Off Topic — HabitableZone

Off Topic » in reply to The Art of the Pun--cultural or linguistic artifact?--Yo! Mary Anne!

Probably not cultural

English has a vast number of possibilities for puns, imo, because of its vast polyglot vocabulary and enormous number of idiomatic expressions. Idioms use words in ways related to their literal meanings but at the same time figuratively, and so set up a way of thinking that encourages punning.

English isn't the only punning language, though. I recall reading, probably in A Distant Mirror by Barbara Tuchman, that Edward I of England knew English well enough to pun in it. As the English royal family spoke French from William the Conqueror up to that point, I believe that means that people punned in French as well. Any doubters are referred to the French cartoon books featuring the mighty (and mighty small) Gaul named Asterix, his very large and dopey friend Obelix, the village druid Panoramix, the tone-deaf but self-confident Assurancetourix...

Hegel based some of his phenomenological terms on German puns.

The author of one of the Gospels had Jesus famously pun in Greek: "Thou art Petros, and upon this petra I build my Church."

The Chinese specialize in visual puns. The word "home" is a combination of the pictographs for "house" and "woman". The word "trouble" combines "home" with two pictographs for "woman". The word "surprise" combines "house" with the pictograph for "horse" inside.

Your Spanish double-entendres are puns as well, if not in the wide-ranging context provided by English. I can only conclude that the Spanish literary classes enjoy sex jokes a great deal. ;) I don't read Spanish well enough to appreciate puns. Are there none in some of the classic works? Did Cervantes never pun?

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