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Vsuresh Posted 12 years ago
Vocabulary
Meaning
Hi
Please tell me what the underlined words means.
Context: From the play Riders to the Sea by John Millington Synge- It seems the mother does not that her son is dead in the sea.
MAURYA (The mother): There does be a power of young men floating round in the sea, and what way would they know if it was Michael they had, or another man like him, for when a man is nine days in the sea, and the wind blowing, it's hard set his own mother would be to say what man was it.
Please tell me what the underlined words means.
Context: From the play Riders to the Sea by John Millington Synge- It seems the mother does not that her son is dead in the sea.
MAURYA (The mother): There does be a power of young men floating round in the sea, and what way would they know if it was Michael they had, or another man like him, for when a man is nine days in the sea, and the wind blowing, it's hard set his own mother would be to say what man was it.
Top answer
because when a man has been in the sea for nine days, with the wind blowing, even his own mother would find it hard to identify him. Actually, I am not myself familiar with the expression "hard set", but that's what it must mean. It may be an Irish expression since the play is set there.
- because when a man has been in the sea for nine days, with the wind blowing, even his own mother would find it hard to identify him.
- Actually, I am not myself familiar with the expression "hard set", but that's what it must mean.
- It may be an Irish expression since the play is set there.
- The dialogue seems to incorporate various dialect words and expressions.
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5 Answers
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... because when a man has been in the sea for nine days, with the wind blowing, even his own mother would find it hard to identify him.
Actually, I am not myself familiar with the expression "hard set", but that's what it must mean. It may be an Irish expression since the play is set there. The dialogue seems to incorporate various dialect words and expressions.
Actually, I am not myself familiar with the expression "hard set", but that's what it must mean. It may be an Irish expression since the play is set there. The dialogue seems to incorporate various dialect words and expressions.
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I interpret this differently. The key line in this passage is "There does be a power of young men floating round in the sea". What the mom is saying here is that when a young man is dead and floating in the sea, there is a kind of supernatural power that enables his mother to see that he's dead. She knows he's dead, and in the rest of the passage - "and what way would they...to say what man was
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I would not interpret this to be talking about a supernatural power. I would take a power of young men to mean a lot of young men. I agree with GPY's interpretation of the last part of the passage.
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