I have to admit, the name of this blog is clever in a silly sort of way. Even sillier, though, is the fact that it has taken me this long to work out the pun. I would keep looking at the address every time I came here, thinking, "Huh, illread. Makes me think of something, but..." And then I would get distracted by some other shiny object, lending proof to my sneaking suspicion that my attention span is... I'm sorry, what were we talking about again?
Here's what I like: "Illread" is both a pledge, as in "I'll read," that is, I shall or I will read, the convention of the URL forcing out the apostrophe, and a confession, as in I (to take the most blatantly obvious example) am "ill read."
But I think, too, that this last is also a charming reference to A Midsummer Night's Dream wherein Oberon greets Titania at the first on-stage crossing of their paths with the line, "Ill met by moonlight, proud Titania." That is, this is a crafty, subtle, underhanded challenge, calling us out to read or risk losing some form of (A) handy child, (B) fairy kingdom, (C) pride, (D) magical love-potion, (E) all of the above in the form of our imaginations, allegorized.
Then, too, you have homophony, such that "illread" becomes "isle red," possibly a reference to the ill-fated Red Island of Rovinj, Croatia. How this last works seems slightly beyond my modest powers of interpretation, but I would imagine it has something to do with the rocks upon which the stormy waters of time will toss us should we fail to keep ourselves afloat with the aid of good, solid, surely-everyone-has-read/watched/listened-to-this-except-me culture.
Any others?
Showing posts with label puns. Show all posts
Showing posts with label puns. Show all posts
Wednesday, February 28, 2007
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)