Grammar – Analyzing Sentence Structure from Sherlock Holmes: Count Dracula and Ebenezer Scrooge

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Here are two adjacent sentences from Sherlock Holmes

  1. Few fictional characters have taken on a life of their own outside the pages of their stories the way Sherlock Holmes has.

  2. Count Dracula and Ebenezer Scrooge come to mind, and each conforms …

Can anyone explain the meaning of the first and the grammar in the second?

The first sentence

I would try to rephrase the first one in this way, please correct me, if I am wrong:

There are (almost) no characters that tried (?) to live lives (what "of their own" adds here? Is not it a tautology?). And then I cannot understand how fictional characters could live lives "outside the pages of their stories"?

The second sentence

In the second sentence:

Count Dracula and Ebenezer Scrooge come to mind, and each conforms …

the most difficult thing is subject – presumably it is "Count Dracula and Ebenezer Scrooge", but in which sense "count" is used here? Is it noun or verb? It ought to be a noun, but as far as understand, as a noun it requires the preposition "of" afterwards – as in "Hold your breath for a count of ten., He was charged with two counts of theft."

Best Answer

To understand this consider a shorter sentence

Dracula has taken on a life outside the pages of his story.

The "story" here is "Dracula", a novel by Bram Stoker. But many people use "Dracula" and know the character "Count Dracula" even if they have never read the novel. The character is used in many other stories, films, some have very little connection to the original novel. For example "Hotel Transylvania" is a film with "Dracula". This is what it means for a character to "live outside the pages of their story": They are used as a character in other stories.

Similarly Sherlock Holmes and Ebeneezer Scrooge are well-known characters, and even people who have never read their original books know the characters.

There are almost no fictional characters that are as well-known from stories other than their original novels as Sherlock Holmes.

"Count" is a title, it is a noble title equivalent to "Earl" (ranking just below "Duke" and above "viscount" and "baron"). In the original story, the vampire was a member of the Transylvanian nobility.

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