Page 41 - The Language of Humour

28 THE SHOCK OF THE NEW
investigating the deep structure of thought. Notice how it plays with,
and disturbs, our notions of ‘time’. (No commentary follows.)

‘What time is it Eccles?’
‘Just a minute. I’ve got it written down here on a piece of paper. A
nice man wrote the time down for me this morning.’
‘Then why do you carry it around with you, Eccles?’
‘Well, if anybody asks me the time, I can show it to them.’
‘Wait a minute, Eccles my good man.’
‘What is it, fellow?’
‘It’s written on this piece of paper that it’s eight o’clock.’
‘I know that. When I asked the fellow to write it down, it was eight
o’clock.’
‘Supposing, when somebody asks you the time, it ISN’T eight
o’clock.’
‘Then I don’t show it to them.’
‘So, how do you know when it’s eight o’clock?’
‘I’ve got it written down on a piece of paper.’
‘I wish I could have a piece of paper with the time written down on
it. Here, Eccles, let me hold that piece of paper to my ear, would you?
(Pause) Here, this piece of paper ain’t going!’
‘What? I’ve been sold a forgery. No wonder it stopped at eight
o’clock/

Activity with text

Look at these examples. There are no double meanings, but do you
think that they involve a type of incongruity? If there are elements of
surprise, innovation and rule-breaking, there must be something else that
you expected. As a language-user, you (and the teller) share a set of
conventions, if not rules, about how language usually works.

(Pilots in space ship) It’s no good, Dawson! We’re being sucked in
by the sun’s gravitational field and there’s nothing we can do!… And
let me add those are my sunglasses you’re wearing! (Gary Larson
cartoon)
(Two workmen eating sandwiches, balancing on a girder miles
above the ground) You ever get that urge, Frank? It begins with
looking down from fifty storeys up, thinking about the
meaninglessness of life, listening to dark voices deep inside you, and
you think, ‘Should I?… Should I?… Should I push someone off? (Gary
Larson cartoon)