This time last year, of course, the World Cup broke the icy spell of seasonal despondency.
One paradoxical reason for their current despondency is what might be called the sanctification of politics.
The barren despondency of the place depressed him and challenged his resolution, arrived at during his recovery, to see the girl again.
Yet many Americans combine despondency about the big picture with personal contentment.
In Kashmir, however, there is despondency that there is no sign of a dialogue between India and even the moderate Kashmiri opposition.
They've moved from a "glass-half-empty" despondency just before Christmas to something a bit more positive (and see my post of Monday for why).
While perma-bears have poured out their despondency the markets have rallied.
The mood of bank bosses about all this is one of despondency, and a number of them now think a deal with the coalition is impossible.
If the actions of the Ulster Unionists or the British government do not account for the full extent of Mr Adams's public despondency, the explanation must lie elsewhere.
So much about the endless plunder of wildlife around the world - and the apparent failure of international agreements to stem the losses - is a cause for despondency.
And currently there's no room for despondency at BAR.
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This situation leads to an infuriating vicious circle, in which teachers often don't take travellers seriously because of their poor record of staying on, thereby exacerbating their feelings of isolation and despondency.
The Brummie accent, a nasal drone that suggests despondency to anyone outside Birmingham who is lucky enough to hear it, is also spreading as its speakers move west into Wales, where it threatens to snuff out the melodic local lilt.
And yet, nervous as the Politburo was, Russian nationalism and history were taken up and exploited when despondency threatened, especially before and during the second world war, and when the Soviet Union needed a narrative to compete with that of western democracy.
Hearing about the problematic sourcing of minerals for our technology, like many of the stories we push to the back of our minds this time of year, can lead to despondency and a sense of disempowerment after all what can we do about it?
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Yet there were times when he felt his life had been futile, and the mood of despondency that had sometimes come upon him in his most active years - which, following Samuel Johnson, Churchill called the "black dog" - seems to have been with him in much of his later life.
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