is used positively in phrases like "infectious laughter."

Consulting the (unlinkable) OED, I see that one old meaning of "infect" is: "To instil in (someone) an opinion or belief, esp. a pernicious one, as heresy or seditious views. Of an (esp. pernicious) opinion, belief, etc.: to persuade, win over (someone); to seduce. In early use also in a good or neutral sense."

1559   J. Whyte Serm. in J. Strype Ann. Reformation (1824) I. vii. 154   Books..full of pestilent doctrines, blasphemy and heresy, to infect the people.
1588   ‘M. Marprelate’ Oh read ouer D. Iohn Bridges: Epist. 26   Being infected by him with the true knowledge of the gospell.
1660   Exact Accompt Trial Regicides 55   The end of your Speech is nothing, but to infect the People.

This metaphor is important in the understanding the value of freedom of speech. Are we susceptible to infection or does exposure build up our resistance to what is harmful?

There's no verb like "infect" for the English word "contagion," which hampers the translator of "contagiar." But I assume that the Spanish word the Pope used traces back to the Latin word that led to "contagion" and that is  con- together + tangĕre to touch. "Infect," by contrast, comes from the "classical Latin infect-, past participial stem of inficere to dye, to stain, to impregnate, to imbue, to taint, to poison, to affect with disease, to corrupt < in- in- prefix2 + facere to make, do, put.")

That "impregnate" makes me ideate about things Popes say against the use of birth control and the similarity of opening oneself to the contagion of love. But let's not get distracted. The concrete image within "contagion" is touching, and "infection" connotes putting in. That makes "contagion" sound like what women do, and "infection" seems like the way of the man.

But the Pope said "contagiar," so let's look at "contagion," which has as its oldest meaning "The communication of disease from body to body by contact direct or mediate." Figuratively, we see it defined as "Hurtful, defiling, or corrupting contact; infecting influence," a usage that goes back to Chaucer in the 14th century:

c1386   Chaucer Second Nun's Tale 72   My soule..That troubled is by the contagioun Of my body....
1776   Gibbon Decline & Fall I. xxi. 591   His mind was tainted by the contagion of fanaticism.
1836   C. Thirlwall Hist. Greece II. xiii. 190   The contagion of these vices undoubtedly spread through the nation.

A second old figurative use is "Contagious or spreading moral disease; moral corruption," and then, in a positive way, closest to the Pope's meaning, "The contagious or ‘catching’ influence or operation of example, sympathy, and the like."

1781   Gibbon Decline & Fall II. 117   The contagion of loyalty and repentance was communicated from rank to rank.
1863   A. P. Stanley Lect. Jewish Church I. xviii. 397   A contagion of goodness, of enthusiasm, of energy..almost impossible to resist.

ADDED: Some attention should be paid to the idea of "invitation." God/Jesus/the Cross does not infect or produce contagion on its own. Its action is to invite. We have to accept the invitation to get the contagion/infection. It's voluntary. The human mind counts. But if you allow yourself to be touched/impregnated, then you will have something that surpasses the rational mind. These images are very helpful in thinking more generally about freedom of speech and the right to receive the speech of others. Censorship represents the fear of contagion, but if you see the speech as an invitation and the human mind as capable of deciding which beliefs to accept, contagion is less fearsome.

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"Smitten by his love."

"The cross of Christ invites us also to allow ourselves to be smitten by his love, teaching us always to always look upon others with mercy and tenderness," said Pope Francis, in Brazil. I don't think he was speaking English. But... smitten.

It's just the past participle of "smite," which is a strange old word that we associate with God striking someone dead. We think of it used comically, affecting an old-time locution.

Here are some uses of "smitten" I found in the (unlinkable) OED:

1819 Shelley Lines Castlereagh Admin. ii, The abortion with which she travaileth Is Liberty, smitten to death.

1671 Milton Paradise Regain'd iv. 559 But Satan smitten with amazement fell.

1848 Thackeray Vanity Fair xvii. 149 Young..Lieutenant Spatterdash..was evidently and quickly smitten by Mrs. Crawley.

Here's the Shelley poem in full:

Lines Written During The Castlereagh Administration.

1.
Corpses are cold in the tomb;
Stones on the pavement are dumb;
Abortions are dead in the womb,
And their mothers look pale--like the death-white shore
Of Albion, free no more.                                   5

2.
Her sons are as stones in the way--
They are masses of senseless clay--
They are trodden, and move not away,--
The abortion with which SHE travaileth
Is Liberty, smitten to death.                              10

3.
Then trample and dance, thou Oppressor!
For thy victim is no redresser;
Thou art sole lord and possessor
Of her corpses, and clods, and abortions--they pave
Thy path to the grave.                                     15

4.
Hearest thou the festival din
Of Death, and Destruction, and Sin,
And Wealth crying "Havoc!" within?
'Tis the bacchanal triumph that makes Truth dumb,
Thine Epithalamium.                                        20

5.
Ay, marry thy ghastly wife!
Let Fear and Disquiet and Strife
Spread thy couch in the chamber of Life!
Marry Ruin, thou Tyrant! and Hell be thy guide
To the bed of the bride! 

ADDED: After receiving email about the Spanish words spoken by the Pope, I wrote another post.

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"I don't like being described as 'sniffing'?"

Says Meade, reading the last post. I'm going for vivid verbs, but I'm still attentive to image control. Meade's not a big language pedant, but he says: "I do object to the suffix '-wise,' like 'weatherwise.'"

"But when I said 'weatherwise,'" I say, referring to the time I said 'weatherwise' the other day, "I was making an allusion to that Frank Sinatra song. Weatherwise, it's such a lovely day... Come fly with me...."



When that album came out, in 1958, my father looked exactly like that. It's funny, when you're a kid — I was 7 — you can get the feeling that if someone looks just like someone else, that they kind of are that person. And not just in that jokey separated-at-birth way. (You never see them in the same place at the same time, ever notice?) But in some mystic way. Even when you know it's not true. It's still kind of true.

Did anyone ever come up to you and accuse you of being a celebrity and when you said that you were not, they insisted that you were? Meade had that experience. Here's Meade's 70s-era doppelganger. ("But you didn't have that hairy mole," I protest, questioning the story.)

Do you pop the bubble of fantasy or not? Would Frank Sinatra admit to being Frank Sinatra? If he were my father, he'd sign the autograph — Frank Sinatra — and get rid of the crumb.

The above-pictured album is somewhere in this pile of records that I inherited from my father, who was a terrible singer, but loved music:



I have a planned blog project related to these records, which I might roll out soon.

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The verb "opt."

I like it... and used it in the previous post. ("[O]bviously if you have a single-parent household, you'll need some kind of income stream to opt to say at home." I liked the "obv... opt" combo.) But Meade sniffed at this usage. Is it as off as using "impact" as a verb? (Which I don't do.)

The (unlinkable) OED has the earliest usage of "opt" as a verb coming in 1853 — which is relatively recent — and written by Frederick Douglass:

1853   Frederick Douglass Paper (Rochester, N.Y.) (Electronic text) 16 Sept.,   This course will not suit a discriminating public. They must opt for something more than long winded and rapid declamations.

There are 3 other 19th century examples, and both put "opt" in quotes. ("1899... The two boys 'opted'  for the Navy.") By contrast, the word "option" goes back to the 1500s. So I guess it's like "enthuse," which the OED comes right out and calls "an ignorant back-formation" (from "enthusiasm"). But why isn't "opt" called "an ignorant back-formation"? What makes a new usage "ignorant"? Or does it make more sense to say: There's one thing that makes it not ignorant: when the first use appears in the writings of the revered former slave Frederick Douglass.
Speaking of earlier posts and things Meade has said about my writing, he recently chided me for aiming the word "ignorant" at a black person. He maintained that there is great sensitivity about that word. WaPo columnist Eugene Robinson had made an assumption about the George Zimmerman case that I called "either ignorant or shamefully deceptive." At the time, I said I had thought carefully about word choice, and I thought "ignorant" was the right word because it focuses on the lack of information, not intelligence, and anyway, in my 2 alternatives — ignorant/deceptive — the hurtful accusation is deceit, and ignorance was a gracious offer of an out. And why should I coddle Eugene Robinson? He's one of the elite. It would be patronizing.

So, now, googling, I did find this: "Is the word 'ignorant' a racial slur?" I think the answer is no, but I do see some evidence of sensitivity around the word, depending on the way you attach it to a noun, notably when you call someone "an ignorant [blank]," especially when the blank is a nasty word, as in "Jane, you ignorant slut."

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"Naked Or Nude?"

An old question...

In fine art, the female body is a nude. In not-so-fine art, she's naked. In Richmond, the Virginia Museum of Fine Art's Wesselmann show has a bit of both.

Jeesh. That's so NPR.

I remember discussing the naked/nude distinction back in '07....

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Does anyone in the Bible ever say "hello"?

It's all translation, if it's in English, and "hello" is a pretty recent English word. (The OED puts its earliest use in the year 1827.) I spent some time with the various translations at BibleGateway, and I found at least one that has "hello" — the Contemporary English Version, within which "hello" appears exactly twice:

Job 17:14 Then I could greet the grave as my father and say to the worms, “Hello, mother and sisters!”

Matthew 26:49 Judas walked right up to Jesus and said, “Hello, teacher.” Then Judas kissed him.

Great material! Job and Judas come across as a couple of darkly edgy comedians.

Why was I looking for "hello" in the Bible? I got caught up — after writing this post — in the meaning of "hail" in "Hail Mary." I was puzzling over whether or not there should be a comma between "hail" and "Mary," which I was reading to mean basically "Hello, Mary." But the Contemporary English Version of the Bible doesn't use "Hello, Mary" in the relevant verse (which is Luke 1:28). (It has: "The angel greeted Mary and said, 'You are truly blessed! The Lord is with you.'")

A common alternative word for "hail" in that verse is "rejoice." I'm also seeing "Greetings!" which seems pretty close to Hello. I thought about other uses of "hail." Meade — who grew up in West Lafayette, home of Purdue — brought up "Hail Purdue." That made me, an alumna of the University of Michigan, think of "Hail! to the victors valiant." And then there's "Hail to the Chief" and "Hail to thee, blithe spirit!" (beginning Shelley's "To a Skylark").

What does "hail" mean beyond "hello"?

"Heil Hitler" is translated as "Hail Hitler." It's not "Hello Hitler," which seems edgily absurd. You could sing it to the tune of "Hello, Dolly," which has a comma, I might note, unlike Hello Kitty.

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"Really? Really?"

Could someone make a video clipping together every time Mark O'Mara said "Really? Really?" sarcastically during his 3 hours of closing argument in the Zimmerman case today? The first "really?" got a high pitch, and the second one got a low pitch. An awful lot of argument was made in the form of stating some contention of the prosecutor's and then saying "Really? Really?" in a style that I would associate with an annoying 20-year-old woman. I'm waiting for middle-aged lawyers to adopt creaky voice.

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"The developing status of sexual surrogates for the disabled, as part of a right to health and well-being: So wrong?"

"Surrogacy involves paying a professional who engages in intimate contact (broadly defined, though certainly not always intercourse) with a patient."

In March, the French National Ethics Committee decided that sexual surrogacy was an "unethical use of the human body for commercial purposes."Anne-Marie Dickelé of the National Ethics Committee justified it to Rousselle: "The sexuality of the disabled cannot be considered a right."

But some French people like Laetitia Rebord, who is confined to a wheelchair due to spinal muscular atrophy, are campaigning passionately against the committee's decision. She's 31, a virgin, and wants to have sex -- "In her sexual fantasies, she is a fit and impetuous blonde who dominates her male partners." As she told Rousselle, "Eventually, one has to address the issue and understand why we are demanding this. I can't move. I can't masturbate."...

As the world increasingly sees health care to be a human right -- Kathleen Sebelius and Barack Obama understand health care to be "not some earned privilege, it is a right'' -- it might seem a leap to not only fail to address sexuality in caring for people with conditions like Rousselle's, but to go the additional step of precluding them from procuring it for themselves. Holland, Switzerland, Denmark, and Germany agree.

How can you have a right to something that would require another human being to do something with his/her body, when the other human being has a right over his/her body? I suppose you could frame it as a right against criminalizing the activities of sex service providers who restrict their business to the disabled. This reminds me of medical marijuana as a leading edge in the movement to legalize marijuana. It seems like a steppingstone to the legalization of prostitution for anyone who wants to buy it, because who will count as disabled enough for the authorization to buy what is criminalized for everyone else?

The public will be drawn in with empathy for people like the young virgin Laetitia Rebord, who will be like the emaciated, elderly cancer patients who were the face of the medical marijuana movement. Once you define a category of persons who may partake of the forbidden activity, others will cadge their way into the category. It will involve so much stretching and lying that pragmatic, flexible folk will cave in and say: It would be better to legalize it for everyone.

But as long as we stay in the medical framework, as we talk about legalization, we're also talking about health insurance coverage. Will we be paying for the select group of medical marijuana users and disabled consumers of sex services? The pragmatic, flexible folk may say: All the more reason to legalize it for everyone, so that it's not a health care service, just something people with the cash are able to buy. But that step is crazy — unless your agenda all along is to legalize marijuana and prostitution — because the most sympathetic consumers are least likely to have the money to buy the product/service. What's the point of using the Laetitia Rebords of this world to leverage policy change only to leave them unable to benefit from the new policy?

That's the practical problem, in my view. I don't want to pay for prostitutes for everyone with a medical condition — obesity?! depression?! — that impedes the pursuit of sexual activity.

Oh! But I'm saying "prostitutes." Was I supposed to say "surrogates"? But why, really? More from the link — which goes to a piece by The Atlantic's health editor James Hamblin:

Surrogacy does not replace a loving relationship, and it should't [sic] be expected to. We don't refuse the help of a physical therapist because it won't be as good as having never gotten hit by a bus to begin with. When real love is on the table, take it. When the table is missing, or someone's axed the legs, then there are surrogates.

Axed the legs... What a harsh metaphor! And right when you're trying to teach us to say "surrogate" and not "prostitution." And are prostitutes/surrogates really the alternative to "real love," deserving of the presumption that anyone who could get real love would surely go for the real love? People opt for prostitutes over real love all the time.

And why are we prompted to use the term "real love" to mean sex with someone you are in love with? I think it's because we're being lured into thinking that disabled people are denied something more than sex. They are denied love. Give them professional sex, because they are denied love and sex. They are denied a "right to health and well-being." That's supposed to make sense to you.

You're being softened up. Have you noticed... are are you so squishy for Laetitia you're too numb to tell?

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"President Obama gave a speech Monday instructing Americans not to be so 'cynical' about government."

I had to do a double take at the date. Yeah, Monday. Yesterday. Didn't he already do that malaise cynicism routine already? (Answer: Yes, in May.)

But here we go again.

President Obama.... then explained that the major problem with government is that it does not run as efficiently as "one of the most inclusive and most successful campaigns in American history." His own....

If that's supposed to make us feel less cynical, it's not working on me. A campaign is about trouncing the other side. The metaphor is military. (The original meaning of the word refers to an open field, and then the idea is of the army operating out in the field.)

And speaking of metaphor...

"What matters in the end is completion. Performance. Results...." Mr. Obama continued. 

Conquer that territory.

You're making me cynical. You're making me laugh. But you're making me cynical.

***

Actually, the original image of a military "campaign" wasn't really about conquering these fields. The (unlinkable) OED says:

The name arose in the earlier conditions of warfare, according to which an army remained in quarters (in towns, garrisons, fortresses, or camps) during the winter, and on the approach of summer issued forth into the open country (nella campagna, dans la campagne) or ‘took the field,' until the close of the season again suspended active operations. Hence the name properly signifying the ‘being in the field,’ was also applied, now to the season or time during which the army kept the field, and now to the series of operations performed during this time. In the changed conditions of modern warfare, the season of the year is of much less importance, and a campaign has now no direct reference to time or season, but to an expedition or continuous series of operations bearing upon a distinct object, the accomplishment or abandonment of which marks its end, whether in the course of a week or two, or after one or more years.

And in the changed conditions of modern political campaigns, there's no longer a particular season. It never ends. But Obama wants a campaign model for the government that must be done after the election campaign is over. It's confusing. It's often been said that Obama wants an endless political campaign. But Obama speaks of completion. So there is the idea of an end. What matters in the end is completion. It will end, but it will end when the goals are accomplished.

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This is a post about the shade of meaning between "laconic" and "taciturn."

There really was a place called Laconia. It's where Sparta was. The OED says "laconic" means, first,  "Characteristic of the Laconians; Spartan-like" and quotes John Adams:

1787   J. Adams Def. Constit. Govt. U.S. Pref., in Wks. (1851) IV. 287   The latest revolution that we read of, was conducted..in the Grecian style, with laconic energy.

But that's not the meaning we want. We want definition #2, from the (unlinkable) OED: "Following the Laconian manner, esp. in speech and writing; brief, concise, sententious. Of persons: Affecting a brief style of speech." Example:

1888   A. K. Green Behind Closed Doors iii. 28   ‘Trust me’ was his laconic rejoinder.

Now, "taciturn" — an adjective based on "tacit" (silent) — has only one meaning: "Characterized by silence or disinclination to conversation; reserved in speech; saying little; uncommunicative." Examples:

1771   T. Smollett Humphry Clinker II. 107   Grieve..was very submissive, respectful, and remarkably taciturn.
1816   Remarks Eng. Mann. 61   The people in Europe who partake most with us in this taciturn propensity, are the Dutch.
1849   T. B. Macaulay Hist. Eng. II. vi. 68   Godolphin, cautious and taciturn, did his best to preserve neutrality.
1876   J. S. Bristowe Treat. Theory & Pract. Med. ii. vi. 852   The patient becomes apathetic, morose or taciturn, or irritable.

So if someone is laconic, he's not against communicating. He's about a certain style of communication: concision. But if someone is taciturn, he's avoiding communication. Taciturn speaks more of a personality type, and not in a good way.

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"As a dogge that turneth aȝen to his spuyng, so is an vnprudent man that rehersith his fooli."

1. So said Wycliffe's Bible, in Middle English, around 1382, translating a proverb that can be more easily understood in the King James form, from 1611: "As a dog returneth to his vomit, so a fool returneth to his folly." No need to get more modern than that.

2. "Returneth" is nice (and helpful to those who lisp). The double "returneth" may seem more poetic than "turneth... rehersith." But you've got to love "fooli" for "folly." The older form is more accessible. And "spuyng" for "vomit"... surely, we lost something there.

3. "Dog" is a very old word of unknown etymology, according to the (unlinkable) OED, which proceeds to explain this particular unknown at great length. Do you prefer the older form "dogge"? (Which I presume was pronounced "doggie.")

4. I'm rummaging around in the OED under "dog" after writing that first post of the day, about the dog vomit fungus, which was the first post today because it's something that came up on the front lawn overnight. (Some things come up in conversation, and other things come up on the front lawn.) The OED has no entry for the fungus, but I tumbled upon the old aphorism, and thought you might find some use for it.

5. I, of course, was returning to my old fooli, having blogged about dog vomit fungus in 2006, and, in fact, I was inclined to return to another old fooli: dog's breakfast, which sounds like something you could order at The Slime Mold Café, which could have been the name of that first post (since it fits the Althouse blog model of a "café" post, having a photograph and an open-ended invitation to talk).

6. The OED says:

dog's breakfast n. slang (orig. U.S.) a confused mess; = dog's dinner n.

1915   New Castle (Pa.) News 13 Feb. 2/5   They abandoned the plan, went ahead in their own way, and have gotten their side all messed up, like a dog's breakfast.
1959   Times 29 Apr. 10/4   He can't make head or tail of it... It's a complete dog's breakfast.
2004   Classic Rock Oct. 102/3   The 1974 record..is either the furthest-reaching concept album ever made, or the biggest dog's breakfast in the entire history of the state of California.

7. What 1974 record? Can you guess without Googling? I'll give you another excerpt:

Here, no longer held back by the leashes of a mere rock band, Ray wastes no time wading right into a carnival of jazz and samba, synth and rumba, rock-opera and boogie-woogie, all the while wearing golden Tutankhamun facepaint and global new-age influences on his sleeve.

8. Ray was not returning to his old fooli, but moving on to new fooli. How about you?

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