OTIOSE
Nobody has remarked that in naming his son Otis, Bryan Ferry not only honoured a soul singer but the American who, in questioning Parliament’s validity, precipitated the Revolution. The Christian name derives from the Boston lawyer James Otis, who died from a lightning bolt. Otis’s root is in the Germanic for riches. This is distinct from otiose, a state in which to enjoy riches or to fail to gain them. Otiation — from Latin — was overlooked by Johnson, who was certainly otiose (leisurely, idle): the adjective gained currency in the industrious Victorian era, which brought it an enduringly pejorative air. Bryan Ferry (once dubbed Byron Ferrari), however, shows that to affect languor can bring prosperity.
CAH