Wordplay is the art of manipulating words based on their spelling or pronunciation rather than their meaning, although some types of wordplay also involve the meaning.

Anagrams (as commonly seen these days in TV commercials for the New York Times) are one of the most widely known forms of wordplay, but many other forms exist:

• reversals
• deletions
• palindromes
• rebuses
• charades
• word ladders
• letter banks
• spoonerisms/spoonergrams, and spoonergram variations

Word"play` (?), n.

A more or less subtle playing upon the meaning of words.

 

© Webster 1913