I am really not sure what this sentence means:

Not surprisingly, Laqueur takes bemused satisfaction in reporting a more recent editorial in The Economist entitled “Staring into the Abyss.”

Anyone has any ideas, let me know. My dictionary is useless here. Bemused usually means preoccupied or bewildered. Neither one makes sense. I've heard people use it to mean amused. I'm not sure what amusement has to do with satisfaction. Let's look at that sentence.

Not surprisingly, Laqueur takes amused satisfaction in reporting a more recent editorial in The Economist entitled “Staring into the Abyss.”

I guess it has some meaning like that, the author means that he was amused and satisfied at the same time. Let's see if we could swap that out for

Not surprisingly, Laqueur takes satisfied amusement in reporting a more recent editorial in The Economist entitled “Staring into the Abyss.”

I think this may be the key to understanding the sentence. Let's try once more without the odd conjunction of words.

Not surprisingly, Laqueur is satisfied and amused while reporting a more recent editorial in The Economist entitled “Staring into the Abyss.”

Probably about right.

This reminds me of a review I was reading of some food where a reviewer described a particular piece of meat as being "too toothsome". Well, as far as I know, toothsome is an adjective for delicious. So the reviewer was saying that the food was too delicious? Presumably not, but then what did he mean? Bizarre.

Labels: nonplussed and friends