Secret Comedy Writing Technique – Malapropisms

In this next installment in my on-going mini series Secret Comedy Writing Techniques I’m going to cover Malapropisms and provide Malapropism examples. A malapropism is the incorrect use of a word by substituting a similar-sounding word with different meaning, more often than not, with comic effect.

A malapropism is an example of an English writing technique, using long complicated words for comic effect. Essentially, the word that gets used means something different from the word the speaker or writer intended to use.

The word used sounds like the word that was apparently meant or intended. Malapropism examples; using a word like “obtuse” (wide or dull) instead of “acute” (narrow or sharp) is not a malapropism; using “obtuse” (stupid or slow-witted) when one means “abstruse” (esoteric or difficult to understand) would be.

The word used has a recognized meaning in the speaker’s or writer’s language. Simply making up a word, or adding a redundant or ungrammatical prefix (“irregardless” instead of “regardless”) or a suffix (“subliminible” instead of “subliminal”) to an existing word, is not a malapropism.

Quick Bit of History…

The term Malapropism takes its name from the post-Restoration comedy The Rivals written in the 1700s by the Irish playwright Richard Brinsley Sheridan. The character Mrs. Malaprop always got confused with her use of English. A Malapropism example of this character doing this would be: “He’s as headstrong as an allegory on the banks of the Nile” (Allegory here is used instead of alligator).

The word originates from the French term mal à propos (wrong on purpose) which is believed to have entered the English language around 1660 the year the English throne was Restored. As you can see malapropisms in comedy have been used for centuries.

Malapropisms: Some Examples

Some further malapropisms examples are “he had to use a fire distinguisher” and “Dad says the monster is just a pigment of my imagination”. Here’s a link to a website that features more Malapropisms: Fun with words.

If you have a facility with words then go ahead and use this technique. I can imagine it working if you did a speech as a corporate impostor. Essentially a humorous speaker poses as an international dignitary or a visiting expert.

Slowly but surely the audience realises that the speaker is an impostor as the speech becomes more outrageous or absurd generating laughter. It works brilliantly well with the English character comic Count Arthur Strong who I’ve seen twice and he is superb at what he does. Here’s an 8m 13sec video clip of the Count doing what he does best.

Malapropism examples can also be found in baseball, check out these Malapropisms in Baseball, courtesy of Yogi Berra which are now affectionately known as Yogiisms: “it ain’t over ’til it’s over”, “it’s deja vu all over again” and 2I usually take a two hour nap from one to four.”

Like I’ve said before, you don’t need this technique to make you funny, but it can help you understand your innate funniness or allow you to tweak a speech. Take a look at Top Comedy Secrets, which has a guide that can help you harness your humour.

Malapropisms is not a technique that would work for me. But if you can make it work for you, then go for it!!

Addendum

Following on from a comment from one of my regular readers and fellow blogger, Nick R Thomas, I’d like to add two other proponants of the Malapropism. The first is Britain’s own comedienne, Hylda Baker who played a character called Nellie Pledge in the sitcom “Nearest and Dearest”. Don’t worry if you’re reading this outside of the U.K. and you’ve never heard of her or the sitcom because… neither have I.

Then there’s America’s own Norm Crosby who worked the Borscht Belt before appearing in Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-in, which would have featured lots of malapropism examples. Most recently he did voice work in the Adam Sandler movie “Eight Crazy Nights”. Here’s an ad he did for a U.S. chain of seafood restaurants called Red Lobster, in 1987.

It’s a 30 second clip, and probably not the best example of the man’s work, but you get to hear how he mangles worms: Norm Crosby Comedy Malaprop

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