From: adam@address.invalid   
      
   unruh wrote:   
   > On 2012-05-22, Adam  wrote:   
   >> I've heard that _written_ Chinese is a "grammarless tongue,"   
   >   
   > But written chinese has essentially nothing to do with spoken. Thus   
   > Cantonese and Mandarin-- different languages, even different number of   
   > tomes-- same written language.   
      
   Now /that/ is an alien concept to me!  Much more so than ideographs   
   or meanings dependent on tones.  OTOH their language(s) has/have   
   several thousand more years of development than English.   
      
   > the aural pun looses all meaning in written chinese (or english)   
      
   And so would English puns when translated.  Sometimes they fall flat   
   in another dialect of English.   
      
   Adam   
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