What's FUNNY about that?

Now for something completely different....

• O western wind, when will you blow?

  So the small rain down can rain.

  O that my love were in my arms,

  And I in my bed again…

• The poem above is an anonymous 16th c. quatrain I memorized as a boy; I had a good English teacher in the 7th grade—though almost all the other kids made fun of her & complained about her class—she was good because she cared about language, she insisted on our learning grammar, & she taught poetry…

• Years later I realized the poems I learned in her class were not great: were not sophisticated or intellectual; but, like all good teachers, she started me in a new direction…

• (The actual meaning of “education” is “to set on a new path”)

• One of the things I learned was synecdoche [sin-ek-do-shay]: the act of using one part of a thing to represent the whole

• In the “Western Wind” poem above, for example, “bed” can also mean “home”

• You probably got that without thinking about it (or knowing the technical term for it!)

• Another thing about meaning is that it can shift: the same word can mean one thing in the sentence & then mean another later in the same context

• In the 16th c. poem, “wind” first means “a change in the weather,” but it also means “the power for sailing (my) ship to home port” (in England)

• Nothing funny yet, though, right?

• How about “dad jokes?” (This is the current term for puns.) Puns also depend upon the same sort of shift of meaning…

• For example: Despite the high cost of living it remains popular.

• I’ll explain this one, in case you don’t get the pun/joke immediately, but I won’t explain any of the others I’m going to write below…

• OK: “living” first (as the object of “cost”) means “expense”—then the same instance of “living” when followed by “popular,” means “staying alive”

• Now try these:

  • There’s no menu at the Karma Restaurant. You get what you deserve.

  • Two guys walked into a bar. The third one ducked.

  • A dyslexic walked into a bra.

  • When I asked her whether I was the only one she’d been with she said, '“Yes. The others were nines and tens.”

  • To be frank I’d have to change my name.

  • My ex still misses me, but her aim is improving.

  • You can think the unthinkable, with an itheberg.

  • If you can’t laugh at yourself, I’d be glad to.

  • There are no jokes about the unemployed because they don’t work.

  • She asked him whether he’d slept with any others and he said, “No. The others were awake.”

  • The last thing I want to do is hurt you, but you’re still on the list.

  • When you cross a penis and a potato you get a dictator.

• I’ll stop now…

• Enjoy whatever comes your way; but if everything’s coming your way, you’re probably in the wrong lane…

• Oh, oh; I promised to stop. Keep your mind open…