Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Entertainment/2014 December 13

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December 13

Jimbo Wales

DEAR SIR- I am teacher of Sri Kamakshi Vidyalaya Matriculation Higher Secondary School in Thoothukudi in India. We invite Mr. Jim-bo Wales to give speech at our school about success and dreams. The major of Thoothukudi will be there and other local famous peoples.

Speech will be held at: School assembly hall on 7th March 2015 at 7pm. Please considor donation and give long speech for our students. Thank you SIR. --Pattaj Farachirti (talk) 17:44, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

This RD is about entertainment, not for entertainment, even though we all agree Jimbo Wales is a great entertainer. Contact Basemetal here 17:46, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

On a more serious note: you could leave a message for Jimbo Wales at his talk page (follow the link). Try picking another section name that "Jimbo Wales". Contact Basemetal here 17:48, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

The page is protected, i can not post to him. Can you do it for me? --Pattaj Farachirti (talk) 17:58, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

That page is semi-protected. You've got to be an autoconfirmed user to be able to edit it. If you wait for 4 days and make 10 edits here at Wikipedia, you will also be able to edit Jimbo Wales's page. I'm afraid I can't do it for you because that would defeat the very purpose of the restriction. This said I don't agree with the rationale of semi-protecting Jimbo Wales's page. Why should people even have to register to be able to leave a message for him? But that's the way it is unfortunately. There were probably practical reasons such as vandalism (?) for doing that. Contact Basemetal here 18:11, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

Note that other ways to contact him are described here. Contact Basemetal here 18:24, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

Detailed Motorcycle Grand Prix results for 1962 - 1964

I am writing a biography on an Australian motor cycle rider, Dennis Fry, who competed in the 350cc and 500cc Motorcycle Grand Prix events in 1962 to 1964. I would like to obtain the detailed results for the 350cc events. The 500cc events are covered by Wikipedia but there are not detailed results for the 350cc events beyond the point scorers. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 110.142.19.215 (talk) 23:21, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

Rhetorical device

Papa Was a Rollin' Stone contains the line

"Papa was a rollin' stone/wherever he laid his hat was his home/and when he died, all he left us was alone"

How do you call the rhetorical device used in the high-lighted sentence? GEEZER^{nil nisi bene} 23:35, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

You might want to ask on the Language Desk. StuRat (talk) 00:07, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I'd call it an instance of zeugma—specifically, what's referred to as "type 2" in our article (though I can't say I've ever seen that particular anatomization into four types before)—based on a play of two senses of leave, "bequeath" and "abandon". Deor (talk) 00:10, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

I don't think this can strictly be called zeugma, because in a zeugma both meanings "bequeath" and "abandon" would have to be present side by side (hence the name). Here only the latter is present. It would have been zeugma if they had said "when he died, all he left us was a lousy coat and alone". What makes this device work is that he uses the less expected meaning. What makes a zeugma work is that the two meanings sort of clash. Contact Basemetal here 00:22, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

Well, I disagree. The point is that that on hearing "all he left us was ..." the listener expects a conclusion corresponding to the "bequeath" meaning, but the final word alone shifts the sense of the sentence to "he left [abandoned] us alone" while at the same time allowing the sense that "he left [bequeathed] us nothing". That's a "sort of clash" in my book. Deor (talk) 00:39, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

Compare with the following sentence from the paraprosdokian article (the article Sluzzelin referred to): "On his feet he wore…blisters." (Aristotle) Can this be called a zeugma? Does this work the same way as the OP's example? Contact Basemetal here 01:42, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

Then, more generally perhaps paraprosdokian? ---Sluzzelin talk 00:32, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

This is very convincing. Thanks!

Can we exclude one more thing? That the formulation ist just "bad grammer/formulation" ?

There are other examples in the text: "Never heard nothin' but bad things", "some bad talk goin' round town", "Papa never was much on thinking". So - for a native speaker - does it sound "well constructed in this way" or rather "slang which happens to end up as paraprosdokian" ?

So far: Thanks for all the input! GEEZER^{nil nisi bene} 09:25, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

A sentence which is "just bad grammar" (perhaps deliberately) is an anacoluthon, but none of your three examples really come under this description. "Never heard nothin' but bad things" is a double negative (with a negative, rather than a positive, meaning), and the sentence is missing the subject ("[We] never heard [anything]" would be the "correct" wording). "Some bad talk goin' round town" is similarly missing the verb ("Some bad talk [was] going round town"), but otherwise fits all the conditions of prescriptive grammar. The third sentence is again grammatical, but "on thinking" is a fairly unconventional/demotic use of "on" in the sense of "engaged with/at"; compare "on vacation", "on fire", "on heroin". Tevildo (talk) 10:42, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

So you - as a native speaker - conclude that "and when he died, all he left us was alone" is clearly intended as a rhetorical device ? GEEZER^{nil nisi bene} 12:41, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

Yes. I would say the writer has deliberately chosen the "depart" meaning of "leave", when the expected meaning is "bequeath". Tevildo (talk) 14:20, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

Thanks! Done - Case closed. GEEZER^{nil nisi bene} 16:26, 14 December 2014 (UTC)