Fluke

Fluke (pronounced flook)

(1) In nautical jargon, the part of an anchor that catches in the ground, especially the flat triangular piece at the end of each arm (also called flue).

(2) A barb, or the barbed head, of a harpoon, spear, arrow etc (also called flue).

(3) A metal hook on the head of certain staff weapons (such as a bill), made in various forms depending on function, whether used for grappling or to penetrate armour when swung at an opponent.

(4) In metal casting, a wing-like formation on a central piece (similar to a spur and often a product of the vesting process to be filed off.

(5) In industrial processing, waste cotton.

(6) Either half (the triangular lobes) of the tail of cetacean (whales, dolphins, porpoises and such).

(7) An accidental advantage; a stroke of good luck; a fortuitous event.

(8) An accident or chance happening.

(9) In cue sports (billiards and such), a successful shot, achieved wholly by accident.

(10) In ichthyology, any of several American flounders of the genus Paralichthys, found in the Atlantic Ocean; used loosely, any of various other flatfishes (an often used an an alternative name for the flounder).

(11) Any parasitic flatworm (notably the blood fluke and liver fluke), of the classes Monogenea and Digenea (formerly united in a single class Trematoda (as trematodes)).

Pre 900: From the Middle English flok, fluke & flewke, from the Old English flōcand cognate with the Old Norse flōki; It may be compared with the and the Old High German flah (flat (source of the modern German flach)), from the Proto-Germanic flakaz although for technical reasons related to the phonetics, etymologists seem to prefer a link with the Middle Low German vlögel (wing) and Germanic vlōch & vlucht (used in the sense of both “wing” & “flight”) or even vlunke (the modern Low German Flunk (wing, pinion)).  The modern use in German of fluke to describe the tail of whales and such is thought to be borrowed from English.  The use of fish came from the Old English flōc (flatfish), of Germanic origin, related to the German flach (flat), the Old Saxon flaka (sole), the Old High German flah (smooth) and the Old Norse floke (flatfish, flounder, flak, floe; disk), all ultimately from Proto-Germanic flakaz, from the primitive Indo European root plak- (to be flat).  The parasitic worm was so named in the 1660s by virtue of the distinctive (flat) shape.  Fluke is a noun & verb, flukishness is a noun, fluking is a verb, fluked is a verb & adjective, flukeless, fulkesque, flukelike, flukier, flukish, fluky, flukier & flukiest are adjectives and flukily is an adverb; the noun plural is flukes (the plural fluke used of the fish; flukes used otherwise including of the flatworms).

Lawyer and feminist activist, Sandra Fluke (b 1981), Ms magazine, Vol XXII, No 2, Spring-Summer 2012.

The use to describe the components of anchors, harpoons and such dates from the mid-sixteenth century and is of obscure origin, most etymologists concluding it was adopted cognizant of the original sense of “flat”, the reference used originally of the flat, pointed end of a anchor and that may have been picked up either from fluke in the sense of “the flatfish” (based on the shape) or from the Low German flügel (wing).  What is certain is the anchor’s triangular fitting was transferred to the tails of whales (and later other cetaceans), that in use by at least 1725.  Fluke has been used in the sense of “a lucky stroke, a chance hit” only since 1857 (when it appeared in the press also as “flook” and the origin is obscure although most sources suggest it came from billiards.  The speculative theories include (1) a reference to a whale's use of flukes rapidly to propel themselves in the ocean, (2) a re-purposing of the contemporary sailors slang “going-a-flunking” (to sail quickly; to go fast) or (3) an English dialectal origin (in the sense of “a guess”).  The adjective fluky (depending on chance rather than skill (“pure ass” a modern form)) was in use by at least 1867.  The “fluke” usually is something “lucky or fortuitous” but there are also the idiomatic phrases “fluke out”, “flukes out”, “fluking out” & “fluked out” which is “to lose or fail due to a fluke; to deserve to win or succeed but instead lose due to a fluke, especially a last-minute or unpredictable fluke” and thus connected with the notion of “defeat from the jaws of victory”.  The “fluke up” (also as “flukes up”, “fluking up” & “fluked up”) is not dependent on the existence of a “fluke” (in any sense) but means “to mess up; to blunder; to fail” and is a polite form of “fuck up”.  The special coinings flukicide & flukicidal are used in relation to the killing of the parasitic fluke worms.

Fluke Networks Cable Tester RJ45, LinkIQ (Part Number LIQ-KIT).

Fluke Corporation is a highly-regarded US manufacturer of industrial test, measurement and diagnostic equipment best known for their electronic test gear.  The company was founded in 1948 by John Fluke (1911-1984), then working at General Electric (GE).

In medical use, the variations include bile fluke (Clonorchis sinensis), blood fluke (Schistosomatidae spp.), bladder fluke (Schistosoma haematobium), cat liver fluke (Opisthorchis felineus), cecal fluke (Postharmostomum gallinum), Chinese liver fluke (Clonorchis sinensis), deer fluke (Fascioloides magna), lancet fluke (and lancet liver fluke) (Dicrocoelium dendriticum), sheep liver fluke (Fasciola hepatica),  lung fluke (Paragonimus spp.), giant intestinal fluke (Fasciolopsis buski) and giant liver fluke (Fascioloides magna); the last two sounding most ominous.  In ichthyology, the names include bannock fluke (Rhombus maximus), Gulf fluke (Paralichthys albiguttus), long fluke (Hippoglossoides limandoides), pole fluke (Glyptocephalus cynoglossus), sail fluke (Lepidorhombus whiffiagonis), American fluke (Fascioloides magna) and sand fluke (Hippoglossoides limandoides).

Poster for Just My Luck (2006, left) and four of the shots (right) from the roll taken by Larry Schwartzwald on Madison Avenue in 2005.

Being one of the industry’s notorious nictators, it was perhaps something not especially flukish when a paparazzo took a photograph of Lindsay Lohan winking but what was a fluke was the shot was perfect for a movie poster, the thought being the wink was a midliminal device which convey the message “you will have a marvellously good time if you watch this film” and the starlet must have agreed because for a while, the wink became her signature gesture.  According to the authoritative PosterWire, Ms Lohan sat for a photo shoot so promotional shots would be ready for the release (even wearing an auburn wig because she had by then entered her famous blonde phase) but the studio rejected what was offered because they were “too high style which was not the vibe of the film.”  Another photo session was scheduled but then someone remembered the paparazzi “winking shot”; not only did it become the poster but it also inspired the film’s tag line: “Everything changed in the wink of an eye.”  The shot used for Just My Luck (2006) was taken the previous year on Madison Avenue by New York Post photographer Larry Schwartzwald (1953-2021) who had the untypical background (among the paparazzi) of studying literature at New York University and, as he proved, “everything is text”.

Donald Trump (b 1946; US president 2017-2021; president elect 2024), Butler, Pennsylvania, 13 July 2024, the “blood shot” (left) and the “bullet shot” (right), both by Doug Mills (b 1960), who has shot (in the photographic sense) every president since Ronald Reagan (1911-2004; US president 1981-1989).

The “blood shot” is destined to become one of the images of twenty-first US politics and while in many ways “perfect”, it’s really not a “fluke” because at that point, every photographer on site was snapping away and something similar was guaranteed to emerge.  Noting the injury was to Mr Trump’s right ear, some immediately dubbed the “bullet shot” the “In one ear and out the other” but it was a genuine fluke because if snapped a millisecond earlier or later, the “speeding bullet” would not have been in the frame; a “one in a million” (at least) shot and therefore flukish.

Hybristophilia

Hybristophilia (Pronounced hi-bris-a-fil-ee-uh)

An attraction to an individual who has committed a crime.

1986: The construct was the Ancient Greek ὑβρίζειν (hubrízein) (to commit an outrage against someone), +‎ -philia.  The -philia suffix was from the Ancient Greek φιλία (philía) (fraternal) love).  It was used to form nouns conveying a liking or love for something and in clinical use was applied often to an abnormal or obsessive interest, especially if it came to interfere with other aspects of life (the general term is paraphilia).  The companion suffix is the antonym -phobia. The related forms are the prefixes phil- & philo- and the suffixes -philiac, -philic, -phile & -phily.  One who exhibits hybristophilia is a hybristophile.  Hybristophilia & hybristophile are nouns; the noun plural is hybristophiles.

Brought to you by Cosmo which interviewed Dr Money for the December 1990 edition.

Although never explicitly mentioned in the American Psychiatric Association's (APA) Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), the phenomenon has long been noted and in popular culture is better known as “Bonnie & Clyde syndrome”.  In the mental health community, hybristophilia is (now sometimes) regarded as a paraphilia (a class of mental disorder characterized by a preference for or obsession with unusual (some still treated as “abnormal”) sexual practices) and the word “hybristophila” was in 1986 introduced by Johns Hopkins University professor Dr John Money (1921–2006), a New Zealand-born psychologist and sexologist with an untypical background whose work on human sexuality and gender remains controversial.  Dr Money’s had an academic interest in those who exhibited a sexual attraction towards individuals who committed serious crimes.

In the literature, it’s clear most hybristophiles are female, something not unexpected given the extent to which crime is a male-dominated business; most of the academic work in the field seems to have focused on women who have developed strong affectionate or romantic feelings towards individuals incarcerated for serious crimes and it’s been studied both in psychiatry and criminology.  Over the decades, the understanding of hybristophilia has evolved and there’s now a greater appreciation of the nuances which can extend to the political and although the original definition was restricted to sexual attraction (conventionally defined), aspects such as “thrill-seeking”, “sympathy”, “celebrity status hunting” (including deals for interviews and such) and a desire to “nurture or reform” have all been identified as factors which may influence the behaviour while some sources claim an alleged increased frequency of instances may be related to the rise in volume of “true crime” material on the internet and streaming services.  Of interest too is the role of the media in “romanticising” criminals and the rise (indeed the standardization) of the methods used by on-line dating apps: the response generated by the publication of a “hot” police mug-shot, the behaviour is not greatly different from “swiping right” on Tinder.

There has been criticism of the profession’s approach to hybristophilia, usually on the grounds of the definition being too broad and prone to the generation of ambiguities, some arguing the term may pathologize normal variations of human attraction, while others question the empirical evidence supporting its classification as a paraphilia.  Of course, the editors of the DSM have never listed it as a paraphilia and it is others who have made the link which at least implies a degree of disapprobation, the phenomenon perceived seemingly as a form of self-harm from which women need to be protected, an attitude with something of a history in psychiatry and medicine generally.  The matter of hybristophilia is emblematic of the general problem of the DSM’s category of paraphilic disorders being thought of as a sort of dumping ground for sexual behaviour thought unusual and when the fifth edition (DSM-5) was published in 2013, the editors acknowledged this by differentiating between (1) atypical human sexual behavior and (2) behavior either causing mental distress to a patient or which makes the them a threat to the psychological or physical well-being of others.  Although it’s clear legal implications played a part in the editorial committee’s discussions about revising diagnostic criteria, the goal really was to update the disorders in the category in a way which would reflect the outcomes for patients and those with whom they interacted rather than abstractions about the behaviour itself.

Lindsay Lohan and her lawyer in court, Los Angeles, December 2011.

What emerged was a change in the defined characteristics of paraphilic disorders, a recognition most people with atypical (as opposed to “abnormal”) sexual interests do not have a mental disorder requiring treatment.  After the DSM-5, to be diagnosed with a paraphilic disorder, a patient must either (1) feel personal distress about their interest (not merely a distress resulting from society’s disapproval) or (2) have a sexual desire or behavior that involves another person’s psychological distress, injury, or death or (3) have a desire to indulge in sexual behaviors involving unwilling persons or persons unable to give legal, informed consent.  There was also a process of re-naming conditions to delineate between an atypical sexual interest and a defined disorder, a process which essentially differentiated between the behavior and the disorder stemming from that behaviour; the APA was giving its imprimatur for folk to engage in consensual atypical sexual behavior without inappropriately being labeled with a mental disorder. With this revision, the DSM-5 distinguished between atypical sexual interests and mental disorders involving these desires or behaviors.  That hybristophilia is not specifically mentioned in any edition of the DSM is thus not an omission as such and the DSM-5 did include the diagnostic category called “Other Specified Paraphilic Disorders” (OSPD) which was created to encompass atypical sexual interests causing significant distress or impairment but not fulfilling the criteria for any of the listed specific paraphilic disorders.  In other words, OSPD was there as a kind of clearing house for clinicians who identified a problem and that might include a hybristophile if the behaviour is causing personal distress or impairment (or consequent problems for others with whom they have some relationship).

Baldur von Schirach in the dock, where he told some lies and some partial truths, Palace of Justice, Nuremberg, May, 1946.

Baldur von Schirach (1907-1974; head of the Hitlerjugend (Hitler Youth) 1931-1940 & Gauleiter (district party leader) and Reichsstatthalter (Governor) of Vienna 1940-1945) would in 1946 have been hanged had some of the material relating to his time as governor of Vienna been brought before the court at the first Nuremberg Trial (1945-1946) but he instead received a 20 year sentence for which he should have been more grateful than ever he was.  In 1965, he was found to be suffering a detached retina and, after some objections from the Soviets, he was sent to the British military hospital in Berlin for surgery.  While under guard in his room on the second floor, the guards noticed movement in the tree next to the window and upon investigation, found a woman climbing the trunk.  She said he name was Karin Stein and told her interrogators she’d had always been “desperately in love” with their prisoner and had for years been sending him letters, cards and flowers (none of which he’d ever been allowed to receive).  She was escorted from the hospital and released but later returned, disguised as a nurse and managed to reach the door to his room before being stopped.  This hybristophile was a good stalker and turned up outside Spandau Prison when, at the stroke of midnight, he was released on 1 October 1966.  She would haunt him for some years.

“Sexy Sadie” mug shot, 1969.

Other notorious criminals who have married while serving long sentences include (1) Charles Manson (1934-2017) who at the age of 80 married the 26 year old who administered his social media sites; (2) Masson family member Susan “Sexy Sadie” Atkins (1948–2009) who in 1981 married someone who had convinced her was a multi-millionaire (she had the marriage annulled when she learned he was poor and had 35 prior marriages) before in 1987 marrying a law student to whom she remained married until her death; (3) Manson family member Charles Denton "Tex" Watson (b 1945) who, after becoming a born again Christian in 1975, married an admirer in 1979 and became an ordained minister, going on to father four children before the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation banned conjugal visits for those serving life sentences (the couple divorced in 2003); (4) In custody, confessed serial killer, rapist and necrophile, Ted Bundy (1946-1989) married a twice-divorced mother of two who'd dated him before his arrest and in 1982 she gave birth to a daughter in 1982, naming Bundy as the father; (5) Serial killer Richard Ramirez (1960–2013, dubbed “The Night Stalker” by the press) received his death sentence for, inter alia, 13 murders, five attempted murders and 11 sexual assaults. Seven years into his time on death row, he married a freelance magazine editor who had been in correspondence with him for some years, telling CNN in 1997: “He's kind, he's funny, he's charming, I just believe in him completely.  In my opinion, there was far more evidence to convict O.J. Simpson, and we all know how that turned out."  (6) Both the  Menendez brothers (Lyle (b 1968) & Erik (born 1970), the pair now back in the news) attracted hybristophiles.  Lyle married twice, firstly to a former model (who divorced him after she found out he was writing to another woman) and subsequently to a magazine editor who has since become an attorney although tabloid revelations that about Lyle leading a “double life” in prison as a gay man can’t have made for marital bliss.  Erik married just the once and the couple are still together; (7) There is also apparently (although undocumented) the condition “hybristophile rebound”: serial killer, kidnapper, and rapist Kenneth Bianchi (b 1951) married a woman with whom he’d been corresponding; earlier she had tried woo Ted Bundy before focusing her sights on Bianchi.

Brian Thompson (1974–2024; chief executive officer (CEO) of UnitedHealthcare 2021-2024, left) and Free Luigi hoodie from Chill Guy (right).

Hybristophilia need not of necessity be a matter of sexual attraction although it’s those cases which attract the most publicity.  Somewhat different is the widespread acclaim expressed towards Luigi Mangione (b 1998) who stands accused of the execution-style murder of Brian Thompson.  Mr Thompson was CEO of a health insurance company which had become notorious for its practices of “deny, delay & defend” (there are alliterative variations to that string) to avoid paying out against claims and the popularity of Mr Mangione is more a case of becoming a “folk hero” with his alleged victim being emblematic of corporate greed and the misuse of power in the US.  Still, it’s inevitable Mr Mangione will attract proposals of marriage; even among those not drawn to his single-handed attack on the excesses of capitalism, some will have noted his good-looking mug shot.  Not even 24 hours passed between the news of Mr Mangione’s arrest and the appearance on-line of “Free Luigi” merchandise.

Mr Ghosn (left) and Mr Putin (Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin; b 1952; president or prime minister of Russia since 1999, right), the Kremlin, Moscow, 2006.

Another who became an instant folk hero (among certain groups) was the Brazilian born Carlos Ghosn (b 1954) of Lebanese descent.  While in Japan serving as CEO of Nissan and chairman of Mitsubishi Motors, Mr Ghosn was arrested on suspicion of financial misconduct at Nissan involving millions of dollars and, possibly noting the 99% conviction rate of the famously efficient Japanese criminal justice system, while under house arrest awaiting trial, he arranged to have himself enclosed in a large freight box which was flown out of the country on a private jet.  Upon landing at Lebanon’s Beirut–Rafic Hariri International Airport, the fugitive was greeted by cheering crowds, a reaction which played into the prejudices many hold about the Lebanese national character.  There is no extradition treaty between Japan and Lebanon.

Diva

Diva (pronounced dee-vuh or dee-vah)

(1) A distinguished female singer; a prima donna.

(2) By later extension, any female celebrity, especially one who sings.

(3) In slang (use can be derogatory or affectionate),a person with an exalted opinion of their worth, is demanding of others and fussy about personal privileges.

1864: From the Italian diva (diva, goddess, a fine or beautiful woman), from the Latin dīva (goddess), feminine of dīvus (divine, divine one; notably a deified mortal (and related to related to deus (god, deity)), from the Old Latin deivā, from the Proto-Italic deiwā (goddess), feminine of deiwos (god), from the primitive Indo-European deywós (god) & (dyeu- (to shine (in derivatives: “sky, heaven, god”).  Diva, divaism & divadom are nouns and divaesque, divalike & divaish are adjectives; the noun plural is dive or (more commonly in English) divas.  The verbs divaed & divaing have been used but are non-standard.

The use of “diva” began on the Opera stages and it’s not clear who was the first soprano so labeled.  The first known reference to a singer a “diva” dates from 1864 but some historians claim the model for the mode of behavior was the Spanish soprano Maria Malibran (1808-1836) who before dying tragically young was notorious for her demanding personality and dramatic ways; retrospectively “diva” was applied to her.  During her lifetime it was used also of the Swedish soprano Jenny Lind (1820-1887) although apparently only in relation to the beauty of her voice (she was dubbed “the Swedish Nightingale” and she’s remembered also “Jenny Lind soup” (made with mashed sago or rutabaga or sago, chicken stock thickened with a roux, Gruyère cheese, sage, egg yolks and heavy cream, all topped topped with beaten egg whites),  The link to her is said to be it being her favorite dish to sooth the chest and vocal cords prior to a performance.

Lindsay Lohan on the panel of The Masked Singer (2019).  Diva can be a term of endearment. 

Divas (real and imagined) are popular figures to parody and the word has produced a number of derived forms including (1) the nouns divaism (diva-like behavior) & divadom (the condition of being a diva; the sphere of divas) and (2) the adjectives divaesque (behavior reminiscent of a diva (the comparative more divaesque, the superlative most divaesque)), divalike & divaish (pertaining to the manner expected of a diva (some noting of the latter the anagram was HIV/AIDS)).  The adjective divaistic and the verbs divaed & divaing (doing something in a divaish way) are non-standard and used for jocular effect.  In music, the noun “diva house” described a late 1980s subgenre of house music, much associated with booming vocals (handbag house listed usually as the synonym although, being pop culture, there are likely some who find a distinction)).  The noun divo is used of “a male diva” (a man with the traits characteristic of a typical diva (used also with the implication the word should summon in the mind "deviant" (ie he's a bit gay)).  Diva (in the sense used in English) was also borrowed from the Italian in un-adapted form in Catalan, Dutch, French, Norwegian Nynorsk, Portuguese, Serbo-Croatian, Slovak, Spanish, Swedish and Turkish.

Top ten (20, 25, 100 etc) lists are a staple of publishing and the internet and some have assembled list of the “greatest” sopranos of all time but it’s really not possible to compare those who performed over centuries.  For those of the pre-electronic age, obviously no recordings exist and the only evidence of their stage performances is the subjective writings of critics and other contemporaries (of their divalike behavior the contemporary reports may be more reliable).  Even well into the twentieth century, the capabilities of the technology used to record sound and the dubious quality of the storage media means it’s difficult to compare and while “digital re-mastering” greatly enhances sound, it’s not entirely certain how closely the result emulates what originally would have been heard.  These difficulties exist in many fields.  In boxing it’s a challenge to creating rankings because those of one era never fought those in another and in sports where the equipment has such an influence (such as golf and tennis), it can be hard to work out where technology ended and ability & application began.  Even the notions of “best” and greatest are contested.  In something like sprinting where everything comes down to a single metric (such as the elapsed time over 100 metres) perhaps it’s possible but is “the best” by definition the current holder of the world record, whomever held it longest or the runner who was judged to have run in the era with the most formidable competition.  There are nuances too.  In motorsport the question of “the greatest” is often debated and that’s clearly not about who is the fastest because in the 1970s few doubted that was Ronnie Peterson (1944–1978) but it’s rare to see him on lists because the sport is so focused on titles.  So it’s probably absurd to create a “greatest divas” list although some have and while there will always be variations, some names are likely always to appear:

Victoria de los Angeles (1923-2005): De los Angeles sang in an age of divas yet according to all reports she was the most un-diva-like of them all.  What made her a great singer was the sheer beauty of her voice, coupled with a delivery which seemed genuinely to affect her audience, one critic noting she didn’t so much master her repertoire as “seduce it”.  It was of course a technique to use a voice to evoke emotion in others and many singers do it but de los Angeles managed it with an innocence which made those listening forget the technical tricks of the trade and just feel.

Maria Callas (1923-1977): There is a cult surrounding Callas and even half a century-odd after her death, she remains probably the best known of all the divas, including among those who have never heard her sing a note.  Her tempestuous private life accounts for much of that but she deserves the reputation she gained as a singer while at the height of her powers.  Both her training and technique were unconventional: Although never the most refined singer, she transcended that by brining to her roles a thrilling intensity and an untypical willingness to sound ugly if that’s what the role demanded; she was a great actress as well as a singer.  Where Callas sits in the pantheon will always be debated but she remains unique.

Kirsten Flagstad (1895-1962): There should probably be a special category for those who sing Richard Wagner’s (1813–1883) operas because as well as tonal beauty and a great memory, they need endurance and sheer power and in all this the Norwegian Flagstad set a mark not yet surpassed.  Even all that is really not enough to conquer the Wagnerian repertoire because a soprano needs also a sense of drama and several modes of attacking the declamatory utterances which make his work so memorable.  Hers was a dark voice which could range from the tenderness of the grieving maiden to the violence of Brünnhilde’s battle-cry and Wagner hasn’t been the same since.

Rosa Ponselle (1897-1981): US born of Italian stock, Ponselle performed mostly in the US along with several seasons in England and Italy.  She retired from stage work in the mid-1930s but to continued to sing into the 1950s and although the recordings of her are obviously pre-modern, they reveal enough for listeners to understand why her voice was so often described as “legendarily beautiful”.  That many critics can’t all be wrong.

Elisabeth Schwarzkopf (1915-2006): It may sound strange to speak of a soprano as “a technician” but it seems appropriate for Schwarzkopf who mastered such a range of styles and material; the word which appears time after time in the critical notices was “flawless”.  What should not be forgotten however were the innovations for she “invented” some of the ways sopranos “phrase” things are now part of the orthodoxy of performance.  Her 1965 performance of Richard Strauss's (1864-1949) Vier Letzte Lieder (Four Last Songs) with the Radio-Symphonieorchester Berlin under György Széll (1897–1970) is definitive: the need again to record the songs vanished because it's simply not possible to improve on Schwarzkoph's recording.  She must have agreed with the critics because she choose seven of her own recordings when appearing on the BBC’s Desert Island Discs.

Renata Tebaldi (1922-2004): Tebaldi’s career began quite modestly in the last days of World War II (1939-1946 and in the early post-war years she confined herself almost exclusively to Italian works of the late nineteenth & early twentieth century but during the 1950s & 1960s she emerged was the leading Italian soprano.  By her own admission she was never a great “actress” and relied for effect on her voice but it alone was enough, critics describing it with terms like creamy or velvety, observing the way audiences would “bask” in its waves.  Because she performed in the same era as Callas the two are often compared but they were very different singers; except for the price tags, one may as well compare a Rolls-Royce with a Ferrari. 

Peanut

Peanut (pronounced pee-nuht)

(1) The pod or the enclosed edible seed of the plant, Arachis hypogaea, of the legume family, native to the tropical Americas (and probably of South American origin).  During the plant’s growth, the pod is forced underground where it ripens.  The edible, nut-like seed is used for food and as a source of oil (historically known variously also as the pinder, pinda and goober (used south of the Mason-Dixon Line (originally as “goober pea)), earthnut, groundnut & monkey nut (pre-World War II (1939-1945) UK use).

(2) The plant itself.

(3) Any small or insignificant person or thing; something petty.

(4) In US slang, a very small clam.

(5) In slang, barbiturates (recorded also of other substances delivered in small pills).

(6) In slang, small pieces of Styrofoam used as a packing material (known also as the “packing peanut”).

(7) Of or relating to the peanut or peanuts.

(8) Made with or from peanuts.

1790–1800: The construct may have been pea (in the sense of the small green vegetable) + nut but may etymologists think it was more likely a folk etymology of pinda or pinder, both forms still in dialectal use south of the Mason-Dixon Line.  The plant is apparently native to South America and it was Portuguese traders who early in the sixteenth century took peanuts from Brazil and Peru to Africa by 1502.  Its cultivation in Chekiang (an eastern coastal province of China) was recorded as early as 1573 and the crop probably arrived with the Portuguese ships which docked there.  According to the broadcaster Alistair Cooke (1908–2004), The spellings pea nut & pea-nut are obsolete.  Peanut is a noun & verb. Peanutted & peanutting are verbs and peanutty & peanutlike are adjectives; the noun plural is peanuts.

The word appears in many aspects of modern culture including “circus peanut” (a type of commercial candy), “cocktail peanuts” (commercially packaged salted nuts served (for free) in bars to heighten thirst and thus stimulate beverage sales (also known generically as “beer nuts”)), “peanut butter” (a spread made from ground peanuts and known also as “peanut paste”), “peanut butter and jelly” (a sandwich made with jelly (jam or conserve) spread on one slice and peanut butter on the other), “small peanuts” (very small amount (always in the plural), “peanut milk” (a milky liquid made from peanuts and used as a milk substitute), peanut brittle (a type of brittle (confection) containing peanuts in a hard toffee), “peanut butter cup” (a chocolate candy with peanut butter filling), “peanut bunker” (a small menhaden (a species of fish)), “hog peanut” (a plant native to eastern North America that produces edible nut-like seeds both above & below ground (Amphicarpaea bracteata)), “peanut worm” ( sipunculid worm; any member of phylum Sipuncula. (Sipuncula spp), “peanut cactus” (a cactus of species Chamaecereus silvestrii), “peanut ball” (in athletics & strength training, an exercise ball comprised of two bulbous lobes and a narrower connecting portion), “peanut marzipan” (a peanut confection made with crushed peanuts & sugar, popular in Central & South America), “peanut whistle” (in the slang of the ham radio and citizens band (CB) radio communities, a low-powered transmitter or receiver, “peanut tree” (A tree of the species Sterculia quadrifida), “peanut-headed lanternfly” (In entomology, a species of Neotropical fulgorid planthopper (Fulgora laternaria)) and peanut tube (in electronics, a type of small vacuum tube).

Herbert (HW) Horwill’s (1864-1943) A Dictionary of Modern American Usage (1935) was written as kind of trans-Atlantic companion to Henry Fowler’s (1858–1933) classic A Dictionary of Modern English Usage (1926) and was one of the earliest volumes to document on a systematic basis the variations and dictions between British and American English.  The book was a kind of discussion about the phrase “England and America are two countries separated by one language” attributed to George Bernard Shaw (GBS; 1856-1950) although there are doubts about that.  Horwill had an entry for “peanut” which he noted in 1935 was common in the US but unknown in the UK where it was known as the “monkey nut”.  According to the broadcaster Alistair Cooke (1908–2004), the world “peanut” became a thing in the UK during the early 1940s when the US government included generous quantities of the then novel peanut butter in the supplies of foodstuffs included in the Lend-Lease arrangements.

In idiomatic use, the phrase “if you pay peanuts, you get monkeys” is used to suggest that if only low wages are offered for a role, high quality applicants are unlike to be attracted to the position.  The phrase “peanut gallery” is one of a number which have enter the language from the theatre.  The original Drury Lane theatre in London where William Shakespeare’s (1564–1616) were staged was built on the site of a notorious cockpit (the place where gamecocks fought, spectators gambling on the outcome) and even before this bear and bull-baiting pits had been used for theatrical production of not the highest quality.  That’s the origin of the “pit” in this context being the space at the rear of the orchestra circle, the pit sitting behind the more desirable stalls.  By the Elizabethan era (1558-1603), the poor often sat on the ground (under an open sky) while the more distant raised gallery behind them contained the seats which were cheaper still; that’s the origin of the phrase “playing to the gallery” which describes an appeal to those with base, uncritical tastes although “gallery god” (an allusion to the paintings of the gods of antiquity which were on the gallery’s wall close to the ceiling) seems to be extinct.  The “peanut gallery” (the topmost (ie the most distant and thus cheapest) rows of a theatre) was a coining in US English dating from 1874 because it was the habit of the audience to cast upon to the stage the shells of the peanuts they’d been eating although whether this was ad-hoc criticism or general delinquency isn’t known.  The companion phrase was “hush money”, small denomination coins tossed onto the stage as a “payment” to silence an actor whose performance was judged substandard.  “Hush money” of course has endured to be re-purposed, now used of the payments such as the one made by Donald Trump (b 1946; US president 2017-2021; president elect 2024) to Stormy Daniels (stage name of Stephanie Gregory, b 1979).

Chairman Mao Zedong (left) and Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek (right), celebrating the Japanese surrender, Chongqing, China, September 1945.  After this visit, they would never meet again.

Joseph "Vinegar Joe" Stilwell (1883–1946) was a US Army general who was appointed chief of staff to the Chinese Nationalist Leader, Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek (1887-1975) (Generalissimo was a kind of courtesy title acknowledging his position as supreme leader of his armed forces; officially his appointment in 1935 was as 特級上將 (Tèjí shàng jiàng) (high general special class)).  Stilwell’s role was to attempt to coordinate the provision of US funds and materiel to Chiang with the objectives of having the Chinese Nationalist forces operate against the Imperial Japanese Army in Burma (now known usually as Myanmar).  Unfortunately, the generalissimo viewed the Chinese communists under Chairman Mao (Mao Zedong 1893–1976; chairman of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) 1949-1976) as a more immediate threat than that of Nippon and his support for US strategy was no always wholehearted. 

So Stilwell didn’t have an easy task and in his reports to Washington DC referred to Chiang as “Peanut”.  Apparently, “peanut” had originally been allocated to Chiang as one of the army’s random code-names with no particular meaning but greatly it appealed to Stillwell who warmed to the metaphorical possibilities, once recorded referring to Chiang and his creaking military apparatus as “...a peanut perched on top of a dung heap...”  That about summed up Stillwell’s view of Chiang and his “army” and in his diary he noted a military crisis “would be worth it” were the situation “…just sufficient to get rid of the Peanut without entirely wrecking the ship…”  A practical man, his plans extended even to assassinating the generalissimo although these were never brought to fruition.  Eventually, Stilwell was recalled to Washington while Chiang fought on against the communists until 1949 when the Nationalists were forced to flee across the straits of Formosa to the Island of Taiwan, the “renegade province” defying the CCP in Beijing to this day.  Stillwell did have one final satisfaction before being sacked, in 1944 handing Chiang an especially wounding letter from Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR, 1882–1945, US president 1933-1945), the reaction so pleasing he was moved to write a poem:

I have waited long for vengeance,
At last I've had my chance.
I've looked the Peanut in the eye
And kicked him in the pants.
 
The old harpoon was ready
With aim and timing true,
I sank it to the handle,
And stung him through and through.
 
The little bastard shivered,
And lost the power of speech.
His face turned green and quivered
As he struggled not to screech.
 
For all my weary battles,
For all my hours of woe,
At last I've had my innings
And laid the Peanut low.
 
I know I've still to suffer,
And run a weary race,
But oh! the blessed pleasure!
I've wrecked the Peanut's face.

Phobias

One who suffers a morbid fear of peanut butter sticking to the roof of one's mouth is said to be an arachibutyrophobe.  Phobias need not be widely diagnosed conditions; they need only be specific and, even if suffered by just one soul in the world, the criteria are fulfilled.  In this sense, phobias are analogous with syndromes.  A phobia is an anxiety disorder, an unreasonable or irrational fear related to exposure to certain objects or situations.  The phobia may be triggered either by the cause or an anticipation of the specific object or situation.

Lindsay Lohan in The Parent Trap (1998) introduced the culinary novelty of peanut butter spread on Oreos; an allure appalled arachibutyrophobes avoid.

The fifth edition of the American Psychiatric Association's (APA) Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5 (2013)) made some interesting definitional changes from the earlier DSM-4 (1994):  (1) A patient no longer needs to acknowledge their anxiety is excessive or unreasonable in order to receive a diagnoses, it being required only that their anxiety must be “out of proportion” to the actual threat or danger (in its socio-cultural context).  (2) Symptoms must now, regardless of age, last at least six months.  (3) The diagnostic criteria for social phobias no longer specify that age at onset must be before eighteen, a change apparently necessitated by the substantial increase in reporting by older adults with the DSM editors noting the six-month duration threshold exists to minimize the over-diagnosis of transient fears.

Whether it was already something widely practiced isn’t known but Lindsay Lohan is credited with introducing to the world the culinary novelty Oreos & peanut butter in The Parent Trap.  According to the director, it was added to the script “…for no reason other than it sounded weird and some cute kid would do it."  Like some other weirdnesses, the combination has a cult following and for those who enjoy peanut butter but suffer arachibutyrophobia, Tastemade have provided a recipe for Lindsay Lohan-style Oreos with a preparation time (including whisking) of 2 hours.  They take 20 minutes to cook and in this mix there are 8 servings (scale ingredients up to increase the number of servings).

Ingredients

2 cups flour
1 cup unsweetened cocoa powder (plus more for dusting)
¾ teaspoon kosher salt
1 ¼ cups unsalted butter (at room temperature)
¾ cup sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Powdered sugar, for dusting

Filling Ingredients

½ cup unsalted butter, at room temperature
¼ cup unsweetened smooth peanut butter
1 ½ cups powdered sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
A pinch of kosher salt (omit if using salted peanut butter)

Filling Instructions

(1) With a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, the butter & peanut butter until creamy.

(2) Gradually add powdered sugar and beat to combine, then beat in vanilla and salt.

Whisking the mix.

Instructions

(1) Preheat the oven to 325°F (160°C). Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.

(2) In small bowl, whisk together flour, cocoa powder & salt.

(3) In a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.  Mix in the vanilla extract. With the mixer running on low speed, add the flour mixture and beat until just combined (it should remain somewhat crumbly).

(4) Pour mixture onto a work surface and knead until it’s “all together”; wrap half in plastic wrap and place in refrigerator.

(5) Lightly dust surface and the top of the dough with a 1:1 mixture of cocoa powder and powdered sugar.

(6) Working swiftly and carefully, roll out dough to a ¼-½ inch (6-12 mm) thickness and cut out 2 inch (50 mm) rounds.  Transfer them to the baking sheets, 1 inch (25 mm) apart (using a small offset spatula helps with this step). Re-roll scraps and cut out more rounds, the repeat with remaining half of the dough.

(7) Bake cookies until the tops are no longer shiny ( about 20 minutes), then cool on pan for 5 minutes before transferring to wire rack completely to cool.

(8) To assemble, place half the cookies on a plate or work surface.

(9) Pipe a blob of filling (about 2 teaspoons) onto the tops of each of these cookies and then place another cookie on top, pressing slightly but not to the extent filled oozes from the sides.

(10) Refrigerate for a few minutes to allow the filling to firm up.  Store in an air-tight container in refrigerator.

The manufacturer embraced the idea of peanut butter Oreos and has released versions, both with the classic cookie and a peanut butter & jelly (jam) variation paired with its “golden wafers”.  As well as Lindsay Lohan’s contribution, Oreos have attracted the interest of mathematicians.  Nabisco in 1974 introduced the Double Stuf Oreo, the clear implication being a promise the variety contained twice crème filling supplied in the original.  However, a mathematician undertook the research and determined Double Stuf Oreos contained only 1.86 times the volume of filling of a standard Oreo.  Despite that, the company survived the scandal and the Double Stuf Oreo’s recipe wasn’t adjusted.

Scandalous in its own way was that an April 2022 research paper published in the journal Physics of Fluids wasn’t awarded that year’s Ig Nobel Prize for physics, the honor taken by Frank Fish, Zhi-Ming Yuan, Minglu Chen, Laibing Jia, Chunyan Ji & Atilla Incecik, for their admittedly ground-breaking (or perhaps water-breaking) work in explaining how ducklings manage to swim in formation.  More deserving surely were Crystal Owens, Max Fan, John Hart & Gareth McKinley who introduced to physics the discipline of Oreology (the construct being Oreo + (o)logy).  The suffix -ology was formed from -o- (as an interconsonantal vowel) +‎ -logy.  The origin in English of the -logy suffix lies with loanwords from the Ancient Greek, usually via Latin and French, where the suffix (-λογία) is an integral part of the word loaned (eg astrology from astrologia) since the sixteenth century.  French picked up -logie from the Latin -logia, from the Ancient Greek -λογία (-logía).  Within Greek, the suffix is an -ία (-ía) abstract from λόγος (lógos) (account, explanation, narrative), and that a verbal noun from λέγω (légō) (I say, speak, converse, tell a story).  In English the suffix became extraordinarily productive, used notably to form names of sciences or disciplines of study, analogous to the names traditionally borrowed from the Latin (eg astrology from astrologia; geology from geologia) and by the late eighteenth century, the practice (despite the disapproval of the pedants) extended to terms with no connection to Greek or Latin such as those building on French or German bases (eg insectology (1766) after the French insectologie; terminology (1801) after the German Terminologie).  Within a few decades of the intrusion of modern languages, combinations emerged using English terms (eg undergroundology (1820); hatology (1837)).  In this evolution, the development may be though similar to the latter-day proliferation of “-isms” (fascism; feminism et al).  Oreology is the study of the flow and fracture of sandwich cookies and the research proved it is impossible to split the cream filling of an Oreo cookie down the middle.

An Oreo on a rheometer.

The core finding in Oreology was that the filling always adheres to one side of the wafer, no matter how quickly one or both cookies are twisted.  Using a rheometer (a laboratory instrument used to measure the way in which a viscous fluid (a liquid, suspension or slurry) flows in response to applied forces), it was determined creme distribution upon cookie separation by torsional rotation is not a function of rate of rotation, creme filling height level, or flavor, but was mostly determined by the pre-existing level of adhesion between the creme and each wafer.  The research also noted that were there changes to the composition of the filling (such as the inclusion of peanut butter) would influence the change from adhesive to cohesive failure and presumably the specifics of the peanut butter chosen (smooth, crunchy, extra-crunchy, un-salted (although the organic varieties should behave in a similar way to their mass-market equivalents)) would have some effect because the fluid dynamics would change.  The expected extent of the change would be appear to be slight but until further research is performed, this can’t be confirmed.