Fun with Puns
Found at Jot HQ the other day, a small booklet of 48 pages entitled A Pennyworth of Puns, which in its references to Home Rule and The New Woman, can be dated to the close of the nineteenth century. In its attempts to describe various types of pun, to date its origin to Ancient Greece and to comment on its place in the history of English humour, this is more a disquisition on the pun than a mere list of examples of it. Perhaps we should begin with some punning book titles.
In a previous Jot we listed some witty book titles which one writer had concocted for books in his library. Thomas Hood was asked by the Duke of Devonshire to come up with titles that he could place on the spines of a ‘ blind door ‘ in his library at Chatsworth. Not all can be appreciated today, but the following are some of the best.
Book titles
Cooke’s Specimens of the Sandwich Tongue
Wolfe’s Treatment of Sheep
Boyle on the Gums
Bunyan on the Foot: by a Pilgrim
Walker’s Excursions to the Birthplaces of distinguished Travellers.
Conundrums
Why is a postage stamp like a naughty boy?
Because it’s licked and put in a corner.
What makes Treason reason, and Ireland wretched ?
The absentee (T)
Why is it a dangerous thing to sit in the free seats at church?
Because you learn to be good for nothing
Why is a novelist the most extraordinary of animals?
Because his tale comes out of his head.
Why is blindman’s buff like sympathy ?
Because it is a fellow feeling for a fellow creature.
When is a ship in love ?
When she is attached to a buoy
When is her love serious?
When she wants a mate.
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