By The Landlord
“Golden Lads, and Girles all must
As chimney-sweepers come to dust.” – William Shakespeare, Fear No More the Heat o’ the Sun, from Cymbeline
“The Queen of England sometimes takes advice in that chamber, and sometimes tea.” – Samuel Johnson, The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia
“They tugged and tore at each other’s hair and clothes, punched and scratched each other’s nose, and covered themselves with dust and glory.” – Mark Twain, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer
“Yet time and her aunt moved slowly — and her patience and her ideas were nearly worn our before the tete-a-tete was over.” – Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice by
"She lowered her standards by raising her glass,
Her courage, her eyes and his hopes." – Flanders & Swann
"There was music in the cafés at night
And revolution in the air." – Bob Dylan
"He watches afternoon repeats and the food he eats." – Blur
“We're so pretty ,
Oh so pretty
Vacant.” – The Sex Pistols
"I do here make humbly bold to present them with a short account of themselves and their art." – Jonathan Swift
“He was doing lines
And crossing all of mine.” – Taylor Swift
What do you read into books and songs? On this annual celebration of the printed word, it feels appropriate to offer all or our beloved customers some refreshment of the ears and eyes and mind, with a surprisingly common, but also concise and pleasingly clever literary device. So let's open the Bar, and this topic, with more than that single example. We can draw a pint and a picture in your mind. Or maybe even a pitcher. With glasses and song lyrics to pour over.
Zeugma, to put it simply, is the use of a word to govern two or more other words or phrases in a line or sentence. It comes from the Ancient Greek ζεῦγμα, zeûgma, literally meaning "a yoking together" like two metaphorical cattle joined by a wooden harness to plough a field, or a the father with stick linking two baskets as shown above.
So this week, it's all about lyrics that use this device. Some artists are particularly fond of it, and talking of beasts in the field in particular, Mick Jagger is jumping eagerly to the Bar to show off some his own wordplay, complaining in that bluesy style how: "You can put me out on the street, / Put me out with no shoes on my feet, / But put me out, put me out, put me out of misery." There's plenty more from him and the Stones to come no doubt, and he may well be put out, in more than one sense, if he doesn't get a mention in nominations.
Without getting too technical, there are also sub-types of zeugma, but they all essentially perform the same trick. Syllepsis, for example, will certainly apply to many lyrics, because it offers a certain richness of wordplay by applying to each word or phrase with a different meaning. Only this morning we opened our back door and our hearts to a hungry cat, but later on this evening we'll need to put the cat put the lights and the cat out, even if the cat is feeling a little put out.
Hearts then are a very handy example. You may, for example, have left your heart, and wallet, or suitcase in, perhaps in San Francisco? Did someone steal that wallet, or perhaps a kiss and your heart? Or more literally, you mind find that a broken heart also comes with broken biscuits, bread or an egg? And in consequence, we may then have to eat our lunch as well as our words.
More technical variants, but they all count anyway, include diazeugma similar to syllepsis, but the governing word comes after the elements which adds to a feeling of concision and speed. Books, films, songs, coffee - let's drink them all in.
There are many artists who regularly play with zeugma, and I've given a little taste of a few above, but hopefully we'll collectively dig out the sources and more by them and many others, and as a result polishing not only our collections but also our musical reputations. I've tried to plant the seeds of ideas, as well as hope for some fine playlists. Like a brand of car, or a style of coat, once you get it, you start to see it everywhere.
We began with the Bard, so let's end with him, and the magnificent music-themed Sonnet 128, so rich in zeugma and other literary devices, has the setting of a lover playing on a wooden instrument in mind and body and the theme of love. It's both earthy and ethereal, metaphorical and literal, and tinkers beautifully on many levels if complexity and meanings across zeugma and other keys. So then, on this World Book Day, as ever where there's a Will, there's always a way.
How oft, when thou, my music, music play’st
Upon that blessèd wood whose motion sounds
With thy sweet fingers when thou gently sway’st
The wiry concord that mine ear confounds,
Do I envy those jacks that nimble leap
To kiss the tender inward of thy hand,
Whilst my poor lips, which should that harvest reap,
At the wood’s boldness by thee blushing stand.
To be so tickled they would change their state
And situation with those dancing chips,
O’er whom thy fingers walk with gentle gait,
Making dead wood more blest than living lips.
Since saucy jacks so happy are in this,
Give them thy fingers, me thy lips to kiss.
Who then, will find multiple meaning and joy in this week's topic by taking the chair? It brings the marvellous return of magicman! Please nominate your zeugma-filled songs, quoting the essential lyrics, in comments below, in time for the bell at 11pm on Monday UK time, for playlists published next week. As ever if a a fine way to tune up your mind, words, memory and music.
Let us all pull together more than a few pints
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