Mrs. Malaprop and Unintended Puns

You remember Mrs. Malaprop, the fictional character who always mixed up words to hilarious effect. Here is what Wikipedia has to say about "Malapropism":

The word "malapropism" comes from the French "mal à propos" meaning "inappropriate", and was personified by Richard Brinsley Sheridan in his comedy The Rivals (1775) as "Mrs. Malaprop", a character who habitually misused her words, while Dogberryism comes from "Officer Dogberry," the name of a character in William Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing who also makes this kind of error. These are the two best-known fictional characters who make this kind of error--there are many other examples. Malapropisms also occur as errors in natural speech. Malapropisms are often the subject of media attention, especially when made by politicians or other prominent individuals. When used intentionally, malapropisms can be an example of irony.[citation needed] The philosopher Donald Davidson has noted that malapropisms show how complex the process is by which the brain translates thoughts into language.

I highlighted a couple of the sentences, given that one of the purposes of this blog is to explore the neuro-electro-mechanical origins of Unintended Puns. I suspect that malapropisms have much the same origin as Unintended Puns, as we have discussed in many past posts, and therefore could be researched in much the same way.

I'll leave you with a pun from a sports article forum. It's the kind we love here at the Pun Forum in that beyond just being a simple pun, it expresses a truth as it makes the pun--enriching the sentence in a way the writer did not intend, and perhaps would not understand without an explanation.

January 2, 2013 I grew up in Cleveland, Ohio, so I follow the Cleveland professional sports teams. Earlier this year, the Browns pursued Chip Kelly to become their next head coach. In an article entitled Browns have sights on Oregon's Chip Kelly (the article is no longer on Yahoo's site), a commenter, obviously a Browns fan, below the article said: "I will go with the flow and let the chips fall where they may. Wears me out hoping and wishing."

Please post your Unintended Puns, or give us your ideas on how they happen.

Two from Work

As I've mentioned in past blogs, I work a lot with computers. So today, I'll share a couple of Unintended Puns dealing with my job and computers, one that I said, and one I swallowed right before I said it.

Usually, I am able to get my job done with minimal frustration. Our company has launched a big initiative in an attempt to join the virtualization craze, meaning that I am often using my desktop computer to remote to another computer, and then remoting from there to a third computer. That third computer has a very small window, and despite my large, high resolution monitor, I usually have to re-position and re-size the window several times, working the mouse quite a bit in order to see what I want to see.

January 29, 2013 As I was showing a colleague something on the squeezed screen so I could then ask her a question about it, and struggling a little bit getting the window positioned so the right information was on the screen, I said: "This is a drag. Literally."

The second Unintended Pun didn't make it past my lips, only because it was very bad, and I guess my brain formulated it soon enough for my body to stop it. Anyway, I was talking to a colleague about a test suite written in the Python language. I am attempting to adapt the suite for our use, knowing that we have a tight schedule. I had also just told my colleague that the extension for Python files is ".py" or phonetically ".pie".

February 5, 2013 I was explaining that it could be tough to get the test suite working for our purposes, but I would do my best. I was about to say:"Making the schedule may be a little pie in the sky thinking."

I changed the wording at the last second to something like "The schedule is tight, but I think we can make it, and it's probably worth it."

I've asked before--have you stopped yourself from saying something, assuming it would be perceived as a pun, and figuring your audience would take you for a fool if you said it? Let us know here at the Pun Forum.

Just had to post this one...

This one rates pretty high--it's funny, it states a truth, and it doesn't need any context. There's only one problem: I just realized that the person may use this as a planned comment that he says to everybody. So I'll need some help from the jury. Without further ado, I'll get to today's Unintended Pun (I think).

January 20, 2013 At the end of a call I made to the insurance company to add a car to our policy, the representative said: "If you run into anything else you want to discuss, just give us a call here at [name withheld to protect me from lawsuits] auto insurance."

What do you think? Is this something the guy thought about and now says to everybody, putting one over on his clients, as well as his boss? Let us know here at the Pun Forum.

Puns for the New Year

Happy New Year, everyone! I've got a couple of recent Unintended Puns to share with you, both said by me. I guess one of them isn't so much a pun, but it's kind of a pun (perhaps you can give me your opinion of its pun-ness). In saying it, I realized another way that one can tell that one is saying, if not an Unintended Pun, at least a word play.

On to the puns, to start the New Year on the right foot.

November 19, 2012 To be honest, I can't remember the full context, but while discussing the nature of desert plants and their defense mechanisms with a work colleague, I said: "I wouldn't want to get on the bad side of a cactus, and I do mean the bad side."

This made me think that a way to tell that you've just said a pun is that you repeat yourself: "and I do mean the bad side." I could have said the much more mundane, "I wouldn't want to get stuck by a cactus." But as I realized that the "bad side" of course had a double meaning--the outside, as well as the mean side, I repeated myself to accentuate the humor.

The second one comes from me just talking to myself. (Yes, I do that, and have most of my life. What can I say? I'm doing it right now.) I had been trying to decide whether or not to buy an extra long twin-sized bed for my son, the advantage of which would be allowing him to sleep better than on a regular length twin-sized bed, but of course take less room than a queen-sized bed. But as a I contemplated the extra cost of less common-sized sheets, I decided against the purchase.

November 21, 2012 I said to myself: "When you throw the (extra cost of) sheets on top of it, we should just buy another queen."

I actually laughed out loud at that one.

If you catch yourself repeating something, or discover some other method of noticing word play or better yet, Unintended Puns, drop us a line.

A Seasonal Word Study

During this season of gift-giving, I want to pause from the Puns, and instead give you a gift in the spirit of this blog--a word study meaningful to the Christmas story.

The Bible accounts describe the "birth" of Jesus of Nazareth--born in a manger with cattle and hay all around. It was a humble, quiet scene, except perhaps for a baby wailing for its mother. But other parts of the account give more details about this "birth" that should make us think about Christmas much more deeply:

• A host of angels appeared to shepherds and told them about this newborn baby, announcing that he would bring peace.
• An old man named Simeon, having spent most of his life waiting "for the consolation of Israel," upon seeing and holding the baby Jesus, was moved to pray to God, "For my eyes have seen your salvation, which you have prepared in the sight of all people, a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to your people Israel."
• And of course, even how Mary became pregnant is a great mystery--"The Holy Spirit will come upon you."

So, this was no ordinary "birth." It was, however, necessary, that Jesus of Nazareth be "born" as a human being, to have both a human nature and a God nature within Him. He could then live as a human being--live a perfect life, to become the perfect sacrifice, to fulfill God's perfect justice, and therfore be Jesus the Christ, the Messiah, the savior of the world. Instead of ordinary, this "birth" was extraordinary in ways beyond our imaginations: it represented the insertion of God into the world, the collision of the eternal with the temporal, the King of kings entering His kingdom.

Given all this, when you think of the "birth" of Jesus over the next few weeks, think of God entering the world, or a King entering His domain. Snow, and reindeer, and trees, and lights are all fun and festive. But please think of God and this birth on a deep level during this Christmas season.

I'll return next time with some great Unintended Puns.

Merry Christmas.