Word: fad
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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Three new British books (see below) should tell Americans much of the drama that lies behind the puzzle. In different moods they deal with three major themes: 1) the treasonable folly of the intellectuals who, in the '303, took up Marxism as something between fad and faith; 2) the ugly betrayals and discontents that grew out of this era's dry rot; and 3) a crisis of faith deeper than either of these troubles-the struggle of an age estranged from God trying to find a way back to religion...
...least one of them (Red Shoes) started a teen-age craze .for carrying ballet slippers, whether the owners were studying ballet or not. Dozens of school companies present productions whenever they can, while three big TV stations offer regular ballet shows. It has all the appearance of a fad, for Japan's own ancient, formalized dance tradition is as different from West ern ballet as Kabuki is from burlesque. But underneath the surface is a foundation of serious interest...
PHRENOLOGY: FAD AND SCIENCE (203 pp.)-John D. Davis-Yale...
Just before World War II a marimo fad started, and thousands of the gamboling plants were snatched from Lake Akan. But the war intervened to save them from extinction, and in 1947 the Education Ministry's Committee for the Protection of Cultural Objects dug up an old law that proclaimed the marimos "a national treasure." It threatened fine or imprisonment for anyone who molested them...
...proclamation backfired. It advertised the marimos, and a second fad swept through Japan. Stealthy marimo-kapparai (marimo snatchers) haunted Lake Akan, diving into the water at night to kidnap the helpless creatures. Marimo smugglers brought them to Sapporo, the capital of Hokkaido, and Japanese tourists bought them furtively, paying up to $50. Biologists and nature lovers wrung their hands in anguish, but nothing effective was done. The little pets from Lake Akan were snatched almost to extinction...