Bible student/Zen mistress Paris Hilton, full of post-pokey philosophy, solemnly told Larry King Wednesday that she has a new outlook on life: "Don't serve the time; let the time serve you."
That statement is a good example of what's known to students of contemporary language as a Russian reversal. The original version went something like this:
In America, you go to the party.
In Soviet Russia, the party goes to you!
In other words, subject and object are reversed in the two halves of the joke, with "Soviet Russia" leading the second statement. The form was popularized by Ukrainian emigré comedian Yakov Smirnoff.
As usual, Uncyclopedia has the last word on the Russian reversal.
Update: Well, maybe not the last last word. I just learned, via Language Log, of the newish Snowclones Database being cultivated by Erin O'Connor (who describes herself as "an animal-loving linguistics geek artist"). (A snowclone is a particular kind of cliché: "X is the new Y" or “If Eskimos have N words for snow, X surely have Y words for Z.”) Erin classifies the Russian reversal as a snowclone--"In Soviet Russia, X Ys You!"--and also as a variation on chiasmus, the term in rhetoric for a "crossover" trope. And she links to Chiasmus.com, where you can revel in chiastic quotes from Mae West ("It's not the men in my life, it's the life in my men"), Cicero ("One should eat to live, not eat to live"), and other great crossover artists.
That's not like a Crazy Ivan, is it?
(Another pop culture reference, this one from Hunt for Red October and Firefly/Serenity)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crazy_Ivan
Posted by: Mark Gunnion | July 01, 2007 at 12:12 PM