Learn English – the meaning of “-er-” in sentence

meaningpunctuation

I am reading a book in which I see this fragment:

. . . but he has —er— ideas what ideas . . .

What is the meaning of —er— in this sentence?

And what is the that appears before and after some of those words?

Best Answer

The -er- has the hyphen (-) around it to show the break in the speaker's words. They stop saying anything that has meaning for a moment, but they are thinking about what they will say to continue the thought.

It means they are stuck for the moment, but are going to continue the sentence as soon as they decide what to say next.