The Gang of Five
The Land Before Time => General Land Before Time => Topic started by: Malte279 on September 07, 2005, 04:04:34 AM
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Hi!
I have a question to all the native English speakers here. The Great Valley of course is the place where Littlefoot and the others live; the work "great" however is ambiguous. It could either mean great in the sense of "very large" or it could be great in the sense of "outstanding quality". When you hear "Great Valley" in the movies, which of the two meanings of great do you understand to be meant?
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it Could be either, but I usually interprt it to mean "very large"
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Then the translation is correct. In the German version of LBT the Great Valley is named "Das Gro?e Tal" which means "The large (Great) Valley" without any other connotation. I was just wondering as I could well imagine some dinosaur creating the name by stating what a great place this valley is to live in.
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No problem Malte. the Definition of 'Great' depends on the context its put in.
For example, My Dog is great' means that i think my dog is a wonderful animal.
On the Other hand "i went to the great Salt Lake" means I saw a really big salty lake.
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Here in the Netherlands th movie is called: De Groene Vallei and the translation is The Green valley, which is noy the right dutch title in literly
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Actually I think its a double pun: "great" as in large, and "great" as in plentiful.
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In other words , its MEANT to be ambigous...
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It's the Large High Quality Valley! LOL!
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I don't find anything remotely vague about the term concerning the word "great" in "The Great Valley". The place is HUGE, it's green, lush, and plentiful, and it's a very nice place to live. Unless you're hoping for a Cable TV hook-up: it's the addeal place to live in peace and harmony (assuming that Daddy Tops and Cera don't get in your face all the time :rolleyes: ).
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I'm happy that there isn't this ambiguity which I suspected there. Not only does the consensus about the meaning of Great as large confirm the translation they used in the German movies, but it also suits my own purpose to describe (like you just did WR ;) ) The Great Valley as a HUGE place not really thoroughly known to any of the dinosaurs living there. I began to write my next fanfiction, in which this will be one element, the day before yesterday.
I have yet another question. What is the difference between the words "Great" and "Grand" if used to describe size? I have some ideas what might be the difference, but I will not write them down here not to influence any of the answers I hope to get.
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Oh boy, I'm a native Englsh speaker, and that's not an easy question. Actually, by all technicalities, there is not much difference in the two words at base, but one is used much more loosely than the other.
Great: can be referring to the large size of something, the best quality of something, the appeal qualities of something, or it can be a reference as to how much a person is enjoying his or herself (example: "this waterslide is great!"). And the word "great" is much more likely to acompany slang terms.
Grand: in general, is a word that's used much more tightly, and you will not find people sayig it nearly as often as "great". It's a reference to something that possesses all the above possibilities of "great" all at once, and it usually has something very "proper" and "classy" about it as well.
When it comes to size: "Great" means huge, "grand" means "uncomparable", because whatever it is, it's one of the biggest, if no the biggest.
In general: it's up to the individual to decide what is "great" and what is "grand".
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grand is defined as 'impressive in size , appearance or general effect' an example would be the Grand Canyon in Arizona. Great is 'unusually or comparively large in size or dimensions' Kenji is correct great is more commonly used and grand is sometimes confused with great, athough there are distinctions between them. I would use grand to describe the expanse of the area the feeling of seeing the expanse of the area.
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^ What he said. ;) Probably couldn't describe it any better.
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I assume it means both. The Great Valley has been shown as being both very large and of outstanding quality.
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It's the ideal place to live in peace and harmony (assuming that Daddy Tops and Cera don't get in your face all the time :rolleyes: ).
Agreed. :lol
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"Great" in this sense probably means "large" or "big."
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The Great Valley is large and nice, but I tend to think of it meaning large, myself, because it's just that -- large.
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I assumed it meant both that it is large, enough room for a heard of far walkers like Longnecks to visit for a while, and also that it has a lot of green food and water as well.
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I assumed it meant both that it is large, enough room for a heard of far walkers like Longnecks to visit for a while, and also that it has a lot of green food and water as well.
This is probably the case. :)
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Well, I think it's great because it's BIG. Isn't it? In fact they translate the Great Valley in Spanish to "El Gran Valle"
Gran, translated to English, means something big, enormous. But I think it's "great" to live there. :lol
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I think the "Great" in Great Valley means...well, great in every sense of the phrase.
On the other hand (tangent), in LBT 6, Doc said that there were other valleys just as nice as the Great Valley, but if so, why haven't we seen any of them? I know they would probably look pretty similar, but I do find myself wondering what the rest of the LBT world looks like, aside from the Mysterious Beyond...then again I haven't watched any Land Before Time movies for quite some time now, so I may be forgetting something.
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That could be where some far walkers walk from, between 2-3 other valleys and places like the great valley. We could get a glimpse from either Doc, Bron, or Ali talking to the gang about some of the places they visit besides there, as a flashback.
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Why would a farwalker go from one "great" valley with lots of food to another? It makes at least some sense for farwalkers to go from one small spot of food in a barren area to another (thus "farwalking"), but going from one lush place like that to another makes no sense at all.