You've Been Mispronouncing Don Juan, Just So You Know
Statue of Don Juan in the square of Refinadores in Seville.
Apparently there's a movie called "Don Jon" coming out. Based on the trailer, it seems to be about a porn addict who's in love with Scarlett Johansson. It looks kind of bad.
The only part of the movie I'm interested in is the title—it's a play on Don Juan, fiction's most famous ladies' man immortalized by the eponymous Lord Byron poem.
Most people mispronounce the name of Byron's hero. This seems like a good time to set the record straight. Usually you'll hear "Don Wan." It's actually pronounced "Don Jew-One."
I know: weird. But look at the words Byron rhymes with Juan.
The other two are women, and the third
Is neither man nor woman.' The chief threw on
The party a slight glance, then said, 'I have heard
Your name before, the second is a new one:....
Never does Byron rhyme Juan was a "wan"-sounding word, like yawn, or dawn.
The awkward pronunciation is part of a running joke in the poem, in which the narrator anglicizes foreign words, the irony being that the author of an urbane tale about a globe-trotting Lothario is actually a provincial rube.
So, for example, the poet rhymes Guadalquivir—actually pronounced "quiveer"—with "river". Likewise "Seville"—pronounced "sayvee"—with "uncivil".
So now you can be an awful pedant whenever someone comments on a friend's romantic prowess or mentions a new movie about porn addiction.
