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Hello, Dalí!

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Today’s Wayno / Piraro Bizarro plunges us into a double play on words, plus a visual parody — offered on a platter — as well:


(#1) To understand the cartoon, you need to know about kosher delis (deli, short for delicatessen), and pastrami as a prominent offering in them; and about Salvador Dalí and his surrealist painting The Persistence of Memory (If you’re puzzled by the odd symbols in the cartoon — Dan Piraro says there are 4 in this strip — see this Page.)

The egregious pun kosher deli > kosher Dalí in combination with a play on the title of a Dalí painting Persistence of Memory > Persistence of Pastrami (with a visual parody on the painting itself, offered on a platter by the waiter; hence, Wayno’s title, “Culinary Surrealism”).

Dalí’s name is most commonly Englished as /ˈdali/, like Dolly, and that makes the deli > Dalí pun particularly close ( /ɛ/ > /a/, otherwise perfect), but sometimes maintains the Spanish / Catalan iambic accentuation as /daˈli/, in which case the imperfect pun is more distant.

On the artist, from Wikipedia:

Salvador Domingo Felipe Jacinto Dalí i Domènech, Marquess of Dalí of Púbol (11 May 1904 – 23 January 1989), known as Salvador Dalí was a Spanish [Catalonian] surrealist artist renowned for his technical skill, precise draftsmanship, and the striking and bizarre images in his work.

Not to mention his personal flamboyance and showmanship.

The artist in a photograph that probably served as the model for the Dalí character in the cartoon:


(#2) Dali’s Mustache (photo by Philippe Halsman)

The painting:


(#3) Salvador Dalí’s The Persistence of Memory (1931)

The painting has been much parodied. As in #1 above and in my 9/26/22 posting “The news for wieners”:


(#4) From cartoonist Gary Larson’s 1990 book Wiener Dog Art: the drawing The Persistence of Wiener Dogs, a parody of / burlesque of / riff on / homage to the Dalí


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