Good things come to those who bait anti-proverb plaque

An anti-proverb or a perverb is the transformation of a standard

proverb A proverb (from ) or an adage is a simple, traditional saying that expresses a perceived truth based on common sense or experience. Proverbs are often metaphorical and are an example of formulaic speech, formulaic language. A proverbial phrase ...

for

humorous Humour (Commonwealth English) or humor (American English) is the tendency of experiences to provoke laughter and provide amusement. The term derives from the humoral medicine of the ancient Greeks, which taught that the balance of fluids in t ...

effect. Paremiologist

Wolfgang Mieder Wolfgang Mieder (born 17 February 1944 in Nossen) is a retired professor of German and folklore who taught for 50 years at the University of Vermont, in Burlington, Vermont. He is a graduate of Olivet College (BA), the University of Michigan (MA ...

defines them as "parodied, twisted, or fractured proverbs that reveal humorous or satirical speech play with traditional proverbial wisdom". Anti-proverbs are ancient,

Aristophanes Aristophanes (; ; ) was an Ancient Greece, Ancient Greek Ancient Greek comedy, comic playwright from Classical Athens, Athens. He wrote in total forty plays, of which eleven survive virtually complete today. The majority of his surviving play ...

having used one in his play ''

Peace Peace is a state of harmony in the absence of hostility and violence, and everything that discusses achieving human welfare through justice and peaceful conditions. In a societal sense, peace is commonly used to mean a lack of conflict (suc ...

'', substituting "bell" (in the unique compound "bellfinch") for "bitch, female dog", twisting the standard and familiar "The hasty bitch gives birth to blind" to "The hasty bellfinch gives birth to blind". Anti-proverbs have also been defined as "an allusive distortion, parody, misapplication, or unexpected contextualization of a recognized proverb, usually for comic or satiric effect".p. xi, Charles Clay Doyle, Wolfgang Mieder, & Fred Shapiro. ''The Dictionary of Modern Proverbs''. New Haven: Yale University Press. To have full effect, an anti-proverb must be based on a known proverb. For example, "If at first you don't succeed, quit" is only funny if the hearer knows the standard proverb "If at first you don't succeed, try, try again". Anti-proverbs are used commonly in advertising, such as "Put your burger where your mouth is" from the

Red Robin Red Robin Gourmet Burgers, Inc., more commonly known as Red Robin Gourmet Burgers and Brews or simply Red Robin, is an American chain of casual dining restaurants founded in September 1969 in Seattle, Washington. In 1979, the first franchised R ...

restaurant chain. Anti-proverbs are also common on T-shirts, such as "Taste makes waist" and "If at first you don't succeed, skydiving is not for you". Andrew Jackson actor

Standard proverbs are essentially defined phrases, well known to many people, as e. g. ''Don't bite the hand that feeds you''. When this sequence is deliberately slightly changed ("Don't bite the hand that looks dirty") it becomes an anti-proverb. The relationship between anti-proverbs and proverbs, and a study of how much a proverb can be changed before the resulting anti-proverb is no longer seen as proverbial, are still open topics for research.

Classification

There have been various attempts at classifying different types of anti-proverbs, based on structure and semantics, including by Mieder, Litovkina, and Valdeva. What follows is somewhat synthetic of these.

Classification on formal criteria

Association Association may refer to: *Club (organization), an association of two or more people united by a common interest or goal *Trade association, an organization founded and funded by businesses that operate in a specific industry *Voluntary associatio ...

: The similarity to the original sequence is strong enough to identify it, but there is no further connection: ''The early worm gets picked first''. * Change of

homonym In linguistics, homonyms are words which are either; '' homographs''—words that mean different things, but have the same spelling (regardless of pronunciation), or '' homophones''—words that mean different things, but have the same pronunciat ...

s: A word which has several meanings is interpreted in a new way: ''Where there's a will, there's a lawsuit''. * Combination: Two sequences are combined: ''One brain washes the other''. *

Permutation In mathematics, a permutation of a set can mean one of two different things: * an arrangement of its members in a sequence or linear order, or * the act or process of changing the linear order of an ordered set. An example of the first mean ...

: While keeping the syntactic structure, the words are jumbled: ''A waist is a terrible thing to mind''. *

Abridgement An abridgement (or abridgment) is a condensing or reduction of a book or other creative work into a shorter form while maintaining the unity of the source. The abridgement can be true to the original work in terms of mood and tone (literature), ...

: The sequence is cut and thus changed completely: ''All's well that ends.'' *

Substitution Substitution may refer to: Arts and media *Substitution (poetry), a variation in poetic scansion * Substitution (theatre), an acting methodology Music *Chord substitution, swapping one chord for a related one within a chord progression *Tritone ...

: Parts of the sequence are replaced: ''Absence makes the heart go wander''. * Supplementation: A sentence with a contrasting meaning is added to the original sequence: ''A man's home is his castle – let him clean it''. *

Syntactic In linguistics, syntax ( ) is the study of how words and morphemes combine to form larger units such as phrases and sentences. Central concerns of syntax include word order, grammatical relations, hierarchical sentence structure (constituency ...

change: The semantic structure of the sentence changes while the sequence of words stays the same: ''Men think: "God governs."'' – ''A good man will think of himself: after, all the others.''

Classification on content criteria

* Mitigation: The meaning seems kept, but is qualified by the supplement: ''Everything has an end, but a sausage has two''. *

Apology Apology, The Apology, apologize/apologise, apologist, apologetics, or apologetic may refer to: Common uses * Apology (act), an expression of remorse or regret * Apologia, a formal defense of an opinion, position, or action Arts, entertainment ...

: The original sequence is defended against attacks: German example, translated: ''Art (Kunst) comes from 'able' (können), not from 'will' (wollen), or we'd better call it wirt (Wulst or Wunst,'' fantasy word'').'' * Conservation: The meaning is similar, with and without the supplement: ''There is no such thing as a free lunch, but there is always free cheese in a mousetrap''. * Break of

metaphor A metaphor is a figure of speech that, for rhetorical effect, directly refers to one thing by mentioning another. It may provide, or obscure, clarity or identify hidden similarities between two different ideas. Metaphors are usually meant to cr ...

: Metaphors are interpreted literally: ''Duty is calling? We call back''. * Neogenesis: The meaning of the new sentence is completely independent of the original one: ''An onion a day keeps everybody away''.

Types of humorous effects

* Bisociation: This is a technical term coined by

Arthur Koestler Arthur Koestler (, ; ; ; 5 September 1905 – 1 March 1983) was an Austria-Hungary, Austro-Hungarian-born author and journalist. Koestler was born in Budapest, and was educated in Austria, apart from his early school years. In 1931, Koestler j ...

. He says that a funny text is situated in two different semantic levels. In the beginning, the hearer or reader is aware of only one of them. The sudden and unexpected punch line is what makes this humorous. For example: ''I only want your best – your money.'' * Destruction: This is where the saying is completely altered and has an opposite meaning, such as: ''Jesus may love you – but will he respect you in the morning?'' * Fictional catastrophe: Catastrophes which are only made up or solved in one's mind might be humorous, as can be seen in the quotation: ''The light at the end of the tunnel is only muzzle flash''.

History

Anti-proverbs have been used and recognized for a long time. The Greek musician

Stratonicus of Athens Stratonicus (; lived 4th century BC), of Athens, was a distinguished musician of the time of Alexander the Great (336–323 BC), of whom scarcely anything is recorded, except the sharp and witty rebuke which he administered to Philotas, when ...

used an anti-proverb to mock a

cithara The kithara (), Latinized as cithara, was an ancient Greek musical instrument in the yoke lutes family. It was a seven-stringed professional version of the lyre, which was regarded as a rustic, or folk instrument, appropriate for teaching mus ...

-singer who had been nicknamed "Ox". He twisted the standard Greek proverb "The ass hears the lyre", replacing the first word to produce "The Ox hears the lyre." However, the term "anti-proverb" was not coined until 1982 by

. The term became more established with the publication of ''Twisted Wisdom: Modern Anti-Proverbs'' by Wolfgang Mieder and Anna T. Litovkina. Anti-proverb cartoon

They were one of the many experimental styles explored by the

French French may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to France ** French language, which originated in France ** French people, a nation and ethnic group ** French cuisine, cooking traditions and practices Arts and media * The French (band), ...

literary Literature is any collection of written work, but it is also used more narrowly for writings specifically considered to be an art form, especially novels, plays, and poems. It includes both print and digital writing. In recent centuries, ...

movement

Oulipo Oulipo (, short for ; roughly translated as "workshop of potential literature", stylized ''OuLiPo'') is a loose gathering of (mainly) French-speaking writers and mathematicians who seek to create works using constrained writing techniques. It wa ...

. The term perverb is attributed to Maxine Groffsky. The concept was popularised by Oulipo collaborator

Harry Mathews Harry Mathews (February 14, 1930 – January 25, 2017) was an American writer, the author of various novels, volumes of poetry and short fiction, and essays. Mathews was also a translator of the French language. Life Born in New York City to an ...

in his ''Selected Declarations of Dependence'' (1977). Anti-proverbs have been alternatively named "postproverbials" by Aderemi Raji-Oyelade, (also known by his pen name, Remi Raji). This term has been adopted by some African proverb scholars, seen in a large collection of articles about antiproverbs/postproverbials in the journal ''Matatu'' 51,2 , edited by Aderemi Raji-Oyelade and Olayinka Oyeleye.

Anti-proverbs in literature

Some authors have bent and twisted proverbs, creating anti-proverbs, for a variety of literary effects. For example, in the

Harry Potter ''Harry Potter'' is a series of seven Fantasy literature, fantasy novels written by British author J. K. Rowling. The novels chronicle the lives of a young Magician (fantasy), wizard, Harry Potter (character), Harry Potter, and his friends ...

novels,

J. K. Rowling Joanne Rowling ( ; born 31 July 1965), known by her pen name , is a British author and philanthropist. She is the author of ''Harry Potter'', a seven-volume fantasy novel series published from 1997 to 2007. The series has List of best-sell ...

reshapes a standard English proverb into "It's no good crying over spilt potion" and Professor

Dumbledore Professor Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore is a fictional character in the ''Harry Potter'' series of novels by J. K. Rowling. For most of the series, he is the headmaster of the wizarding school Hogwarts. He is also the founder and ...

advises Harry not to "count isowls before they are delivered". From Nigeria, Adeyemi shows the use of both proverbs and anti-proverbs in ''Rérẹ́ Rún'' by Okediji. Adeyemi believes that they add humor, color and beauty to his writing. But on a political plane, he believes "Anti-proverbs were also used to stimulate critical consciousness in the readers to fight for their rights but with wisdom. The conclusion of the paper was that the conscious manipulation of the so-called fixed proverbs could generate new proverbs, encourage creativity in the writers and expose hidden meanings of proverbs." In a slightly different use of reshaping proverbs, in the

Aubrey–Maturin series The Aubrey–Maturin series is a sequence of nautical historical novels—20 completed and one unfinished—by English author Patrick O'Brian, set during the Napoleonic Wars and centring on the friendship between Captain Jack Aubrey of the R ...

of historical naval novels by

Patrick O'Brian Patrick O'Brian (12 December 1914 – 2 January 2000), born Richard Patrick Russ, was an English novelist and translator, best known for his Aubrey–Maturin series. These sea novels are set in the Royal Navy during the Napoleonic Wars and ...

, Capt.

Jack Aubrey John "Jack" Aubrey , is a fictional character in the Aubrey–Maturin series of novels by Patrick O'Brian. The series of novels portrays his rise from lieutenant to rear admiral in the Royal Navy during the Napoleonic Wars. The twenty (and o ...

humorously mangles and mis-splices proverbs, such as "Never count the bear's skin before it is hatched" and "There's a good deal to be said for making hay while the iron is hot."Jan Harold Brunvand. 2004. "The Early Bird Is Worth Two in the Bush": Captain Jack Aubrey's Fractured Proverbs. ''What Goes Around Comes Around: The Circulation of Proverbs in Contemporary Life'', Kimberly J. Lau, Peter Tokofsky, Stephen D. Winick, (eds.), pp. 152–170. Logan, Utah: Utah State University Press
digitalcommons.usu.edu
/ref> An earlier fictional splicer of proverb is a character found in a novel by

Beatrice Grimshaw Beatrice Ethel Grimshaw (3 February 1870 – 30 June 1953) was an Irish writer and traveller. Beginning in 1903, she worked as a travel writer for the ''Daily Graphic'' and ''The Times'', leading her to move to the Territory of Papua, wh ...

, producing such combinations as "Make hay while the iron is hot" (very similar to an example from Capt. Aubrey) and "They lock the stable door when the milk is spilt". Part of

G. K. Chesterton Gilbert Keith Chesterton (29 May 1874 – 14 June 1936) was an English author, philosopher, Christian apologist, journalist and magazine editor, and literary and art critic. Chesterton created the fictional priest-detective Father Brow ...

’s reputation as the "Prince of Paradoxes" rested on his ability to turn proverbs and clichés on their heads. One example of this facility occurs in his ''What’s Wrong with the World'': Arguing that the education of children is better left to their mothers than to professional educators, he ends his argument with, "... a thing is worth doing, it is worth doing badly." Commenting on this, Dale Ahlquist in the Society of Gilbert Keith Chesterton blog, argues that there is considerable good sense in this paradoxical anti-proverb. He cites Chesterton’s own remark that "Paradox has been defined as 'Truth standing on her head to get attention'", and notes that Chesterton in the same passage explicitly concedes that there are things, like astronomy, that need to be done very well; whereas when it comes to writing love letters or blowing one’s nose, Chesterton argues that, "These things we want a man to do for himself, even if he does them badly."

Variations

Splicing two proverbs

In a slightly different pattern of reshaping proverbs humorously, pieces of multiple proverbs can be spliced together, e.g. "Never count the bear's skin before it is hatched" and "There's a good deal to be said for making hay while the iron is hot."

Garden path proverbs

The term has also been used to describe a

garden path sentence A garden-path sentence is a grammatically correct sentence that starts in such a way that a reader's most likely interpretation will be incorrect; the reader is lured into a parse that turns out to be a dead end or yields a clearly unintended mea ...

based on a proverb; namely, a sentence that starts out like the proverb, but ends in such a way that the listener is forced to back up and re-parse several words in order to get its real sense: * Time flies like to fly around clocks.
("time flies like an arrow" / the habits of "time flies", a fictitious kind of

fly Flies are insects of the order Diptera, the name being derived from the Greek δι- ''di-'' "two", and πτερόν ''pteron'' "wing". Insects of this order use only a single pair of wings to fly, the hindwings having evolved into advanced ...

.) Proverbs beginning with ''Time flies like ...'' are popular examples in

linguistics Linguistics is the scientific study of language. The areas of linguistic analysis are syntax (rules governing the structure of sentences), semantics (meaning), Morphology (linguistics), morphology (structure of words), phonetics (speech sounds ...

, e.g. to illustrate concepts related to

syntax In linguistics, syntax ( ) is the study of how words and morphemes combine to form larger units such as phrases and sentences. Central concerns of syntax include word order, grammatical relations, hierarchical sentence structure (constituenc ...

parsing. These examples are presumably inspired by the quip " Time flies like the wind; fruit flies like a banana", attributed to

Groucho Marx Julius Henry "Groucho" Marx (; October 2, 1890 – August 19, 1977) was an American comedian, actor, writer, and singer who performed in films and vaudeville on television, radio, and the stage. He is considered one of America's greatest comed ...

. To be effective in written form, a garden-path proverb must have the same spelling and punctuation as the original proverb, up to the point where the reader is supposed to back up, as in the "time flies" example above. These spelling or punctuation constraints may be relaxed in perverbs that are spoken, rather than written: * Don't count your chickens will do it for you.
("don't count your chickens before they hatch" / "don't count, your chickens will ...") * Think before you were born you were already loved.
("think before you act" / "think: before you were born, you were ...") * You can't teach an old dog would be better for your students.
("you can't teach an old dog new tricks" / "you can't teach; an old dog would be ...")

Proverbs with surprising or silly endings

The term is also used in the weaker sense of any proverb that was modified to have an unexpected, dumb, amusing, or nonsensical ending—even if the changed version is no harder to parse than the original: * A rolling stone gathers momentum.
("

A rolling stone gathers no moss "A rolling stone gathers no moss" is a proverb, first credited to Publilius Syrus, who in his states, "People who are always moving, with no roots in one place or another, avoid responsibilities and cares." The phrase spawned a shorter mossless ...

".) * All that glitters is not dull.
("

All that glitters is not gold "All that glitters is not gold" is an aphorism stating that not everything that looks precious or true turns out to be so. While early expressions of the idea are known from at least the 12th–13th century, the current saying is derived from a ...

".) * Don't put the cart before the aardvark.
(" Don't put the cart before the horse".) * A penny saved is a penny taxed.
("A penny saved is a penny earned".)

Puns on a proverb

The word has also been used for

pun A pun, also known as a paronomasia in the context of linguistics, is a form of word play that exploits multiple meanings of a term, or of similar-sounding words, for an intended humorous or rhetorical effect. These ambiguities can arise from t ...

s on proverbs: * Slaughter is the best medicine.
("''Laughter'' is the best medicine".) * What doesn't kill you makes you stranger.
(" What doesn't kill you makes you ''stronger''".) * Nothing succeeds like excess.
("Nothing succeeds like ''success''".) * Levity is the soul of wit.
("''Brevity'' is the soul of wit".) *

Absinthe Absinthe (, ) is an anise-flavored Liquor, spirit derived from several plants, including the flowers and leaves of ''Artemisia absinthium'' ("grand wormwood"), together with green anise, sweet fennel, and other medicinal and culinary herbs. His ...

makes the heart grow fonder / Absence makes the heart go wander.
("''Absence'' makes the heart grow ''fonder''".)