LMB Quote Game

[E Pericoloso Sporgersi]

... the hereditary flemish enemy!

Aw ...
And here I was convinced this hostile sentiment had been eradicated ever since the "Entente Cordiale".

Okay. Next time we'll reclaim "la Flandre Française". And while we're at it, we'll annex "les Ch'tis" too.

[voralfred]

... the hereditary flemish enemy!

Aw ...
And here I was convinced this hostile sentiment had been eradicated ever since the "Entente Cordiale".

Okay. Next time we'll reclaim "la Flandre Française". And while we're at it, we'll annex "les Ch'tis" too.

"Entente Cordiale" was with the Brits, not the Flamingoes... er.. the Flemings (I never understood why we have the same word in french...).

Touche pas à mes Ch'tis!

Back to topic:

... she trailed off, looking into the kind, concerned, and loving wall of her mother's face.

Who's looking at her mother, here ?

Iselle looking at her mother Ista (probably, just before leaving for the capital; we don't see them much together)

I'm thinking that "kind, concerned, and loving" points to motherly love. But "wall of her mother's face" suggests a motherly conflict.

On Beta Colony, before Cordelia went to Barrayar, she was unjustly accused of having been butchered by the Brainwasher of Komarr. Cordelia couldn't see belief in her innocence in her mother's face.

which, I now believe, is the correct answer, not Iselle and Ista...

[SPetty]

Cordelia and her mother sounds right to me, but I haven't looked it up to check it. I would have thought Ista and the Provincara over Iselle and Ista, were it not for the fact that we don't see things from Ista's point of view until after the Provincara dies. We're never in Iselle's head, so that wouldn't work either. It's funny how often I can figure out the quote by looking at point of view, and word choice. Almost makes the money I spent for my seldom-used English major worthwhile from time to time.

Caroline, I think Voralfred might have already posted the half Sherlock I got for the third Dag. Check the Sherlock thread before you put it up.

[voralfred]

Cordelia and her mother sounds right to me, but I haven't looked it up to check it. I would have thought Ista and the Provincara over Iselle and Ista, were it not for the fact that we don't see things from Ista's point of view until after the Provincara dies. We're never in Iselle's head, so that wouldn't work either. It's funny how often I can figure out the quote by looking at point of view, and word choice. Almost makes the money I spent for my seldom-used English major worthwhile from time to time.

Caroline, I think Voralfred might have already posted the half Sherlock I got for the third Dag. Check the Sherlock thread before you put it up.

a) I did check it: it is indeed Cordelia and her mother, but the etiquette of the game is to wait for Caroline to confirm (maybe she'll say I am right just to tease EPS )
b) I also did post Suzette's 1/2 for the third Dag, and managed to botch it: as Suzette later corrected, he was a disappointed would-be designate alternate, not a disappointed would-be father...
c) there are still at least two pairs of characters with same (first) first name and same last name; each pair is worth 1/2
To my knowledge there is no indication of what the "second" first name (rather than "middle name") for any of these four characters might be, or even if they have one. But even if such "second" first names are mentioned anywhere and do not match, they won't count to invalidate the answer.

[voralfred]

Well, it has been almost one week since EPS posted the correct answer...and Caroline still hasn't come to give him the lie and claim that my answer was the right one, by french patriotism against the flemish enemy (GO WALLONIA!) ..so I suppose EPS has it.
Why don't you post the next quote, Francis, and wait for Caroline to confirm and post your sherlock?

[Caroline Tredez]

I'm sorry, I've had a busy week and just completely forgot I had a quote going. E Pericoloso Sporgersi had it right, of course, I'll update the Sherlock thread right away. And since the half-sherlock has already been given, I can't give more than my congratulations to Spetty for having found the third Dag.

[E Pericoloso Sporgersi]

Barrayaran Vor names minus the Vor prefix have roots in Earth names.
For example Arlberg, which is the name of an Austrian mountain range. On Barrayar it would result in Vorarlberg.
Vorlopoulos is clearly of Greek descent.

But some names are a concatenation of Vor plus, instead of a name, a concept in one of the European languages.

I have found nine Vor names having a conceptual meaning.

For one point, state 6 such names, their originating language and their corresponding meaning.

Each additional name above 6 (there might be more than nine) gains one half point.

BTW. Vorarlberg is the name of an Austrian federal state, but it does not appear in the saga, that I know.

[voralfred]

Barrayaran Vor names minus the Vor prefix have roots in Earth names.
For example Arlberg, which is the name of an Austrian mountain range. On Barrayar it would result in Vorarlberg.
Vorlopoulos is clearly of Greek descent.

But some names are a concatenation of Vor plus, instead of a name, a concept in one of the European languages.

I have found nine Vor names having a conceptual meaning.

For one point, state 6 such names, their originating language and their corresponding meaning.

Each additional name above 6 (there might be more than nine) gains one half point.

BTW. Vorarlberg is the name of an Austrian federal state, but it does not appear in the saga, that I know.

Fortunately I am an expert in obscure european languages. There are many more than 9 such words !

For the High Vor, LMB relied heavily on the Basque language:

barra: beggar
kosigan: coward
rutyer: private (as in : lowest rank of infantryman)


She used a lot of estonian too
patril: blind
bretten: deaf
halas: dumb
vane: cripple (and the spelling variant from the closely related finnish : vayne ; but this should just count as one answer)

But most come from the poorly known poldevian language, an almost lost language only spoken by now in some remote valleys in the heart of the Carpathians. Although not of the slavic family, as all linguists agree, the endings are often strongly influenced by neighboring slavic languages

tugalov : bread
robyev: meat
garin : fish
lynkin: berry (generic)
volynkin: blueberry
gorov : wine
pinski : beer
tashpula: potato

While we discuss almost dead languages, there is also one word in Old Frankish, a germanic language which is the ancestor of modern dutch and modern flemish . That was the language of Chlodowech whom we French call Clovis and consider as our first king; though he mostly spoke Old Frankish, he was trying to learn some french. One word he found really hard to remember was "vase", the Old Frankish word for which was "soisson" (Ekaterin's husband's name was Vorsoisson, if you remember)
So he was always repeating to himself
"Souviens-toi, "vase" c'est "soisson", souviens-toi, "vase" c'est "soisson"…"
and became famous for that. But this mnemotechnic sentence has been misinterpreted and gave rise to a totally apocryphical anecdote you can find in WIkipedia. And if the French page quotes the original sentence almost correctly, in addition to a different, completely ludicrous version, the english page only translates the latter, absurd, version.

By the way, the word for "vase", whether in modern dutch or in modern flemish, has no connection to the Old Frankish term "soisson", as EPS can certainly confirm.
Can't you, Francis?

[SPetty]

So what you're saying,voralfred, is that Miles's last name loosely translates to "thief coward." I'm not sure he'd like that.

Those are some interesting last names. If they were recently made up, I'd presume she'd just used the google translator (and didn't like her characters much, based on the meanings). However, this would be a little more difficult to do in the mid 80's. I'm not sure how many Poldevian/English dictionaries exist. Still, quite interesting. Thank you!

[voralfred]

Hey !
Isn't anyone trying to seriously answer EPS's question?
I thought it was obvious (also from the absence of reaction by EPS here, though he did allude to my frequent practical jokes there) that what I gave you was pure bullshit. It was all tongue-in-cheek, especially since (despite the presence of an Poldevian ambassador in the opium den "Le Lotus Bleu" in Tintin's eponymic adventure) there is no such thing as a poldevian country, people or language. An old practical joke agains french politicians.
The only true thing (that EPS could have acknowledged, at least) is that the word for "vase" in modern dutch or modern flemish is not related to "soisson".
(well it is also true that Clovis/Chlodowech's mother tongue was Old Frankish, a germanic language very loosely connected to modern dutch and modern flemish, spoken in his northern original area, around Tournai, and, really and truly, not at all connected to whatever romance language was evolving into French at that time in the much southern lands that he conquered and became king of).

[voralfred]

OK, so let me try my luck

German
Henri Vorvolk in one of the few Counts of Gregor's generation in Warrior. (Later, there will be more, as older Counts die of old age or are killed during wars)
Volk= people, nation
General Vorkraft is the name of Aral's ship in Shards, though we meet no actual person by that name
Kraft= strength

Dutch and/or flemish, I assume
Vorparadijs is the oldest of the Imperial Auditors in Memory and later books
Paradijs of course must mean Paradise, in some language or other. I know Dutch people with the combination "IJ" in theijr name, hence my assumptijon.

French
Vortalon is possibly only a fictional name, that of a heroic Captain in Nikki's favorite story (Komarr? Civil Campaign? I don't remember).
talon= heel
Vorbataille is, if I remember correctly, the arch-villain in Winterfair's Gifts
bataille= fight
I vaguely remember a Vorville, somewhere
ville= city, large town

If Vorville is correct, for the bonus (counts as one? two?)
The doublet Vorlakial (with Kanzian, the only person that Aral can name as a better strategist than himself in Shards) and Vorlakail whose death is one of the first problems to be thrown into Aral's lap in Barrayar even before he is officially Regent Elect, let alone Regent.
The meaning is "look-alike", in the two dialects of albanian (lakial in tosk, lakail in gheg)

[E Pericoloso Sporgersi]

I went looking for Vor names in this list.
There are eleven names in this list with a meaning in a more or less wide-spread European language (at first I said nine because I missed Vortalon and Vorlakial, and of course you need to drop the Vor prefix):

French:
Vorbataille - battle *
Vortalon - heel; spur *
Vorville - city; town *

German and Dutch:
Vorberg - mountain
Vorvolk - people; ethnic group *

German:
Vorbretten - plural of German brett = board (as in cutting board)
Vorkraft - force; power *

Dutch:
Vorparadijs - paradise *

English:
Vorlightly - antonym of heavily
Vorvane - part of a windmill or propeller

Albanian:
Vorlakial - look-alike *

As Voralfred gave us seven names (marked with * and I suspect Vorlakail is a typo), he wins 1.5 points and the next quote/question.

[voralfred]

Dear Francis
I can't believe it! After all the horseshit (to speak like Miles) I gave you about basque, estonian, poldevian and Old Frankish, you still trust me about albanian? Don't you realize that I am just addicted to teasing you? Sure there are two dialects, tosk and gheg, but this is about all I know about albanian! Certainly not the word for "look-alike" in a any of these languages. Well, I'll just remove my extra 1/2 point..
As for Vorlakail/Vorlakial, whether it was intended or a typo, I'll ask LMB in my next batch of translation-induced questions and will communicate the answer to the forum.
I'll think a bit, and post a new quote ASAP.

[voralfred]

"I wouldn't ask AAA BBB for the time of day. Nor would he give it to me." CCC1 brooded. "DDD would hint obliquely where I might find a chrono. You..." his metaphor extended itself, unbidden, "would give me a clock."
"If I had one, CCC2, I'd give you a clock factory," EEE sighed.

I think this one is pretty easy. You can answer by memory without having to find it.

Book?
AAA BBB means : first name surname of a character. You have to give both
CCC1 and CCC2 are two different ways to mean the same character; all I ask is an unambiguous designation of that character.
DDD is a single word, EEE is in fact two words but I won't give you more details. All I ask, for each of these characters, is an unambiguous designation.

BONUS:
One half sherlock if you give the exact terms for all of : CC1, CC2, DDD and EEE

Not more than 1/2 for the whole set, as it it too easy, it would be enough to find the exact place! Or if you have total recall..

[SPetty]

risi did this one in 2007. I was pretty sure it had been done before, so I did a search. Choose again.

And you got me on the fake name definitions. Then again, the only language other than English that I have more than a passing relation to is Russian, and I've forgotten most of the vocabulary, so unless you'd said something I remember (elephant, for example), I probably would have been taken in.

[voralfred]

risi did this one in 2007. I was pretty sure it had been done before, so I did a search. Choose again.
(...)

Sorry ! I should have checked. I did check this one :

XXX wouldn't allow him possession of a pocket-knife, let alone YYY.

XXX and YYY are not just single words but consist of several words each.

Book?
Speaker?
XXX?
"him"?
YYY?

[voralfred]

XXX wouldn't allow him possession of a pocket-knife, let alone YYY.

XXX and YYY are not just single words but consist of several words each.

Book?
Speaker?
XXX?
"him"?
YYY?

Oh, come on! It's easy!
I'll give you three hints, one of them a bonus:

Hint #1: XXX consists of three words: an article, an adjective and a noun.
Hint #2: YYY also consists of three words: an article and two nouns, but the first one acts almost as an adjective to the second one (not a saxon genitive, but a similar meaning)

Hint #3 and Bonus
There are two characters with the speaker. For 1/2 , name them

[E Pericoloso Sporgersi]

...
OK, here is my proposal: it is a problem of technology-related language, not technology per se.
After firearms became common, the verb "to fire" started to be used to mean "to shoot" even if the shooting was actually performed with an obsolete,old-technology weapon, bow, crossbow, spear-thrower, you-name-it, so it does not immediately shock us that Dag speaks of "firing" an arrow, since anyone might use this terminology now. But in TSK Universe, "firing" should not mean shooting.

I have recently seen the film Snow White and the Huntsman.

There are scenes during the attack of a castle when a platoon of archers shoots volleys of arrows, and a team operates a large mechanical sling hurling balls of fire at the attackers.
In both cases the commanding officers don't shout the command FIRE, they simply yell RELEASE.

The film writers/producers/directors must have read the posts about it.

An actor whose bow's string broke, muttered shoot, but I guess they edited that out.

[voralfred]

No answer yet?
A longer quote, then:

XXX wouldn't allow him possession of a pocket-knife, let alone YYY. And so, ZZZ, when you were finally forced to choose between two palpable evils and a WWW—you upped and ran after the WWW.

XXX and YYY are not just single words but consist of several words each.
ZZZ is another character
WWW is really an adjective but it is used here as a noun

Book ?
Speaker ?
XXX ?
"him" ?
YYY ?
ZZZ ?
WWW ?

Oh, come on! It's easy!
I'll give you three hints, one of them a bonus:

Hint #1: XXX consists of three words: an article, an adjective and a noun.
Hint #2: YYY also consists of three words: an article and two nouns, but the first one acts almost as an adjective to the second one (not a saxon genitive, but a similar meaning)

Hint #3 and Bonus
There are two characters with the speaker. For 1/2 , name them

Well, obviously, ZZZ is present. The bonus is now : name the other character present in this scene.

[voralfred]

(...)

BONUS(...)
Find other pairs of characters with the same characteristic, namely same first name and same last name.
I can think of two pairs, right now, but there might be more, and any such pair will give the finder a one half
(...)
But to get each half it is not enough to write "there are two characters called XXX YYY", you have to give an unambiguous indication of who each one of the pair is!
Warning: there are not two distinct characters called Arde Mayhew. The one who smuggled Cordelia out of Beta Colony and the one that Miles meets in "Warrior" are one and the same.

Suzette found a third pair, Count Aral Vorkosigan (late, as of Cryoburn) and young Aral Alexander, Miles eldest son ("second first" names do not interfere, only "first first names" and last names are relevant). But the two pairs I know of are still out there...

I'll give you hints: what I call a "character" need not be alive in any book of the Saga. But it has to be someone whose existence is not just inferred, but whom is actually discussed.
For instance, since Alys Vorpatril was presumably not brought in by a stork (I am not even sure there are storks on Barrayar) and was born before uterine replicator technology on Barrayar made possible to create people out of a batch of various genes, like Terrence Cee, with no actual parents (though this probably was the case already at that time in more advanced planets) one can infer she has parents. But these are not characters, they are not discussed anywhere, we don't even know Alys maiden name.
Contrariwise, Aral's elder brother, though killed during Mad Yuri's war and never actually appearing, is mentioned and discussed in several occasions. So he deserves to be called a "character", in my definition.

How does this bear on my Bonus ?

All four members of the two pairs I know of are characters, in my definition. However, not all need be alive in even one book of the Saga.

In addition, in the case of one of the pairs, there is a third person (not a character!), whose existence, (present or past) can be inferred in all certainty, and whose first name and last name presumably are/were the same as those shared by this pair of characters, according to what is known of Barrayar society, and in virtue of Ockham's razor, but this is not a formal proof.

Final hint: the other pair I know of also shares the same last name as the one with the third non-character "associate", though a different first name (two pairs plus an associate, not a quartet/almost quintet)
That should make it easy. There are not so many families we met a lot of members of... The Durona, of course, but that was the answer to the main question to which this bonus was originally related...

Oh, BTW, LMB speaks only tosk, not gheg. In other words, as EPS had supposed, there should have been only one "albanian" name, namely Vorlakial. Vorlakail was a misprint (unless it is the reverse, she speaks only gheg, and Vorlakial is the misprint?)

[E Pericoloso Sporgersi]

... I'll give you hints ... That should make it easy ...

My head hurts ...

Oh, BTW, LMB speaks only tosk, not gheg. ...

But does she eat gahg, do you think?

[voralfred]

... I'll give you hints ... That should make it easy ...

My head hurts ...

Considering you almost found one of the pairs for the old bonus (and, therefore, the last name in question) I am surprised....

Oh, BTW, LMB speaks only tosk, not gheg. ...

But does she eat gahg, do you think?

I understand this was meant as a joke, but the fact is, I can answer, and the answer is : NO
When I had the privilege to meet her, in Spain, we went to a restaurant together and had tapas. She ordered, among others, eel, expecting to have a slice of a sizable eel. But what they did serve, to her distress, was a dish of eel alevins (I found that this french word also exists in english, but is sounds rare: I mean baby eels) which looked, for all practical purposes, like smallish earthworm, and even more closely, to gagh. But she did not eat them...

[voralfred]

No answer yet?
A longer quote, then:

XXX wouldn't allow him possession of a pocket-knife, let alone YYY. And so, ZZZ, when you were finally forced to choose between two palpable evils and a WWW—you upped and ran after the WWW.

XXX and YYY are not just single words but consist of several words each.
ZZZ is another character
WWW is really an adjective but it is used here as a noun

Book ?
Speaker ?
XXX ?
"him" ?
YYY ?
ZZZ ?
WWW ?

Oh, come on! It's easy!
I'll give you three hints, one of them a bonus:

Hint #1: XXX consists of three words: an article, an adjective and a noun.
Hint #2: YYY also consists of three words: an article and two nouns, but the first one acts almost as an adjective to the second one (not a saxon genitive, but a similar meaning)

Hint #3 and Bonus
There are two characters with the speaker. For 1/2 , name them

Well, obviously, ZZZ is present. The bonus is now : name the other character present in this scene.

A precision, and a new hint:

- what I mean by

two nouns, but the first one acts almost as an adjective to the second one (not a saxon genitive, but a similar meaning)

something like:
water bottle, coffee pot, government building...

- WWW is "lunatic"

But now I rescind the bonus. To get just one full you have to answer all of the followings :

Book ?
Speaker ?
XXX (article, adjective, noun)?
"him" ?
YYY (article, noun, noun as in "coffee pot")?
ZZZ ?
and who else is present ?

XXX wouldn't allow him possession of a pocket-knife, let alone YYY. And so, ZZZ, when you were finally forced to choose between two palpable evils and a lunatic—you upped and ran after the lunatic.

Now if you are a bonus-hunter, there is my bonus about pairs of characters having the same "first first" name and last name ("second first" names, even different, don't interfere), I just realized that with my definition of a character as someone who is discussed, even without ever appearing in the flesh, as opposed has having an existence (past or present) that can be inferred (for instance, the mother of any character, if she is never ever discussed - which is the case for more than 95% of all characters' mothers), I just thought of yet a third pair. Though the first name of one of them is not mentioned, and can only be presumed, not ascertained, I will accept this pair, because both members of the pair are indeed characters in my definition. Granted, in the case of one of the member of this pair, there are just two discussions, in the same book; but the character is mentioned at least twice in each occasion. But, well, mentioned more than four times, in two separate chapters, this is way enough to be deemed a character. The last name differs from the two other pairs I know of.
And besides these three pairs, there might be more that I am not aware of, so this might be a real gold mine for bounty bonus hunters..

[voralfred]

No answer yet?
A longer quote, then:

XXX wouldn't allow him possession of a pocket-knife, let alone YYY. And so, ZZZ, when you were finally forced to choose between two palpable evils and a WWW—you upped and ran after the WWW.

XXX and YYY are not just single words but consist of several words each.
ZZZ is another character
WWW is really an adjective but it is used here as a noun

Book ?
Speaker ?
XXX ?
"him" ?
YYY ?
ZZZ ?
WWW ?

Oh, come on! It's easy!
I'll give you three hints, one of them a bonus:

Hint #1: XXX consists of three words: an article, an adjective and a noun.
Hint #2: YYY also consists of three words: an article and two nouns, but the first one acts almost as an adjective to the second one (not a saxon genitive, but a similar meaning)

Hint #3 and Bonus
There are two characters with the speaker. For 1/2 , name them

Well, obviously, ZZZ is present. The bonus is now : name the other character present in this scene.

A precision, and a new hint:

- what I mean by

two nouns, but the first one acts almost as an adjective to the second one (not a saxon genitive, but a similar meaning)

something like:
water bottle, coffee pot, government building...

- WWW is "lunatic"

But now I rescind the bonus. To get just one full you have to answer all of the followings :

Book ?
Speaker ?
XXX (article, adjective, noun)?
"him" ?
YYY (article, noun, noun as in "coffee pot")?
ZZZ ?
and who else is present ?

XXX wouldn't allow him possession of a pocket-knife, let alone YYY . And so, ZZZ, when you were finally forced to choose between two palpable evils and a lunatic—you upped and ran after the lunatic.

(...)

Still longer :

XXX (article, adjective, noun) wouldn't allow him possession of a pocket-knife, let alone YYY (article, noun, nous, as in "coffee pot, water bottle, government building). And so, ZZZ, when you were finally forced to choose between two palpable evils and a lunatic—you upped and ran after the lunatic.
"I think AAA does very well," objected BBB CCC.
"Agh." DDD EEE buried FFF face in FFF hands, briefly. "Love, we are discussing...

AAA is the same as "him"
BBB CCC is a two-word expression representing the third person present (whom you must also name)
DDD EEE is a two-word expression representing the first speaker

On purpose, I did not hide the way the first speaker addresses the third person present. This indication of their relationship should be a very strong hint!
FFF is a possessive: his/her/its, according to the gender of DDD EEE.

Book ?
First speaker, i.e. BBB CCC ? That would include the gender for FFF, and any unambiguous characterization would do ?
XXX ?
"him"= AAA ?
YYY ?
ZZZ ?
DDD EEE ? Any unambiguous characterization would do

[E Pericoloso Sporgersi]

...
Now if you are a bonus-hunter, there is my bonus about pairs of characters having the same "first first" name and last name ("second first" names, even different, don't interfere), I just realized that with my definition of a character as someone who is discussed, even without ever appearing in the flesh, as opposed has having an existence (past or present) that can be inferred (for instance, the mother of any character, if she is never ever discussed - which is the case for more than 95% of all characters' mothers), I just thought of yet a third pair. Though the first name of one of them is not mentioned, and can only be presumed, not ascertained, I will accept this pair, because both members of the pair are indeed characters in my definition. Granted, in the case of one of the member of this pair, there are just two discussions, in the same book; but the character is mentioned at least twice in each occasion. But, well, mentioned more than four times, in two separate chapters, this is way enough to be deemed a character. The last name differs from the two other pairs I know of.
And besides these three pairs, there might be more that I am not aware of, so this might be a real gold mine for bounty bonus hunters..

Good grief, the hoops you have to jump through for a measly half titbit. Not to mention the headache ...

Finally Voralfred's convoluted hints were fruitful and I thought of another pair of same-name characters:

Donna/Dono Vorrutyer's brother Count Pierre Vorrutyer and their ancestor Count Pierre "Le Sanguinaire" Vorrutyer.

Maybe I'll manage to get some sleep now ...