Words from the Genius Puns

… u/ebkbk for this post: Today, my son asked "Can I have a book mark?" and I burst into tears. 11 years old and he still doesn't know my name is Brian. made on 24.11. with 38.9k upvotes

[also already made by u/Tface on 25.03. for 16.9k upvotes]

Let's move on to the top 3 of each month:

January:

1. Is this sub still active? by u/I_Fart_Liquids on 01.01. with 36.4k upvotes

2. Gonorrhea would have been a great name for diarrhea medicine by u/daugarten on 20.01. with 30.8k upvotes

3. An open letter to the mods of r/dadjokes: by u/Alfie_13 on 27.01. with 18.9k upvotes

February:

1. Was watching Star Wars with my daughter. She asked why Luke was climbing inside a Tauntaun, I said to keep warm. by u/jakeisbill on 05.02. for 20.3k upvotes

2. My daughter asked me what I'm posting on Reddit... by u/madazzahatter on 25.02. for 18.3k upvotes

3. When a woman is giving birth, she is literally kidding. by u/ownworldman on 23.02. for 17.7k upvotes

March:

1. I got an e-mail saying, "At Google Earth, we can read maps backwards!" and I thought... by u/madazzahatter on 21.03. for 22.2k upvotes

2. Today, my son asked "Can I have a book mark?" and I burst into tears. by u/Tface on 25.03. for 16.9k upvotes.

3. [When I reach home, my 1.5 y.o. son rushes out to the gate to sit in my lap while I park the car. Then he just grabs the steering and starts shaking it with brrrmmm brrrmmm sound. His cute antics always make me forget that he's suffering from a rare disease.](https://www.reddit.com/r/da

I have written this book to sweep away all misunderstandings about the crafty art of punnery and to convince you that the pun is well worth celebrating.... After all, the pun is mightier than the sword, and these days you are much more likely to run into a pun than into a sword. [A pun is a witticism involving the playful use of a word in different senses, or of words which differ in meaning but sound alike.]

Scoffing at puns seems to be a conditioned reflex, and through the centuries a steady barrage of libel and slander has been aimed at the practice of punning. Nearly three hundred years ago John Dennis sneered, “A pun is the lowest form of wit,” a charge that has been butted and rebutted by a mighty line of pundits and punheads.

Henry Erskine, for example, has protested that if a pun is the lowest form of wit, “It is, therefore, the foundation of all wit.” Oscar Levant has added a tag line: “A pun is the lowest form of humor—when you don’t think of it first.” John Crosbie and Bob Davies have responded to Dennis with hot, cross puns: “...If someone complains that punning is the lowest form of humor you can tell them that poetry is verse.”

Samuel Johnson, the eighteenth century self-appointed custodian of the English language, once thundered, “To trifle with the vocabulary which is the vehicle of social intercourse is to tamper with the currency of human intelligence. He who would violate the sanctities of his mother tongue would invade the recesses of the national till without remorse... ”

Joseph Addison pronounced that the seeds of punning are in the minds of all men, and tho’ they may be subdued by reason, reflection, and good sense, they will be very apt to shoot up in the greatest genius, that which is not broken and cultivated by the rules of art.

Far from being invertebrate, the inveterate punster is a brave entertainer. He or she loves to create a three-ring circus of words: words clowning, words teetering on tightropes, words swinging from tent tops, words thrusting their head into the mouths of lions. Punnery can be highly entertaining, but it is always a risky business. The humor can fall on its face, it can lose its balance and plunge into the sawdust, or it can be decapitated by the snapping shut of jaws. While circus performers often receive laughter or applause for their efforts, punsters often draw an obligatory groan for theirs. But the fact that most people groan at, rather than laugh at, puns doesn’t mean that the punnery isn’t fu