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 Posted: Mon Mar 31, 2008 12:47 pm
In many classic books, such as Victor Hugo's Les Miserables (which I have just begun to read), in reference to names or places there will be a single letter followed by a prolonged dash. I never gave them mind in the past, but now that I am reading Les Mis. my curiosity has finally been aroused. Is there any back story to these dashes or any special meaning? I would greatly appreciate any explanation.
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Posted: Mon Mar 31, 2008 9:01 pm
I don't know why. I think it had something to do with the translations. I had to read it in 7th grade and my teacher said that the cities' names were hard to pronounce anyways. Coincidently, I was thinking about this topic yesterday...
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Posted: Tue Apr 01, 2008 10:05 am
I was told the reason for those dashes was to leave out names of cities and people, but I am not sure about that, now that I read the explanation above me.
Personally, I always thought the reason for the dashes was simply because everyone already knew what the word was supposed to be. -shrugs-
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Posted: Tue Apr 01, 2008 4:32 pm
Well. I'm posting on this again. I'm a big fan of the musical and I was googling it to see if I could find if it would ever come to my area again. I found the Wikipedia article on it. Now I know Wikipedia is rarely credible, but I found the names of D and M sur M.
Digne and Montreuil-sur-Mer
So why they are left out of the translations. I have no idea.
Here is the article:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Les_Misérables_(musical)
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Posted: Thu Apr 03, 2008 7:10 pm
In modern times, it's a way to distinguish people yet still grant anonymity. For example, a blogger could post: "And today I went out with K---... he's so much hotter than J---, but he isn't too bright." Now, if either John or Kevin happen to read this, they wouldn't be too pleased. Thus, their names are omitted.
In Les Mis? I couldn't tell you for sure. It could be any of the reasons someone else already said, or it could be that the translator was drunk or something. >.>
(Does the musical count as *a* version of it? sweatdrop )
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Posted: Sun Apr 06, 2008 3:36 pm
It is one of my favorite novels, but I have no idea of the meaning of those dashes. Interesting.
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