Thanks to Heather, who sent me an email featuring some paraprosdokians. To quote the wikipedia entry, a paraprosdokian is "a figure of speech in which the latter part of a sentence or phrase is surprising or unexpected in a way that causes the reader or listener to reframe or reinterpret the first part. It is frequently used for humorous or dramatic effect, sometimes producing an anticlimax."
If you didn't click on that link to wikipedia above, click on it now, and read an amusing list of paraprosdokians from such luminaries as Mitch Hedberg and Jack Handey.
P.S. Writing Mitch Hedberg's name reminded me of this. Not necessarily a paraprosdokian, but definitely useful to remember while apartment hunting: "I bought a house. It's a two-bedroom house, but I think it's up to me how many bedrooms there are, don't you? Fuck you real estate lady, this bedroom has a oven in it. This bedroom has a lot of people sittin' around watchin' TV. This bedroom's over in that guy's house. Sir, you got one of my bedrooms, are you aware? Don't decorate it."
P.P.S. The above is quoted from "Mitch All Together." Here is a clip of him doing the same bit, but the delivery is inferior to the CD. Start at 3:46.
1 comment:
One of my favorites is, "I was older than most when I finally lost it, already in my twenties. Like many New Yorkers, I was in the back of a taxicab speeding down Broadway, late at night when no one could see. Unlike most, I got mine back the next day, with most of my credit cards still there."
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