durk(y)

At work I did something to the text of a document as an experiment, looked at the result and exclaimed “That looks durky”. This is not a word which I would usually use, and almost certainly not a word at all. Maybe I was thinking “dorky”, which is a word I occasionally use. But there was no doubt as the general meaning, and absolutely no doubt as to the grammar. Durky just has to be an adjective, and probably a negative one. 

A colleague and I speculated about other sentences where durk(y) might have a positive meaning: I love the way you durk, You are the durk of my life. Durk could be a noun or verb. Although I used durky, durk could also be an adjective, but the pairing would probably be durk (noun) < > durky (adjective) or durk (adjective) < > durkness (noun), depending on which came first, with durkiness hovering there uncertainly. In turn, the adverb would be durkly or durkily. In the end, we don’t have to decide, because the word is unlikely to catch on. It’s just not fetch enough.

Durk(y) is more likely to have a negative meaning. There’s something about ur/ir or or which makes them sound dark: dirty or dorky. I’ll let you guess (if you don’t know) whether JRR Tolkein’s Mirkwood was a pleasant place or not.

Later in the day, I was listening to an extended piece of classical music and Youtube interrupted the movement with an ad for a product or service by Google. I said “Durk you, Google!” (Maybe I should have blamed Youtube.)

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Lo-lee-ta

On 29 May 1913, one of the biggest bangs in classical music history took place in the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées in Paris, being the premiere of The Rite of Spring, a ballet by Igor Stravinsky. A combination of the music, stage design, costumes, story and choreography led to a near-riot (or an actual one, depending on whose account you read. In an interview some time later, Stravinsky referred to Vaslav Nijinsky‘s “knocked-kneed and long-braided Lolitas”. There is very little information about the interview, but it is obviously some time later because 1) it was filmed and is now viewable on Youtube, 2) Stravinsky looks considerably advanced in years and 3) he uses the name Lolita in that way, placing the interview after the publication of Vladimir Nabokov’s novel in 1955 (when Stravinsky was 73). (Indeed, the poster of the video suggests the early 1960s.)

A lolita (more often lower-case, but Pages for Mac just upper-cased it), is now an alluring (at least to a certain kind of man) older girl or young teenager. (Nabokov’s narrator specifies the age range nine to 14; he also calls them demoniac, placing the blame on them rather than himself.) Even though The Rite of Spring is about a pagan fertility ritual, it is questionable as to how alluring the dancers were or are, or were or are meant to be.

But the name Lolita goes back further than Nabokov’s novel. Dolores is a good Spanish name (Maria Dolores, Saint Mary of the Sorrows), which became Lola, which became Lolita.