Acknowledgements

Like diplomats, I am but the most visible part of the work you are holding in your hands. It would not have been possible without the help, assistance, indulgence, and affection of so very many people. Just as diplomacy makes the diplomat visible through the work of hundreds of invisible hands, my name too appears alone on the cover of this book. However, I am only here because so many helped me.

There is no hope of thanking each of you as much as you deserve. Nor am I sure that in my distraction I can truly appreciate what you have done as much as I should. But the kindness given, its importance, and my gratefulness are too great not to try.

Vivienne Jabri, mentor, intellectual pioneer, and inspiration. It is with her that I first began to develop my interest in the very words through which diplomatic knowledge is produced as well as scientific rigour, high expectations about IR theory work, honest hard feedback, and a deep, sincere, and true appreciation of why we do this.

My family. I owe everything to you, and not just in the ways children, siblings, and partners usually do. You have, for decades now, supported me, my ideas, ambitions, intellectual fishing trips, and my love of philosophy. My parents inspired me with authentic intellectual freedom, flair, love of creation, suspicion of intellectual strictures, my mother’s exceptional yet kindly drive and thoughtful discipline, and, as my father frequently reflects in his artistic work, the understanding that life itself is at stake in politics. May we all be like you. Tally, my beloved sister, exceptional curator and art thinker, has long indulged my artistic flights of fancy and always ensured my visual explanations made sense. You should be grateful to her too, for she designed the diagrams that help make sense of the analysis in this book. Leoncita, erstwhile partner in mind, body, and ontology: you inspired me every day, fuelled my love of doing this, and, with your endless curiosity, reminded me why it must be done. You were there every day, from first proposal to the day I finished this book and danced all the way home.

I have incurred so many intellectual debts that I am certain this word of thanks could only ever be half adequate and, even then, only truly acknowledge far too little of what I owe.

Thanks are due to living intellectual heroes, who at various points gave me advice and encouraged me along the way. My colleagues at the Department of War Studies, King’s College London, particularly Mervyn and Lola Frost, Peter Busch, Leonie Ansems de Vries, Flavia Gasbarri, Jack Spence, Didier Bigo, and so many more, including colleagues and partners in intellectual crimes Thomas Bottelier, Claire Yorke, Filippo Costa-Buranelli, and Jill S. Russell, who were the best intellectual environment for an obsessive researcher like myself. A special expression of appreciation and gratefulness is due to Nicholas Michelsen, my partner in researching the history of nationalist ideas, a real intellectual brother and thinker.

I also want to thank quasi-mythical heroes who have made deep impressions on my intellectual life. Michael Shapiro, who a long time ago encouraged me to go all-out on analytically treating political text like literature; Mark Atwood Lawrence, who, never having met me, has always supported my approach to researching diplomacy; Manuele Gragnolati and much-missed Richard Parish, the professors who first introduced me to the magic of language and its analysis. Manuele, I will always hear your voice in my head: ‘Focus on the text!’.

Never forgotten, I thank the archivists, assistants, and employees of numerous diplomatic archives that kindly indulged my requests, assisted me in finding documents, and sometimes gave me hints and explanations that were, in hindsight, far more significant than the technicalities of where documents are kept. Likewise, following the paper trail of diplomatic knowledge production while keeping close watch on real-world diplomatic practices was only possible thanks to the many diplomats and foreign policy workers – especially Our Lady of Diplomatic Salvation – that helped me map where reports actually go, understand institutional quirks, and helped me fill in gaps in the documentary record.

Sometimes encouragement and inspiration came from those that will be our future: my history of nationalism class – the Identity Hunters – at King’s College, who are unceasingly inspiring, questioning, intellectually challenging, and fill me with hope; my PhD students, especially Felicia Yuwono, who in the last three years reminded me of my passion for analysing diplomatic practices and their impact.

Just as importantly, many artists have contributed to my work, their contributions inspiring and world-changing. My personal imaginary would not exist without the work of painters like my father Gaston Orellana and the visual creativity that fuels understanding of the world. My long-time collaborator and friend Tom de Freston with whom, allied to Mariah Whelan and Christiana Spens, we explore unspeakable traumas in our Truth Tellers collective. Dom Bouffard, collaborator in punk endeavour, with whom I explored political memories we inherited but did not live. Their work is not just decoration, but rather millions of little holes patiently carved into the fabric of what we think is reality. Together, they show us how our world is imagined and, consequently, made.

As I drafted this book, thousands of musicians kept me company with countless hours of music. I’d like to highlight my inspiring friends Al Wade and The Modern World, whom I sometimes dragged to university to play for me and my students, and who often send me music and playlists to keep me happy, angry, and writing. The many musicians in my collection, from Pink Floyd and Led Zeppelin to Future Islands and The War on Drugs, not forgetting Buckethead, who helped me stay focused in fierce-mythical guitar riffs. Their music inspired me to remember what is at stake in life, always fuelling hope that ‘if you listen very hard / the tune will come to you at last / when all are one and one is all / to be a rock and not to roll’. And it’s not just rock: classical composers gave me time, mystery, and never-ending space, particularly Tchaikovsky, whose Manfred symphony inspired the structure of this book. As Nietzsche said: ‘without music, life would be a mistake’.

Finally, but decidedly not least since you are holding this book in your hands, I thank the editors at Manchester University Press, who saw the vision of this project, helped me shape it, and were very patient with the many delays to which I subjected them.

To all of you, named and unnamed, I say farewell and sign off as if I were one of the diplomats studied in this book. Not just in diplomatic form, but with sincere gratefulness,

I have the honour to be,

with the highest respect

Madam/Sir,

your most obedient, humble servant

Pablo de Orellana

London 2024