the stock phrase "the lesser of two evils". After Aubrey offers his pun (to the enjoyment of many), Dr. Maturin shows a disdain for the craft with his reply, "One who would pun would pick-a-pocket." Not infrequently, puns are used in the titles of comedic parodies. A parody of a popular song, movie, etc., may be given a title that hints at the title of the work being parodied, replacing some of the words with ones that sound or look similar. For example, collegiate a cappella groups are often named after musical puns to attract fans through attempts at humor. Such a title can immediately communicate both that what follows is a parody and also that work is about to be parodied, making any further "setup" (introductory explanation) unnecessary. 2014 saw the inaugural UK Pun Championships, at the Leicester Comedy Festival, hosted by Lee Nelson. Walsh went on to take part in the O. Henry Pun-Off World Championships in Austin, Texas. In 2015 the UK Pun Champion was Leo Kearse. Books never written Sometimes called "books never written" or "world's greatest books", these are jokes that consist of fictitious book titles with authors' names that contain a pun relating to the title. Perhaps the best-known example is: "Tragedy on the Cliff by Eileen Dover", which according to one source was devised by humourist Peter DeVries. It is common for these puns to refer to taboo subject matter, such as "What Boys Love by E. Norma Stitts". Literature Non-humorous puns were and are a standard poetic device in English literature. Puns and other forms of wordplay have been used by many famous writers, such as Alexander Pope, James Joyce, Vladimir Nabokov, Robert Bloch, Lewis Carroll, John Donne, and William Shakespeare. In the poem A Hymn to God the Father, John Donne, whose wife's name was Anne More, puns repeatedly: "Son/sun" in the second quoted line, and two compound puns on "Done/done" and "More/more". All three are homophonic, with the puns on "more" being both homographic and capitonymic. The ambiguities introduce several possible meanings into the verses. Alfred Hitchcock stated, "Puns are the highest form of literature." Shakespeare Shakespeare is estimated to have used over 3,000 puns in his plays. Even though many of the puns were bawdy, Elizabethan literature considered puns and wordplay to be a "sign of literary refinement" more so than humor. This is evidenced by the deployment of