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Have Yourself a Punny Little Christmas
Q. Why did Frosty decide to live in the middle of the ocean?
A. Because snowman is an island.
Q. What do you call a bunch of parents standing in line to buy their daughters a popular doll?
A. A Barbie queue.
Q. An opinion survey in Alaska is called what?
A. A north poll.
Q. When you cross a sheep with a cicada, what do you get?
A. Baa, humbug!
A. Because snowman is an island.
Q. What do you call a bunch of parents standing in line to buy their daughters a popular doll?
A. A Barbie queue.
Q. An opinion survey in Alaska is called what?
A. A north poll.
Q. When you cross a sheep with a cicada, what do you get?
A. Baa, humbug!
- GenresLanguage
111 pages, Paperback
First published July 17, 2006
About the author
Richard Lederer
89 books70 followersRichard Lederer is the author of more than 35 books about language, history, and humor, including his best-selling Anguished English series and his current book, The Gift of Age. He has been profiled in magazines as diverse as The New Yorker, People, and the National Enquirer and frequently appears on radio as a commentator on language. He has been named International Punster of the Year and Toastmasters International's Golden Gavel winner.
He is the father of author and poet Katy Lederer and poker players Howard Lederer and Annie Duke.
He is the father of author and poet Katy Lederer and poker players Howard Lederer and Annie Duke.
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
April 27, 2024
Well, I did kind of expect that the continuous barrage of Christmas themed puns, wordplays, bloopers and humorous questions textually featured by Richard Lederer in his 2006 Have Yourself a Punny Little Christmas would (or rather I guess could) very rapidly become dragging and kind of same old, same old repetitive. For I have always tended to find literary collections of puns and the like regarding one specific subject (or in Have Yourself a Punny Little Christmas about one specific holiday, about one specific celebration) more than a trifle one-sided, and with that, obviously also very much and likely tedious in scope and feel, so that my general and potential reading joy reaction to Have Yourself a Punny Little Christmas and to what Lederer has compiled and is presenting showing itself as being pretty much rather meh and ho-hum (and even to use Ebenezer Scrooge's words kind of "bah humbug") is actually not all that surprising and indeed major foreseeable.
But the above having been said, I can and will nevertheless admit that within the pages of Have Yourself a Punny Little Christmas, Richard Lederer does indeed provide some laugh-out-loud funny and delightful wordplay treasures. And yes, I could thus also actually see myself using a select few of the puns etc. encountered in Have Yourself a Punny Little Christmas such as for example that a group of adults waiting in line at a store to purchase a doll for their daughters is a Barbie queue, that a Christmas bird dog is a point setter and also many of the punny and altered Christmas carols in a intermediate or advanced ESL class during the Yuletide season for a fun language based holiday themed activity, but indeed, not all that many, only in very small dosages, and that I would also not EVER consider using either Richard Lederer's introductory words on Christmas or Jim MacLean's accompanying artwork, that I would simply take a few textual examples from Have Yourself a Punny Little Christmas for in-class activities, but would definitely never be exposing students to the entire book, both to not unnecessarily bore them and also because (and even more importantly) I do find both the introduction and the accompanying illustrations for Have Yourself a Punny Little Christmas quite horrid (and for two rather important and kind of problematic reasons).
For one, in the introduction to Have Yourself a Punny Little Christmas on Christmas as a holiday, Richard Lederer's penchant for information dropping, for textually overwhelming his readers with facts, facts, facts and for rather snarkily and arrogantly textually boasting (and this even though I have actually found some language based and historical errors) gets majorly tedious and infuriating (and that no, I would definitely NOT want students and in particular students learning English as a second or as a foreign language to encounter Lederer's holier than thou and arrogant "I am better and more intelligent, more educated than anyone" tone). And for two, sorry, but Jim McClean's accompanying black and white pictures are ugly, are often rather weirdly parodistic, and that McClean's illustration of the infant Jesus in his manger is potentially visually offensive, as it makes Jesus Christ look really creepy and with a clown-like face (and that therefore, I can and will only consider two stars for Have Yourself a Punny Little Christmas and that said two star rating is in my humble opinion actually pretty generous on my part).
But the above having been said, I can and will nevertheless admit that within the pages of Have Yourself a Punny Little Christmas, Richard Lederer does indeed provide some laugh-out-loud funny and delightful wordplay treasures. And yes, I could thus also actually see myself using a select few of the puns etc. encountered in Have Yourself a Punny Little Christmas such as for example that a group of adults waiting in line at a store to purchase a doll for their daughters is a Barbie queue, that a Christmas bird dog is a point setter and also many of the punny and altered Christmas carols in a intermediate or advanced ESL class during the Yuletide season for a fun language based holiday themed activity, but indeed, not all that many, only in very small dosages, and that I would also not EVER consider using either Richard Lederer's introductory words on Christmas or Jim MacLean's accompanying artwork, that I would simply take a few textual examples from Have Yourself a Punny Little Christmas for in-class activities, but would definitely never be exposing students to the entire book, both to not unnecessarily bore them and also because (and even more importantly) I do find both the introduction and the accompanying illustrations for Have Yourself a Punny Little Christmas quite horrid (and for two rather important and kind of problematic reasons).
For one, in the introduction to Have Yourself a Punny Little Christmas on Christmas as a holiday, Richard Lederer's penchant for information dropping, for textually overwhelming his readers with facts, facts, facts and for rather snarkily and arrogantly textually boasting (and this even though I have actually found some language based and historical errors) gets majorly tedious and infuriating (and that no, I would definitely NOT want students and in particular students learning English as a second or as a foreign language to encounter Lederer's holier than thou and arrogant "I am better and more intelligent, more educated than anyone" tone). And for two, sorry, but Jim McClean's accompanying black and white pictures are ugly, are often rather weirdly parodistic, and that McClean's illustration of the infant Jesus in his manger is potentially visually offensive, as it makes Jesus Christ look really creepy and with a clown-like face (and that therefore, I can and will only consider two stars for Have Yourself a Punny Little Christmas and that said two star rating is in my humble opinion actually pretty generous on my part).
Displaying 1 of 1 review