Fforde is hilarious. I just read the the passage about the usage of had had and that that at the Jurisfiction section meeting and I laughed bigtime!

He is indeed a vay farny man... He said that he puts so many different jokes in his book that there's something for everyone. Apparently in something rotten there's a joke exclusively for people in the type-setting industry.

A very accommodating author

I'm trying to find a full transcript of this passage.
Anyone know where??? There is a partial transcript here - [itre.cis.upenn.edu]

But I want the full passage beginning from - "Good. Item seven. ..."

Can anyone be bothered writing it out?

Wonderfully funny. Probably laughed equally as hard.
Try page 253(U.S.)

For someone who's mothertongue is not English, this passage was quite hard - but still very funny. I was surprised, Fforde didn't get confused himself (well - who knows...)

'Good. Item seven. The had had and that that problem. Lady Cavendish, weren't you working on this?'
Lady Cavendish stood up and gathered her thoughts. . . . 'It's mostly an unlicensed usage problem. At the last count David Copperfield alone had had had had sixty-three times, all but ten unapproved. Pilgrim's Progress may also be a problem owing to its had had / that that ratio.'

'So what's the problem in Progress?'

'That that had that that ten times but had had had had only thrice. Increased had had usage had had to be overlooked but not if the number exceeds that that that usage.'

'Hmm,' said the Bellman. 'I thought had had had had TGC's approval for use in Dickens? What's the problem?'

'Take the first had had and that that in the book by way of example,' explained Lady Cavendish. 'You would have thought that that first had had had had good occasion to be seen as had, had you not? Had had had approval but had had had not; equally it is true to say that that that that had had approval but that that other that that had not.'

'So the problem with that other that that was that--?

'That that other--other that that had had approval.'

'Okay,' said the Bellman, whose head was in danger of falling apart like a chocolate orange, 'let me get this straight: David Copperfield, unlike Pilgrim's Progress, which had had had, had had had had. Had had had had TGC's approval?'

There was a very long pause.

'Right,' said the Bellman with a sigh.

************************************************************

Is that what you were looking for, jezzaboogie?

I laughed till I cried- maybe it caught me at a vulnerable moment , but anyone who can make a career out of writing passages like that has got my vote. The other highlight for me has to be the unmasking of Mrs Bradshaw on the verandah. Brilliant!

The "had had" routine is clever and funny.

The straightfaced "unmasking" of Mrs. Bradshaw and its accompanying conversation is sheer split-your-sides brilliance.

Funny? Yes. Original? No!!

Though I am sure Jasper would not claim this is an original "piece of business", I must point out that it was a popular play on words when I were a lad at Grammar school, nearly 40 years ago. In those days, it was about Smith and Jones, who both had taken an English exam, but had disgreed on a question about past tenses. It goes, "Smith, unlike Jones who had had 'had', had had 'had had'. 'Had had' had had the examimers' approval."

(Blimey, we were such creeps at my school!)

Sad really....

Such humour is no longer funny....

Well, Jasper may not have been original, but he topped you easily with 11 to 10 times 'had'.

</rescue>

By not funny I mean that most kids in school won't see what's so funny. They won't even read it anyway....

My very cool lit teacher gave us a similar puzzle as a punctuation exercise. Here it is without the punctuation; see if you can figure out how to punctuate it so that it makes sense:

that that is is that that is not is not that that is not is not that that is that that is is not that that is not is not that it it is

And we actually all sat there and puzzled it out! (Yes, it does make perfect sense when punctuated correctly.)



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Metaphors be with you!

I'm bouncing this thread in the vain hope that someone will actually try to solve my puzzle!



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Metaphors be with you!

Easy:



That that is, is. That that is not, is not. That that is not, is not that that is. That that is, is not that that is not. Is not that it? It is.

Yay!

I have seen something similar in French:

Je suis que je suis, mais je ne suis pas que je suis. Si je suis que je suis, je ne suis pas que je suis.

Bearing in mind that puns and word-play tend to be English language games, while not that complicated this amused my little brain

+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+

My computer beat me at chess, but I won at kickboxing

Alright, how about this:

"Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo."

It helps if you know that Buffalo is a city in the US, and the verb "to buffalo" means to confuse.

I've been confused by this one before ;) I think the second, rather than the fourth buffalo should be capitalised, but IIRC the sentence buffalo^n is valid for all n.

Rob

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That statement is either so deep it would take a lifetime to fully comprehend every particle of its meaning, or it is a load of absolute tosh. Which is it, I wonder?
Terry Pratchett, Hogfather

JaneElliot: Parfaitment fait!

SkidMarks: Does that French jeu du mots depend on "suis" meaning both "am" and "to follow"?

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Metaphors be with you!

Yes, Puck, it does. Happy New Year!