History PunBasedTitle / Literature

* The book/TV series ''Time Warp Trio'' does this for the book/episode titles. Examples: Me Oh Maya, My Big Fat Greek Olympics, You Can't, But Genghis Khan.

* One of Lawrence Block's Even Tanner novels is called ''The Canceled Czech''.

* The first book of a certain fantasy trilogy by Esther Friesner was called ''Gnome Man's Land''.

* [[WordOfGod According to]] OrsonScottCard, ''EndersGame'' has one of these--in the original short story, the character was named "Ender" solely so he could use that title, a pun on "endgame".

** Details for non-native speakers: (The) ''Light Fantastic'': English idiom referring to a dance ("trip the light fantastic") but here alluding to magical light. ''Mort'': the name of the human character, who goes to work for Death (''mort''). ''Soul Music'': the book is really about, er, Music With Rocks In, but the soul is obviously involved. ''Feet of Clay'': cliché "The idol has feet of clay"; the book's central character is a golem, with feet (and all other body parts) of clay. ''Interesting Times'': possibly apocryphal Chinese curse "May you live in interesting times"; the story is set in the Discworld's analogue to East Asia. ''Going Postal'': English expression "go postal" = go crazy; story is about the postal system. ''Monstrous Regiment'': famed quotation "this monstrous regiment of women"; at the time (16th century) the meaning was closer to modern "regimen" (i.e. government), but [[spoiler: the book spins it literally]].

* ''Game, Set, & Math'', a collection of humorous mathematical stories written by Ian Stewart for the French edition of ''Scientific American''. The jacket copy points out to anyone who misread the title, "Well, there ''is'' a chapter on the ''mathematics'' of tennis..."

* RobertRankin's books are frequently examples, such as ''Raiders of the Lost Car Park'' and ''The Brentford Chainstore Massacre''.

* Every book in Robert Asprin's ''MythAdventures'' series.

* ''[[Literature/VampireAcademy Frostbite]]'' is about a bunch of vampires going to a ski resort.

** ''Discworld/MenAtArms'', sort of. It's about the city guards, who are "men at arms," but the BigBad is a gun (...ItMakesSenseInContext), so "at arms" could also be interpreted as "against weapons". Its also a joke on the 'men' part, since a main plot in the novel is how the City Watch is, for the first time, admitting a dwarf, a troll and a w[[spoiler:oman who's a werewolf]], meaning they're not actually men at all.

* Several Literature/{{Discworld}} novels, including ''Discworld/EqualRites'', ''Discworld/{{Sourcery}}'', ''Discworld/{{Maskerade}}'' and ''Discworld/TheFifthElephant''.

** ''Discworld/MenAtArms'', sort of. It's about the city guards, who are "men at arms," but the BigBad is a gun (...ItMakesSenseInContext), so "at arms" could also be interpreted as "against weapons". Its also a joke on the 'men' part, since a main plot in the novel is how the City Watch is, for the first time, admitting a dwarf, a troll and a woman [[spoiler: who's a werewolf]], meaning they're not actually men at all.

** ''Discworld/MenAtArms'', sort of. It's about the city guards, who are "men at arms," but the BigBad is a gun (...ItMakesSenseInContext), so "at arms" could also be interpreted as "against weapons".

* Every title in ''TheClique'' series of books (except for the first one) is a pun or punny [[LiteraryReferenceTitle reference]] to something else: "Bratfest at Tiffany's" "Dial L for Loser" "Invasion of the Boy Snatchers".

** RobertRankin's books are frequently examples, such as ''Raiders of the Lost Car Park'' and ''The Brentford Chainstore Massacre''.

* The name "Finnegan" in Joyce's Literature/FinnegansWake is a play on the words "fin," meaning ''end'', and "again," a reflection of the book's highly cyclical nature.

* The name "Finnegan" in Joyce's FinnegansWake is a play on the words "fin," meaning ''end'', and "again," a reflection of the book's highly cyclical nature.

* So many novels in the {{mystery}} genre do this; there are far too many examples to list here.

** ''Discworld/MenAtArms'', sort of. It's about the city guards, who are "men at arms," but also about "arms" in the sense of weapons.