It is a misconception that the Village is a nameless place, after all when the Prisoner asks the waitress the name of the place where he is, the waitress tells him The Village. Sometimes The Village is referred to as 'here,' 'in this place,' described as an 'international community." But there can be no doubt as to the village's name, The Village.
BCNU
Quite right so! Strange, you are the first Brit I know of to tell about this fact. "The Village" (usually with a capitalised "v") is the proper name of the village. However, maybe it's because our, the German version goes a slightly different way that makes this more obvious. Dubbing director Brinkmann chose not to translate the word "village" into its German equivalent „Dorf“. I cannot go into linguistic details here. But there has been much debate about why he did so and that, after all, he was right to do so. „Dorf“ wouldn’t be considered a real lingustic transfer of meaning. So, with no German name for this location, it becomes clear that the English „the Village“ is the proper name.
ReplyDeleteMind you, the prologue sequence thus changes rather drastically from „Where am I? In the Village.“ to „Where am I? You are here.“ Or: „Sie sind da.“ Which can be taken for not just „You are here“ but „You exist.“ – BCNU!
Hello Arno,
DeleteIt has always seemed logical to give the Village the capitalised "V" seeing as that is the Village's name, I should probably give it a capital "T" The Village.
Thank you for your descriptive comment regarding the German version. As you know I'm always intersted in reading how other television companies treat 'the Prisoner,' and I'm sure other readers of my blog will also find your description interesting. I think "You are here" but "You exist" could be tasken for "You are Village" which is how Two sees Six in THEPRIS6NER!
We have not shared emails for a while, and yet there have been some interesting comments between us. However I shall be in touch by email a little later today.
Very kind regards
David
BCNU