Word Play

These are some interesting forms of word play. If you know of any more good examples, please send them to me.

Palindromes

Palindromes are words or phrases (or sequences of numbers or other symbols) that read the same forwards and backwards. Usually spaces and punctuation are disregarded. For example:

Radar

racecar

redivider (the longest single English word palindrome)

I prefer pi.

never odd or even

Live Evil (an album title)

damn mad

Madam in Eden, I'm Adam.

Sex at noon taxes.

A Man, a plan, a canal - Panama

Was it a cat I saw?

Rise to vote sir

A Toyota

Yo! Banana Boy!

Ma is as selfless as I am.

Pa's a sap.

If I had a HiFi

Girls named Hannah and boys named Otto often learn about palindromes at an early age.

Palindromes can be made in other languages, for example:

火柴當柴火 (a match creates a fire in the fireplace)

油燈少燈油 (the oil lamp does not have enough oil)

上海自來水來自海上 (Shanghai's tap water comes from the sea)

船上女子叫子女上船 (The girl on the boat calls the children to go aboard)

Contradictions in terms (Perceived Oxymorons)

Contradictions in terms are phrases that consist of two words or shorter phrases that normally have opposite or nearly opposite meanings. For example:

pretty ugly

athletic scholarship

tight slacks

head butt

virtual reality

Dodge Ram

jumbo shrimp

boneless rib

wicked good

act naturally

original copy

good shit

wholesome

holy war

hot chili

student teacher

extensive briefings

random order

detailed summary

sharp curves

civil war

military intelligence

by reason of insanity

Microsoft Works

These are often called oxymorons, but technically are not. True oxymorons are actually boring relative to these amusing phrases.

Chiasmus

Chiasmus is a phrase that conveys its meaning by repetition with terms of the phrase reversed. For example:

From the inaugural address of John F. Kennedy, January 20, 1961 "...ask not what your country can do for you - ask what you can do for your country."

From a speech by Dwight D. Eisenhower to the Republican National Committee January 1958, "What counts is not necessarily the size of the dog in the fight - it's the size of the fight in the dog."

Line spoken by Mae West in I'm No Angel, 1933, "Well, it's not the men in your life that counts, it's the life in your men."

From the StarKist tuna advertisements of the 1980s, "Sorry, Charlie. StarKist doesn't want tunas with good taste - StarKist wants tunas that taste good."

Genesis 9:6, "Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed."

From Croesus , 6th century BC, "In peace sons bury their fathers, but in war fathers bury their sons."

Implied Chiasmus

Chiasmus may be implied from other well known phrases. For example:

Kermit the Frog said, "Time's fun when you're having flies."

Mae West said, "A hard man is good to find."

A hangover is the wrath of grapes

Phonetic Chiasmus

Chiasmus may exist between the syllables of different words. For example:

Winston Churchill is quoted as having said, "I'd rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy."

A witty New Year's toast is, "Champagne to our real friends, real pain to our sham friends"

One might wonder, "why do we drive on a parkway but park on a driveway?"

One might wonder, "why do we play at a recital but recite at a play?"

Antanaclasis

Antanaclasis is a phrase consisting of a word or phrase repeated with a different meaning each time. For example:

"Your argument is sound... all sound." -Benjamin Franklin

"If you aren't fired with enthusiasm, you will be fired with enthusiasm." -Vince Lombardi

"The long cigarette that's long on flavor." -advertisement for Pall Mall cigarettes

"If we don't hang together, we'll hang separately." -Benjamin Franklin

Double Entendre

A double entendre is a phrase that can be interpreted two different ways. Generally one way has a surprising an sometimes unintended meaning. Double Entendres can come about from the use of short words with multiple meanings, such as in newspaper headlines. For example:

Teacher Strikes Idle Kids

Squad Helps Dog Bite Victim

Stolen Painting Found by Tree

Remember in prayer the many who are sick of our church and community

The Bellamy Brothers had a song, "If I said you had a beautiful body, would you hold it against me?"

Commonly negative phrases used in the positive

Many words in common usage are negative terms without a commonly used corresponding positive term. These are cleverly pointed out in the following story.

How I Met My Wife
by Jack Winter
Published 25 July 1994 - The New Yorker

It had been a rough day, so when I walked into the party I was very chalant, despite my efforts to appear gruntled and consolate.

I was furling my wieldy umbrella for the coat check when I saw her standing alone in a corner. She was a descript person, a woman in a state of total array. Her hair was kempt, her clothing shevelled, and she moved in a gainly way.

I wanted desperately to meet her, but I knew I'd have to make bones about it since I was travelling cognito. Beknownst to me, the hostess, whom I could see both hide and hair of, was very proper, so it would be skin off my nose if anything bad happened. And even though I had only swerving loyalty to her, my manners couldn't be peccable. Only toward and heard-of behavior would do.

Fortunately, the embarrassment that my maculate appearance might cause was evitable. There were two ways about it, but the chances that someone as flappable as I would be ept enough to become persona grata or a sung hero were slim. I was, after all, something to sneeze at, someone you could easily hold a candle to, someone who usually aroused bridled passion.

So I decided not to risk it. But then, all at once, for some apparent reason, she looked in my direction and smiled in a way that I could make heads and tails of.

I was plussed. It was concerting to see that she was communicado, and it nerved me that she was interested in a pareil like me, sight seen. Normally, I had a domitable spirit, but, being corrigible, I felt capacitated -- as if this were something I was great shakes at -- and forgot that I had succeeded in situations like this only a told number of times. So, after a terminable delay, I acted with mitigated gall and made my way through the ruly crowd with strong givings.

Nevertheless, since this was all new hat to me and I had no time to prepare a promptu speech, I was petuous. Wanting to make only called-for remarks, I started talking about the hors d'oeuvres, trying to abuse her of the notion that I was sipid, and perhaps even bunk a few myths about myself.

She responded well, and I was mayed that she considered me a savory character who was up to some good. She told me who she was. "What a perfect nomer," I said, advertently. The conversation become more and more choate, and we spoke at length to much avail. But I was defatigable, so I had to leave at a godly hour. I asked if she wanted to come with me. To my delight, she was committal. We left the party together and have been together ever since. I have given her my love, and she has requited it.

Puns

Puns are words or phrases chosen for humorous effect that do not make sense in the context in which used but can easily be confused with another word or phrase that makes sense. As succinctly stated by Walter Redfern (in Puns, Blackwell, London, 1984), "To pun is to treat homonyms as synonyms". For example:

The pun is mightier than the sword.

Two peanuts were walking down the street. One was a salted.

Being in politics is just like playing golf: you are trapped in one bad lie after another.

Don't let your metaphoric retch exceed your metaphoric gasp.

In Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet after being stabbed Mercutio says, "Ask for me tomorrow and you shall find me a grave man."

Fishy Puns

The realm of ocean and fish terminology is fertile "ground?" for sewing puns, as exemplified by the Kip Addotta song Wet Dream with the following lyrics:

It was April the forty-first
Being a quadruple leap year
I was driving in downtown Atlantis
My barracuda was in the shop
So I was in a rented stingray
And it was overheating

So I pulled into a Shell Station
They said I'd blown a seal
I said, "Fix the damn thing
And leave my private life out of it
Okay pal?"

While they were doing that
I walked over to a place called the Oyster Bar, a real dive
But I knew the owner
He used to play for the Dolphins
I said "Hi Gil"
You have to yell, he's hard of herring

CHORUS:
Think I had a wet dream
Cruisin' thru the Gulf Stream
Ooh Ooh Ooh Ooh
Wet dream

Gil was also down on his luck
Fact is he was barely keeping his head below water
I bellied up to the sandbar
He poured me the usual

Rusty snail, hold the grunion
Shaken not stirred
With a peanut butter and jellyfish sandwich on the side
Heavy on the mako

I slipped him a fin
On porpoise
I was feeling good
I even dropped a sand dollar in the box for Jerry's squids
For the halibut

Well the place was crowded
We were packed in like sardines
They were all there to listen to the big band sounds of Tommy Dorsal
What sole

Tommy was rockin' the place with a very popular tuna
Salmon Chanted Evening
And the stage was surrounded by screaming groupers
Probably there to see the bass player

One of them was this cute little yellowtail
And she's giving me the eye
So I figured this is my chance for a little fun
You know, piece of Pisces

But she said things I just couldn't fathom
She was too deep, seemed to be under a lot of pressure
Boy, could she drink
She drank like a . . .
She drank a lot

I said "What's your sign"
She said "Aquarium"
I said "Great, let's get tanked"

CHORUS:
Think I had a wet dream
Cruisin' thru the Gulf Stream
Ooh Ooh Ooh Ooh
Wet dream

I invited her to my place for a midnight bait
I said "Come on baby, it'll only take a few minnows"
She threw me that same old line
"Not tonight, I gotta haddock"

And she wasn't kidding either
Cause in came the biggest, meanest looking haddock
I'd ever seen come down the pike
He was covered with mussels

He came over to me and said
"Listen, shrimp, don't you come trollin' around here"
What a crab
This guy was steamed
I could see the anchor in his eyes

I turned to him, I said
"A-balone, you're just being shellfish"
Well, I knew it was going to be trouble and so did Gil
‘Cause he was already on the phone to the cods

The haddock hits me with a sucker punch
I catch him with a left hook
He eels over
It was a fluke but there he was
Lying on the deck, flat as a mackerel
Kelpless

I said "Forget the cods Gil
This guy's gonna need a sturgeon"
Well, the yellowtail was impressed with the way I landed her boyfriend
She came over to me, she said
"Hey, big boy, you're really a game fish
What's your name"
I said "Marlin"

CHORUS:
Think I had a wet dream
Cruisin' thru the Gulf Stream
Ooh Ooh Ooh Ooh
Wet dream

Well, from then on we had a whale of a time
I took her to dinner, I took her to dance
I bought her a bouquet of flounders
And then I went home with her
And what did I get for my trouble
A case of the clams

CHORUS:
Think I had a wet dream
Cruisin' thru the Gulf Stream
Ooh Ooh Ooh Ooh

Wet dream
Cruisin' thru the Gulf Stream
Ooh Ooh Ooh Ooh

Wet dream
Cruisin' thru the Gulf Stream
Ooh Ooh Ooh Ooh

Daffynitions

Definitions of words that sounds like one or more other words. For example:

Oboe: An English tramp.

Propaganda: A gentlemanly goose.

Toboggan: Why one goes to a flea market.

Spoonerisms

A phrase in which parts of two words are switched. For example:

Is it kistomary to cuss the bride?

Three cheers for our queer old dean Victoria!

Just funny signs

These signs or slogans for small businesses are just plain amusing:

In a butcher shop window: "Never a bum steer."

On a diaper service truck: "Rock a dry baby."

On a divorce lawyer's wall: "Satisfaction guaranteed or your honey back."

At a lumberyard: "Come see, come saw."

On a plumber's truck: "A royal flush beats a full house."

At the tire store: "We skid you not!"

On a septic tank pump truck: "Yesterday's Meals on Wheels"

On a septic tank pump truck: "We're #1 in the #2 business."

Over a gynecologist’s office: "Dr. Jones, at your cervix."

At a proctologist's door: "To expedite your visit please back in."

On a plumber's truck: "We repair what your husband fixed."

At a pizza shop: "7 days without pizza makes one weak."

At a tire shop: "Invite us to your next blowout."

On a plastic surgeon's office door: "Hello. Can we pick your nose?"

At a towing company: "We don't charge an arm and a leg. We want tows."

On an electrician's truck: "Let us remove your shorts."

In a nonsmoking area: "If we see smoke, we will assume you are on fire and take appropriate action."

On a maternity room door: "Push. Push. Push."

At an optometrist's office: "If you don't see what you're looking for, you've come to the right place."

On a taxidermist's window: "We really know our stuff."

In a podiatrist's office: "Time wounds all heels."

On a fence: "Salesmen welcome! Dog food is expensive."

At a car dealership: "The best way to get back on your feet - miss a car payment."

In a veterinarian's waiting room: "Back in 5 minutes. Sit! Stay!"

At the electric company: "We would be delighted if you send in your payment. However, if you don't, you will be."

In a restaurant window: "Don't stand there and be hungry, Come on in and get fed up."

In the front yard of a funeral home: "Drive carefully. We'll wait."

At a propane filling station: "Thank heaven for little grills."

At a radiator shop: "Best place in town to take a leak."

In a pet store: "Buy one dog, get one flea..."

The oddity of the exceptional pronunciation of English words

Reasons why the English language is so hard to learn:
1) The bandage was wound around the wound.
2) The farm was used to produce produce.
3) The dump was so full that it had to refuse more refuse.
4) We must polish the Polish furniture.
5) He could lead if he would get the lead out.
6) The soldier decided to desert his dessert in the desert.
7) Since there is no time like the present, he thought it was time to present the present.
8) A bass was painted on the head of the bass drum.
9) When shot at, the dove dove into the bushes.
10) I did not object to the object.
11) The insurance was invalid for the invalid.
12) There was a row among the oarsmen about how to row.
13) They were too close to the door to close it.
14) The buck does funny things when the does are present.
15) A seamstress and a sewer fell down into a sewer line.
16) To help with planting, the farmer taught his sow to sow.
17) The wind was too strong to wind the sail.
18) After a number of injections my jaw got number.
19) Upon seeing the tear in the painting I shed a tear.
20) I had to subject the subject to a series of tests.
21) How can I intimate this to my most intimate friend?

There is no egg in eggplant, nor ham in hamburger; neither apple nor pine in pineapple. English muffins weren't invented in England or French fries in France. Sweetmeats are candies while sweetbreads, which aren't sweet, are meat. We take English for granted. But if we explore its paradoxes, we find that quicksand can work slowly, boxing rings are square and a guinea pig is neither from Guinea nor is it a pig. And why is it that writers write but fingers don't fing, grocers don't groce and hammers don't ham? If the plural of tooth is teeth, why isn't the plural of booth beeth? One goose, 2 geese. So one moose, 2 meese? One index, 2 indices? Doesn't it seem crazy that you can make amends but not one amend. If you have a bunch of odds and ends and get rid of all but one of them, what do you call it? If teachers taught, why didn't preachers praught? If a vegetarian eats vegetables, what does a humanitarian eat?

In what language do people recite at a play and play at a recital? Ship by truck and send cargo by ship? Have noses that run and feet that smell? How can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same, while a wise man and a wise guy are opposites? You have to marvel at the unique lunacy of a language in which your house can burn up as it burns down, in which you fill in a form by filling it out, and in which an alarm goes off by going on.

A poem

Dearest creature in creation,
Study English pronunciation.
I will teach you in my verse
Sounds like corpse, corps, horse, and worse.
I will keep you, Suzy, busy,
Make your head with heat grow dizzy.
Tear in eye, your dress will tear.
So shall I! Oh hear my prayer.
Just compare heart, beard, and heard,
Dies and diet, lord and word,
Sword and sward, retain and Britain.
(Mind the latter, how it's written.)
Now I surely will not plague you
With such words as plaque and ague.
But be careful how you speak:
Say break and steak, but bleak and streak;
Cloven, oven, how and low,
Script, receipt, show, poem, and toe.
Hear me say, devoid of trickery,
Daughter, laughter, and Terpsichore,
Typhoid, measles, topsails, aisles,
Exiles, similes, and reviles;
Scholar, vicar, and cigar,
Solar, mica, war and far;
One, anemone, Balmoral,
Kitchen, lichen, laundry, laurel;
Gertrude, German, wind and mind,
Scene, Melpomene, mankind.
Billet does not rhyme with ballet,
Bouquet, wallet, mallet, chalet.
Blood and flood are not like food,
Nor is mould like should and would.
Viscous, viscount, load and broad,
Toward, to forward, to reward.
And your pronunciation's OK
When you correctly say croquet,
Rounded, wounded, grieve and sieve,
Friend and fiend, alive and live.
Ivy, privy, famous; clamour
And enamour rhyme with hammer.
River, rival, tomb, bomb, comb,
Doll and roll and some and home.
Stranger does not rhyme with anger,
Neither does devour with clangour.
Souls but foul, haunt but aunt,
Font, front, wont, want, grand, and grant,
Shoes, goes, does. Now first say finger,
And then singer, ginger, linger,
Real, zeal, mauve, gauze, gouge and gauge,
Marriage, foliage, mirage, and age.
Query does not rhyme with very,
Nor does fury sound like bury.
Dost, lost, post and doth, cloth, loth.
Job, nob, bosom, transom, oath.
Though the differences seem little,
We say actual but victual.
Refer does not rhyme with deafer.
Foeffer does, and zephyr, heifer.
Mint, pint, senate and sedate;
Dull, bull, and George ate late.
Scenic, Arabic, Pacific,
Science, conscience, scientific.
Liberty, library, heave and heaven,
Rachel, ache, moustache, eleven.
We say hallowed, but allowed,
People, leopard, towed, but vowed.
Mark the differences, moreover,
Between mover, cover, clover;
Leeches, breeches, wise, precise,
Chalice, but police and lice;
Camel, constable, unstable,
Principle, disciple, label.
Petal, panel, and canal,
Wait, surprise, plait, promise, pal.
Worm and storm, chaise, chaos, chair,
Senator, spectator, mayor.
Tour, but our and succour, four.
Gas, alas, and Arkansas.
Sea, idea, Korea, area,
Psalm, Maria, but malaria.
Youth, south, southern, cleanse and clean.
Doctrine, turpentine, marine.
Compare alien with Italian,
Dandelion and battalion.
Sally with ally, yea, ye,
Eye, I, ay, aye, whey, and key.
Say aver, but ever, fever,
Neither, leisure, skein, deceiver.
Heron, granary, canary.
Crevice and device and aerie.
Face, but preface, not efface.
Phlegm, phlegmatic, ass, glass, bass.
Large, but target, gin, give, verging,
Ought, out, joust and scour, scourging.
Ear, but earn and wear and tear
Do not rhyme with here but ere.
Seven is right, but so is even,
Hyphen, roughen, nephew Stephen,
Monkey, donkey, Turk and jerk,
Ask, grasp, wasp, and cork and work.
Pronunciation (think of Psyche!)
Is a paling stout and spikey?
Won't it make you lose your wits,
Writing groats and saying grits?
It's a dark abyss or tunnel:
Strewn with stones, stowed, solace, gunwale,
Islington and Isle of Wight,
Housewife, verdict and indict.
Finally, which rhymes with enough,
Though, through, plough, or dough, or cough?
Hiccough has the sound of cup.
My advice is to give up!!!

How the human mind interprets words

Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are witretn, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a total mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe.

Similarities between English and German

Certain large German multinational corporations adopt English as the preferred language for corporate communications. Some such companies have adopted a five-year phased plan to adapt the difficult spelling of certain English words in internal documents.

In the first year, "s" will be used instead of the soft "c". Sertainly, sivil servants will reseive this news with joy. Also, the hard "c" will be replased with "k". Not only will this klear up konfusion, but typewriters kan have one less letter.

There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the sekond year, when the troublesome "ph" will be replased by "f". This will make words like "fotograf" 20 per sent shorter.

In the third year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be expekted to reach the stage where more komplikated changes are possible. Governments will enkourage the removal of double letters, which have always been a deterent to akurate speling. Also, al wil agre that the horible mes of silent "e"s in the languag is disgraful, and they would go.

By the forth year, peopl wil be reseptiv to steps such as replasing "th" by "z" and "w" by "v". During ze fifz year ze unesesary "o" kan be dropd from vords kontaining "ou" and similar changes vud of kors be aplid to ozer kombinations of leters.

After zis fifz year, ve vil hav a reli sensibl riten styl. Zer vil be no mor trobls or difikultis and evrivum vil find it ezi tu understand ech ozer. Ze drem vil finali kum tru.