old jungle saying
English translation: it's a joke
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| 05:22 May 5, 2019 |
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| English language (monolingual) [PRO] Art/Literary - Poetry & Literature / Fiction | |||||
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|  Selected response from: Charles Davis Spain Local time: 07:39 | ||||
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| SUMMARY OF ALL EXPLANATIONS PROVIDED | ||||
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| 4 +6 | it's a joke |
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| 4 +1 | piece of wisdom passed down through the ages |
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| 4 | we who live in the "urban jungle" of criminals already know that for ages |
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| Summary of reference entries provided | |||
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| "Confucius say:" |
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Answers
2 hrs confidence: 
peer agreement (net): +1
peer agreement (net): +1piece of wisdom passed down through the ages Explanation: When you say that something is an old "X" saying, it means that it is a piece of wisdom that has been passed down through the ages in that particular environment. For example, an old "army" saying is: "The more you sweat in peace, the less you bleed in war." So, here, this is a piece of wisdom that has been passed down throughout the ages in the jungle, presumably from one animal to another (although that is obviously meant to be humorous). -------------------------------------------------- Note added at 2 hrs (2019-05-05 07:28:16 GMT) -------------------------------------------------- Note: You said that the conversation was between two detectives, so I am not sure what "Deer" was supposed to mean. If Deer is a man, then I guess this is the "urban" jungle as noted by philgoddard above. I wasn't paying attention to that part at the beginning. |
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3 hrs confidence:
we who live in the "urban jungle" of criminals already know that for ages Explanation: I would see it more in the sense of: in the "jungle" of criminals we have to deal with all the time it's a well accepted wisdom / it's a common, well known fact. So to me it sounds more like a confirmation, another way of saying "of course, that's what we - the men dealing with the criminal jungle - would do naturally" |
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53 mins confidence: peer agreement (net): +6
peer agreement (net): +6it's a joke Explanation: That is, a joke on Deer's part, if he realises this is not an "Old Jungle Saying", and a joke on the author's part, at Deer's expense, if Deer thinks it is. As you say, this is very similar to something Einstein once wrote (in a letter in 1949): "A new idea comes suddenly and in a rather intuitive way, but intuition is nothing but the outcome of earlier intellectual experience.” https://books.google.es/books?id=aAJoBAAAQBAJ&pg=PT28#v=onep... "Old Jungle Saying" refers to the "Phantom" comic books in this same era (1940s). For example, "When the Phantom moves, lightning stands still." http://www.phantomwiki.org/Old_Jungle_Sayings So Old Jungle Sayings are maxims, meant to sound profound and portentous, but actually a bit pretentious. If Deer really thinks this Einstein quotation is one of them, he must be a bit stupid. But I think it's likely that he's being deliberately ironic and making a deadpan joke ("tonelessly"), suggesting that the Einstein quotation sounds like one of the solemn statements from a comic book. I don't think there's anything more to it than that. -------------------------------------------------- Note added at 57 mins (2019-05-05 06:19:16 GMT) -------------------------------------------------- It's quite likely, I think, that Deer is mocking his colleague here for being pretentious, using a quotation from Einstein about something much more ordinary and less profound than advanced physics. He would be saying, in effect, "you sound like something out of comic book". -------------------------------------------------- Note added at 1 hr (2019-05-05 06:45:25 GMT) -------------------------------------------------- Phil could be right; Deer could simply be saying "this is a truth well known to those familiar with the urban jungle", but if so, I think it must be ironic and intended as a joke in any case. It's a quaint comment to make if it doesn't refer to the Phantom. The author (the Swedish novelist Arne Dahl) must be aware that this is a quotation from Einstein, and in the circumstances quoting Einstein does seem a bit self-important a faintly ridiculous (I would say). -------------------------------------------------- Note added at 2 hrs (2019-05-05 08:00:17 GMT) -------------------------------------------------- As Björn has established, the word in the original Swedish version of the novel is "djungelordspråk": https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=w1IGCwAAQBAJ&pg=PT46&dq=... And this is exactly the word used for the "Old Jungle Sayings" in the Swedish version of "The Phantom" (see Björn's second source). It literally means "jungle proverb"; the translator's use of the precise expression from the original "Phantom" strongly suggests that the allusion is deliberate. -------------------------------------------------- Note added at 3 hrs (2019-05-05 08:31:21 GMT) -------------------------------------------------- Here's a Swedish press article about Arne Dahl's next book, "Inland". The writer talks about the detective characters in both books being a bit caricatured, like cartoon characters, or Indiana Jones and Lara Croft, and then writes: "När jag var liten pojke hade jag en nära relation med Fantomen" Which means (according to Google Translate): "When I was a little boy, I had a close relationship with the Phantom." This is not proof, but it does show that the Phantom was popular in Sweden and that an association between it and these characters has occurred to the writer of the article. www.kristianstadsbladet.se/kultur-o-noje/dahl-skriver-som-i... -------------------------------------------------- Note added at 3 hrs (2019-05-05 08:38:56 GMT) -------------------------------------------------- By the way, Deer is a woman, Désirée Rosenkvist, Sam Berger's former colleague. -------------------------------------------------- Note added at 5 hrs (2019-05-05 10:22:19 GMT) -------------------------------------------------- I don't know whether the original Phantom comics ever reached Japan, but maybe you could find an equivalent in the world of more modern Japanese manga: some hero associated with wise sayings. -------------------------------------------------- Note added at 21 hrs (2019-05-06 02:42:20 GMT) -------------------------------------------------- It seems that The Phantom/Fantomen is still popular in Sweden. It is still being published. Here is a news story from 2016, announcing that there are plans for the new Phantom (in the series) to be a woman: "The Swedish version of long-running comic strip The Phantom could be poised to break new ground by backing a woman to become the next full-time incarnation of the eponymous hero." It also says that since the 1960s Sweden has produced its own version of The Phantom, derived from the American one but with an independent timeline in the story. https://www.thelocal.se/20160805/is-sweden-about-to-make-thi... |
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