Surplus

Surplus (pronounced sur-pluhs)

(1) Something that remains above what is used or needed.

(2) In agricultural economics, produce or a quantity of food grown by a nation or area in excess of its needs, especially such a quantity of food purchased and stored by a governmental program of guaranteeing farmers a specific price for certain crops.

(3) In accounting, the excess of assets over liabilities accumulated throughout the existence of a business, excepting assets against which stock certificates have been issued; excess of net worth over capital-stock value.

(4) In public finance, an excess of government revenues over expenditures during a certain financial year.

(5) In international trade, an excess of receipts over payments on the balance of payments.

(6) In economic theory, an unsold quantity of a good resulting from a lack of equilibrium in a market.  For example, if a price is artificially high, sellers will bring more goods to the market than buyers will be willing to buy.  In classical economics, the opposite of shortage.

(7) In Chancery law (and its successor courts), the remainder of a fund appropriated for a particular purpose.

1325–1375: From the Middle English surplus, from the Old French sorplus (remainder, extra), from the Medieval Latin superplūs (excess, surplus), the construct being super (over) + plūs (more).  The Italian surplus was a borrowing from modern French where surplus had existed since the twelfth century while in English, surplus has been used as an adjective since the fourteenth century.  Enjoying the same pronunciation, surplice and surplus are often confused.  A surplice is a liturgical vestment of the Christian Church, usually styled as a tunic of white linen or cotton material, with wide sleeves and often some lace embellishment or embroidered edges.  Lengths vary; in medieval times it reached almost to the ground but tends now to be shorter; some still retain the longer garments for the ceremonial.  As surplis, it was a thirteenth century Middle-English borrowing from the Anglo-French surpliz, a syncopated variant of Old French surpeliz, derived from the Medieval Latin superpellīcium (vestīmentum) over-pelt (garment), neuter of superpellīcius, the construct being super (over) + pellīt(us) (clothed with skins or fur) + -ius (the adjectival suffix).  A clerical surplice is thus a kind of frock; a clerical surplus means "too many priests".  Surplus is a noun, adjective & verb, surplusage is a noun and surplused & surplussing are verbs; the noun plural is surpluses or surplusses.

Surplus Repression

German-American Herbert Marcuse (1898–1979), a sociologist and philosopher, highly influential in the mid-late twentieth century.  Even today, Marcuse enjoys a cult following and remains a hate-figure for those on the right who trace the ills of Western civilization to the corrosive influence Marxist & neo-Marxists exerted on youth in the newly expanded universities in the 1960s & 1970s.

A critique of capitalism’s culture and economic arrangements, Marcuse's book Eros and Civilization (1955) drew, inter alia, from Karl Marx (1818-1883) and Sigmund Freud (1856-1939) and described an alternative structure for society.  He didn’t reject Freud’s idea that repression of man's instinctive desires was necessary for civilization to endure but Marcuse distinguished between basic (or necessary) repression and surplus repression, detailing the differences between the biological vicissitudes of the instincts and the socially imposed.  His construct was that basic repression was that which man suppresses to permit peaceful societies to form; repression or modification of the instincts being necessary “…for the perpetuation of the human race in civilization.”  Surplus repression meant those “…restrictions necessitated by [the] social domination” of the particular ruling-class or hegemony.  The purpose of surplus repression was to shape the instincts of individuals to conform to the requirements of modern capitalism, a surrender to what Marcuse called the “performance principle”, a construct building on Marx’s theories of alienation and surplus value.

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

Marcuse's writing did have the attraction of being more accessible than that of Marx or Freud (and certainly that of many neo-Marxists or Freudians) but that also meant it was easier for critics to cherry pick the points they found most objectionable.  For an explanation of why society need to be organized the way it was, conservatives seemed to prefer the rationalization of the "harsh but deliciously clever" English philosopher Thomas Hobbes (1588–1679) best known for his book Leviathan (1651) in which appeared the memorable passage describing the life of man in a world where there existed no restraining authorities forcing people to repress their worst instincts:

In such condition, there is no place for industry; because the fruit thereof is uncertain: and consequently no culture of the earth; no navigation, nor use of the commodities that may be imported by sea; no commodious building; no instruments of moving, and removing, such things as require much force; no knowledge of the face of the earth; no account of time; no arts; no letters; no society; and which is worst of all, continual fear, and danger of violent death; and the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.

Such a culture Hobbes called the "state of nature" by which he meant not an environmentally sustainable hippie commune but a place in which there was "bellum omnium contra omnes" (war of all against all) and murder went unpunished except by another murder.  Although the distinction is now an unfashionable one to draw, conservatives liked the way Hobbes seemed to know not all cultures were civilizations and that a little surplus repression was a small price to pay for for its benefits.  Hobbes lived through troubled times and his views on the importance of stable, strong governance should be understood as the writings of one who had seen what the alternative looks like but as a list of exculpatory bullet-points, his world view was one which could be ticked off by by the ayatollahs in Tehran or the CCP (Chinese Communist Party).  Marcuse is not so transportable.

Peace man: PotM (Playmate of the Month) Debbie Ellison (b 1949) on the cover of Playboy magazine, September 1970.  That year's PotY (Playmate of the Year) was Sharon Clark (b 1943).  With due respect to Ms Ellison, sometimes, it really may have been bought for the articles: Michael G Horowitz's profile of Marcuse was published in this edition.  The old curmudgeon of the left wouldn’t have had much sympathy for hippies and their piece sign because neither appeared to be doing much to bring on the revolution and was anyway once heard to remark: “Ach, women!  Useless in a revolutionary situation!”

Playboy titled the profile Portrait of the Marxist as an Old Trooper although the author (one of the philosopher's old students) preferred to call the piece a "personality snapshot" and it certainly had a different flavor than what would have been found in the activist press or journals of political science.  Years later, the author would concede some of his critique of Marcuse's work was misplaced and many of the old pessimist's predictions had (unfortunately) transpired.  That said, Marcuse seems never to have complained about the piece, unlike Albert Speer (1905–1981; Nazi court architect 1934-1942; Nazi minister of armaments and war production 1942-1945) whose interview by Eric Norden, conducted over an apparently convivial ten days in the “richly furnished living room of his spacious home” in Heidelberg, was published in Playboy’s June 1971 edition.  Speer would later complain the piece had been “…restructured, with words and formulations entirely foreign to me.”  He did however conclude “…on the whole the interview as printed corresponds with my opinions…” by which he meant Nordon was yet another to accept an recycle his core position: “If I didn't see it [the Holocaust], then it was because I didn't want to see it.”  That was the so-called “Billigung defense” which Speer since 1945 had, in a masterful manner, used simultaneously to accept a collective guilt yet absolve himself of individuality responsibility.  Others no more guilty but less cunning had been hanged at Nuremberg and the Playboy interview was printed years before material was discovered in the German federal archives documenting his part in the persecution of Jews and the unearthing of private correspondence in which he admitted knowledge of the holocaust and its awful, chilling rationale.  As one of his biographers, Gitta Sereny (1921–2012), rightly pointed out in Albert Speer: His Battle with Truth (1995): “If Speer had said as much in Nuremberg, he would have been hanged.”

Marcuse’s work was acknowledged as a landmark in the synthetization of Marxist and psychoanalytic theories but was criticized for being just another of the "pointless utopian myths" written of since antiquity, work cut adrift from the moorings of the political reality which seemed in the 1960s more urgently to demand attention.  Marcuse acknowledged the distance of his work from reality and conceded his theories could reach actualization only by revolution or gradual infiltration of the structures of the power-elite and, after the disappointments of the moments in 1968 when revolution fleetingly was in the air, he preferred the latter.  German student activist Rudi Dutschke (1940–1979) had advocated a "…march through the institutions of power", radically to change society from within government and cultural institutions by becoming part of the machinery and structures under which capitalism operated.  This too owed a debt to the theories of hegemony and Marcuse wrote to Dutschke in 1971 saying he “regarded your notion of the "march through the institutions" as the only effective way.”  It all failed.  It was the highly unusual coincidence of political, economic & demographic circumstances in the post war (1948-1973) Western world which briefly in 1968 made the system seem internally vulnerable and the hegemony learned the lesson: they would control who manned the institutions that matter and the trouble-makers could march through things like theatre trusts, literary festivals and art gallery committees.

Exquisite

Exquisite (pronounced ek-skwi-zit or ik-skwiz-it)

(1) Of special beauty or charm, or rare and appealing excellence and often associated with objects or great delicacy; of rare excellence of production or execution, as works of art or workmanship; beautiful, delicate, discriminating, perfect.

(2) Extraordinarily fine or admirable; consummate.

(3) Intense; acute, or keen, as pleasure or pain; keenly or delicately sensitive or responsive; exceeding; extreme; in a bad or a good sense (eg as exquisite pleasure or exquisite pain).

(4) Recherché; far-fetched; abstruse (a now rare early meaning which to some extent survives in surrealist’s exercise “exquisite corpse”).

(5) Of particular refinement or elegance, as taste, manners, etc or persons.

(6) A man excessively concerned about clothes, grooming etc; a dandy or coxcomb.

(7) Ingeniously devised or thought out (obsolete).

(8) Carefully adjusted; precise; accurate; exact (now less common except as an adverb.

(9) Of delicate perception or close and accurate discrimination; not easy to satisfy; exact; fastidious (related to the sense of “exquisite judgment, taste, or discernment”.

1400–1450: From the Late Middle English exquisite (carefully selected), from the Latin exquīsītus (excellent; meticulous, chosen with care (and literally “carefully sought out”)), perfect passive participle of exquīrō (to seek out), originally the past participle of exquīrere (to ask about, examine) the construct being ex- + -quīrere, a combining form of quaerere (to seek). The construct of exquīrō was ex- +‎ quaerō (seek).  The ex- prefix was applied to words in Middle English borrowed from the Middle French and was derived from the Latin ex- (out of, from) and was from the primitive Indo-European eǵ- & eǵs-.  It was cognate with the Ancient Greek ἐξ (ex-, out of, from) from the Transalpine Gaulish ex- (out), the Old Irish ess- (out), the Old Church Slavonic изъ (izŭ) (out), the Russian из (iz) (from, out of).  Exquisite is a noun & adjective, exquisiteness & exquisitiveness are nouns and exquisitively & exquisitely are adverbs; the noun plural is exquisites.

1972 Lancia Fulvia 1600 HF Series II.  

Everything about the Lancia Fulvia (1965-1976) appeared exquisitely delicate but the little machine was tough and was for half-a-decade a dominant force in international rallying.  A Lancia legend is that when the hood was opened on one of the first to reach the US, a mechanic, brought up on a diet of hefty V8s, upon seeing the tiny, 1.2 litre (75 cubic inch) narrow-angle V4 is said to have remarked: “Don’t ask me, take it to a jeweler.”

The etymology of the Latin quaerō (seek) is mysterious.  It may be from the Proto-Italic kwaizeō, from the primitive Indo-European kweh (to acquire) so cognates may include the Ancient Greek πέπαμαι (pépamai) (to get, acquire), the Old Prussian quoi (I/you want) & quāits (desire), the Lithuanian kviẽsti (to invite) and possibly the Albanian kam (I have).  Some have suggested the source being the primitive Indo-European kwoys & kweys (to see) but there has been little support for this.  The authoritative Lexikon der indogermanischen Verben (Lexicon of the Indo-European Verbs (LIV)), the standard etymological dictionary of the Proto-Indo-European languages, suggests it’s a derivation of hzeys (to seek, ask), via the form koaiseo.  "Exquisite corpse" is a calque of the French cadavre exquis (literally “exquisite cadaver”).  Dating from 1925, it was coined by French surrealists to describe a method of loosely structured constructivism on the model of the parlour game consequences; fragments of text (or images) are created by different people according to pre-set rules, then joined together to create a complete text.  The name comes from the first instance in 1925: Le cadavre exquis boira le vin nouveau (The exquisite corpse will drink new wine).  Exquisite corpse is noted as a precursor to both post-modernism and deconstructionist techniques.

Although not infrequently it appears in the same sentence as the word “unique”, exquisite can be more nuanced, the comparative “more exquisite, the superlative most exquisite” and there has certainly been a change in the pattern of use.  In English, it originally was applied to any thing (good or bad, art or torture, diseases or good health), brought to a highly wrought condition, tending among the more puritanical to disapprobation.  The common modern meaning (of consummate and delightful excellence) dates from the late 1570s while the noun (a dandy, a foppish man) seems first to have been used in 1819.  One interesting variant which didn’t survive was exquisitous (not natural, but procured by art), appearing in dictionaries in the early eighteenth centuries but not since.  The pronunciation of exquisite has undergone a rapid change from ek-skwi-zit to ik-skwiz-it, the stress shifting to the second syllable.  The newer pronunciation attracted the inevitable criticism but is now the most common form on both sides of the Atlantic and use seems not differentiated by class. 

The exquisite wimp: Baldur Benedikt von Schirach

Exquisite is used almost exclusively as an adjective, applied typically to objects or performances but it’s also a noun, albeit one always rare.  As a noun it was used to describe men who inhabited that grey area of being well dressed, well coiffured, well mannered and somewhat effeminate without being obviously homosexual; it was a way of hinting at something without descending to the explicit.  PG Wodehouse (1881-1975) applied it thus in Sam the Sudden (1925) and historians Ann (1938-2021) & John Tusa (b 1936) in The Nuremberg Trial (1983) found no better noun to apply to former Hitler Youth Leader Baldur von Schirach, noting (as did his many enemies in the party) his feminine tastes in furnishings and propensity to pen poor poetry.  The companion word to describe a similar chap without of necessity the same hint of effeminacy is “aesthete”.  In The Anatomy of the Nuremberg Trials: A Personal Memoir (1992), Brigadier General Telford Taylor (1908–1998; lead US counsel at the Nuremberg Trial) wrote of him that: “at thirty-nine, was the youngest and, except perhaps for Joachim von Ribbentrop (1893–1946; Nazi foreign minister 1938-1945) and Hans Fritzsche (1900–1953; Nazi propagandist), the weakest of the defendants.  If wimps had then been spoken of, Schirach would have been so styled.”

Nazi poetry circle on the terrace at the Berghof on the Obersalzberg.

Left to right: Adolf Hitler (1889-1945; Führer (leader) and German head of government 1933-1945 & head of state 1934-1945), Martin Bormann (1900–1945), Hermann Göring (1893–1946; leading Nazi 1922-1945, Hitler's designated successor & Reichsmarschall 1940-1945), and Baldur von Schirach (1907-1974; head of the Hitlerjugend (Hitler Youth) 1931-1940 & Gauleiter (district party leader) and Reichsstatthalter (Governor) of Vienna (1940-1945)), Berchtesgaden, Bavaria, Germany, 1936.  Of much, the other three were guilty as sin and would (at the last possible moment) commit suicide but von Schirach would survive to die in his bed at 67.  There seems no record to confirm if that bed was in a “a snow white bedroom with delicate lace curtains” as the rougher types in the Nazi Party had once derided him for having.

Airey Neave (1916–1979) was the British military lawyer who served the indictments on the defendants at Nuremberg and in On Trial at Nuremberg (1978) he recalled the experience, cell by cell.  His first impression of von Schirach was that his appearance was “…bi-sexual and soft with thé dansant eyes [thé dansant was a dance held while afternoon tea was served and in idiomatic use “thé dansant eyes” suggested the coquettish fluttering of the lashes a flirtatious young lady might deploy]”, adding “He looked a man who might be dangerous to small boys.  At a second glance, I imagined him beneath the palms at Cannes in co-respondent shoes.”  In this context, Neave used “co-respondent” in the sense of the man cited in divorce proceedings as the one who slept with the adulterous wife and a “co-respondent shoes (or car, suit, tie etc)” were distinguished by flashiness rather than quality.

Von Schirach went on trial before the IMT (International Military Tribunal) in the first Nuremberg trial (1945-1946), an event the author Rebecca West (1892–1983) attended in her capacity as a journalist and among her impressions she wrote of him, admitting she was at first “startled” because “…he was like a woman in a way not common among men who look like women.  It was as if a neat and mousy governess sat there, not pretty but with never a hair out of place, and always to be trusted never to intrude when there were visitors: as it might be Jane Eyre.”  Although indicted also under Count 1 (conspiracy to commit crimes against peace), for his role as head (1931-1940) of the Hitlerjugend (Hitler Youth), von Schirach was convicted only under Count 4 (crimes against humanity) for his part in deporting Viennese Jews to the death camps while Gauleiter and Reichsstatthalter of Vienna.  Cunningly, and not without ostentation, he admitted some guilt for his role in “corrupting German youth” although by that he meant the political indoctrination to which he subjected them, rather than conduct many in the Nazi party liked to hint he enjoyed with the boys under his command; however defined, it’s certain he corrupted more youth than Socrates (circa 470–399 BC).  Applying common law principles, the IMT found his actions as head of the Hitlerjugend didn’t reach the threshold of “conspiracy” and thus acquitted him on Count 1, his 20 year sentence handed down for his conduct in Vienna.  The preparation for the trial had been rushed and had subsequently discovered evidence against him been presented at the trial, doubtlessly and deservedly he’d have been hanged.  Had that sentence been imposed, whether like Göring he’d have followed Socrates and taken hemlock will never be known.

Exquisite: A style guide

Lindsay Lohan in a Gucci Porcelain Garden Print Silk Gown with an all-over Dutch toile in blue and white, high ruffled collar and bib, flared sleeves, pussy bow and a blue and red patent leather belt around a high waist, Savoy Hotel, London, June 2017.

The gown was said to have a recommended retail price (RRP) of Stg£4,040 (US$7300).  The occasion was the launch of the charitable organization One Family, dedicated to combating child trafficking.  While there was a fussiness about the detailing, the quality of the construction was obvious and successfully to use, at this scale, a pattern of this intricacy is not easy and demands a skilled eye.  On the move, it swished around nicely and although the whims of critics can be hard to predict, on the night, most seemed to like this and it was a perhaps welcome relief from the expanses of skin of the "naked dress" movement, then beginning to dominate red carpets.

Designers find inspiration where it's found: Four dinner plates from Wedgewood's Enoch "Countryside Blue" collection, circa 1967.

Within the one critique, the word exquisite can appear, used as a neutral descriptor (an expression of extent), a paean to beauty and even an ironic dismissal.  A gown for example can be “exquisitely detailed” but that doesn’t of necessity imply elegance although that would be the case of something said to be an “exquisite design”.  That said, most were drawn to the Lindsay Lohan's Gucci gown in some way, the references to Jane Austen (1775–1817) many (although historians of fashion might note Gucci’s creation as something evocative more of recent films made of Ms Austen's novels than anything representative of what was worn in her era) and the fabric’s patterning & restraint in the use of color produced a dreamily romantic look.

Naiad

Naiad (pronounced ney-ad, ney-uhd or nahy-ad)

(1) In Classical Mythology, a nymph (a female deity) dwelling in (in some stories “presiding over”) a lake, river, spring or fountain.

(2) In entomology, aquatic larva or juvenile form of the dragonfly, damselfly, mayfly and related insects.

(3) In botany, any monocotyledonous submerged aquatic plant of the genus Naias (or Najas), having narrow leaves and small flowers (of the family Naiadaceae (or Najadaceae) and also called the water nymph.

(4) In malacology, any of certain freshwater mussels of the genus Unio.

(5) In informal use, a female swimmer, especially a young, expert one.

Circa 1600: From the Latin Nais, Naias & Nāïad- (stem of Nāïas, genitive naiadis), from the Ancient Greek Nāïás (plural Naiades) (a water nymph) and related to νάω (náō or náein) (to flow), from the primitive Indo-European naw-yo-, a suffixed form of snau & nau- (to swim, flow, let flow (from the primitive Indo-European root sna- (to swim).  The English poet, literary critic, translator and playwright John Dryden (1631–1700) used the Latin singular form Nais; In English, the plural form Naiades was in use as early as the late fourteenth century and the use of the initial capital was inconsistent, something not unusual in Middle and early Modern English .  Naiad is a noun; the noun plural is naiads or naiades.

The companion term (in the sense they were often riparian (growing on the bank of a river or stream)) was dryad (a female tree spirit), from the Old French driade (wood nymph), from the Latin Dryas & Dryadis, from the Ancient Greek Δρυάς (Druás) (dryad), from δρῦς (drûs) (oak), from the primitive Indo-European derew & derewo- (tree, wood) and related to the primitive Indo-European dóru (tree).  The niads should not be confused with the Nereids (plural Nereids or Nereides).  In Greek Mythology, Nerids were one of 50 sea nymphs who were attendants upon Poseidon (Neptune); they were represented riding on sea horses, sometimes in human form and sometimes with the tail of a fish.  In zoology, nerid is an alternative form of nereidid (any polychaete worm of the Nereididae).  Nereid was from the stem of the Latin Nērēis (sea-nymph), from the Ancient Greek Νηρηΐς (Nērēḯs), from Νηρεύς (Nēreús) (the sea-god Nereus).

Fuchsia Water Nymph.

The Naiads were water nymphs who, although very long-lived, were mortal, a physiology not unique among the deities of Classical Mythology and although the Naiads incarnate the divinity of the spring or stream which they inhabited, a waterway could be the home to more than one of the nymphs; presence did not confer an exclusivity of dominion.  As is typical of the myths, the stories often are inconsistent for although Homer said the Naiads were the daughters of Zeus, elsewhere they’re described as daughters of the waters in which they dwell.  The daughters of Ασωπός (Asopus) were Naiads.  Asopus (Ασωπός) was the god of the river Asopus and (the family tree is typically murky and varies with the source) was either son of Poseidon & Pero, of Zeus & Eurynome or of Oceanus & Tethys.  He married Metope, the daughter of Ladon, fathered two sons (Ismenus and Pelagon) and an impressive 20 daughters although The Greek historian of the first century BC, Διόδωρος (Diodorus of Sicily) listed the names only of a dozen (Corcyra, Salamis, Aegina, Pirene, Cleone, Thebe, Tanagra, Thespia, Asopis, Sinope, Oenia (or Ornia) and Chalcis.  Confusingly Asopus is in other places mentioned as the said to be the father of Antiope and Plataea (that genealogy contested by other authors), after whom the city Plataea is named.  Plataea was a city-state in Boeotia at the foot of Mount Cithaeron, between the mountain and the river Asopus (which divided its territory from that of Thebes).  The modern Greek town of Plataies is adjacent to its ruins.

Led astray by freshwater sirens: Hylas and the Nymphs (1896), oil on canvas by the aptly named John William Waterhouse (1849–1917), Manchester Art Gallery, England.  Ύλας (Hylas) would not long live to enjoy his flirtation with a pack of Naiads.  Much taken by his beauty, the naiads lured the youth to the water for their pleasure, after which, according to the Roman Poet Ovid (Publius Ovidius Naso; 43 BC–17 AD), they drowned him; at the least, that suggests ingratitude.  Hylas may have died content but that's not something on which Ovid dwelt.

In theory, there shouldn't be a river or spring without at least one naiad but the storied ones were those associated with famous waterways and many of the nymphs had adventures (not always welcome) with the good, great and ghastly.  At Syracuse dwelt the beautiful Αρέθουσα (Arethusa; all nymphs were beauties but Arethusa was a supermodel among the breed), a companion of Αρτεμις (Artemis) who was identified by the Romans with Diana.  Some said she was the daughter of Demeter, but in most stories she was the twin sister of Apollo, their parents being Zeus and Leto.  One day, while swimming in the river (something which, unsurprisingly, the Naiads often did), Arethusa realized she wasn’t alone when she heard the voice of Alpheus, the god of the river, whose crush on her had developed into a passion which included stalking her.  Pursued by the lustful god, the nymph fled, crying out for Artemis to save her from what she knew would be an awful fate.  Artemis surrounded her in a concealing fog but Alpheus refused to leave the place where the mist swirled and in fright, Arethusa turned into a fountain.  In the way the myths handle the physics of such circumstances, the earth opened up to prevent Alpheus mingling his own waters with those of the spring which Arethusa had become, and, guided by Artemis, Arethusa went through underground channels to Syracuse, on the Island of Ortygia (which is dedicated to Artemis).  This Hellenistic myth is preferred by most but another version of the attempted sexual assault involves Αλφειός (Alpheus, (another river god)) which differs only in detail.

Lindsay Lohan, as a Naiad, surfacing from her spring.

The Naiads were often claimed to possess powers of healing and the notion of “curing waters” persists into the twenty-first century; although some of this is quackery there is a scientific basis in some cases and the origin of the use of lithium as an early anti-depressant was physicians in Ancient Greek noting the drinking of waters from a certain place “cured men of melancholy”.  Those waters turned out to have a pharmacologically significant lithium content.  However, not all naiads could be used so efficaciously because bathing in certain springs or rivers could be considered sacrilegious, even if it was someone exulted taking a dip.  Nero (Nero Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus (37-68; Roman emperor (and the final emperor of the Julio-Claudian dynasty) 54-68)) was attacked by fever and some sort of partial paralysis and after bathing in the source of the Aqua Marcia and the Roman scuttlebutt was he’s incurred the displeasure of the Naiads, something which brought Nero’s subjects some delight.  Clearly, one upset a Naiad a one’s own risk because it was said also they could visit madness upon those who laid eyes on them, the nymphs possessing the mortal spirit of a transgressor and driving them to insanity.  For this reasons, travelers were warned (the Trip Advisor concept is not new) Naiads were particularly numerous in the Péloponnèse, a place of many waterways.

Palinode

Palinode (pronounced pal-uh-nohd)

(1) A poem in which the poet retracts something said in an earlier poem.

(2) A recantation (used loosely and now rare).

(3) In Scots law, a recantation of a defamatory statement.

1590–1600: From the sixteenth century French palinode (poetical recantation, poem in which the poet retracts invective contained in a former satire), from the Middle French palinode, from the Late Latin palinōdia (palinode, recantation), from the Ancient Greek παλινῳδία (palinōidía) (poetic retraction), the construct being πάλιν (pálin) (again, back) + ᾠδή (ōidḗ) (ode, song) + -ia (from the Latin -ia and the Ancient Greek -ία (-ía) & -εια (-eia), which form abstract nouns of feminine gender.  It was used when names of countries, diseases, species etc and occasionally collections of stuff).  The alternative form palinody is obsolete.  Palinode & palinodist are nouns, palinodial, palinodical & palinodic are adjectives and palinodically is a (non-standard) adverb; the noun plural is palinodes).

Although the palinode is now usually defined as meaning “a poem in which the palinodist (ie the poet) retracts something said in an earlier poem”, the French in the sixteenth century seem mostly to have use the word of works in which the writer “retracts invective contained in a former satire”.  It thus had an obviously political slant and it seems likely at least some palinodes were penned to stave of threats of legal action (or something worse).  Although it endures in literary use (and among political scientists with a feeling for classical forms), the word has long been obscure and the OED (Oxford English Dictionary) lists the adjective palinodical as obsolete with its only known instance of use dating from 1602 when it appeared in a work by the English poet, playwright and pamphleteer Thomas Dekker (circa 1572-1632).  The “other” species of palinode was the “ode to Sarah Palin” (b 1964; Republican nominee for VPOTUS 2008) of which there were several including some set to music.

The palinode became associated with poetry because verse (in one form or another) was once a more common form of written expression.  It has however been applied to any retraction or recantation (formal or otherwise), especially one that publicly withdraws an earlier statement, belief or work.  For reasons of ecclesiastical practice, theological palinodes tended to be in verse but there were exceptions including by John Milton (1608–1674) who in The Reason of Church-Government (1642) retracted his earlier advocacy of episcopacy (the bishops and their role), acknowledging his views had changed; for years it remained a rare example of its type.  Beyond poetry proper, use has been quite loose and memorable palinodes have been political, scientific and literary, some especially of the latter described variously as “insincere”, “back-handed” or “bitchy”.  Much of their charm lies in some retractions becoming famous while the original text doubtlessly would have been forgotten were it not for the palinode.

The Death of Socrates (1787), oil on canvas by Jacques-Louis David (1748–1825), Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City.  Had Socrates just dashed off a palinode, maybe he'd never have had to take his dish of hemlock.

The archetypal palinode dates from the sixth century BC and it set the template.  According to legend, the Greek lyric poet Stesichorus (Στησίχορος, circa 630–555 BC) blamed Helen of Troy for the Trojan War and almost at once was struck blind.  He then composed a (“it was not true…”) palinode absolving Helen of guilt, the words of the encomium (praise, eulogy) said to have come to him in a dream.  His sight was restored, thus the understanding the use of the device as a means of undoing moral or divine offense.  The texts from Antiquity have of course survived only in fragmentary form but clearly there were palinodes, Plato (circa 427-348 BC) in his Phaedrus (a dialogue between Socrates (circa 470–399 BC) and Phaedrus (circa 444–393 BC)) he recounted how Socrates first delivers a speech condemning love, then explicitly retracts it with a second passage praising divine madness and erotic love.  Plato explicitly called the second speech “a palinode”, making it one of philosophy’s earliest known self-conscious retractions and, it has to be admitted, only those for whom martyrdom is a calling would think it not preferable to taking hemlock.

Geoffrey Chaucer (circa 1344-1400), right at the end of The Canterbury Tales (1387-1400), as a formal retraction, disowned those earlier passages he had come to think sinful or frivolous and begged forgiveness for having written them.  It's considered one of Medieval literature’s most explicit and sincere palinodes and presumably he also asked God and at least one priest for absolution for those unworthy thoughts, this likely the course of action taken also by the English journalist Malcolm Muggeridge (1903–1990) who wrote long pieces disavowing earlier having welcomed communism and opposed censorship.  One long-established tradition (transgress with enthusiasm in youth; reform with piety as one contemplates mortality) is a movement owing much to Saint Augustine of Hippo (354–430) who in Confessiones (Confessions, 397-400) wrote: Da mihi castitatem et continentiam, sed noli modo (Lord, give me chastity and continence, but not yet), an exemplar of that school of the palinodic being George W Bush (George XLIII, b 1946; POTUS 2001-2009) who abandoned whiskey and much else.  As he might have put it in a “Bushism”: “I spent my youth misunfortunatistically”.  The whole “born-again” movement in Christianity seems often something of a life lived palinodically.

Galileo before the Holy Office (1847), oil on canvas by Joseph-Nicolas Robert-Fleury (1797-1890).

The element “Holy Office” was first applied to the official designation for the Inquisition during the thirteenth century and after that there were a number of variant constructions before in 1965, it was renamed the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF), the most famous of the latter-day inquisitors being Benedict XVI (1927–2022; pope 2005-2013, pope emeritus 2013-2022) who, with some relish, discharged the role between 1981-2005.  Since 2022, the Inquisition has been styled the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith (DDF).  Coincidentally, DDF is also the acronym for “drug & disease free” and (in gaming) “Doom definition file” while there’s also the DDF Network which is an aggregator of pornography content.  The Holy See may be aware of these uses but probably takes the view the target markets are different and, given the DDF Network appears not to offer any “gay male” content, if one author’s conclusions are accepted, the site is unlikely often to be accessed by priests, bishops, cardinals and such.

Some palinodes have become among the more famous statements made by an accused before a court.  Under courts run by the Nazis and the Soviet Union they were of course legion (the scripts often written by the prosecutors) but the most famous was probably the retraction the Roman Inquisition in 1633 extracted from the Italian physicist and pioneering astronomer Galileo Galilei (1564–1642); under threat of torture (words to be taken seriously if from the lips of an inquisitor), he abjured his support for heliocentrism; the defendant's legendary mutter: “Eppur si muove” (although it does move) almost certainly apocryphal.  After that, palinodes came thick and fast, the Swiss philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712–1778) in Les Confessions (Confessions of Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1770, published 1782)) not only his retracted many of his earlier stances (especially in matters of religion and education) but did so repeatedly, sometimes in the same chapter.  More than a decade in the writing, Les Confessions functions as something of a “rolling palinode”, his intellectual past constantly revised.  More nuanced in this approach was the English naturalist Charles Darwin (1809-1882) who, in later editions of On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life (1859), toned down or even withdrew some claims regarding human evolution and teleology.  These revisions can be considered “partial palinodes” but they were really merely a reflection of the modern scientific method which updates theories as new evidence emerges; a matter of correct intellectual caution.

Agitprop poster of comrade Stalin (1878-1953; Soviet leader 1924-1953, left) greeting comrade Trofim Lysenko (1898-1976, right).  The Russian slogan (РАБОТАТЬ ТАК, ЧТОБЫ ТОВАРИЩ СТАЛИН СПАСИБО СКАЗАЛ!) translates best as “Work in such a way that comrade Stalin will say ‘thank you.’”  In comrade Stalin’s Soviet Union, wise comrades followed this sound advice.  For students of the techniques used in the propaganda of personality cults, it should be noted comrade Stalin stood around 1.65 metres (5 foot, 5 inches) tall.

In the matter of scientific and intellectual palinodes, others can do the retractions which can be thought of as palinodes by proxy or (more flippantly) Munchausen palinodes by proxy.  To avoid damage to his reputation, Sir Isaac Newton’s (1642–1727) executors and later editors suppressed and implicitly retracted his alchemical writings and similar judicious editing has excised from the records of some their embrace of the once intellectually respectable field of astrology.  Actually, Newton wasn’t wholly wrong on the science; at the molecular level there is little difference between lead and gold and although traditional chemical alchemy seems impossible, recent experiments have, atom-by-atom, transformed lead into gold, the problem being that to transform a few atoms (and even these often short-lived radioactive isotopes rather than stable Au-197) demanded the use of a huge and expensive particle accelerator; unless there’s some unanticipated breakthrough, the process cannot be scaled up so gold must continue to be dug up.  Communism systems too belatedly made something of an art of the palinode.

In the Soviet Union, after the death of comrade Stalin, a number of “scientific orthodoxies” supported by the late leader abruptly were cancelled, notably the dotty, pseudoscientific “theories” of agronomist Trofim Lysenko whose doctrine of Lysenkoism set back Soviet agriculture by decades.  The evidence suggests comrade Stalin was well aware comrade Lysenko was likely a comrade charlatan but, uniquely among the many Soviet apparatchiks, the dodgy agronomist achieved a great rapport with the peasants who were being most tiresome.  It was Lysenko’s remarkable success in convincing peasants to accept the Kremlin’s imposition of collectivized farming that make him Stalin’s invaluable asset.  In China, when comrade Chairman Mao (Mao Zedong 1893–1976; chairman of the CCP, 1949-1976) instituted many of Lysenko’s “agricultural reforms” (which included applying Karl Marx's (1818-1883) theories of class consciousness to the thought processes of seeds), in the great famine which followed, it's believed between 40-45 million may have starved to death.  The Kremlin was at least precise in who or what got cancelled whereas the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) were a little vague although the Chinese people understood their language.  Long skilled at “reading between the Central Committee’s lines”, when they heard it admitted comrade Chairman Mao’s legacy was “70% good and 30% bad”, the meaning was clear.  As a judgment it may have been generous but if applied to some leaders in the West, would the numbers be any more favorable?

Lindsay Lohan on the cover of Vogue Czechoslovakia, May 2025.

So palinody has a long tradition but while figures like Rousseau, Darwin and Muggeridge had years or even decades “agonizingly to reappraise” their position, in the social media age, it can within the hour be necessary to recant.  In 2006, Lindsay Lohan granted an interview to Vanity Fair in which she acknowledged: “I knew I had a problem and I couldn't admit it.  “I was making myself sick.  I was sick and I had people sit me down and say: 'You're going to die if you don't take care of yourself'”, adding she used drugs: “a little”.  On reflection, and possibly after seeking advice, he publicist the next day contacted the magazine in an attempt to get the “drug confession” retracted.  Later, she would also recant her claims her earlier (and by some much-admired) weight-loss had been achieved by D&E (diet & exercise), admitting it was the consequence of an eating disorder.  Ms Lohan has issued a few palinodes (but although also a song-writer, none have been in poetic verse) and as well as drug use, the correctives have covered topics such as the MeToo movement, Harvey Weinstein (b 1952), Donald Trump (b 1946; US president 2017-2021 and since 2025) and her attitudes to motherhood.

Ye (b 1977, the artist formerly known as Kanye West).

The first notable palinode of 2026 was interesting for a number of reasons, the first of which was structural.  Although the once vibrant industry of print journalism has in the West been hollowed out by successive strikes from the internet, social media and AI (artificial intelligence), in a tactic guaranteed to ensure maximum cross-platform coverage, the multi-media personality, rap singer and apparel designer Ye chose as the host for his latest announcement not Instagram or X (formerly known as Twitter) but a full-page advertisement in Rupert Murdoch’s WSJ (Wall Street Journal).  As a “commercial, in confidence” arrangement, it’s not certain how much the WSJ would have invoiced to run the copy but advertising in the paper remains at “premium level” because of its national circulation and readership with a high proportion in the still much-prized “A”, “B1” & “B2” demographics.  Industry sources suggest that, depending on the day of the week and other variables, a full-page advertisement (black & white) placement in the WSJ’s national edition typically would cost between US$160,000–$220,000 for a “one-off” (ie no re-runs or ongoing contract).

That’s obviously rather more than a post on Instagram or X but what a still “prestigious” legacy title like the WSJ confers is a certain “authority” because, as Marshall McLuhan (1911-1980) explained in Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man (1964): “The medium is the message”.  If one conveys one’s message through a whole page of the WSJ, regardless of the text’s content, the message is different compared with the same words appearing on a social media platform: anyone can post a palinode on Instagram but only a few can pay Rupert Murdoch US$200,000-odd to print it in the WSJ.  The point about Mr Ye using the WSJ was the message was aimed not only at his usual audience but those in finance and industry who interact with the music and apparel businesses.  While some consumers of rap music or his other “projects” may be WSJ readers or even subscribers, the publication’s base has a very different profile and it will be a certain few of those Mr Ye wishes his message to reach.

Marigold Counseling's Bipolar Disorder chart.

Headed “To those I’ve hurt”, his palinode was more than a simple retraction and was an apology for his previous “reckless” anti-Semitism; whether “reckless” carefully was chosen from the spectrum (careless; reckless; intentional) used by disciplinary bodies in sporting competitions wasn’t discussed.  By way of explanation, Mr Ye revealed that some 25 years earlier, he’d suffered an injury to the “right frontal lobe” of his brain and, because the medical focus at the time was on the “immediate physical trauma”, “comprehensive scans were not done” meaning “the deeper injury, the one inside my skull, went unnoticed.”  It seems that not until 2023 was his condition correctly assessed, the injury linked to his diagnosis with Bipolar Disorder type-1 (the old “manic depressive disorder”).  Clinicians distinguish between type 1 and type 2 Bipolar thus: (1) In Bipolar I disorder there must be at least one manic episode that may come before or after hypomanic or major depressive episodes (in some cases, mania may cause a dissociation from reality (psychosis)) and (2) In Bipolar II disorder there must be at least one depressive episode and at least one hypomanic episode but never any psychosis.  (Cyclothymic Disorder involves periods of hypomania and depression not sufficiently severe to be classified as full episodes).  As Mr Ye explained: “Bipolar disorder comes with its own defense system. Denial.  When you’re manic, you don’t think you’re sick. You think everyone else is overreacting.  You feel like you’re seeing the world more clearly than ever, when in reality you’re losing your grip entirely.  Once people label you as ‘crazy’ you feel as if you cannot contribute anything meaningful to the world.  It’s easy for people to joke and laugh it off when in fact this is a very serious debilitating disease you can die from.”

As he further noted: “The scariest thing about this disorder is how persuasive it is when it tells you:  You don’t need help. It makes you blind, but convinced you have insight. You feel powerful, certain, unstoppable.  I lost touch with reality. Things got worse the longer I ignored the problem.  I said and did things I deeply regret.  Some of the people I love the most, I treated the worst. You endured fear, confusion, humiliation, and the exhaustion of trying to have someone who was, at times, unrecognizable. Looking back, I became detached from my true self.  In that fractured state, I gravitated toward the most destructive symbol I could find, the swastika, and even sold T-shirts bearing it. One of the difficult aspects of having bipolar type-1 are the disconnected moments - many of which I still cannot recall - that led to poor judgment and reckless behavior that oftentimes feels like an out-of-body-experience.  I regret and am deeply mortified by my actions in that state, and am committed to accountability, treatment, and meaningful change. It does not excuse what I did though. I am not a Nazi or an antisemite. I love Jewish people.”  He also included remarks intended explicitly for the black community, which he acknowledged “held [him] down through all of the highs and lows and the darkest of times.  The black community is, unquestionably, the foundation of who I am. I am so sorry to have let you down. I love us.  My words as a leader in my community have global impact and influence.  In my mania, I lost complete sight of that.”

He made a comment also about what is a sometimes misunderstood aspect of Bipolar Disorder: “Having bipolar disorder is notable state of constant mental illness.  When you go into a manic episode, you are ill at that point. When you are not in an episode, you are completely ‘normal’.  And that’s when the wreckage from the illness hits the hardest.  Hitting rock bottom a few months ago, my wife encouraged me to finally get help.  My words as a leader in my community have global impact and influence. In my mania, I lost complete sight of that.  As I find my new baseline and new center through an effective regime of medication, therapy, exercise and clean living, I have newfound, much-needed clarity. I am pouring my energy into positive, meaningful art: music, clothing, design and other new ideas to help the world.”  He concluded by saying: “I’m not asking for sympathy, or a free pass, though I aspire to earn your forgiveness.  I write today simply to ask for your patience and understanding as I find my way home.”  The message was signed “With love, Ye.”

Mr Ye with his wife, Australian architect & model Bianca Censori (b 1995) in “WET” themed top (which she wears well), Huacai Intercontinental Hotel, Beijing, China, September 2024.  Ms Censori works for Yeezy as an Architectural Designer.

What Mr Ye placed in the WSJ was a certain type of palinode, one in which there’s a retraction and definitely an apology but also an explanation.  Although, commendably, he included the words “…It does not excuse what I did…”, documenting the long-undiagnosed traumatic brain injury does provide an explanation for his conduct so, the piece is not a true mea culpa (from the Latin meā culpā (through my fault) and taken from the Confiteor, a traditional penitential prayer in Western Christianity; it’s best translated as “I am to blame”.  Mr Ye’s point was that what he did was wrong but “he” was not to blame in the sense that what he did was the result of the Bipolar Disorder induced by his injury.  What that means is that there was no mens rea (a construct from the Latin mēns + reus (literally “guilty mind”), the phrase a clipping of the precept in English common law: Actus non facit reum nisi mens rea sit (The act does not make a person guilty unless the mind is also guilty).  In other words: “I didn’t do it, the Bipolar Disorder did it”.  As a defence the approach is well-known but what Mr Ye is suggesting is supported in the medical literature, there being a number of documented cases of individuals whose behavior suddenly and radically changed for the worse as a result of a condition affecting the brain (either traumatic injury or an illness such as a tumor).  Despite his caveat, his diagnosed Bipolar Disorder, as well as explaining things, may well “excuse what I did”.

However, as an exercise in “reputational recovery” (one of the forks of “crisis management”), Mr Ye does have “a bit of previous” for which to atone including donning a “White Lives Matter” T-shirt which was controversial because there is no political or moral equivalence between that and the implications of “Black Lives Matter”.  In isolation, such a thing might have been thought just a publicity device and, in another time, the dark irony may have caught on in sections of the black community but in the atmosphere of 2022 it was the wrong item at the wrong time.  Worse was to come because later that year Mr Ye tweeted he was going “death con 3” on the Jews, the play on words assumed an adaptation of the DEFCON (Defense Readiness Condition) status levels used by the US military:

DEFCON 5: Normal peacetime readiness (lowest level).

DEFCON 4: Increased intelligence gathering and strengthened security.

DEFCON 3: Heightened readiness; forces ready for increased alert.

DEFCON 2: One step from nuclear war; forces ready to deploy at six hours notice.

DEFCON 1: Maximum readiness; imminent nuclear war or attack underway.

Fashion statement: Mr Ye in black capirote.

So it could have been worse, assuming his “death con 3” implied only “heightened readiness; forces ready for increased alert”.  The Pentagon invoked DEFCON 2 during the Cuban Missile Crisis (16-28 October 1962) and has never (as far as is known) triggered DEFCON 1.  However, “death con 3” was thought bad enough and a number of corporations sundered their contractual arrangements with Mr Ye, the loss of the agreement with Adidas believed financially the most damaging.  The next year, to his “Vultures album (re-titled Vultures 1 for the packaged release in 2024) listening party” Mr Ye wore a black Ku Klux Klan hood.  The use of black rather the while of the KKK in popular imagination attracted some comment from those who seek meaning in such things but it was historically authentic, the original, Reconstruction-era Klan (1865-1871) not having a standardized or even defined garb.  In the 1860s, members used whatever fabric was available, bed-sheets, blankets, sackcloth, and women’s dresses all re-purposed with no apparent interest in patterns or color co-ordination and animal hides or even face paint were used if no fabric was to hand.  The choices were pragmatic, the purposes concealment and intimidation, not visual uniformity.  The now familiar capirote (pointed hood) atop a white robe didn’t become emblematic of the KKK until the heyday of the so-called “Second Klan” between 1915 and the 1940s and although white deliberately was chosen as a symbol of “purity” and white supremacy, there’s nothing to suggest Mr Ye was seeking to vest his garment with similar denotations.

Fashion statement: Mr Ye in the now deleted “Swastika T-shirt” (the Yeezy part-number was HH01). 

Most provocative however was doubtlessly his adoption of the swastika for various purposes and his effuse praise for Hitler and Nazism.  In humanity’s long and depressing roll-call of evil and depravity, there is Adolf Hitler (1889-1945; Führer (leader) and German head of government 1933-1945 & head of state 1934-1945) and there is “everybody else” so selling “swastika T-shirts” at US$20 (promoted in an advertisement at the 2025 Super Bowl) and “dropping a tune” titled Heil Hitler was never likely to be a good career move.  The product code for the T-shirts was “HH01” and those who recalled his comment: “There’s a lot of things that I love about Hitler" in a December 2022 podcast with the since bankrupted host Alex Jones (b 1974) probably deconstructed that to mean “Heil Hitler” although to remove any doubt he also tweeted: “I love Hitler” and “I'm a Nazi”.  Swastika T-shirts were just too much for Shopify which took down the page, issuing a statement saying Mr Ye had “violated” the company's T&Cs (terms & conditions).  It was an example of the dangers inherent in having a site administered by AI with humans checking the content only in reaction to complaints.

Forbes magazine, 31 August 2019.  Forbes had just anointed Mr Ye a “billionaire”.

Those with some generosity of spirit will attribute honorable motives to Mr Ye’s palinode while cynics will note the financial hit suffered as a consequence of his recent conduct.  In 2020, he complained to Forbes magazine it had neglected to include him on their much-anticipated “Billionaires List” (he may have been peeved his then wife (the estimable Kim Kardashian (b 1980)) had made the cut) and duly the publication re-crunched its numbers, including him in a revised edition.  In the wake of his troubles, Forbes “wrote down” the value of his brand and after the “Adidas fallout”, he didn’t appear on the 2023 list.  As he said in the WSJ advertisement, he is “pouring my energy into positive, meaningful art: music, clothing, design and other new ideas to help the world” and all these products, appropriately branded, need to be sold at a profit but having a brand tainted by an association with Nazism and anti-Semitism makes things a “harder sell”.  Hopefully, all will be forgiven and Yeezy-branded hoodies, running shoes and such will again ship in volume; Rupert Murdoch can be proud of the WSJ’s latest contribution to American commerce.