Overuse of the word “the” in “Macbeth” • Hacker News Board

Re: Overuse of the word “the” in “Macbeth”

#31

Post by retrac » Sat, Aug 28, 2021, 1:27 AM UTC

lupire wrote: post #8

karolisd wrote: post #7

I'd wager the use of "the" is mostly about making the meter work and having the iambic pentameter sound the way he wanted it to. This isn't a data science question. Especially if the data science is blind to meter and to phonetics.

why "the" but not "a"? Same meter. But I agree it's silly that say "the" is what makes Macbeth creepy, and not, you know, the occult theme that permeates it.

Stressed "the" and unstressed "the" have different implications for meter. (And meaning.) "The" has two pronunciations in English. "Thee" and "thuh". The former is stressed, the latter not. While part of it follows the same pattern as a/an governed by by the initial sound, some of the rules are complicated. "Thee" is also used for emphasis as a demonstrative.

"Give me thuh cat toy." (Some ordinary toy.)

"Give me thee cat toy." (The one with special powers.)

Re: Overuse of the word “the” in “Macbeth”

#32

Post by michaelmrose » Sat, Aug 28, 2021, 1:29 AM UTC

gerdesj wrote: post #25

shakna wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The backtick? That's generally the non-shift character on the "tilde key", generally right under the escape key. It's on most physical keyboards.

Where do I find these things: “” I use a en_GB keyboard and I have a very broad mind 8) I think I know where 66 and 99 come from.

If you have an Apple keyboard it ought to be left of the letter z.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_and_American_keyboards

Re: Overuse of the word “the” in “Macbeth”

#33

Post by alisonkisk » Sat, Aug 28, 2021, 1:59 AM UTC

retrac wrote: post #31

lupire wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

why "the" but not "a"? Same meter. But I agree it's silly that say "the" is what makes Macbeth creepy, and not, you know, the occult theme that permeates it.

Stressed "the" and unstressed "the" have different implications for meter. (And meaning.) "The" has two pronunciations in English. "Thee" and "thuh". The former is stressed, the latter not. While part of it follows the same pattern as a/an governed by by the initial sound, some of the rules are complicated. "Thee" is also used for emphasis as a demonstrative. "Give me thuh cat toy." (Some ordinary toy.) "Give me thee…

Sure, but the article doesn't attempt to classify the stress, and the stress is often flexed as a convenience to help the meter or to avoid hard -to-pronounce double vowels, not to change emphasis.

"I don't what that one; I want thee other one. Thuh yellow one, not thee orange one."

Re: Overuse of the word “the” in “Macbeth”

#34

Post by alisonkisk » Sat, Aug 28, 2021, 2:05 AM UTC

jwmhjwmh wrote: post #27

allturtles wrote: post #4

I think this is just the way Shakespeare wrote, not anything specific to Macbeth's 'creepiness.' I was able to quickly find a similar example in Julius Caesar: "Then he offered it to him again; then he put it by again; but, to my thinking, he was very loath to lay his fingers off it. And then he offered it the third time; he put it the third time by;" Or Much Ado About Nothing: "I have the toothache." It is not surpr…

Similar to the second quote, English speakers nowadays (at least where I live) say things like "I have the flu." In this phrase, I believe "the flu" refers to the ailment in general as opposed to what affects the speaker in particular. Maybe this is also the case with your second quote?

I have the coronavirus. I have Covid.

I have a headache and a toothache.

I have a cold and a fever. I have yellow fever.

I have a cough. I have whopping cough.

I have the flu.

I have the chicken pox, smallpox, the measles, and the mumps. I have rabies.

Re: Overuse of the word “the” in “Macbeth”

#35

Post by alisonkisk » Sat, Aug 28, 2021, 2:09 AM UTC

Zanni wrote: post #29

SeanLuke wrote: post #26

Did they bother analyzing the rest of the Shakespeare canon to see how often "the" appeared? The article doesn't say.

Yeah, that's the chart in the middle of the article of the log likelihood of each word. The higher that score, the more a word is used in Macbeth relative to the rest of his plays. However ... the author blips right over the fact that "our" and "she"--two very common words--both have a higher log likelihood than "the".

[flagged]

Re: Overuse of the word “the” in “Macbeth”

#36

Post by galaxyLogic » Sat, Aug 28, 2021, 2:58 AM UTC

allturtles wrote: post #4

I think this is just the way Shakespeare wrote, not anything specific to Macbeth's 'creepiness.' I was able to quickly find a similar example in Julius Caesar: "Then he offered it to him again; then he put it by again; but, to my thinking, he was very loath to lay his fingers off it. And then he offered it the third time; he put it the third time by;" Or Much Ado About Nothing: "I have the toothache." It is not surpr…

But isn't the article saying that Macbeth uses the word "the" more frequently than other plays by Shakespeare? In other words it is not the way Shakespeare typically wrote, and that difference gives the play a peculiar flavor

Re: Overuse of the word “the” in “Macbeth”

#37

Post by sandworm101 » Sat, Aug 28, 2021, 3:48 AM UTC

This analysis appears to be of the modern shakespear text. That can differ from "first folio" versions closest to what was actually performed. The modern text has been sanitized, the poetry cleaned up. I wouldnt dig too deep into specific word counts as they are likely more a result of later rewordings. An extra the here or there may have been added by publishers to perfect the meter. That happens sometimes when a play for the stage starts being sold as a poem to be read in drawing rooms.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Folio

Re: Overuse of the word “the” in “Macbeth”

#38

Post by pvg » Sat, Aug 28, 2021, 4:17 AM UTC

sandworm101 wrote: post #37

This analysis appears to be of the modern shakespear text. That can differ from "first folio" versions closest to what was actually performed. The modern text has been sanitized, the poetry cleaned up. I wouldnt dig too deep into specific word counts as they are likely more a result of later rewordings. An extra the here or there may have been added by publishers to perfect the meter. That happens sometimes when a pl…

The First Folio is the only surviving source of the text and more importantly minor edits aren't going to change statistical properties of text much at the counts-of-the-definite-article level.

Re: Overuse of the word “the” in “Macbeth”

#39

Post by dang » Sat, Aug 28, 2021, 4:36 AM UTC

alisonkisk wrote: post #35

Zanni wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, that's the chart in the middle of the article of the log likelihood of each word. The higher that score, the more a word is used in Macbeth relative to the rest of his plays. However ... the author blips right over the fact that "our" and "she"--two very common words--both have a higher log likelihood than "the".

[flagged]

We've banned this account for trolling.

Please don't create accounts to break HN's guidelines with.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: Overuse of the word “the” in “Macbeth”

#40

Post by porknubbins » Sat, Aug 28, 2021, 5:11 AM UTC

dylan604 wrote: post #22

allturtles wrote: post #4

I think this is just the way Shakespeare wrote, not anything specific to Macbeth's 'creepiness.' I was able to quickly find a similar example in Julius Caesar: "Then he offered it to him again; then he put it by again; but, to my thinking, he was very loath to lay his fingers off it. And then he offered it the third time; he put it the third time by;" Or Much Ado About Nothing: "I have the toothache." It is not surpr…

I've heard the phrase "I've got the cancer". As if there's only one cancer to get, and everyone will know of it. Then again, the English say "I'm going to hospital" where an American would say "I'm going to the hospital", so maybe the Bard used up all of the (how do you pluralize the??) so that the English use it less? At least the TFA author might theorize as such.

As a US English speaker "I'm going to hospital" sounds a little bit off in that British English excessively sophisticated way. But then I realized that most of the time if you're sick the main thing is you're going to the institution to get treatment, not trying to specify which location you are going to. Its almost like if we went around saying "I go to the school" or "I'm in the college" which sounds pretty dumb.