The DSM-V, that rough beast whose hour has come round at last, continues to slouch towards press time to be born. Though there is more than a little of the Floating Island of Laputa to their efforts, its authors deserve our gratitude – and our compassion. One can only imagine how happy and relieved they must feel at the prospect of at last being done with this postmodern labor of Hercules. It is unlikely any of them dreamed of the hornet’s nest they would be stirring up when they first undertook the task of revision of this more than problematic text, the so-called Bible of American psychiatry. The Zeitgeist is by no means friendly to canons of any kind – and the issues involved in the definition and diagnosis of mental health make the topic a dangerous Third Rail for anyone brave or foolhardy enough to come near.