Why is ふとんがふとんだ a pun?

Question

I was reading an article about how the humour in the Yakuza games gets translated into English, and in the original Japanese a pun is made.

ふとんがふとんだ

The article says it is a play on words. But I cannot find any explanation online but I do see a reference to it. I can understand "a table is a table" but this isn't really a pun, it would be equivalent to "calling a spade a spade" in English.

Answer 1

A pun is a play on words exploiting homophones or similar-sounding words.

The pun in [布団]{ふとん}が[吹っ飛んだ]{ふっとんだ} The futon was blown off is that it sounds almost like 布団が布団だ A futon is a futon, the latter being a complete tautology.

There are many such popular puns, including

• 犬がいぬ
  A dog is a dog v The dog is gone
• イルカはいるか
  A dolphin is a dolphin v Is there a dolphin?
• イクラは幾ら
  Salmon roe is salmon roe v How much is the salmon roe?
• コンドルは[喜んどる]{よろこんどる}
• ラクダは楽だ
• etc. ad nauseam

Answer 2

The actual pun is:

「ふとんがふっとんだ」 with a small っ.

and not:

「ふとんがふとんだ」 = "A futon is a futon."

which is what you wrote.

The verb prefix 「ふっ」 is explained here:

What does the word 「ぶったてる」mean?

To use kanji, the phrase is:

「布団{ふとん}がふっ飛{と}んだ。」 = "The futon was blown off."

Thus, it is a legit pun indeed. It is the kind that small kids like to say.