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Meaning/translation of title "The Light Fantastic" by Terry Pratchett
I have read The Light Fantastic by Terry Pratchett in English and always interpreted the title as "The Fantastic (adjective) light (noun)". Mostly because I do not see "Fantastic" as noun. To my surprise the Slovak translation is titled "Ľahká…
Piro
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How many of Poe's stories are interconnected?
I'm currently (slowly!) working through the complete works of Edgar Allan Poe. Three of his stories are detective tales featuring Dupin, a possible inspiration for the more famous fictional detective Sherlock Holmes: "The Murders in the Rue Morgue",…
Rand al'Thor
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34
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Did Shakespeare write his own stage directions?
It's well known that Shakespeare had no part in publishing the text of his own plays - indeed, many of them were only published posthumously. I've read that a significant proportion of his plays came to press by way of actors in his company, hoping…
Rand al'Thor
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Is there any textual evidence to support that Dumbledore was gay?
JK Rowling announced in 2007 to an audience at Carnegie Hall that Albus Dumbledore was in fact, gay and always had been...
Q: Did Dumbledore, who believed in the prevailing power of love, ever fall in love himself?
JKR: My truthful answer to you...…
Skooba
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Did H. G. Wells use an emoticon in “The Time Machine”?
Emoticons were introduced in 1982. Today I started reading The Time Machine and I saw this line in the first page:
And he put it to us in this way—marking the points with a lean
forefinger—as we sat and lazily admired his earnestness over this…
Antonio
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33
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Did Lenore merely leave or is she dead?
Edgar Allen Poe's poem The Raven has the narrator mourning the loss of his love Lenore. But it's actually not entirely clear to me if Lenore merely left the narrator (for whatever relationship-related intricacies) or if she is dead altogether.
When…
Cahir Mawr Dyffryn æp Ceallach
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Has the phrase "Elementary, my dear Watson" ever truly appeared in a Sherlock Holmes book?
A famous phrase attributed to Sherlock Holmes is "Elementary, my dear Watson" or "Elementary, dear Watson"
Has this phrase ever occurred in a Sherlock Holmes book?
If yes, in which novel or story does it exist?
If no, then have there been any…
Buffer Over Read
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Why is Snape so fond of Malfoy?
In the end of Harry Potter, we learn that
Snape disliked Harry because he resembled his father
This however, does not account for why Snape shows favoritism to Draco before the Dark Lord resurrects (after which it is relatively obvious why). I am…
Matrim Cauthon
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32
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How could sixty cents of $1.87 be in pennies?
The first three sentences of O. Henry's Gift of the Magi are as follows:
One dollar and eighty-seven cents. That was all. And sixty cents of it
was in pennies.
I've always wondered about this. This implies that $1.27 is in nickels, quarters and…
aschultz
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Is Babar an African or Asian elephant?
As a child I remember enjoying the Babar picture books about the eponymous elephant and his escapades. Now, many years later, it occurs to me to wonder what kind of elephants Babar and his people were: African elephants or Asian elephants. The…
Rand al'Thor
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What does Mark Twain mean by "cheers and a tiger"?
I know about the big stripey cat, but what is "a tiger" in this context:
...finishing up with cheers and a tiger for "Hadleyburg purity and our eighteen immortal representatives of it."
(from The Man That Corrupted Hadleyburg by Mark Twain)
I've…
B. Clay Shannon-B. Crow Raven
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What is the symbolism of Atticus killing the mad dog?
So in To Kill A Mockingbird, Atticus kills a mad dog. He does it with one shot.
Is there some more symbolism to this or is it just an event?
bleh
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What is the pun in Kipling's poem "The Three-Decker"?
In the poem The Three-Decker, by Rudyard Kipling, there is one line where the meter is slightly different from all the other lines. I Googled that line, not expecting to find anything, and Google Books came up with this from the magazine The Academy…
Peter Shor
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Why did Alexandre Dumas use Greek names for the three musketeers?
In the 1844 novel The Three Musketeers by French novelist Alexandre Dumas there are three musketeers who are named Aramis, Athos, and Porthos.
But they are French. Why did Alexandre Dumas choose Greek names for them?
Snack Exchange
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Why did Sir Arthur Conan Doyle decide to kill off this character?
In the short story "The Final Problem", Sir Arthur Conan Doyle made the decision to kill off Sherlock Holmes (although he did bring him back again in the story of "The Empty House"). This was met with great disapproval from the fans, who didn't want…
Mithical
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