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[–] 24 points 3 weeks ago (21 children)

For me, the problem with "Rocinante" is I don't know how to pronounce it. So, while reading, I'd skip past it, recognizing that it's the horse, but not parsing it as a word.

If asked that question, I'd need to explain that, but I'd stumble over the word.

If a book has too many oddly (to me) spelled names, I'll skip it for this reason. Apostrophes in the middle and no vowels, and I'm not going to read your book.

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  • [–] 9 points 3 weeks ago (17 children)

    Ro Cin An Te

    Roh sin ahn the

    Rocinante

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  • [–] 14 points 3 weeks ago (9 children)

    Why would you make it a 'th' at the end??

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  • [–] 1 point 3 weeks ago (6 children)

    The weird 'th' handling of 'c' isn't just a Catalan thing? Is that all of Spain? I know I'm biased as a North American, but preference for Mexican Spanish.

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  • [–] 2 points 3 weeks ago (1 child)

    I have no idea about 'c' becoming 'th'. I was referring to the 't' at the end that the above comment made 'the' when breaking it down, which they have mentioned in a reply was an auto-correct error.

    The Spanish I know is not generally NA influenced.

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  • [–] -1 points 3 weeks ago (4 children)

    Thin, not sin.

    Ro as in rod. Thin as in, well, thin. An as in ant. Te as in tent.

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  • [–] 2 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

    So you are saying it's raa - thin - an - teh??

    That's wild... I'm convinced you are not pronouncing 'ant' or 'tent' "correctly" for those to be your suggestions...

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  • [–] 1 point 3 weeks ago*

    Hm... Ro as in Ross..? The rest is the correct pronunciation, yes.

    Maybe, I don't know... an as in anvil and te as in tenant..? English, being several unrelated languages in a trenchcoat, can be a bit weird, and pronunciation varies excessively with dialects...

    The vowels in Castilian (aka Spanish outside of Spain and other Castilian speaking countries) are very simple, five vowels, five sounds, pronounced more or less as they would have been in Latin.

    C is pronounced like a k or a hard z, never as an s (except in some dialects).

    Rocinante. From rocín and antes, for he was a rocín (old horse) before being Quijote's steed (also during, but the old man wasn't all there).

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  • [–] 2 points 3 weeks ago*

    For me, the problem with “Rocinante” is I don’t know how to pronounce it.

    If you're using a European language, you're pronouncing it correctly, or close enough.

    If your only contact with English is the written word, I guess it depends on what languages you're familiar with. If you're using AI / translation software, just ask it to read it to you. Maybe it'll get it right. Or not. Who can tell with those things.

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