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At the end of the Monty Python sketch "Biggles Dictates a Letter", there's a voiceover (sounds like John Cleese to me) saying: "Next week, part 2: Biggles Flies Undone"

https://getyarn.io/yarn-clip/991e5b96-4e4b-42b4-b45e-801eef914a26

I've always thought this was a pun with two possible meanings: "Biggles's fly is undone", i.e. the fly of his trousers is not properly closed; and "Biggles Flies on Dun" where "Dun" is some location in Europe. But I realized that I've never heard of a place called "Dun".

I searched for "Dun", "Dunn", "Donne", and "Donnes". I found that France has a "Village of Dun" and a "Town of Dun" but both are tiny and don't mention any notable history.

Maybe there is no second meaning; maybe it's just a phrase meant to trick your mind: You think you are hearing "Biggles flies on" and then the last word is revealed to actually be "undone". (Humorist Dave Barry calls this comedy technique "judo": you set up an expectation and then instead of fulfilling the expectation, do something absurd.)

Is this a pun? If so, what is the second meaning?

steveha
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  • You also don’t fly on a location you fly to a location. – Jim Jan 29 '21 at 08:03
  • @Jim The shorter the word, the more uses it can get. I think there is a use of "on" in the military that goes like this: "The brigade marched on General X's forces" So I always thought this was the airplane equivalent. Biggles has a mission in "Dun" thus "Biggles Flies on Dun" I tried to Google up an example of "on" used in this way but it's awfully hard to Google a specific usage of such a short, common word. – steveha Jan 29 '21 at 08:56

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It is a (rather old-fashioned) pun on 'undone' but it turns on Lexico's third definition of the word:

undone
formal, humorous (of a person) ruined by a disastrous or devastating setback or reverse.
‘I am undone!’

"Alas! I am undone!" is still in common, and histrionic, usage. As a pun it was a favourite of Frankie Howerd's character in Up Pompeii.

So Cleese's pun says Biggles flies (despite being) ruined, and it also says (as you say) his fly is undone.

But...

In the UK we used to call them 'flies'. Plural. Cleese's generation certainly did. The buttons resembled flies, and as there was always more than one of 'em the word was always plural. I daresay it was the advent of the zip that led to the singular 'fly' being used.

So the second sense of the line is not "Biggles's fly is undone" but the more arresting and headline-like "Biggles's flies undone".

I should add that 'I am undone' was not deemed humorous until the twentieth century. "Woe is me! for I am undone;" [Isaiah 6:5, kjv]

Old Brixtonian
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    I agree with almost everything you say but, as far as I know, the terms "fly" and "flies" don't come from a resemblance of buttons to flies but, rather, from the structure of the opening in the trousers where the fasteners are concealed by a piece of cloth called a 'fly'. I suspect that the name is related in some way to the "flies" of a theatre where canvas scenery flats are lifted off the stage. They are also concealed from the audience by strips of cloth hanging above the stage. – BoldBen Jan 29 '21 at 07:39
  • @BoldBen Ha! I hadn't thought of theatre. Yes. Plenty in common with tailoring of course. I wonder. But as you say, flats gets flown up or down: not sideways. And they're hidden more by the architecture and the darkness of the flies than by cloths. Legs and leg curtains hide actors in the wings, but they don't close: they pivot. Theatre curtains are referred to as 'tabs' and if the expression was "Your tabs are undone" I'd buy it! – Old Brixtonian Jan 29 '21 at 09:37