h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Pshaw! *Everybody* knows what a schwa is!

OED puts a schwa in its pronunciation for synechdoche: si-NECK-d*-ki.

The * stands here for the schwa. Note that the last vowel in the word is different from Ed's (American?) one: it's an i as in kit.

OED gives the pronunciation of zeugma as ZYOO-gm* where the y is as in yes and the oo as in boon, and * is once again a schwa.

They also give a nice example from 1586: His loosnesse ouercame all shame; his boldnesse, feare; his madnesse, reason.

And from 1882: By the figure of speech called zeugma, or rather syllepsis, the same word..is often made to serve two purposes in the same sentence. A verb is often used with two clauses which is only appropriate to one of them, as in Pope's line 'See Pan with flocks, with fruits Pomona crowned.'

I'm offering a prize for the first person to introduce the word 'zeugma' into a conversation.

Yes I'd like you to meet 'zeugma'.
'Zeugma' this is British English.
Oh! You've met.


~jwf~

Is "Time flies like bananas" a zeugma? On second thoughts, it can't be, as there is only one object. What is it then? It's not *just* a pun....

>> just <<

How about:

'Just doing just work just for fun.'

Is that a zeugma?

The original of that was "Time flies like an arrow", which a computer gave one possible interpretation of as "flies of the type known as "time flies" have a liking for an arrow. The computer scientist hadn't thought of that interpretation and was surprised. He invented the sentence to highlight it:

Time flies like an arrow; fruit flies like a banana.

That _is_ a zeugma.

And now for something comepletely different:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/bllcks/facts/spanish.shtml

WARNING: Contents under pressure and may contain nuts.
ALSO POSSIBLY OFFENSIVE TO THOSE WHO OBJECT TO 'bllcks',
but hey, it's a BBC site so it can't be that bad.


~jwf~

Avocados you say... http://www.calicoonline.co.uk/prod_desc_TS20.html?sno=298

t.

I read every one of those nutty facts, and I'd like to take issue with one of them. 'Testify' does not come from a Roman habit of putting their hand on their 'bits' when they swore an oath. You can find the truth of the matter here: http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-swe1.htm

Unfortunately, I don't have a man handy so I can grasp his 'bits' while I swear that it's true.

"Time flies like an arrow; fruit flies like a banana. That _is_ a zeugma."

I think not; it has to make double use of a word that is only uttered once to qualify, as for instance

Time flies like an arrow; fruit flies, a banana.

(Not an improvement.)

But it seems the yoking aspect is the dual use of a single word, and reiteration unyokes the oxen. You have to hit the ground running, the nail on the head, and new heights of absurdity all at once.

It may be even more arcane: there is a suggestion that part of the figure is the inappropriateness of the yoked word to one of its contexts. In that case you'd have to blow your trumpet and your banners too.

Which brings us back to good ole mixed metaphors. This one I heard on a political chat show (Nightly News with Vincent Browne) last week. Our leader, Brian Cowen, was "caught between the cross hairs of an economic tsunami." Beat that.

That article on avocado etymology is sloppy. The word in Spanish in 'aguacate' not 'aguacote', and it doesn't mean testicle, it means avocado pear.

The fruit comes from South America and so does the name. 'Avocado' is an approximation for the Aztec word, 'ahuacatl', which does indeed also mean testicle--in the Nahuatl language, not in Spanish. That would be 'testiculo' or informally 'cojón'.

Load of cojones.

I apologise for getting the quote wrong, but my hunch that it wasn't quite a zeugma now seems right. They're quite hard to think up if you stick rigidly to the rules. Thanks for putting me right, Gnomon and Recumbentman.

Load of cojones.

I just hope those don't belong to a canine... >post 21

If you google 'zeugma examples', you get a few pages' worth. Alanis Morisette gets a mention.

http://www.wunderland.com/WTS/Alison/lexophilia/sub-things/zeugma.html

I liked:
'The farmers in the valley grew potatoes, peanuts and bored.'

Syllepsis seems to be a particular sub-class of zeugma whereby one of the repeated words is......missing - ie it's there elliptically. Such as:

'He laid carpets and housewives by the score.'

But that suggests that it is still a zeugma if the word with two meanings appears twice, as in the "Time flies" sentence.

<> ... is not necessariy a zeugma, although if you faint (verb not adjective) you probably don't need to be told to discontinue!

There's a song "Have Some Madeira, M'Dear" by Flanders and Swann which features zeugmas:

And he said as he hastened to put out the cat, the wine, his cigar and the lamps...

She lowered her standards by raising her glass, her courage, her eyes and his hopes...

When he asked, "What in Heaven?" she made no reply, up her mind, and a dash for the door...

Oh, nice!