Definition: (1) One word used in two contrasting (and often comic) senses. (2) Homonymic pun.
Etymology:
From the Greek, "reflection, bending, breaking against"
Examples:
- "Time flies like an arrow; fruit flies like a banana."
(Groucho Marx)
- "If you don’t look good, we don’t look good."
(Vidal Sassoon advertising slogan)
- "If you aren't fired with enthusiasm, you will be fired with enthusiasm."
(Vince Lombardi)
- "At first glance, Shirley Polykoff's slogan--'If I've only one life, let me live it as a blonde!'--seems like merely another example of a superficial and irritating rhetorical trope (antanaclasis) that now happens to be fashionable among advertising copy writers."
(Tom Wolfe, "The Me Decade and the Third Great Awakening")
- "Kings worry about a receding heir line."
- "Lunatic Fringe"
(name of a barber shop)
- "And there's bars on the corners and bars on the heart."
(Tim McGraw, "Where The Green Grass Grows")
- "Wok This Way"
(name of Thai restaurant)
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