Since 1992
Print and digital marketing
By Barbara McAllister
Word of the Day: Mondegreen
You may not be familiar with this delightful word, but chances are you’re familiar with the concept. You probably didn’t even know this phenomenon had a name, but you may have a few of your own. Even more unsettling, perhaps you have a few mondegreens you aren’t aware of.
The word “mondegreen” was coined by the writer Sylvia Wright in a 1954 article in The Atlantic magazine. As a child she was exposed to the Scottish ballad “The Bonny Earl of Murray” with lyrics she heard as:
“They have slain the Earl of Murray, and Lady Mondegreen.”
“Poor Lady Mondegreen!” thought young Sylvia. Years later she discovered that instead of tragic Lady Mondegreen, slain along with the Earl, the lyrics actually were “They have slain the Earl of Murray and laid him on the green.” She created the word “mondegreen” to mean mishearing a popular phrase or song lyric.
I know how she felt. When we sang “Michael row the boat ashore” around the campfire, I wondered why sister had to help to “trim the snails.” How do you even trim a snail? Of course, later I realized that sister had to help to “trim the sails,” but I can’t say that made any more sense to me. I kind of enjoyed the thought of snail trimming.
Popular music lends itself to this pitfall — everyone likes to sing along to a catchy tune, the vocals are hard to understand and they don’t necessarily make sense anyway.
So if you you’re in the car singing at the top of your lungs along with Steve Winwood to “bake me a pie of love” instead of “bring me a higher love,” you, gentle reader, have a mondegreen!
Your spouse may tease you mercilessly for thinking Bachman Turner Overdrive is “makin’ carrot biscuits” but at least you know there’s a name for it.
