The Reader's Shelf: Make Pun of Yourself: A Language Literature Romp, April 1, 2011
Apr 1, 2011Language is what separates us from other animals. Not only do we declare “official” languages, but we then break them down even further. There is formal, informal, descriptive, and emotive language. There are parts of speech such as nouns, verbs, adjectives, and prepositions. If that’s not enough to remember, let’s add in figurative language, such as similes, alliterations, or onomatopoeia. And don’t get me started on slang, fragments, or dangling participles. It’s no wonder that authors have used their literary prowess to poke a little fun at our remarkable powers of verbalization.
“Writing is inhibiting. Sighing, I sit, scribbling in ink this pidgin script.” Yes, those are two sentences written with words containing only the vowel I. And they are the opening sentences of Christian Bök’s Eunoia (Coach House, dist. by Consortium. 2009. ISBN 9781552452257. pap. $14.95). It’s a masterly work of art that will forever transform the way one sees the English language. Fans of nonsense literature will be intrigued by Bök’s witty and descriptive ode to vowels. Each of the five chapters in verse is a univocal lipogram, i.e., it only contains one vowel. Each vowel is personified (U is lustful, E is perverse) as the chapter unfolds beautifully, following a set of rules described in the afterword.
Could you write a missive without the letter Z? Of course. How about without an O? Much harder. Mark Dunn’s touching Ella Minnow Pea: A Novel in Letters (Anchor: Random. 2002. ISBN 9780385722438. pap. $14) is centered on the fictional country of Nollop, home to the creator of the sentence, “The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.” When the tiled letters begin to fall off of Nollop’s commemorative statue, the town council decides it’s a sign from the grave that those letters should be banned from the alphabet. For a community where the written word is an art form, this is nothing short of blasphemy. As more letters are banned, the reader will have to decipher the story further, almost as if it were in code.
Edward Gorey, famous for literary nonsense filled with the dark and the gory (pun intended), also loved anagrams and strange alphabets. Amphigorey (Perigee: Berkley. 1980. ISBN 9780399504334. pap. $18.95) contains 15 short stories, including Gorey’s popular “The Gashlycrumb Tinies,” a depressing alphabet in which “A is for Amy who fell down the stairs.” With grim limericks, stories made of randomly composed sentences, and startlingly detailed macabre illustrations, these are tales for those who love the sinister, prefer strolls in the dark, and have a quick enough wit to catch the sense out of the nonsense.
But wordplay doesn’t have to be gloomy. Piers Anthony has created a magical world that any logophile can enjoy. Beginning with A Spell for Chameleon (Del Rey: Ballantine. 1987. ISBN 9780345347534. pap. $7.99), his “Xanth” stories are sprinkled with silly puns such as dimepedes that dwarf centipedes and breadfruit trees that really provide loaves of bread. Filled with romance, adventure, fantasy, and a bit of low-brow humor, the foreign world of Xanth will be a comfort on days when you just need to get away.
What about all the little things that make written language comprehensible? For punctuation lovers, Lynn Truss’s Eats, Shoots and Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation (Gotham: Penguin Group [USA]. 2006. ISBN 9781592402038. pap. $12) offers hilarious examples of mistaken commas and despair over the rampant disregard for accurate grammar. Beware, Truss’s (is that the correct possessive form?) distinct, stickler voice might sound in your head at every future grammar faux pas!
For an academic approach, try David Crystal’s Language Play (Univ. of Chicago. 2001. ISBN 9780226122052. pap. $19.95). This fresh, original read outlines the type of word games people take part in, discusses professional instances of language play, and talks about how important playing with language is to children. Crystal’s argument is unique, in that he postulates away from the idea that language is primarily to communicate ideas but instead serves as a way to bond with other people.
Kitty Burns Florey learned sentence diagramming in sixth grade and fell in love with a grammar school exercise now almost extinct. Sister Bernadette’s Barking Dog: The Quirky History and Lost Art of Diagramming Sentences (Mariner: Houghton Harcourt. 2007. ISBN 9780156034432. pap. $14.95) is a fun, witty adventure about a long-forgotten teaching method that will satisfy any language lover. Armed with amusing historical facts and rambling examples of certain acclaimed authors’ sentences, Florey guides readers through the ups, downs, and turns of trying to make “a picture of language.”
This column was contributed by Nathalie Wargo, an MLIS student at the University of Washington iSchool, Seattle
| Author Information |
| Neal Wyatt compiles LJ’s online feature Wyatt’s World and is the author of The Readers’ Advisory Guide to Nonfiction (ALA Editions, 2007). She is a collection development and readers’ advisory librarian from Virginia. Those interested in contributing to The Reader’s Shelf should contact her directly at Readers_Shelf@comcast.net |
