Ludic language : the case of the punning echoic allusion

Vol.37,No.1(2011)

Paul Lennon

https://doi.org/10.5817/BSE2011-1-5

Stable URL (handle):
http://hdl.handle.net/11222.digilib/118123

PDF
Abstract
This paper is concerned with punning echoic allusion. First, a distinction is drawn between common parlance senses of allusion (vague reference) and the literary idea of echoic allusion (cryptic quotation). It is then shown that echoic allusion involves play with multiple meanings in the manner of a pun and, like the pun, is highly dependent for its effect on the fact that the potential polysemy of individual words at the level of langue is only disambiguated at the level of parole by both situational and linguistic context. Examples of allusions based on verbatim quotation are compared to perfect puns, while allusions based on nonverbatim quotation are compared to imperfect puns. Grice's (1975) model of comprehension of indirect language is then modified and expanded to chart the processes by which readers (and listeners) understand punning echoic allusion. Finally, the possible motivations writers may have for punning echoic allusion are considered.

Keywords:
allusion; echoic; intertextual; inference; ludic; pun; quotation

Pages:
79–95
References

Belloc, Hilaire ([1923]1954) ' On his Books'. In: Roughead, W.N. (ed.) The Verse of Hilaire Belloc. London: Nonesuch Press.

Dryden, John ([1666]1961) ' Annus Mirabilis or The Year of Wonders'. In: Kinsley, James (ed.) The Poems and Fables. London, New York, Toronto: Oxford University Press.

Fry, Christopher (1949) The Lady's not for Burning: a Comedy. London: Oxford University Press.

Lodge, David (1988) Nice Work. London: Secker and Warburg.

Marlowe, Christopher ([1604]1949) The Tragical History of Dr. Faustus. Edited by Frederick S. Boas. Second edition. London: Methuen.

Milne, A. A. (1924) When We Were Very Young. London: Methuen.

Shakespeare, William (1970). The Complete Works. A new edition, edited with an introduction and glossary by Peter Alexander. London and Glasgow: Collins.

Thackeray, William Makepeace ([1848]1968) Vanity Fair. New York: Penguin Books.

Villon, Francois ([1461]1991) Le Grand Testament: 'Ballades des dames jadis'. In: Oevres: Texte et Traduction. Présentés par André Lanly. Paris: Champion.

Alexander, Richard J. (1980) ' English Verbal Humour and Second Language Learning'. LAUT Paper No. 60. University of Trier, Germany.

Armstrong, David T. (1945) ' Literary Allusions'. English Journal 34 (4), 218–219. | DOI 10.2307/807699

Bakhtin, Mikhail M. (1981) ' Discourse in the Novel'. In: Holquist, Michael (ed.) The Dialogic Imagination: Four Essays, Translated by Caryl Emerson and Michael Holquist. Austin, Texas: University of Texas Press, 259–422.

Bartlett, Frederick C. (1932) Remembering: A Study in Experimental and Social Psychology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Ben-Porat, Ziva (1976) ' The Poetics of Literary Allusion'. A Journal for Descriptive Poetics and Theory of Literature 1, 105–128.

Bloom, Harold (1975) A Map of Misreading. New York: Oxford University Press.

Conte, Gian B. (1986) The Rhetoric of Imitation: Genre and Poetic Memory in Virgil and Other Latin Poets. Translated from the Italian, edited by Charles Segal. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.

Coombs, James H. (1984) ' Allusion Defined and Explained'. Poetics 13, 475–488. | DOI 10.1016/0304-422X(84)90019-6

Crystal, David (1998) Language Play. London: Penguin Books.

Freud, Sigmund (1960) ' Jokes and their Relation to the Unconscious'. In: Strachey, James (translator and ed.) The Standard Edition of the Complete Works of Sigmund Freud, Volume 8. New York: W. W. Norton and Co. First published 1905.

Glucksberg, Sam (1993) ' Idiom Meanings and Allusional Content'. In: Cacciari, Cristina and Patricia Tabossi (eds.) Idioms: Processing, Structure and Interpretation. Hove: Lawrence Erlbaum, 3–26.

Grice, Herbert, P. (1975) ' Logic and Conversation'. In: Cole, P. and J. L. Morgan (eds.) Syntax and Semantics, Volume 3: Speech Acts. New York: Academic Press, 41–58.

Hermerén, Göran (1992) ' Allusions and Intentions'. In Iseminger, Gary (ed.) Intention and Interpretation. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 203–220.

Hockett, Charles F. (1977) ' Jokes'. In: The View from Language: Selected Essays 1948–1974. Athens, Georgia: The University of Georgia Press, 257–289.

Hollander, John (1981) The Figure of Echo: A Mode of Allusion in Milton and After. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Jackendoff, R. (1995) ' The Boundaries of the Lexicon'. In: Everaert, Martin, Erik-Jan van der Linden, André Schenk and Robin Schreuder (eds.) Idioms: Structural and Psychological Perspectives. Hillsdale NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 133–166.

Kellett, E. E. (1969) Literary Quotation and Allusion. Port Washington, NY: Kennikat Press. First published 1933.

Lachmann, Renate (1983) ' Intertextualität als Sinnkonstitution'. Poetica 15, 66–107.

Leech, Geoffrey N. (1969) A Linguistic Guide to English Poetry. London: Longman.

Lemke, J. L. (1985) ' Ideology, Intertextuality and the Notion of Register'. In: Benson, James D. and Willliam S. Greaves (eds.) Systematic Perspectives on Discourse, Volume 1. Selected Theoretical Papers from the Ninth International Systemic Workshop. Norwood, NJ: Ablex Publishing, 275–294.

Leppihalme, Ritva (1994) ' Translating Allusions: When Minimal Change is not Enough'. Target: International Journal of Translation Studies 6 (2), 177–193. | DOI 10.1075/target.6.2.04lep

Marino, Matthew (1988) ' Puns: The Good, the Bad and the Beautiful'. Humour: International Journal of Humour Research 1 (1), 39–48.

Meyer, Herman (1961) Das Zitat in der Erzählkunst: Zur Geschichte und Poetik des Europäischen Romans. Stuttgart: J. B. Metzlersche Verlagsbuchhandlung.

Mitchell, T. F. (1978) ' Meaning is what you do – and how I interpret it. A Firthian View of Pragmatics'. Die Neueren Sprachen 27, 224–253.

Morawski, Stefan (1970) ' The Basic Functions of Quotation'. In: Greimas, A. J. and Roman Jakobson (eds.) Sign, Language, Culture. The Hague: Mouton, 690–705.

Nattinger, James R. and Jeanette S. DeCarrico (1992) Lexical Phrases and Language Teaching. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Nerlich, Brigitte and David D. Clarke (2001) ' Ambiguities We Live By: Towards a Pragmatics of Polysemy'. Journal of Pragmatics 33, 1–20. | DOI 10.1016/S0378-2166(99)00132-0

Nord, Christiane (1990) ' Zitate und Anspielungen als pragmatisches Übersetzungsproblem'. TEXTconTEXT 5, 1–30.

Pawley, Andrew and Frances Hodgetts Syder (1983) ' Two Puzzles for Linguistic Theory: Nativelike Selection and Nativelike Fluency'. In: Richards, Jack and Richard Schmidt (eds.) Language and Communication. London: Longman, 191–226.

Perri, Carmela (1978) ' On Alluding'. Poetics 7, 289–307. | DOI 10.1016/0304-422X(78)90030-X

Riffaterre, Michael (1978) Semiotics of Poetry. London: Methuen.

Sampson, Rodney and Colin Smith (1997) And Now for Something Completely Different: Dictionary of Allusions in British English. Ismaning: Max Hueber Verlag.

Sinclair, John McH. (1987) ' Collocation: A Progress Report'. In: Steele, Ross and Terry Threadgold (eds.) Language Topics. Essays in Honour of Michael Halliday, Volume 2. Amsterdam and Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company, 319–331.

Sperber, Dan and Deidre Wilson (1995) Relevance: Communication and Cognition. Second edition. Oxford UK and Cambridge USA: Blackwell. First published 1986.

Threadgold, Terry (1987) ' Changing the Subject'. In: Steele, Ross and Terry Threadgold (eds.) Language Topics: Essays in Honour of Michael Halliday, Volume 2. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company, 549–597.

Wilss, Wolfram (1989) Anspielungen: Zur Manifestation von Kreativität und Routine in der Sprachverwendung. Tübingen: Max Niemeyer Verlag.

Chambers Twentieth Century Dictionary (1977) Revised edition with new supplement. Edited by A. M. MacDonald. Edinburgh: W. and R. Chambers Ltd.

Oxford Concise Dictionary of Quotations (1993) Third edition. Edited by Angela Partington. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Oxford English Dictionary (1989) Second edition, Volume 1. Edited by J. Simpson and E. Weiner. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Wordsworth Dictionary of Quotations (1997) Edited by Connie Robertson. Ware, Herts.: Wordsworth Editions Ltd.

Metrics

0

Crossref logo

1

5

Views

0

PDF views

PDF