De todo y de todos

[laepelba]

I'm not sure if this is the right forum for this question, but I'll try. I'm reading an article that has the following sentence:

"Claro, no sabemos de él porque es un ciudadano originario de Islandia, un país con un poco más de 300,000 habitantes y ubicado muy lejos de todo y de todos."

I understand the whole sentence, except for the last part, which I have bolded. The context is an article about the arrest of a group of Icelandic men who were recently arrested in London on charges of bank fraud. The author is Argentine, writing for a Latin American audience.

Any help with that phrase is greatly appreciated!

[Perikles]

Originally Posted by laepelba

muy lejos de todo y de todos.

Surely, that just means "very far from everything and everybody".

i.e. in the middle of nowhere.

[irmamar]

Originally Posted by Perikles

Surely, that just means "very far from everything and everybody".

i.e. in the middle of nowhere.

Yes, it does.

[aleCcowaN]

Nueva Zelandia está muy lejos de todo, pero no está muy lejos de todos.
Albania no está muy lejos de todo, pero está bastante lejos de todos.

[Luna Azul]

Todo = everything

Todos =everybody (for males and females)

Todas = everybody (for females)

Todos/as = all (plural) All the books.

Todo-toda is also used as whole: the whole class = toda la clase

[laepelba]

Originally Posted by aleCcowaN

Nueva Zelandia está muy lejos de todo, pero no está muy lejos de todos.
Albania no está muy lejos de todo, pero está bastante lejos de todos.

Sorry I'm just getting back to this ... it's been a heck of a week....

Anyway - I get what Luna said that todo=everything and todos=everybody ... but I don't get what you're saying here, Alec....

[aleCcowaN]

Originally Posted by laepelba

Sorry I'm just getting back to this ... it's been a heck of a week....

Anyway - I get what Luna said that todo=everything and todos=everybody ... but I don't get what you're saying here, Alec....

The literal translation is right ("everything" and "everybody") but the sentence wasn't said to be read at its literal value. Think about why the author needs to state Iceland is far from everything AND everybody. "Lejos de todo" means figuratively being away from main centres and main routes, sort of an outskirt of human activities. "Lejos de todos" means nobody feels specially linked to it and deeply cares about it (Surely people of the Faeroes does; maybe even Norwegians and Danish, but on a global scale it doesn't mean so much). "Lejos de todo" implies space and "lejos te todos" implies interest and attachment.

[laepelba]

No, I guess I meant that I didn't understand your comment about Albania being "lejos de todos". If you mean that no one feels especially linked to it, I'm not sure if that's merely your perception, or if you have a particular issue with Albania...... ????

[aleCcowaN]

I'm sure everybody wait with expectation the latest developments and news about Albania, which probably takes dozens of square inches in your local newspaper every single day.