Saturday, 4 April 2026
fugue
noun
A dissociative state involving loss of identity, often with flight from familiar surroundings. Also: a contrapuntal musical form.
Nuance
The musical and psychological meanings both involve layering and running: in music, voices chase each other; in psychology, the self flees.
“He drove for three hours in a kind of fugue, arriving somewhere he hadn't meant to go.”