play upon words
noun
Roget 842:
wit,
humor,
wittiness;
sense of humor;
attic wit,
attic salt;
atticism†;
salt,
esprit,
point,
fancy,
whim,
drollery,
pleasantry.
farce,
buffoonery,
fooling,
tomfoolery;
shenanigan [U.S.],
harlequinade
etc.
599†;
broad farce,
broad humor;
fun,
espieglerie [Fr.];
vis comica [Lat.].
jocularity;
jocosity,
jocoseness†;
facetiousness;
waggery,
waggishness;
whimsicality;
comicality
etc.
853.
banter,
badinage,
retort,
repartee,
smartness,
ready wit,
quid-pro-quo;
ridicule
etc.
856.
jest,
joke,
jape,
jibe;
facetiae [Lat.],
levity,
quips and cranks;
capital joke;
canorae nugae [Lat.];
standing jest,
standing joke,
private joke,
conceit,
quip,
quirk,
crank,
quiddity,
concetto†,
plaisanterie [Fr.],
brilliant idea;
merry thought,
bright thought,
happy thought;
sally;
flash of wit,
flash of merriment;
scintillation;
mot [Fr.],
mot pour rire [Fr.];
witticism,
smart saying,
bon-mot,
jeu d'esprit [Fr.],
epigram;
jest book;
dry joke,
quodlibet,
cream of the jest.
word-play,
jeu de mots [Fr.];
play of words,
play upon words;
pun,
punning;
double entente,
double entendre [Fr.]
etc.
(ambiguity)
520;
quibble,
verbal quibble;
conundrum
etc.
(riddle)
533;
anagram,
acrostic,
double acrostic,
trifling,
idle conceit,
turlupinade†.
old joke,
tired joke,
flat joke,
Joe Miller†.
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Roget 563:
neology,
neologism;
newfangled expression,
nonce expression;
back-formation;
caconym†;
barbarism.
archaism,
black letter,
monkish Latin.
corruption,
missaying†,
malapropism,
antiphrasis†.
pun,
paranomasia†,
play upon words;
word play
etc.
(wit)
842;
double-entendre [Fr.]
etc.
(ambiguity)
520;
palindrome,
paragram†,
anagram,
clinch;
abuse of language,
abuse of terms.
dialect,
brogue,
idiom,
accent,
patois;
provincialism,
regionalism,
localism;
broken English,
lingua franca;
Anglicism,
Briticism,
Gallicism,
Scotticism,
Hibernicism;
Americanism†;
Gypsy lingo,
Romany;
pidgin,
pidgin English,
pigeon English;
Volapuk,
Chinook,
Esperanto,
Hindustani,
kitchen Kaffir.
dog Latin,
macaronics†,
gibberish;
confusion of tongues,
Babel;
babu English†,
chi-chi.
figure of speech
etc.
(metaphor)
521;
byword.
colloquialism,
informal speech,
informal language.
substandard language,
vernacular.
vulgar language,
obscene language,
obscenity,
vulgarity.
jargon,
technical terms,
technicality,
lingo,
slang,
cant,
argot;
St. Gile's Greek,
thieves' Latin,
peddler's French,
flash tongue,
Billingsgate,
Wall Street slang.
pseudology†.
pseudonym
etc.
(misnomer)
565;
Mr.
So-and-so;
wha d'ye call 'em†,
whatchacallim,
what's his name;
thingummy†,
thingumbob;
je ne sais quoi [Fr.].
neologist†,
coiner of words.
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verb
Roget 523:
misinterpret,
misapprehend,
misunderstand,
misconceive,
misspell,
mistranslate,
misconstrue,
misapply;
mistake
etc.
495.
misrepresent,
pervert;
explain wrongly,
misstate;
garble
etc.
(falsify)
544;
distort,
detort†;
travesty,
play upon words;
stretch the sense,
strain the sense,
stretch the meaning,
strain the meaning,
wrest the sense,
wrest the meaning;
explain away;
put a bad construction on,
put a false construction on;
give a false coloring.
be at cross purposes,
play at cross purposes.
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