Acknowledging the importance of pictorial elements in the generation of meaning, the author attempts to introduce a systematic classification of plays on words and the ways in which they can be translated. Given the author’s view that translation is a “special case of linguistic activity”, linguistic factors are emphasized. The author notes that the interplay between verbal and non verbal elements is useful in interpreting the linguistic component of the text. However, the predetermined size of speech bubbles limits the space available in the target language, and the visual context narrows the translator’s choice of equivalents. Plays on words are subdivided into two main groups, plays on sense and plays on sound. Only this latter group, which includes onomatopoeia, is specific to comics.