The Bliffida Glomp Museum of Accidental Renaissance Art is pleased to announce its acquisition of The Narcissus of Venice (oil on canvas) by Flemish painter Hyndrik VanDerBoing (1523-1571). The painting depicts the classic Greek tragedy of Narcissus, who fell in love with his own reflection and ended up making a monkey of himself.
Yet another masterpiece, brilliant!
Agreed! How Mike comes up with this brilliant stuff is one of life’s greatest mysteries!
Excellent mondegreen reference as the cherry on top!
Isn’t it, tho’!??? I LOVE this.
There’s my new word for the day. You guys keep me educated.
Not sure I’ll explain this quite right – Ricky’s Mom, help me out! – there’s a folk ballad involving a lord whose name I can never remember, but a high-ranking person – who was killed – in a battle, one presumes – “and they laid him on the green”. However, many people thought the lyrics were “and Lady Mondegreen”. Thus was a name given to misconstrued lyrics.
One of my favorites is that Van Morrison TexMex classic, “Hey, Weird Amigo!”
My fave comes from Wayne and Garth singing the classic Credence Clearwater Revival song “There’s a Bathroom on the Right.”
And even more education! Thanks. I like hearing the stories behind word origins.
100% correct, Murray C!
My own mondegreen is not unique: I wondered for years who Leslie was in “Groovin,'” and how he or she got into the song. Prosody matters, people!
As a kid, I always wondered what a luya was, as in “Glory had a luya.”
In the song “Don’t know much about history,,, (What a Wonderful World This Would Be”) there’s the line …”Don’t know much about a science book. Don’t know much about – ‘a French-Eyed Took’ ” always wondered what a “French-Eyed Took” was.
Then there are the famous ones like “I led the pigeons to the flag” or “Gladly the cross-eyed bear” or “Surely good Mrs. Murphy shall follow you all the days of your life” – that one certainly put the fear into the hearts of young children.
…or the one my father cited – “Jesus, save your pilot, me”!
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Does anyone here who went to Holy Thursday services (Catholic, most likely) remember when endless Litanies were sung with latin responses that sounded all the world like “Oh, wrap your nose up” (Ora pronobis) and “Leave her on a stormy day” (Liberamus domine) and “Sarah has a stoppy nose” – I have no idea what the latin was for that one.
Well, he is rather adorable; can you blame him?
I for one am very confused and frightened by the statue he’s perching on. Is it some Renaissance version of the Alien, with its mouth within a mouth within another mouth thing?
That is an amazing – and perplexing – beastie! Sort of a food chain/evolution metaphor???
I think you have the right of it! Looks like a fish being eaten by another fish that’s being eaten by another fish that’s being carried away by a bird of prey. To be eaten, I would assume.
Or is that a mane behind what I thought was a 3rd fish. In which case, a lion would be eating a fish that a bird was attempting to fly away with while it was eating a smaller fish… Perplexing, most definitely.
I thought it was sort of a combo hippo/ triceratops because of the frill. But it looks like it has a short elephant trunk that turns into a bird’s head. Very confusing.
This is hysterical!! Love the headline (now I have a Hendrix ear worm), names and a perfect back story for the picture.
Wonderful pictures like this remind me what a truly bad photographer I am. ?