Stark Naked; a paranomastic odyssey

(price-clipped) [very slight wear to book extremities, small rubbed white spot near top left corner of front cover; the jacket is only lightly worn, but has a 2-inch closed tear at the top of the front panel]. (cartoon illustrations) Cartoon illustrations of the denizens of "Emotional Heights -- a quiet little town, just a stone's throw from Dead Center and a few miles down the road from Hardershee Falls." Get it yet Everybody in this fictional little burg has a name that's a play on words: the undertaker, Mort Tician; the richest man in town, Andover Fist; the town puppeteer, Mario Nette; and so on, and on, into the hundreds. There are a lot of real groaners here, but a lot of cleverness too: the local torch singer is Bertha Dabloos, the handymen are Will Ing and Ken Do, etc. (And, by the way, paranomastic is correctly spelled "paronomastic," and its exemplars are not to be confused with puns. I'll save you the trouble of looking it up: "Pun and paronomasia are often confounded, but are in strictness distinct in form and effect. A pun is a play upon two senses of the same word or sound, and its effect is to excite a sense of the ludicrous. Paronomasia is rather the use of words that are nearly but not quite alike in sound, and it heightens the effect of what is said without suggesting the ludicrous." Got it)

Product Info

Publisher: Random House

Year: (c.1969)

Type: Used

Binding: Hardcover

First Edition

Seller Info

ReadInk

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