Ghost

Ghost (pronounced gohst)

(1) The soul of a dead person, a disembodied spirit imagined, usually as a vague, shadowy or evanescent form, as wandering among or haunting living persons.

(2) A mere shadow or semblance; a trace; a remote possibility; a faint trace or possibility of something.

(3) A spiritual being; the principle of life; soul; spirit (sometimes initial capital letter).

(4) A secondary image, especially one appearing on a television screen as a white shadow, caused by poor or double reception or by a defect in the receiver (also called ghosting).

(5) In photography, a faint secondary or out-of-focus image in a photographic print or negative resulting from reflections within the camera lens (also called ghost image).

(6) In optics, a series of false spectral lines produced by a diffraction grating with unevenly spaced lines.

(7) In metalworking, a streak appearing on a freshly machined piece of steel containing impurities.

(8) In pathology, a red blood cell having no hemoglobin.

(9) In tax-avoidance and other frauds, a fictitious employee, business etc, fabricated especially for the purpose of manipulating funds.

(10) In literature (especially quasi-literature), as ghost-write, to write a book, speech etc for another without attribution (distinct from the trade of the acknowledged ghostwriter).

(11) In engraving, to lighten the background of a photograph before engraving.

(12) In informal use (often associated with social media), suddenly to end all contact with a person without explanation, especially a romantic relationship; abruptly to leave a social event or gathering without saying goodbye.

(13) In digital technology, to remove comments, threads, or other digital content from a website or online forum without informing the poster, keeping them hidden from the public but still visible to the poster.

(14) In bibliography, as ghost edition, an entry recorded in a bibliography of which no actual proof exists.

Pre 900: From the Middle English gost, gast & goost (breath; good or bad spirit, angel, demon; person, man, human being", in Biblical use "soul, spirit, life”), from the Old English gāst (breath, soul, spirit, ghost, being), related to the Old High German gaist & geist (spirit) and the Sanskrit hēda (fury, anger).  The Proto-West Germanic gaist was derived from the Proto-Germanic gaistaz (ghost, spirit, (source also of the Old Saxon gest, the Old Frisian jest, the Middle Dutch gheest, the Dutch geest & the German Geist (spirit, ghost))), from the primitive Indo-European ǵhéysd-os, from ǵhéysd- (anger, agitation) and was cognate with the Scots ghaist (ghost), the Saterland Frisian Gäist (spirit), the West Frisian geast (spirit), the Dutch geest (spirit, mind, ghost), the German Geist (spirit, mind, intellect), the Swedish gast (ghost), the Sanskrit हेड (héḍa), (anger, hatred) and the Persian زشت‎ (zešt) (ugly, hateful, disgusting).  There’s no documentary evidence but the ultimate root is conjectured to be the primitive Indo-European gheis-, used in forming words involving the notions of excitement, amazement, or fear (source also of Sanskrit hedah (wrath), the Avestan zaesha- (horrible, frightful), the Gothic usgaisjan and the Old English gæstan (to frighten).  Ghost is a noun & verb (and used imaginatively as an adjective), ghoster is a noun, ghostly & ghosty are adjectives, ghosting is a noun & verb and ghosted is a verb & adjective; the noun plural is ghosts.

Ghost is the English representative of West Germanic words for "supernatural being" and in Christian writings in Old English it was used to render the Latin spiritus, a sense preserved by the early translators of the Bible in “Holy Ghost”.  The sense of a "disembodied spirit of a dead person", especially imagined as wandering among the living or haunting them, is attested from the late fourteenth century, a meaning-shift which returned the word to what was its probable prehistoric sense.  Most Indo-European words for "soul or spirit" also double with reference to supernatural spirits.  Many have also a base sense of "appearance" (the Greek phantasma; the French spectre; the Polish widmo, from Old Church Slavonic videti (to see), the Old English scin, the Old High German giskin (originally "appearance, apparition”), related to the Old English scinan & the Old High German skinan (to shine)).  Other concepts exist, including the French revenant (literally "returning" (from the other world)), the Old Norse aptr-ganga, (literally "back-comer") & the Breton bugelnoz (literally "night-child”).  The Latin manes (spirits of the dead) was probably a euphemism.

The gh- spelling appeared early in the fifteenth century in Caxton, influenced by Flemish and Middle Dutch gheest, but was rare in English before mid-1500s.  The sense of a "slight suggestion, mere shadow or semblance" (as in ghost image, ghost of a chance etc) is noted from the 1610s; the sense of "one who secretly does work for another" is from 1884 and ghost-write was a 1922 back-formation from the earlier (1919) ghost-writing.  The American Indian ghost dance was first noted in 1890, ghost town is from 1908, ghost story dates from 1811, the now less common ghost-word (apparent word or false form in a manuscript due to a blunder) is from 1886.  The “ghost in the machine” was English philosopher Gilbert Ryle's (1900-1976) 1949 description of René Descartes's (1596-1650) mind-body dualism and the phrase "to give up the ghost" (to die or prepare to die) was well-known in the Old English version; one of the many way folk avoid words like "death" or "die".  Synonyms include phantom, devil, demon, soul, shadow, spectre, vision, vampire, apparition, revenant, appearance, haunt, visitor, shade, spook, poltergeist, phantasm, wraith, daemon & manes.  There are a surprising number of uses of ghost, ghosted, ghosting etc said to be associated modern or internet slang covering fields as diverse as linguistic techniques and the art & science of smoking weed, the latter a rich vein of coinings.  However, the most commonly used describes someone with whom one has been in contact suddenly stops responding, disappearing, as it were, like a ghost.  This can happen in conjunction with unfriending etc but can be an act in isolation.  After becoming one of a number of Australian prime ministers (figuratively) defenestrated by their party before the voters got their chance, Malcolm Turnbull (b 1954; prime minister of Australia 2015-2018) left parliament and decried similarly deposed leaders who chose to stay as "miserable ghosts", a breed with a long tradition in many parliaments.   

Ghostwriters

Art of the Deal by Donald J Trump with Tony Schwartz (1987).  If the Nobel Committee can't bring themselves to confer on President Trump the Peace Prize, they could perhaps make him the Literature Laureate.  He would think that equally deserved.

Ghostwriters (also as ghost-writer) are professional writers hired to create content (books, columns, posts or any other (traditionally) text-focused item), the authorship of which ultimately will be credited to another although ghostwriters can be acknowledged as “co-authors” or (more commonly), receive credit in the form of having their name appear on the cover with a preceding “with”.  That latter approach of course implies some form of collaborative authorship and a famous example is Donald Trump’s (b 1946; POTUS 2017-2021 and since 2025) The Art of the Deal (1987), published as “by Donald J. Trump with Tony Schwartz” [b 1952].  The Art of the Deal is said to be competently written and for those in the business of the ruthless pursuit of deals it’s apparently an invaluable manual, Mr Trump in one interview saying perhaps the most important passages those advising (1) most deals don’t come off and (2) it’s better to walk away from what appears a bad deal than to close it in the hope it can be made to work.  Had than counsel been followed, there’d likely have been rather fewer corporate collapses than have been suffered since it was published; there’s good reasons why The Art of the Deal stayed at number 1 on The New York Times Best Seller list for three months and was a on the list for a year odd.

One day, there may be Lindsay Lohan: The autobiography.  Hopefully, there will be competing "authorized" and "unauthorized" editions.

So what does “By X with Y” usually imply?  The conventional view is it means “Y” is likely to have composed much of the text, based on interviews with “X”, their previous statements or other things they may have written.  It’s the most common approach in the biographies of sports stars that appear in the run-up to Christmas or father’s day; those books often sell well although whether they’re so often read is uncertain.  By contrast, “By X and Y” should mean true co-authorship (though not necessarily on the basis of 50-50 contribution) whereas “X by Y” should be a pure biography (although that can be “authorized” with the cooperation of “X” or “unauthorized” with even “X’s” active opposition to publication).  The “with” category obviously is the most ambiguous and thus often the most useful for a subject, allowing them to bask in the praise of a work well-received yet provide a layer of “plausible deniability” if needed.  Ghostwriters are used for a number of reasons including constraints of time, a lack of interest in the project (though not the profits) or, typically, a lack of the necessary skill with the written word.  Ghostwriting contracts can vary but the focus typically includes terms of payment, non-disclosure of involvement, the notional author’s exercise of veto over all or some of the content and the rights to the finished work.  Mr Trump certainly acknowledged using a ghostwriter, as did Paris Hilton (b 1981) who in her 2023 memoir thanked the ghostwriter who: “helped me find my voice”.

Monsieur Sarközy (left) and his third wife (Italian supermodel Carla Bruni, b 1967, right) arrive at La Santé Prison, November 2025.  Ghostwritten or not, it's unfair to "judge a book by its cover" but Monsieur Sarközy always looked guilty of something.  

One who never needed help to "find his voice" was Nicolas Sarközy (b 1955; President of France 2007-2012) who even found symbolic ways to express his inner torments.  When, in October 2025, entering La Santé Prison in Montparnasse to begin a five-year sentence imposed for “criminal association” related to campaign financing (it was a conspiracy charge), as well as comfortable shoes and some nice warm jumpers, the former Le Président took a novel and made sure the assembled press pack knew it was a copy of Le Comte de Monte-Cristo (The Count of Monte Cristo, 1844-1946) by Alexandre Dumas (1802-1870)), one of literature’s great “tales of revenge”.  He's since been released pending an appeal hearing so he's got some time to plot and scheme his vengeance and decide upon whom it will first be visited.

It’s the disclosure of using a ghostwriter that is critical, even if the exact details of relative contributions to the text remain murky.  The French novelist and dramatist Alexandre Dumas (1802-1870) is best-known for Les Trois Mousquetaires (The Three Musketeers, 1844) and Le Comte de Monte-Cristo but, by his own reckoning, he published some 1,200 volumes, hiring a veritable corps of ghostwriters so the production of “his” works could proceed on an assembly-line basis (many famous painters did much the same, creating by the twentieth century a significant (and lucrative) industry of those in the "authentication" business).  His illegitimate son (Alexandre Dumas fils (1824–1895 (fils being French for “son”)) was also an author of note (best remembered for The Lady of the Camellias (1848 and Camille in English-language versions), adapted by Giuseppe Verdi (1813–1901) for his opera  La traviata (The Fallen Woman, 1853)) and when one day father and son met for lunch, Dumas the elder asked: ‘‘Have you read my new novel yet?”.  “No,” replied the younger man, “Have you?”

JFK's Ghost, Kennedy, Sorensen and the Making of Profiles in Courage (2021) by David R.Stokes (b 1956 and a member of the Association of Ghostwriters).

One ghostwriter not (explicitly) acknowledged was Theodore Chaikin "Ted" Sorensen (1928–2010; US lawyer, author & presidential adviser), now widely believed to have written the great bulk (and possibly all) of Profiles in Courage (1956), credited to John Kennedy (JFK, 1917–1963; POTUS 1961-1963).  The slim volume displayed Sorensen’s fine touch with language but it was a slight work, a collection of eight, short biographical sketches describing acts of “bravery and integrity” by  DWM (dead white men who were now mostly forgotten US senators) and that it received the 1957 Pulitzer Prize for Biography was an indication more of the political sympathies of the selection committee than the work’s literary merit or historical significance.  Still, it was a minor contribution to history and Barack Obama (b 1961; POTUS 2009-2017) accepted the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize, awarded apparently to express the Norwegian Nobel Committee’s gratitude he wasn’t George W Bush (George XLIII, b 1946; POTUS 2001-2009).  Even at the time the authorship of Profiles in Courage was controversial with some journalists openly accusing the then Senator Kennedy (Democrat-Massachusetts 1953-1960) of having done little more than put his name on the cover and accept a Pulitzer.  A fortnight after the award was announced, stories began to appear in the press casting doubt on the authorship and, within days, a check (cheque) was drawn against a Kennedy family trust in favour of Ted Sorensen for US$100,000-odd, a extraordinary sum wholly disproportionate to either the fee even well-paid ghostwriters would expect or the profits realised by Profiles in Courage.  Shamelessly (a Kennedy family trait), whether as a senator or POTUS, JFK would autograph copies of “his” book and personally hand them as gifts to visiting dignitaries.

Politicians of course have speechwriters and their contributions are usually well-publicized, some of the more-skilful (or more publicity-conscious) becoming minor celebrities, a thing sometimes resented by those for whom they write although, as a general principle, politicians are well-advised if they leave speech-writing to the pros.  During the 1969 election campaign, when discussing speechmaking, bizarrely, the idiosyncratic Sir John Gorton (1911-2002; prime minister of Australia 1968-1971), despite having at his finger-tips the entire resources of the Commonwealth government, complained that the leader of the Opposition’s (Gough Whitlam (1916–2014; Prime Minister of Australia 1972-1975) “…large staff—which I haven’t got—helps him.  You see, I have never delivered a speech that I haven’t written myself. I doubt very much if Mr Whitlam has ever delivered a speech he wrote himself.  I need some research assistance, some background speech notes and this is what [Mr Whitlam’s staff are] doing and that is all [they are] doing.”  When asked his reaction to Mr Gorton’s claim he wrote all his speeches himself, Mr Whitlam (who had spent the campaign lampooning Gorton’s frequent lapses into near incoherency) quipped: “That is one of the few prime ministerial statements of this election that I find credible.”

An artist's ghostly take on an unforgiving woman: Portrait of Lady Violet Bonham Carter (circa 1917), oil on canvas by Sir William Orpen (1878–1931).

It’s not only speeches that are written for politicians to deliver, much of that to which their signatures are appended the work of others including most correspondence and some ghostwriters manage to hone their style to emulate the distinctiveness of those for whom they labor.  Although he once claimed “Oh, I have not read a great deal”, Winston Churchill’s (1875-1965; UK prime-minister 1940-1945 & 1951-1955) literary output was prodigious, including even one novel (that proved great fun for Freudians interested in mother-son relationships) and yielded the 1953 Nobel Prize in Literature.  His style came to be called “Churchillian” and is recognizable (indeed, even in the 1930s it was thought old-fashioned) but it could also be replicated and, years after his death, it became more widely known his teams of “research assistants” genuinely were responsible for many first drafts and even the authorship of what were at the time described in terms like “rolling Churchillian phrases” but in fairness, in that he was not unique and he did review every word prior to publication, editing and polishing as required.  Sometimes the criticism of such practices can go too far.  When Lord Beaverbrook (Maxwell Aitken, 1879-1964), died, Churchill’s private secretary drafted a short message of condolence to be published in the next edition of The Times: “I am deeply grieved at the loss of my oldest and closest friend who severed his country and his causes valiantly and was the most loyal and devoted of comrades.”  As a message from an old man with not long to live to the memory of his friend of almost 60 years, it seemed not objectionable but an objection came from Lady Violet Bonham Carter, (1887–1969, daughter of Henry Asquith (1852–1928; UK prime minister 1908-1916)) who called the message “clearly political” and thus breaking his silence on such matters, a silence tacitly for some time erected due to his decline.  The secretary smoothed things over with her but she returned to the theme after seeing two messages sent in Churchill's name in support of the Conservative Party on the eve of the 1964 general election.  These she branded “forgeries”.  To this accusation the secretary responded with rather more ferocity, telling her: “I really do not think you should have used the word ‘forgery’ to me.  Sir Winston has had things drafted for him for many years, even when he was prime minister.  If they represent his views, and he signs them, they are not ‘forgeries’.”

C'était ça ou mourir (2026) by Thélyson Orélien.  How the Prix Goncourt's committee rules on this work may prove influential in the future of publishing.

That represents the current view of what's "drafting" rather than "forging" although it may take some time before texts created by generative AI (artificial intelligence) are granted the same approbation, a ghostwriter’s hand still human and, at least for a while, that still matters as one French committee recently concluded, removing from consideration for the 2026 Prix Goncourt (The Goncourt Prize) the novel C'était ça ou mourir (It Was Either That or Die, 2026) by Haitian-born Canadian novelist Thélyson Orélien (b 1988), the concerns being “plagiarism” and “the use of generative AI.”  Although Le prix Goncourt carries a merely symbolic purse of €10, it’s vested with genuine prestige and is associated with a spike in sales so is worth winning.  Monsieur Orélien denies the accusations and the matter is attracting attention because it’s a sign of things to come, literary prize committees among the many institutions that will need to formulate protocols to determine where legitimate use of AI (research, grammar checks, formatting etc) ends and concepts like plagiarism, appropriation and “non-authorship” begins.  It was the English philosopher Gilbert Ryle (1900–1976) who, in The Concept of Mind (1949), when discussing the notion of dualism explored by the French philosopher René Descartes (1596–1650), introduced the phrase “ghost in the machine” and that was better to illustrate for modern readers his critique of the Cartesian position of the mind being distinct from the body with physical and mental activities occurring “simultaneously but separately”.  Mind-body dualism had a long run in Western philosophy and can again be re-considered because we’ve come a long way and with generative AI, the "ghostwriter is now the machine" and these agents clearly have “opinions” so not only are they writing, increasingly, they are “deciding” what to write.  The problems confronting such committees seem insoluble so the fudge may be the creation of new literary prizes for AI generated works and there’s no reason why the committees and juries shouldn’t at least in part be made up of AI agents.

Holy Ghost vs Holy Spirit in Biblical Translation

Pentecostés (Pentecost, circa 1545), oil on canvas by Tiziano Vecelli (or Vecellio), (circa 1489-1576; known in English as Titian), basalica of Santa Maria della Salute, Venice.  The Christian holy day of Pentecost (celebrated 50 days after Easter Sunday) commemorates the descent of the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles and other followers of Jesus Christ while they were in Jerusalem celebrating the Feast of Weeks.

The Trinity is one of Christianity’s central doctrines, the unity of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit as three persons in the one Godhead.  One of the most important Christian affirmations about God, it’s rooted in the idea God came to meet Christians in a threefold figure: (1) as Creator, Lord of the history of salvation, Father, and Judge, as revealed in the Old Testament; (2) as the Lord who, in the incarnated figure of Jesus Christ, lived among human beings and was present in their midst as the “Resurrected One”; and (3) as the Holy Spirit, whom they experienced as the helper or intercessor in the power of the new life.  In the Roman Catholic Church, the Sign of the Cross is made in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  It’s a myth that prior to Vatican II (the Second Vatican Council 1962-1965), the Third Person of the Trinity was always referred to in English as the Holy Ghost and one of the council’s decisions was to replace this with Holy Spirit.  Although it’s true Pius XII (1876–1958, pope 1939-1958) authorized several bilingual rites that included Holy Spirit, this was merely procedural and a formalization of processes for the publishing of new editions of existing works. Well before the twentieth century, the shift to Holy Spirit had become almost universal in translation although use of the older form persisted because of the reverence for tradition among some congregations (if not always the clergy) and a fondness, particularly in the Anglican community, for earlier translations, especially the Book of Common Prayer (1549-1622) and the King James version of the Bible (KJV: 1611).

Pentecôte (Pentecost, 1732), oil on canvas by Jean Restout (1692–1768), Louvre Museum, Paris.

The change reflects the evolution of words but, as a matter of Christian theology, "Holy Ghost" and "Holy Spirit" mean exactly the same thing.  The early translators were influenced by ghost being of Germanic origin and, as the Old English gast inherited the original meaning “soul, life, breath, good or bad spirit, angel or demon”, they used gast to translate the Latin Spiritus: thus Holy Ghost.  Although the more modern sense of a disembodied dead person dates from the late fourteenth century, it long remained rare and when translating the Bible into English the scholars behind the KJV opted mostly to use Holy Ghost which enjoys 90 entries compared with seven for Holy Spirit (between translators it's thought there were only linguistic and not doctrinal differences).  Either as literature or theology, there’s nothing in the texts to suggest any difference of meaning between the two, the conclusion of biblical scholars being the choices were wholly arbitrary and probably an unintentional consequence of the KJV being translated from the Greek into English by different committees.  One committee translated hagion pneuma as Holy Spirit while the other preferred Holy Ghost and when the work of the two bodies was combined, the differences remained.  In English, the meaning shift of ghost was induced essentially by its adoption in literature and popular culture, the sense long universally understood to be that of the spectre of a deceased person or a demonic apparition, hardly an association the church found helpful.  It hasn’t wholly been replaced however, some editions of the Book of Common Prayer still are printed with the phrase “He may receive the benefits of absolution, together with ghostly counsel and advice, to the quieting of his conscience.”

Unrelated to etymological matters however, there is one fine theological point about the Trinity.  It took some time for the Patristic Fathers (the early Christian writers of the period generally considered to run from the end of New Testament times or end of the Apostolic Age (circa 100 AD) to either the Council of Chalcedon (451 AD) or the Second Council of Nicaea (787 AD)) to work out the Trinity was three persons, but one God.  The Old Testament foretold the visit to earthly life of the Messiah, but did not name him explicitly as Jesus, seeing the Holy Spirit as a manifestation of God, but did not see Him as a separate person of the one Godhead.  Despite the implications of that, at least since the still influential Saint Augustine of Hippo (354–430), it’s never been an orthodox view the Old Testament should be thought incomplete.  Benedict XVI (1927–2022; pope 2005-2013, pope emeritus 2013-2022), always one to find a fine theological point, noted “Christians do not read the Old Testament for its own sake but always with Christ and through Christ, as a voyage to Truth through continuing Revelation.”

Rolls-Royce and Ghosts, ancient & modern

A century-odd apart: 1902 Rolls-Royce Silver Ghost (left) and Paris Hilton's 2010 Rolls-Royce Ghost (right).

Although for model names Rolls-Royce has borrowed from the atlas (Corniche, Camargue), their most frequent source has been the spirit world (Ghost, Phantom, Wraith,  Spectre) and the Silver Ghost (1906-1926) was the car that cemented the company's reputation for quality.  Sometime during its life, it may well have deserved to be regarded "the best car in the world" and while that term a long ago ceased to be useful, Rolls-Royce have at times justified the tag "best-made cars in the world".  Some might have matched the quality of the fit and finish but it's doubtful many have ever done it better and such was the reputation the Silver Ghost quickly gained that the name (coined by the Autocar magazine and not the factory) overtook the line.  Originally, the Silver Ghost had been but one model in a range available on their standard (40/50 hp) chassis but the name so captured the public imagination that, eventually, the factory relented and when the first of the Phantom line was released in 1926, Silver Ghost for all the 40/50 cars it became.  Perhaps surprisingly, although in the subsequent century there were many uses of the "silver" element (Silver Wraith, Silver Dawn, Silver Cloud, Silver Shadow, Silver Spirit, Silver Spur & Silver Seraph), it wasn't until 2009 the "Ghost" name was revived and (since 2021 in its second generation), it remains in production, the line augmented in 2011 by the Ghost EWB (extended wheelbase).  Plenty of manufacturers have over the years listed LWB (long wheelbase) models but EWB was a genuinely novel abbreviation, the factory not commenting on whether LWB had become "a bit common" or it was just a piece of "product differentiation".      

RAF (Royal Air Force) Rolls-Royce Silver Ghost armored car, Iraq, circa 1936.

The Silver Ghost also had what may seem an improbable career as a military vehicle, the factory eventually building 120 armored cars on the chassis, a role to which it was well-suited because famously it was robust enough to survive the often rough roads throughout the British Empire.  Although the period of intended service on the Western Front during World War I (1914-1918) was shortened when the "war of movement" anticipated upon the outbreak of hostilities quickly gave way to effectively static trench warfare, the machines proved ideally suited to the conditions in the Middle East, the most famous the squadron used by T.E. Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia; 1888–1935) in battles against Ottoman forces during World War I.  What the British discovered was the tactics the Royal Navy honed at sea for 300-odd years could be applied to motorized operations across vast sandy stretches, detachments of armored cars able to be handled like squadrons of destroyers.  Lawrence remarked the Rolls-Royces were “more valuable than rubies” in desert combat and that he’d be content with one for the rest of his life were it to be supplied with tyres and petrol, the big, heavy Ghosts prone voraciously to chew through both.  In many parts of the empire, numbers of the armoured cars remained in service well into the 1930s (valued especially by the Raj in India) and the last was retired from service with the Irish Free State only in 1944, new tyres having become unobtainable.

Variation

Variation (pronounced vair-ee-ey-shuhn)

(1) The act, process, or accident of varying in condition, character, or degree; The act of varying; a partial change in the form, position, state, or qualities of a thing.

(2) Amount, rate, extent, or degree of change.

(3) A different form of something; a variant; a related but distinct thing.

(4) In music, the transformation of a melody or theme with changes or elaborations in harmony, rhythm, and melody (the technique often using repetition of material with alterations to melody, harmony, rhythm, timbre, texture, counterpoint or orchestration (though often with some invariant characteristic).

(5) In ballet, a solo dance, especially one a section of a pas de deux.

(6) In astronomy, any deviation from the mean orbit of a heavenly body, especially of a planetary or satellite orbit.

(7) In admiralty use as applied to nautical navigation, the angular difference at the vessel between the direction of true north and magnetic north; also called magnetic declination.

(8) In biology, a difference or deviation in structure or character from others of the same species or group (specifically in genetics the modification of a hereditary trait.

(9) In linguistics, any form of morphophonemic change, such as one involved in inflection, conjugation, or vowel mutation.

(10) In linguistics, when two or more linguistic forms appear in the same environment without a change in meaning, the choice of form being determined by factors of dialect, sociolect, register or simply the speaker's preference.

(11) In board and other games, a a line of play that differs from the original.

(12) In mathematics (variational calculus), an infinitesimal perturbation applied to a function, typically denoted , used to probe how a functional changes.

1350-1400: From the Middle English variation (difference, divergence), from the Middle French variation, from the Old French variacion (variety, diversity) and directly from the Latin variationem & variātiōn (stem of variātiō) (a difference, variation, change), from the past participle stem of variare (to change) (the source of the modern English vary).  The use in the context of musical composition wasn't common until the early nineteenth century.  The available synonyms themselves show an impressive variation: deviation, abnormality, diversity, variety, fluctuation, innovation, divergence, alteration, discrepancy, disparity, mutation, shift, modification, change, swerve, digression, contradistinction, aberration, novelty, diversification, mutation, alteration, difference.  Apart from the English variation, European descendants include the French variation, the Italian variazione, the Portuguese variação, the Russian вариация (variacija), the Spanish variación and Swedish variation.  Variation & variationism are nouns, variationist is a noun & adjective and variational is an adjective; the noun plural is variations.

In jurisdictions of the common law tradition, the word “variation” must be used with caution because while in documents it can be innocuous, it possesses also a number of well-established legal meanings, these varying according to the field of law where applied.  In the broadest (and simplest) sense, a “variation” is a change to an existing legal instrument, obligation, agreement etc that in some way changes something while leaving the arrangement’s whole substantially in existence.  The most familiar use is in contract law, a variation to a contract an agreement between parties to the contract to alter one or more of the terms.  In practice, despite the evolved rules, with the agreement of all parties, a variation to a contract can be so fundamental that it really become a “new contact”.  Provided there is certainty in the wording of the “variation” and all parties are content, this can be uncontroversial but in disputes, a variation can be found to be so fundamental a court will declare it a “new contract”.  Contract variations are so common (and often oral transactions if minor) that most pass unnoticed though disputed variations are among some of the famous entries in contract law text books.  In the jargon, a variation is conceptually distinct from a rescission (terminating an existing contract) or a novation (substituting a new contract or party for an existing one).

The interesting technical aspect of course is the point at which a “variation” becomes a contract, the terminology of significance because just because those writing something call it a “variation”, that doesn’t mean a court will accept it is one; depending on this and that, it may be held what the parties call a “variation” has, in effect, rescinded and replaced the original contract.  Borrowing from the traditions of equity the maxim “equity looks at substance rather than form” and what contract law judges do is look at consequence rather than the label.  One who would have understood that what matters is substance rather than form was comrade Stalin.  He eventually would find the Yugoslavian communists just to troublesome but while they could still be controlled, he was inclined to despair, complaining they were “more Marxist than Marx” and became annoyed with one delegation to which he'd just explained the importance of assuming control of the organs of state without it appearing a communist takeover.  All they wanted to talk about was the design of the red stars for the caps of the police and military personnel, prompting him angrily to exclaim: “What do you want with red stars on your caps?  The form is not important but what is gained, and you—red stars!  By God, there’s no need for stars!”     

Ginger, copper, auburn & chestnut are variations on the theme of red-headedness: Lindsay Lohan demonstrates the possibilities. 

Courts can also impose variations on their own orders (in which a term or terms might be altered but the order remains operative).  A judge of their own volition may issue a variation or it can be a response to a request from one of the parties (or both) to the proceedings.  Variations in orders are very common in family matters (quantum of maintenance payments, shared parenting arrangements etc) and criminal law (a sentence, bail or parole arrangements etc).  As a piece of judicial administration, variations are a vital aspect because, analogous with the use in contract law, they are a “modification”, meaning the force of the original remains afoot with no need for a re-hearing or the making of a new order.  Of course, a court may choose to set aside an order and make a new one; it’s on an order-by-order basis.  In specialized matters such will or trusts, variations can highly be regulated the laws of trusts especially specific and, as Rupert Murdoch (b 1931) found out, sometimes legally bulletproof.  Beneficiaries and trustees are of course subject to restrictions on variations but courts are also governed by the rules.  

Glenn Gould and the Goldberg Variations: 1955 & 1981

Published in 1741, J.S. Bach’s (1685-1750) Goldberg Variations consists of an aria and thirty variations.  Written for the harpsichord, it was named after German harpsichordist & organist Johann Gottlieb Goldberg (1727-1756), thought to have undertaken the first performance.  The work is now part of the canon of Baroque music but, before 1955, was an obscure piece of the Bach repertoire, a technically difficult composition for the hardly fashionable harpsichord and known mostly as a device for teachers to develop students’ keyboard skills.  Even for aficionados of the Baroque, it was rarely performed.

Glenn Gould (1932-1982) was a Canadian classical pianist, his debut album on the then novel twelve-inch vinyl LP an interpretation of The Goldberg Variations, played not on a harpsichord but a piano.  It was at once acknowledged to be an extraordinary performance and although critics don't always embrace radical approaches to older pieces, the praise was almost universal although there was one reviewer wo expressed "shock" ate Gould's fingers moving at a tempo the composer would never have envisioned, resulting in a piece of electrifying intensity; it really was something beyond mere interpretation. As well as introducing him to a wider audience, The Goldberg Variations proved also Gould's swansong, uniquely for him, re-recorded in 1981 and issued days before his death.  Eschewing the stunningly fast pace that had made the earlier recording famous and clearly the work of a mellower, more reflective artist, for those familiar with the original, it’s a masterpiece of controlled tension.  In 2002, Sony re-released both, the earlier essentially untouched, the later benefiting from a re-mastering correcting some of the technical deficiencies that tended to plague many early digital releases.  Although critics and professional musicians doubtlessly understood why Gould believed there were aspects of the 1955 performance that detracted from the whole and why he felt his second attempt the better piece of art, for those who listen to music for pleasure, it’s still the original that thrills.

Rarely can a single recording have so successfully revived a long-neglected work but that’s what Gould’s 1955 release did for Bach’s Goldberg Variations, his audacious interpretation unlocking fascinations that have since drawn audiences although not until the next century were many other pianists tempted into the studio.  The (alleged) early history also is intriguing: When first published, the piece was titled: “Aria with diverse variations for a harpsichord with two manuals.  Composed for Music Lovers to Refresh their Spirits.”  While we can be grateful for the adoption of the punchier “Goldberg Variations”, the origins of the wordy original may lie in the household of an insomniac Russian count then serving as ambassador to the electoral court of Saxony (part of the Holy Roman Empire).  To sooth him to sleep, the ambassador would have the court musician (Johann Gottlieb Goldberg) spend evenings in an antechamber, playing the harpsichord.  It was the count who requested Bach to compose works of a “gentle yet lively character” so that, even if not lulled to sleep, he might be cheered up.  That tale appeared in a very early biography of Bach and few historians think it likely (his pupil Goldberg was the aged 14) but it’s attractive enough not to be forgotten and while the inclusion of “lively” might seem a strange request from an insomniac, as a chronic condition it has been linked to depression.

Simone Dinnerstein, Goldberg Variations by J.S. Bach (Telarc CD-80692).

Additionally, the count may have had scripture in mind:  “And it came to pass, when the evil spirit from God was upon Saul, that David took an harp, and played with his hand: so Saul was refreshed, and was well, and the evil spirit departed from him.” (1 Samuel 16:23; King James Version of the Bible (KJV, 1611).  Not for nothing is Bach known as perhaps the greatest composer of “Church Music”, his works often including what was in his lifetime called gemüths-ergetzende (soul-enhancing).  Certainly, the work retains its capacity to stun, US pianist Simone Dinnerstein’s acclaimed recording in 2007 one of that year’s big hits on the classical charts: Released by Telarc, it was her self-financed project to mark a return to performance after pausing to give birth to her first child and definitely it was not a Gould 1.1 or 2.1.  Preformed on a 1903 Hamburg Steinway model D concert grand, the sound was sumptuous without the contrived lushness many studios once were compelled to concoct in the day before digital techniques were refined to the point where individual notes could be captured almost in the space’s “specific cubic millimetres”.  What’s often forgotten about the Goldberg Variations is that although reviewers have often focused on the “difficult passages”, some of it is simple indeed and it’s this “light & dark” that can be exploited; Gould in 1955 had his approach, Dinnerstein in 2007 had her own and the contrast in obvious from the opening aria, played at a tempo that will seem startling to those who have only heard Gould’s first take on the meditation.  What she seems to have decided is it could be a romantic piece (not the most fashionable view in 2007), not from beginning to end, but with the character of those passages gaining emphasis from the more rapid sections.  It was an accomplished work and while the virtuosity might have been expected, it’s the inventiveness that will intrigue although there will be some who expected more, some of the repeats not included, presumably a technical limitation of the single-CD release.  Hopefully, like Gould, she’ll re-record, now technology no longer imposes such constraints.

Borderline

Borderline (pronounced bawr-der-lahyn)

(1) On or near a border or boundary; a border; dividing line; line of demarcation.

(2) Uncertain; indeterminate; debatable; an indeterminate position between two conditions.

(3) Not quite meeting accepted, expected, or average standards.

(4) In psychiatry, as Borderline Personality Disorder, a descriptor of a personality disorder characterized by instability in many areas, as mood, identity, self-image and behavior and often manifested by impulsive actions, suicide attempts, inappropriate anger, or depression. The abbreviation is BPD.

1847: A compound word (also as border-line), created to describe a "strip of land along a frontier" as distinct from the actual line of a border, the construct being border + line.  Border was inherited from the Middle English bordure, from the Old French bordure & bordeure, from border (to border), from bort & bord (a border), of Germanic origin akin and to the Middle High German borte (border, trim) and the German Borte (ribbon, trimming); doublet of bordure.  Line, influenced in Middle English by the Middle French ligne (line), was from the Latin linea, from līneus (flaxen; a flaxen thing) from līnum (flax).  The Middle French ligne was from the Old Danish likna, derived with the inchoative suffix -ne from lig (similar) and was related to the Swedish likna, the English liken and the Middle Low German līkenen.  It replaced galīkōną, an older verb without -n, hence the Old English ġelīcian, the German gleichen and the Gothic galeikōn.  As an adjective meaning "verging on" it is attested from 1903, originally in medical jargon to describe various conditions but from the 1930s, it became most associated with metal health, the diagnosis of the condition BPD (Borderline Personality Disorder) apparently first mentioned in the medical literature in 1938 and evolving over several decades.  More correctly, that process can be called a "co-evolution" because while in academic and clinical use understanding of the condition was being refined, in the popular imagination BPD became one of the more popular terms used both for self-diagnosis and to apply to others (whether or not known personally).  Because BPD is inherently a spectrum condition, coinings like borderlinelike & borderlineish are superfluous although (of behavior) borderlinesque might be useful; all three remain non-standard.  The adjective nonborderline is used both in political geography (those lines of delineation on maps indicating something other than national or sub-national borders) and mental health (meaning “unaffected by BPD”).  Borderline is a noun, verb, adjective & adverb, borderliner & borderlineness are nouns and borderlined & borderlining are verbs; the noun plural is borderlines.  

Borderline Personality Disorder

On the internet, BPD is one of the more popular of the conditions ascribed to celebrities, politicians and others in the public eye.  As a general principle, places on the web are not recommended as sources of medical advice and that includes mental health although it seems obvious that in many politicians, their personality disorders are well beyond being classified as "borderline", many thresholds long since crossed.

In clinical psychiatry, although the number of borderline conditions has increased, it’s only the concepts of Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) and the Schizotypal Personality which are claimed to have adequate diagnostic reliability, the parameters of both first codified in the third edition of the American Psychiatric Association's (APA) Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM).  The fourth edition (DSM-IV-TR (2000)), established the most commonly followed criteria for BPD and in DSM-5 (2013), these were extended to a remarkable sixteen headings in seven (A-G) categories in what appeared to be a kind of clinical mopping-up of symptoms suffered by those not able, for whatever reason, to be diagnosed with something more specific.  Indeed, the all-encompassing taxonomy appears rendered superfluous by Criterion E which seems just about to sum it up.

Criterion A: Moderate or greater impairment in personality functioning; two or more of the following criteria: (1) Identity: Markedly impoverished, poorly developed, or unstable self-image, often associated with excessive self-criticism; chronic feelings of emptiness; dissociative states under stress. (2) Self-direction: Instability in goals, aspirations, values, or career plans. (3) Empathy: Compromised ability to recognize the feelings and needs of others associated with interpersonal hypersensitivity (i.e., prone to feel slighted or insulted); perceptions of others selectively biased toward negative attributes or vulnerabilities. (4) Intimacy: Intense, unstable, and conflicted close relationships, marked by mistrust, neediness, and anxious preoccupation with real or imagined abandonment; close relationships often viewed in extremes of idealization and devaluation and alternating between over-involvement and withdrawal.

Criterion B: Four or more of the following seven pathological personality traits must be present: (5) Emotional liability: Unstable emotional experiences and frequent mood changes; emotions that are easily aroused, intense, and/or out of proportion to events and circumstances. (6) Anxiousness: Intense feelings of nervousness, tenseness, or panic, often in reaction to interpersonal stresses; worry about the negative effects of past unpleasant experiences and future negative possibilities; feeling fearful, apprehensive, or threatened by uncertainty; fears of falling apart or losing control. (7) Separation insecurity: Fears of rejection by and/or separation from significant others, associated with fears of excessive dependency and complete loss of autonomy. (8) Depressivity: Frequent feelings of being down, miserable, and/or hopeless; difficulty recovering from such moods; pessimism about the future; pervasive shame; feelings of inferior self-worth; thoughts of suicide and suicidal behavior. (9) Impulsivity: Acting on the spur of the moment in response to immediate stimuli; acting on a momentary basis without a plan or consideration of outcomes; difficulty establishing or following plans; a sense of urgency and self-harming behavior under emotional distress. (10) Risk-taking: Engagement in dangerous, risky, and potentially self-damaging activities, unnecessarily and without regard to consequences; lack of concern for one’s limitations and denial of the reality of the personal danger. (11) Hostility: Persistent or frequent angry feelings; anger or irritability in response to minor slights and insults.

Criterion C: (12) The impairments in personality functioning and the individual’s personality trait expression are relatively inflexible and pervasive across a broad range of personal and social situations.

Criterion D: (13) The impairments in personality functioning and the individual’s personality trait expression are relatively stable across time with onsets that can be traced back at least to adolescence or early adulthood.

Criterion E: (14) The impairments in personality functioning and the individual’s personality trait expression are not better explained by another mental disorder.

Criterion F: (15) The impairments in personality functioning and the individual’s personality trait expression are not attributable to a substance (eg, a drug of abuse, medication, exposure to a toxin) or a general medical condition (eg, severe head trauma).

Criterion G: (16) The impairments in personality functioning and the individual’s personality trait expression are not better understood as normal for the individual’s developmental stage or the socio-cultural environment.

The wide BPD net cast in DSM-5 pleased the psychiatrists but in recent years, there’s been interest in changing the name of BPD, a movement led not the profession but by those diagnosed with the condition, the creation of pressure-groups now greatly assisted by social media.  The objections seem to be that BPD (1) somehow marginalizes the sufferers in the hierarchy of mental illness, (2) fails to capture the underlying issues and mechanisms involved in producing its symptoms and (3), denigrates and even invalidates the very existence of their condition, the word “borderline” suggesting their symptoms aren’t sufficiently severe to be a “real” condition.  In that sense, the word does have loaded connotations, “borderline” used first by 1930s psychoanalysts to describe patients whose symptoms lay between psychosis and neurosis but to modern lay-persons, a common interpretation is that the condition “borders” on being a “real” illness.  Some even object to “disorder” but most accept it; they’d just prefer to be diagnosed with a more significant, and fashionable, depressive disorder.

Although it seems hardly more respectable, Emotional Intensity Disorder emerged from a survey as the popular choice of patients, beating out Emotional Regulation Disorder, Emotional Dysregulation Disorder, Emotionally Unstable Personality Disorder, Impulsive Personality Disorder & Impulsive-Emotional Dysregulation Disorder.  The clinicians liked Emotional Regulation Disorder but were out-voted.  Unimpressed by either, the committee working on the revision of DSM-5 proposed Borderline Type (which sounds like a sceptical psychiatrist’s casual dismissal of emos), but noted “no decision has yet been made.”  When in 2022 the text-revision (DSM-5-TR) was released, although there were textual and contextual updates, the diagnostic criteria for BPD did not change so the distinction between the two can be thought terminological rather than structural, the language used reflected the editors’ decades-long attempts at once to be more precise and less stigmatizing.  In DSM-5-TR there was also an obvious focus on editing “now suspect” references to gender but none of this altered the construct of BPD.  As had long been the practice, DSM-5-TR included updated epidemiology data (if newer research or analysis was thought to have provided some refinement) but it was very much a project focused on cultural considerations, terminology and “modernization” of language.

Checkpoint Charlie and the Berlin borderline, 1961-1990

Konrad Adenauer (1876–1967; FRG Chancellor 1949-1963) at Checkpoint Charlie in 1962; car is a Mercedes-Benz 300d (W189).

The 300 was produced in four generations (W186: 300, 300b & 300c, 1951-1957 & W189: 300d, 1957-1962) and became known informally as the “300 Adenauer”, the association prompted by the chancellor using six (cabriolets, sedans and a landaulet) 300s during his long term in office.  The 300d is also associated with John XXIII (1881–1963; pope 1958-1963) who was presented with one in 1960 and it served as the official papal vehicle until 1965 when Paul VI (1897-1978; pope 1963-1978) took delivery of a Mercedes-Benz 600; both cars were high-roofed landaulets.  Used only until the mid-1960s, the lower case characters in the model designation appeared only in documents and were never added to the badgework but they are another layer in the intricacy of the factory's model nomenclature which, when first conceived (sort of) made sense but a combination of new technology and range-proliferation (with the same engines appearing in different classes conspired to make the system unmanageable and in the early 1990s there was a structural revision which, as amended (with its own inconsistencies), endures to this day.

Although the most famous, the crossing point in the Berlin Wall (1961-1989) on the borderline between East and West Berlin and named Checkpoint Charlie (Checkpoint C to the military) was one of three, all known by their designation drawn from the NATO phonetic alphabet, the now forgotten pair being Checkpoint Alpha at Helmstedt and Checkpoint Bravo at Wannsee.  The Soviets (officially) didn't use the NATO designation, instead calling Checkpoint Charlie the КПП Фридрихштрассе (KPP Fridrikhshtrasse (Friedrichstraße Crossing Point)) while the government of the GDR (Deutsche Demokratische Republik (German Democratic Republic; the old East Germany, 1949-1990) listed it as the Grenzübergangsstelle (Border Crossing Point) Friedrich-Zimmerstraße.

Checkpoint Charlie, 1963.

In one of the charming coincidences of the Cold War, Checkpoint Charlie was located at the intersection of Friedrichstraße, Zimmerstraße & Mauerstraße (Wall Street).  It became the only well-know crossing point because, for reasons of security and administrative convenience, it was the sole designated crossing point (whether for foot or vehicular traffic) for foreigners and members of the three Allied (previously occupying) forces (France, the UK & the US) stationed in the FRG (Bundesrepublik Deutschland (Federal Republic of Germany; the old West Germany, 1949-1990).  The manned structures associated with Checkpoint Charlie were also in a location which lent itself to photography from a number of angles and replicas were built by film studios for the many productions shot in Berlin during the Cold War.  Often dark, gloomy pieces, the "Cold War spy film" was a genre which over the decades as geopolitical tensions waxed & waned but the divided Berlin of the 1960s was its high-point and what was done then "defined the look".  The Cafe Adler (Eagle Café), adjacent to Checkpoint Charlie was for decades one of West Berlin's tourist hotspots.

Checkpoint Charlie in 1982, showing the larger aluminum building which that year replaced the original wooden hut.

To those accustomed to seeing the gargantuan structures the US military tend to erect wherever they take root, Checkpoint Charlie must have been a surprise, a modest (though enlarged in 1962) and obviously temporary wooden hut was for more than twenty years all that stood on the western side, the little building replaced in 1982 only because it had become so dilapidated it was literally falling down around the guards stationed within and even then, the metal structure which replaced it, while larger, was no more permanent.  That obvious impermanence was part of the political messaging, the Western powers never wishing to hint at an acceptance the division of Germany would forever endure.  However, if people were surprised, it’s doubtful many were disappointed, the compact architecture providing a single point of focus and even in the pre-selfie era, at one glance, what tourists could take in was evocative of the Cold War cinema with which so many were familiar.

Checkpoint Charlie, 1970.

The attitude of the allied powers reflected their political position that while obviously a line of control, the Berlin Wall was not a legitimate international borderline and thus only small, temporary buildings were required.  To the authorities in the Kremlin and the GDR, whatever some might suggest was the position in international law, the Berlin Wall was a borderline and thus on their side the infrastructure quickly grew to include watchtowers, a military barracks and a multi-lane, enclosed clearing zone in which those wishing to cross could be interrogated and searched.

Checkpoint Charlie in 2020, now a replica “1961” hut with new sandbags.

The Berlin Wall “fell” in November 1989 and the checkpoint booth was removed some six months later although, because East and West Germany remained legally separate countries, the checkpoint at the point of the borderline was retained as the designated official crossing-point for foreigners and diplomats, an arrangement which ended in October 1990 when German reunification was formalized in law.  Checkpoint Charlie has since remained one of Berlin's tourist attractions and, just as some parts of the once demolished wall have been re-created because supply of the real thing wasn’t enough to meet demand, the municipal government soon erected an almost exact replica of the checkpoint as it stood in 1961 although the quality of the construction is said to be rather more robust than the original and it’s expected to enjoy a longer life.  Better to capture the flavor, even the sandbags which gradually were removed during the 1970s are back in place, carefully stacked.  During every week of the tourist season, selfies are taken by the thousand.