Sickle

Sickle (pronounced sik-uhl)

(1) In agriculture, an implement for cutting grain, grass, etc., consisting of a curved, hook-like blade mounted in a short handle.

(2) In astronomy, a group of stars in the constellation Leo, likened to this implement in formation (initial capital letter).

(3) In veterinary anatomy, any of the sickle-shaped middle feathers of the domestic cock.

(4) In pathology, as sickle-cell anemia, a severe hereditary condition in which mutated haemoglobin distorts red blood cells into a crescent shape, causing the cells to become stuck in capillaries; historically known as drepanocytosis.  The deformation of red blood cells into an abnormal crescent shape is called sickling and in medical slang a patient with the condition is a sickler.  

(5) As a stylized graphic, crossed with a hammer, used as a symbol of communism and the USSR and adopted by communist parties in many countries; metonymically, Socialism or communism itself.

Pre-1000: From the Middle English sikel (also assibilated in sichel), from the Old English sicol & siċel, the origin of which is uncertain, the most supported suggestion being it was a borrowing from Latin sēcula (sickle) or sīcīlis (sickle)”, cognate with the Dutch zikkel and the German Sichel.  The construct of the Latin sēcula was sec(āre) (to cut) + -ula or –ule (the diminutive suffix used to form taxonomic names, usually of genera).  The alternative explanation is it was a diminutive of the Proto-Germanic sikilō (ploughshare) from the primitive Indo-European seg-, a variant of sek- (to cut).  It was cognate with West Frisian systel, sisel & sizel (sickle), the Dutch sikkel (sickle) and the German Sichel (sickle).  It was related also to West Frisian sichte (sickle), the Dutch zicht (sickle), the Low German Sichte & Sicht (sickle) & Sech (blade of a sickle or scythe).  Sickle is a noun, verb & adjective, sickler & sickleman (sicklewomoman seem never to have been a thing although there must have been many and one would presumably now use sickleperson) are nouns, sickled is a verb and sickling is a noun & verb; the noun plural is sickles.

One of the standards used by the USSR after 1922.

The hammer and sickle (available on PCs as the Unicode symbol ☭ long before emojis) was created in 1917 to symbolise proletarian solidarity: the hammer representing the workers, the sickle the peasants (the intelligentsia ignored for representational purposes by the journalists, school-teachers and lawyers who would come to dominate the later dictatorship).  The design, formerly adopted as the USSR’s national symbol in 1922, was by Yevgeny Ivanovich Kamzolkin (1885–1957), his winning entry in a competition.  During the decades when the USSR enjoyed a better image than during the cold war, the hammer and sickle became widely used as a symbol both for communist parties and international proletarian unity even though the Soviet state had long been the dictatorship of the party elite rather than of the proletariat as Karl Marx (1818-1883) had predicted in his Communist Manifesto (1848).

Hammer and Sickle Set, (1977) by Andy Warhol (1928–1987), screen-printed montage on paper.

It remains a familiar sight in Russia and states like China, Laos and Vietnam which are, even if only nominally, still communist.  It’s less welcome in many former communist countries, some of which make public display a criminal offence, mirroring German legislation banning the swastika.  Even the French Communist Party, for much of its existence the most cravenly Stalinist and Moscow-centric of operations, abandoned the hammer and sickle in favour of a five-pointed star although the painful step wasn’t taken until 2014.  The British Labour Party, wimpier than the French, once used a crossed shovel and quill which, to some critics, came respectively to symbolise the workers who founded the party and the bourgeoisie who staged a hostile takeover a process which afflicted also the Australian Labor Party (ALP), described by one disillusioned veteran as "the cream of the working class overthrown by the dregs of the middle class".  By the the 1980s, the British Labour party had adopted a rose which meant everything in general and nothing in particular so the "New Labour" of the 1990s was, if not inevitable, at least anticipated.  In the Kremlin, Vladimir Putin (b 1952; president or prime minister of Russia since 1999) wasn’t going to let anything like that happen and in 2007 he intervened to stop modernisers among his own supporters removing the hammer and sickle from reproductions of the most hallowed relic of the Great Patriotic War (1941-1945), the Victory Banner, the flag Soviet troops raised over the Reichstag building in Berlin on 1 May 1945.  Mr Putin wasn't at all nostalgic about the Soviet economic model but he liked everything else and has tried to recreate as much of it as possible.

No sickle required: Lindsay Lohan with hammer used to attack a Volvo as part of a promotional stunt, New York City, March 2014.  Who hasn't wanted to attack a Volvo with a big hammer?

The flag of the Hezbollah (right), the public display of which is banned in some jurisdictions where both the organization's political & military wings are listed as "terrorist organizations" includes a depiction of  Kalashnikov AK-47 assault rifle but that of Mozambique (left) is the only national flag to feature the famous weapon and the Africans fixed a bayonet to the barrel which was a nice touch.  Mozambique gained independence from Portugal in 1975 although the flag wasn’t officially adopted until 1983 as a modified version of what was essentially the battle flag of the Frente de Libertação de Moçambique (FRELIMO, the Mozambique Liberation Front, the Marxist (later styled “democratic socialist”) resistance movement which fought a war of liberation (1964-1974) against the Portuguese colonial forces).  Artistically, just as Marxism (notably often in Stalinist form) had been politically influential in post-colonial Africa, the hammer & sickle exerted an artistic appeal.  The flag of Mozambique has an AK-47 crossed by a hoe sitting atop an open book and is the only national flag upon which appears a modern firearm, the handful of others with guns all using historic relics like muskets or muzzle-loaded cannons.  The Angolan flag has a machete crossing a half gear wheel and both these African examples follow the symbolic model of the hammer and sickle, representing variously the armed struggle against repression, the industrial workers and the peasantry.

Hammer & sickle pencil & mini-skirts.

Terrible

Terrible (pronounced ter-uh-buhl)

(1) Distressing; severe.

(2) Extremely bad; horrible; of poor quality.

(3) Exciting terror, awe, or great fear; dreadful; awful.

(4) Formidably great; awesome.

1400–1450: From the late Middle English, from the Latin terribilis, from terrēre (to terrify), the construct being terr(ēre) (to frighten) + -ibilis (-ible).  The suffix –ible was from the Middle English, from the Old French, from the Latin –ibilis (the alternative forms were –bilis & -abilis).  An adjectival suffix, now usually in a passive sense, it was used to form adjectives meaning “able to be”, “relevant or suitable to, in accordance with”, or expressing capacity or worthiness in a passive sense.  The suffix -able is used in the same sense and is pronounced the same and –ible is generally not productive in English, most words ending in -ible being those borrowed from Latin, or Old & Middle French; -able much more productive although examples like collectible do exist.  Terrible is a noun & adverb, terribly is an adverb, terribility & terribleness are nouns and terribler & terriblest are adjectives; use as a noun plurals remains rare (although possible a la crooked Hillary Clinton’s (b 1947; US secretary of state 2009-2013) “…basket of deplorables…”, the same applying to the comparative (terribler) & supurlative (terriblest), “more terrible” & “most terrible” respectively both more elegant and preferred.  The adjective unterrible apparently exists.   

Phrases like “not terrible” belong to the “damning with faint praise” class, the use carrying a different implication than the rare adjective unterrible.

Because the earlier meanings (formidable; great; awesome) have faded from use, the synonyms now deployed tend to be: cruel, atrocious, ghastly, horrendous, disturbing, dreadful, horrid, abhorrent, unpleasant, unfortunate, hideous, disastrous, dire, harrowing, awful, gruesome, extreme, dangerous, appalling, frightful, horrible, horrifying & terrifying.  Technically, terrible can also mean “causing terror” but the related word terrifying is much more commonly used to mean this and now, to use “terrible” in this sense would probably be thought an error.  Terrible also once was a somewhat formal way of describing something as having great power or being worthy of awe, a sense present when used to describe supernatural power and, especially in Christianity, God and all his works.  In the Bible, the number varies according to the translation (some modern editions omit completely describing God as in any way “terrible” because of the confusion it’s likely to cause but in older translations, the word in its various senses appears dozens of times, a few examples from the 1611 King James Version (KJV) being:

Thou shalt not be affrighted at them: for the LORD thy God [is] among you, a mighty God and terrible. Deuteronomy 7:21

And he said, Behold, I make a covenant: before all thy people I will do marvels, such as have not been done in all the earth, nor in any nation: and all the people among which thou [art] shall see the work of the LORD: for it [is] a terrible thing that I will do with thee. Exodus 34:10

And when we departed from Horeb, we went through all that great and terrible wilderness, which ye saw by the way of the mountain of the Amorites, as the Lord our God commanded us; and we came to Kadeshbarnea. Deuteronomy 1:19

And he said, Behold, I make a covenant: before all thy people I will do marvels, such as have not been done in all the earth, nor in any nation: and all the people among which thou art shall see the work of the LORD: for it [is] a terrible thing that I will do with thee. Exodus 34:10

And said, I beseech thee, O LORD God of heaven, the great and terrible God, that keepeth covenant and mercy for them that love him and observe his commandments. Nehemiah 1:5

And in thy majesty ride prosperously because of truth and meekness [and] righteousness; and thy right hand shall teach thee terrible things. Psalms 45:4

And I will punish the world for [their] evil, and the wicked for their iniquity; and I will cause the arrogancy of the proud to cease, and will lay low the haughtiness of the terrible. Isaiah 13:11

For the terrible one is brought to nought, and the scorner is consumed, and all that watch for iniquity are cut off. Isaiah 29:20

Our skin was black like an oven because of the terrible famine. Lamentations 5:10

After this I saw in the night visions, and behold a fourth beast, dreadful and terrible, and strong exceedingly; and it had great iron teeth: it devoured and brake in pieces, and stamped the residue with the feet of it: and it was diverse from all the beasts that were before it; and it had ten horns. Daniel 7:7

He and his people with him, the terrible of the nations, shall be brought to destroy the land: and they shall draw their swords against Egypt, and fill the land with the slain. Ezekiel 30:11

When speaking of the awesome, formidable power of God, the Hebrew word translated as "terrible" in the KJV reflects English usage that was common and well-understood in the seventeenth century.  The type of "terror" associated with the word at that time was a reverent fear of God, which even today, theologians would suggest is the appropriate response to a Being immeasurably greater and more powerful than any living thing, Jesus telling his followers to have this kind of fear of God (Luke 12:4-5).  One can understand why some modern translations express the Hebrew word as "awesome" or "to be held in reverence", the dominant modern meaning of "terrible" as "extremely bad", "appalling" or "atrocious" not helpful in spreading the Christian message.  Interestingly, some translations use "dreadful" instead of and as well as "terrible", the meaning shift there a similar linguistic phenomenon.

Terrible in the seventeen century Biblical sense also appears in the first verse of the nineteenth century Battle Hymn of the Republic, written as a patriotic anti-slavery song during the American Civil War.

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord

He is trapling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored

He have loosed the faiteful lightening of his terrible swift sword

His truth is marching on

 

Glory, Glory halleluhja

Glory, Glory halleluhja

Glory, Glory halleluhja

His truth is marching on

Battle Hymn of the Republic, lyrics (1861) by Julia Ward Howe (1819-1910), music (1856) by William Steffe (1830-1890).

Although in the hymn there are allusions to several passages of scripture, the most vivid imagery is that which recalls the wrathful God of terrible power in Revelation 14:14–19.

14 And I looked, and behold a white cloud, and upon the cloud one sat like unto the Son of man, having on his head a golden crown, and in his hand a sharp sickle.

15 And another angel came out of the temple, crying with a loud voice to him that sat on the cloud, Thrust in thy sickle, and reap: for the time is come for thee to reap; for the harvest of the earth is ripe.

16 And he that sat on the cloud thrust in his sickle on the earth; and the earth was reaped.

17 And another angel came out of the temple which is in heaven, he also having a sharp sickle.

18 And another angel came out from the altar, which had power over fire; and cried with a loud cry to him that had the sharp sickle, saying, Thrust in thy sharp sickle, and gather the clusters of the vine of the earth; for her grapes are fully ripe.

19 And the angel thrust in his sickle into the earth, and gathered the vine of the earth, and cast it into the great winepress of the wrath of God.

20 And the winepress was trodden without the city, and blood came out of the winepress, even unto the horse bridles, by the space of a thousand and six hundred furlongs.

Ivan the Terrible (Ivan IV Vasilyevich, 1530–1584), Tsar of Russia 1547-1584), oil on canvas (1897) by Viktor Vasnetsov (1848–1926).

Russia over the centuries has been ruled by some difficult souls (tsars and tsarinas both) but only one is remembered in history as "the terrible" although, in his lifetime he was referred to also as "Ivan the Fearsome" & "Ivan the Formidable" so there seems little doubt about his character.  Historians note his rule began rather well with a period of liberal reform and improvement (by the standards of the age) but, what with one thing and another, some personality disorders emerged and they didn't improve with age, his reign coming to be associated with repression, torture and gruesome forms of execution.  Some of the stories doubtless are apocryphal but there's enough documentary evidence to confirm Ivan deserved the appellation by which he's now remembered.  His most enduring legacy to public administration in Russia was the creation of a secret police called the Oprichnina which he used as an instrument of terror although, he came later to suspect them of disloyalty, dissolving the operation and executing many of its members.  Later Russian and Soviet leaders would however be impressed with the achievements of the Oprichnina and there were many revivals, most famously the various formations of Soviet and post-Soviet times (Cheka, GPU, OGPU, NKGB, NKVD, MGB, KGB, SMERSH & FSB).  In 1584, Ivan the Terrible suffered a massive stroke while playing chess with one of his few friends, dying hours later at the age of 53.  The kingdom passed to his middle son, the feeble-minded Feodor (1557-1598) who died childless, after which Russia descended into lawlessness and anarchy, a period which came to be known as the "Time of Troubles" (1598-1613), an era which ended only when the rule of the Romanovs was established, the dynasty enduring until the revolutions of 1917.

Atavism

Atavism (pronounced at-uh-viz-uhm)

(1) In biology (most often in zoology & botany), the reappearance in an individual of characteristics of some (typically) remote ancestor which have not manifested in intervening generations.

(2) An individual embodying such a reversion.

(3) Reversion to an earlier or more primitive type (a “throwback” in the vernacular).

(4) In sociology and political science, the recurrence or reversion to a past behavior, method, characteristic or style after a long period of absence, used especially of a reversion to violence.

1825-1830: The construct was the Latin atav(us) (great-great-great grandfather; remote ancestor, forefather” (the construct being at- (akin to atta (familiar name for a father) and used perhaps to suggest “beyond”)  + avus (grandfather, ancestor) + -ism.  The –ism suffix was from the Ancient Greek ισμός (ismós) & -isma noun suffixes, often directly, sometimes through the Latin –ismus & isma (from where English picked up ize) and sometimes through the French –isme or the German –ismus, all ultimately from the Ancient Greek (where it tended more specifically to express a finished act or thing done).  It appeared in loanwords from Greek, where it was used to form abstract nouns of action, state, condition or doctrine from verbs and on this model, was used as a productive suffix in the formation of nouns denoting action or practice, state or condition, principles, doctrines, a usage or characteristic, devotion or adherence (criticism; barbarism; Darwinism; despotism; plagiarism; realism; witticism etc).  Atavism & atavist are nouns, atavic, atavistic & atavistical are adjectives and atavistically is an adverb; the noun plural is atavisms.

The primitive Indo-European awo meant “adult male relative other than the father”, the most obvious descendent the modern “uncle”.  The English form was influenced by the French atavisme (the coining attributed usually to the botanist Antoine Nicolas Duchesne (1747-1827 Paris) and was first used in biology in the sense of “reversion by influence of heredity to ancestral characteristics, resemblance of a given organism to some remote ancestor, return to an early or original type”.  The adjective atavistic (pertaining to atavism) appeared in 1847, joined three year later by the now rare atavic (pertaining to a remote ancestor, exhibiting atavism).  Atavism (and its related forms) are none of those words which can be used as a neutral descriptor (notably in botany) or to denote something positive or negative.  Although the core meaning is always some “past or ancestral characteristic”, it tends to be pejorative if use of people or human cultures reverting to some “primitive characteristics” (especially if they be war or other forms of violence.  In the vernacular, the earthier “throwback” has been more common than the rather formal “atavistic” although the circumlocution “skip a generation” is often used for traits that occur after a generation of absence and “throwback” anyway became a “loaded” term because of its association with race (in the sense of skin-color).

Medicine has constructed its own jargon associated with the phenomenon in which an inherited condition appears to “skip a generation”: it’s described often as “autosomal recessive inheritance” or “incomplete penetrance”.  While the phrase “skipping a generation” is not uncommon in informal use, the actual mechanisms depend on the genetic inheritance pattern of the condition.  Autosomal Recessive Inheritance is defined as a “condition is caused by mutations in both copies of a specific gene” (one inherited from each parent).  This can manifest as an individual inheriting only one mutated copy (which means they will be a carrier but will remain asymptomatic) but if two carriers have issue, there is (1) a 25% chance the offspring will inherit both mutated copies and express the condition, (2) a 50% chance the offspring will be a carrier and (3) a 25% chance the offspring will inherit no mutations.  Thus, the condition may appear (and for practical purposes does) skip a generation in those cases where no symptoms exist; the classic examples include sickle cell anemia and cystic fibrosis.  Incomplete Penetrance occurs when an individual inherits a gene mutation which creates in them a genetic predisposition to a condition but symptoms do not develop because of environmental factors, other genetic influences or “mere chance” (and in the matter of diseases like those classified as “cancer”, the influence of what might be called “bad luck” is still probably underestimated, and certainly not yet statistically measured.  In such cases, the mutation may be passed to the next generation, where it might manifest, giving the appearance of skipping a generation and the BRCA1 & BRCA2 mutations for (hereditary) breast cancer are well-known examples.

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

In political science, “atavism” is used to refer to a reversion to older, more “primitive” means of furthering political ends.  Although it’s most associated with a critique of violence, political systems, ideologies, behaviors or economic policies have all be described as “atavistic” and their manifestation is linked often with ideas presented as representing (and implicitly offering a return to) a perceived “golden age”, a past structure which is idealized; it appear often as a reaction to change, notably modernity, globalization, or what is claimed to be a “decline in values”.  Political scientists identify stands in nominally non-violent atavism including: (1) Nostalgic Nationalism.  Nationalist movements are almost always race-based (in the sense of longing for a return to a “pure” ethnicity in which a population is “untainted” by ethnic diversity.  It’s usually a romanticization of a nation's past (historically, “purity” was less common than some like to believe) offering the hope of a return to traditional values, cultural practices, or forms of governance.  (2) Tribalism and Identity Politics. A call to primordial loyalties (such as ethnic or tribal identities), over modern, pluralistic, or institutional frameworks has been a feature of recent decades and was the trigger for the wars in the Balkans during the 1990s, the conflict which introduced to the language the euphemism “ethnic cleansing”, a very atavistic concept.  Tribalism and identity politics depends on group identities & allegiance overshadowing any broader civic or national unity on the basis of overturning an artificial (and often imposed) structure and returning to a pre-modern arrangement. (3) Anti-modernism or Anti-globalization. These are political threads which sound “recent” but both have roots which stretch back at least to the nineteenth century and Pius IX’s (1792–1878; pope 1846-1878) Syllabus Errorum (Syllabus of Errors, 1864) was one famous list of objections to change.  The strategy behind such atavism may be identifiably constant but tactics can vary and there’s often a surprising degree of overlap in the messaging of populists from the notional right & left which is hardly surprising given that in the last ten years both Donald Trump (b 1946; US president 2017-2021; president elect 2024) and Bernie Sanders (b 1941; senior US senator (Independent, Vermont) since 2007) honed their messaging to appeal to the same disgruntled mass.

Elizabeth Boody Schumpeter (1898-1953, left) & Joseph Schumpeter (1883–1950, right).  It was his third marriage.

Austrian political economist Joseph Schumpeter used the word “atavism” in his analysis of the dynamics which contributed to the outbreak of World War I (1914-1918), something he attributed to the old, autocratic regimes of Central and Eastern Europe “dragging the modern, liberal West” back in time.  Schumpeter believed that if commercial ties created interdependence between nations then armed conflict would become unthinkable and US author Thomas Friedman (b 1953) in The Lexus and the Olive Tree: Understanding Globalization (1999) suggested the atavistic tendency of man to go to war could be overcome by modern commerce making connectivity between economies so essential to the well-being of citizens that no longer would they permit war because such a thing would be so dangerous for the economy; it was an attractive argument because we have long since ceased to be citizens and are merely economic units.  Friedman’s theory didn’t actually depend on his earlier phrase which suggested: “…countries with McDonalds outlets don’t go to war with each other” but that was how readers treated it.  Technically, it was a bit of a gray area (Friedman treated the earlier US invasion of Panama (1989) as a police action) but the thesis was anyway soon disproved in the Balkans.  Now, Schumpeter and Friedman seem to be cited most often in pieces disproving their theses and atavism remains alive and kicking.

Reaper

Reaper (pronounced ree-per)

(1) A machine for cutting standing grain; reaping machine; a machine used to harvest crops.

(2) One who reaps; a person employed to harvest crops from the fields by reaping; a machine operator who controls a mechanical reaper.

(3) A short form of grim reaper (often capitalized), the personification of death as a man or cloaked skeleton holding a scythe.

(4) The recluse spider (Loxosceles and Sicarius spp).

Pre 1000: From the Middle English reper, repare & repere (a harvester, one who cuts grain with a sickle or other instrument) from the Old English compound rīpere (the agent-noun from the verb reap), the construct being reap (from the Middle English repen, from the Old English rēopan & rēpan, variants of the Old English rīpan (to reap), from the Proto-Germanic rīpaną and related to the West Frisian repe, the German reifsen (to snatch) and the Norwegian ripa (to score, scratch); source was the primitive Indo-European hireyb- (to snatch)) + -er (from the Middle English –er & -ere, from the Old English -ere, from the Proto-Germanic -ārijaz, probably borrowed from Latin –ārius and later reinforced by the synonymous but unrelated Old French –or & -eor (the Anglo-Norman variant was -our), from the Latin -(ā)tor, from the primitive Indo-European –tōr; the suffix was added to verbs to form an agent noun).  The agent noun meaning "a reaper" is from the 1590s whereas the sense of "a machine for cutting grain" dates from 1841 and that of a “machine for reaping and binding field crops" appeared in 1847.  Variations of the spelling including Riper, Ryper & Riper appear in pre-1000 parish records as surnames and the presumption is most would have had some sort of vocational relationship to “reap”; Repere was first noted as a surname in the early fourteenth century.  Reaper is a noun; the noun plural is reapers.

The Grim Reaper as often depicted.

The use as the name of a personification of death dates from 1818 and “grim reaper” was first attested in 1847 although the association of grim and death is document from at least the seventeenth century with actual common use probably much earlier; a Middle English expression for "have recourse to harsh measures" was “to wend the grim tooth” and has been found as early as the 1200s.  The adjective grim was from the Old English grimm (fierce, cruel, savage; severe, dire, painful), from the Proto-Germanic grimma- (source also of the Old Saxon, Old Frisian, Old High German & German grimm (grim, angry, fierce), the Old Norse grimmr (stern, horrible, dire), the Swedish grym (fierce, furious), from the primitive Indo-European ghremno- (angry), thought to be imitative of the sound of rumbling thunder (and may thus be compared with the Greek khremizein (to neigh), the Old Church Slavonic vuzgrimeti (to thunder) and the Russian gremet' (thunder).  Grim by the late twelfth century had lost the worst of the earlier connotations of violence and foreboding, by then understood to impart a sense of "dreary, gloomy".  The verb form in the Old English was grimman (past tense gramm; past participle grummen), while the noun grima (goblin, specter) may also have been a proper name or attribute-name of a god, the source of its appearance as an element in so many place names.

The Grim Reaper: Public health initiative, Australia, 1987.

The Grim Reaper was a 60 second-long television advertisement, run in 1987 as part of a public health campaign to increase awareness of the danger of HIV/AIDS.  It depicted the Grim Reaper of popular imagination in a ten-pin bowling alley, using a seven foot high (2.1 m) bowling ball to knock over men, women and child "pins", each of which represented a victim of the disease.  It was part of what would later be called a multi-media campaign which included radio broadcasts and printed material and certainly provoked a reaction, more sophisticated consumers of messaging thinking it at least banal and perhaps puerile while others found it disturbing and reported it scared their children.  The public response was hardly “hysterical” as has sometimes been claimed although the even then assertive gay community didn’t like that they were explicitly mentioned, fearing scapegoating although, given the publicity which by then had been documenting the track of AIDS for some four years, that horse had already bolted.  It was by the standards of the time confronting and criticism meant the government cancelled broadcasting, three weeks into a run which was intended to be twice the duration yet the public health community was pleased with the results and the programme was praised internationally, the direct Australian approach influencing others.  Some Australian state governments subsequently used even more graphic imagery in public health initiatives around matters such as smoking and road safety but it’s notable that attempts to use similar techniques to promulgate messages during the COVID-19 pandemic were thought a failure.  With various platforms having desensitized most to all but the most horrific sights, the public’s capacity to be shocked may have moved beyond what television advertising agencies can manage.

Blue Öyster Cult (Don't Fear) The Reaper (1976) © Donald Roeser (b 1947).

All our times have come

Here but now they're gone

Seasons don't fear the reaper

Nor do the wind, the sun or the rain, we can be like they are

 

Come on baby, don't fear the reaper

Baby take my hand, don't fear the reaper

We'll be able to fly, don't fear the reaper

Baby I'm your man

 

La, la, la, la, la

La, la, la, la, la

 

Valentine is done

Here but now they're gone

Romeo and Juliet

Are together in eternity, Romeo and Juliet

40,000 men and women everyday, Like Romeo and Juliet

40,000 men and women everyday, Redefine happiness

Another 40,000 coming everyday, We can be like they are

 

Come on baby, don't fear the reaper

Baby take my hand, don't fear the reaper

We'll be able to fly, don't fear the reaper

Baby I'm your man

 

La, la, la, la, la

La, la, la, la, la

 

Love of two is one

Here but now they're gone

Came the last night of sadness

And it was clear she couldn't go on

Then the door was open and the wind appeared

The candles blew then disappeared

The curtains flew then he appeared, saying don't be afraid

 

Come on baby, and she had no fear

And she ran to him, then they started to fly

They looked backward and said goodbye, she had become like they are

She had taken his hand, she had become like they are

Come on baby, don't fear the reaper

Although they’d led a discursive existence since 1967, by the early 1970s, Blue Öyster Cult was in the crowded field of post-psychedelic acts blending quasi-classical motifs, mysticism, neck-snapping riffs and pop panache.  Coming from this milieu, the commercial success in 1976 of the single (Don't Fear) The Reaper was unexpected although more predictable was the controversy triggered by the lyrics being interpreted as advocating suicide.  It’s tempting to read the words that way, the eye drawn to the mention of Shakespeare's star-cross'd lovers, but the musician who wrote the lyrics claimed the song was about mortality and the inevitability of death, not its hastening and that in Romeo and Juliet he saw a couple with a faith in eternal love, not icons of a death cult.  The forty-thousand souls mentioned being taken by the reaper is way too high to refer to the daily suicide toll and actually references the total daily death take, the “forty thousand” being a bit of artistic license because the real number (125-135,000 at the time the lyrics were penned) would have too many syllables for the rhythm of the music.

Coming & going, dressed for the occasion.  Lindsay Lohan in Grim Reaper mode fulfilling a court-mandated community service order at LA County Morgue, October, 2011.

Lapidify

Lapidify (pronounced luh-pid-uh-fahy)

(1) To convert into stone or stony material; to petrify.

(2) To transform a material into something stony.

(3) Figuratively, to cause to become permanent; to solidify.

1620s: From the French lapidifier, from the Medieval Latin lapidificāre, the construct being the Latin lapis (stone) + -ify.  The origin of the Latin lapis is uncertain but there may be a link with the Ancient Greek λέπας (lépas) (bare rock, crag), which was from either the primitive Indo-European lep- (to peel) or a Mediterranean substrate language, most etymologists tending to favor the latter.  The -ify suffix was from the Middle English -ifien, from the Old French -ifier, from the Latin -ificare, from -ficus, from facio, (“make” or “do”).  It was used to produce verbs meaning “to make”; the alternative form was -fy.  The literal synonym in geology is petrify but also used (in various contexts) are set, harden, clarify, solidify, calcify, mineralize & fossilize.  Lapidify, lapidifies, lapidifying & lapidified are verbs, lapidification is a noun and lapidific & lapidifical are adjectives; the noun plural is lapidifications.

Medusa

In Greek mythology, Medusa (from the Ancient Greek Μέδουσα (Médousa), from μέδω (médō) (rule over)) was the youngest of the three Gorgon sisters and among them, the sole mortal.  In the popular imagination it seems to be believed than only the gaze of Medusa had the power to turn men to stone but her sisters Stheno & Euryale also possessed the gift.  The three were the daughters of Phorcys & Ceto who lived in the far west and the heads of the girls were entwined with writhing snakes and their necks protected with the scales of dragons while they had huge, boar-like tusks, hands of bronze and golden wings.  That alone would have made dating a challenge but anyone who had the misfortune to encounter them was turned instantly to stone.  Only Poseidon (god of the sea and one of the Olympians, the son of Cronus & Rhea) didn’t fear their glance because he had coupled with Medusa and fathered a child (in some tales the ghastly Cyclops Polyphemus which wasn’t encouraging but the other Cyclops were about as disagreeable).

Bust of Medusa in marble (1636) by Gianlorenzo Bernini (1598-1680), Museos Capitolinos. Palazzo dei Conservatori, Rome, Italy (left) and Lindsay Lohan in Medusa mode, Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen (2004) (right).

Born in great secrecy, Perseus was the son of Zeus & Danae but one day, Danae’s father Acrisius heard the baby’s cry and, enraged that Zeus had seduced his daughter, had mother & child sealed in a wooden chest and cast into the sea; it washed up on the shores of the island of Seriphos, the pair rescued by the fisherman Dictys, brother of the ruling tyrant Polydectes.  When Perseus grew, he was one day one of those at one of Polydectes' banquets and when the guests were asked what gift they would offer their host, all except Perseus suggested horses.  He instead offered to bring to the table the severed head of Medusa.  It’s not clear if this was intended as a serious suggestion (wine may have been involved) but the tyrant insisted, saying that otherwise he would take Danae by force.  Embarking on this unpromising quest Perseus was helped by Hermes & Athena who took him to the Graeae; they showed him the way to the nymphs who lent him winged sandals, a kibisis (the backpack of the gods) and the helmet of Hades which rendered the wearer invisible.  Hermes armed him with the harpe, a sickle made of adamant.

Thus equipped, Perseus and Athena began the hunt for the Gorgons.  Of the three sisters, only Medusa was mortal so the project of decapitation had at least some theoretical prospect of success.  The far west was a bleak and uninviting place to which few travelled and they had little trouble in finding their lair, outside which they lay in wait until the family slept.  After midnight, when Medusa had fallen into a deep slumber, Perseus rose into the air on the nymphs’ winged sandals, and, while Athena held a shield of polished bronze over Medusa so it acted as a mirror, protecting them from her gaze, Perseus wielded his harpe, in one stroke striking head from shoulders.  Instantly, from the bloodied neck sprang Pegasus the winged horse and Chrysaor the giant.  Perseus stashed the severed head in the kibisis and quickly alit for home, pursued by a vengeful Stheno & Euryale but, concealed by the helmet’s cloak of invisibility, he evaded them.  Arriving in Seriphos, he became enraged after discovering Polydectes had attempted to rape Danae who had been compelled to seek refuge at the altars of the gods.  Perseus took Medusa’s head from the backpack and held the visage before Polydectes, lapidifying him in an instant, declaring his rescuer Dictys was now the island’s ruler.  The invaluable accessories he returned to the Nymphs while Athena set the head of Medusa in the middle of her shield, meaning she now possessed the power of lapidification.

Pravda

Pravda (pronounced prahv-duh)

(1) Formerly an official newspaper of the Communist Party of the USSR.

(2) A newspaper now run by the Communist Party of the Russian Federation (the digital presence (Russian, English & Portuguese) maintained by a nominally privately-controlled entity.

(3) In slang (in the West), a derisive term applied to any form of news media thought to be biased or distributing fake news or misinformation (often on the basis of them being a mouthpiece of the state or the corporate interests of the owners).

Pre 1600: From the Russian правда (pravda) (literally “the truth”), from the Proto-Slavic правъ (pravŭ) (used variously to denote concepts related to law, order, and correctness), the source also of other Slavic words such as the Bulgarian, Czech and Slovak право (pravo) which was formed in Polish as prawo, all of which variously conveyed “law”, “justice”, “right” or “righteousness”.  Over time, the word shifted in meaning, assuming the modern general sense of “truth” by the mid-nineteenth century. Pravda is a noun; the noun plural is pravdas.

Pravda mini pencil-skirt with hammer & sickle.

Officially, Pravda was first published in 1912 but it had actually existed in Moscow since 1903 although originally it showed no overt political orientation, something which changed after the abortive Russian Revolution of 1905 and editorial direction became contested before a leftist faction gained control.  In the manner in which the control of institutions passed between the factions in the years prior to the 1917 revolution, Pravda was for a while edited by Comrade Leon Trotsky (1879-1940; founder of the Fourth International) who moved the operation to Vienna to protect it from the attention of the Tsar’s police before it was taken over by Comrade Vladimir Lenin (1870–1924; head of government of Russia or Soviet Union 1917-1924).  Lenin was a lawyer who understood how a carefully designed corporate structure could take advantage of Russian law and moved the paper to Saint Petersburg (known as Leningrad in the days of the USSR).  His tactics substantially ensured ongoing publication until the outbreak of World War I (1914-1918) when the government (like many including some in the West) either suspended or changed any laws which looked inconvenient and wartime regulations were used to censor the press to the extent Pravda was closed and in a game of cat-and-mouse was forced to change both its name and the premises from which it operated on a number of occasions (officially eight but some editions never actually reached the printing stage and it may have been as many as eleven).  Despite it all, between 1912-1991, Pravda survived to operate as the organ of the Communist Party and after 1917 it was the voice of the state.  Pravda always enjoyed wide circulation but under an arrangement which must make modern editors and proprietors envious, there was never much interest in stimulating sales, it being compulsory for all the many parts of state institutions and the military to each day buy multiple copies.  Whenever additional funds were needed, department heads were ordered to order more.

Special Edition of Izvestia published in honor of Comrade Stalin’s state funeral, Moscow, 9 March 1953.  Both newspapers were integral to the manufacturing of Stalin's cult of personality.

The other Russian newspaper of note was Известия (Izvestia) which translates for most purposes as “the news”.  The Russian izvestiya means “bring news”, “tidings” or “herald” (in the medieval sense of an official messenger announcing news) and was from the verb izveshchat (to inform; to notify).  It was exclusively a creation of the party, founded in 1917 initially as a vehicle for the distribution of statements by and comment on behalf of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union.  Unlike Pravda which to some extent still operated as a conventional newspaper (though without any dissenting views), Izvestia existed only to disseminate state propaganda.  Now controlled by the National Media Group, it survives to this day and is described as a “national newspaper of Russia” although, given the present-day influence the Kremlin, its original full-name Известия Советов народных депутатов СССР (Izvestiya Sovetov Narodnykh Deputatov SSSR) which translates as “Reports of Soviets of Peoples' Deputies of the USSR” hints at the source of editorial direction.  There are of course differences between the press in Russia and in the West but there are also similarities, notably in the cynicism of the readership, a favorite saying in Soviet times being there was no pravda in the Izvestia and no investia in the Pravda.  Another similarity with Western corporations is that Pravda enjoys an eponymous street address, its headquarters being at 24 Pravda Street, Moscow, emulating Apple (1 Apple Park Way, Cupertino, California) and Microsoft (One Microsoft Way, Redmond, Washington).

Pravda, 6 March 1953.  On the day the death of Comrade Joseph Stalin (1878-1953; Soviet leader 1924-1953) was announced, the first indication to Muscovites the news might be ominous was that Pravda and Izvestia, rather than appearing shortly after midnight, didn’t show up in the kiosks until after nine.  Pravda noted the event with an appropriately mournful black border around its front page which was devoted wholly to Stalin and included an editorial calling for “monolithic unity” and “vigilance”.  Presumably, Mr Putin (b 1952; president or prime minister of Russia since 1999) still feels much the same.

Lindsay Lohan attending the Just Sing It App Launch at Pravda, New York City, December 2013.

For over seventy years, the two newspapers existed as documents, if not of news and truth in the conventional sense of the words, a uniquely accurate record of the official Soviet world-view and the way it wish to be represented.  It was influential too in that many of its stock phrases and modes of expression were picked up by political scientists in the West and, given the paucity of information from other sources, analyzing Pravda and Izvestia became a staple of the diet of the Kremlinologists who inhabited university departments and later think tanks, parsing and deconstructing the text in search of the hidden meanings of what Winston Churchill (1975-1965; UK prime-minister 1940-1945 & 1951-1955) described as “a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma”.