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[ARCHIVE] Same pun in Russian and Hebrew. What are the chances

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Corinnebelle

[ARCHIVE] Same pun in Russian and Hebrew. What are the chances

Post by Corinnebelle »

leonig01wrote:

A pun is a joke that makes a play on words. A pun makes use of words that have more than one meaning, or words that sound similar but have different meanings, to humorous effect. The rhetorical term for punning is paronomasia, which literally means "to call a different name."
Puns rely on several types of words to work, words that are similar in spelling, sound or meaning, such as homophones, homonyms, and homographs.
Here is an example:
I was struggling to figure out how lightning works, but then it struck me.
Usually puns cannot be translated due to the incompatibility between the double meaning that lies in the essence of the pun.
I guess cross-language puns are available to bilinguals and higher, but here is what I found:
В чём разница между слоном и роялем? В том, что к роялю можно прислониться, а к слону нельзя прироялиться.
מה ההבדל בין פיל לפסנתר? שאת הפסנתר אפשר להפיל, אבל את הפיל אי אפשר לפסנתר
What is the difference between an elephant and a piano? The piano can be elephanted, but the elephant cannot be pianoed.
Sounds weird when translated to English. But these are puns. Apply locally.
P.S. It is "lean on" in Russian and "drop down" in Hebrew, but the game of words works in both languages

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Stasia
Poland

Re: Same pun in Russian and Hebrew. What are the chances

Post by Stasia »

[mention]Corinnebelle[/mention] - we have the same joke in Polish as well:

Jaka jest różnica między słoniem a fortepianem? Fortepian można zasłonić, a słonia nie można zafortepianić.

The play of words in the Polish version is in that the noun słoń (elephant) is similar to the verb zasłonić (to cover), while "zafortepianić" is a nonsensical/made-up verb just for the purpose of the joke, with the meaning of "turn into a piano" - a word created to underscore that the task is impossible.

So in a "non pun" translation, it would go something like: What's the difference between an elephant and a piano? You can cover up (zasłonić) an elephant, but you can't make an elephant into a piano.

Native: :poland:; Fluent: :es:, :us:; Getting there: Image; Intermediate: :fr:; Beginner: :ukraine:

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