What is a Yemen?

I think many people refer to it as "The Yemen", it's not just this film. Silly, I know. Again, similar to like you said "the Ukraine", "The Netherlands" or "the Bahamas". It doesn't make sense, but people do it.

(not saying it's right, just people do it)

Sybran - stop being stupid and go 'inconspicuously through the window'

It is THE YEMEN throughout Paul Torday's book. Nuff said

Do you also get really riled up when people say 'The United States'?

Otterprods, to keep those aquatic Mustelidae in line.

Until 1990 there were two countries North and South Yemen, it became common to use the word THE to refer to area occupied by both countries. Since they are now one country it is now not necessary but the precedent has been set.

Nor would you ever say "in the United States."

I've never heard anyone calling it "the Yemen". However, "the" is usually used with plural (the Bahamas, the United States), so I don't really see why they'd put "the Yemen", but maybe they were trying to sound more literal like you guys mentioned.

I suppose the people who live there would say otherwise. I don't think its a big deal. If it took place in the Netherlands, you wouldn't way Slamon Fishing in Netherlands.

"It's grammatically okay as it's not really an important country"

That's as subjective as saying green isn't an important color.

Hey! I'm from 'the Yemen' . It's a beautiful country with lots of history. For example, the famous queen of sheba was Yemeni, and the first ever skyscraper was built there and still stands today,even though it's over a thousand years old. Just because it's not part of the western world, doesn't mean it's not important.

In English, we also say the Netherlands. Also, we also say "the Sudan".

The reason "the" is used to make the proper noun definitive is because of an area being historically called something before the formation of the state. For example, we call the largest desert "the Sahara" and the largest forest as "the Amazon". We use the definitive "the" before these proper nouns because they describe geographical regions. Similarly, Yemen the nation has historically been considered as Yemen the region.

English is considered a thieves' den, a robbers' cave. This is because almost every word in English finds a counterpart - which is usually its source - in some other language.

"The Yemen" is clearly a Brit-ism. I've heard it before. Don't they sometimes say "The Lebanon" too? Not sure about that one, but I think I've heard it. It seems to be a bit of a British tendency, at least comparied to Americans.

It's really pretty arbitrary. In general, people don't say "The" when what follows is an arbitrary given name (like "Dave," for example), and do when what follows is more descriptive (like, "The Tall Guy") or plural (like "United States," which is actually both description and plural). Hence, "America," but "The Mideast" or "The Midwest" (which you'd think would be a lot closer together than they are). Or "Maryland," but "The State of Maryland" and "The District of Columbia" (which is never referred to as "Columbia," that being a university found elsewhere, or a misspelled source of cocaine, or a province that's lost its modifier ... which really should be "The British Columbia," I suppose).

When it comes to countries and places, there doesn't seem a ton of rhyme or reason. "The Sudan" and "Sudan" seem to be used interchangably in the US, as are "The Congo" and "Congo" (in which case it's even more confusing because there are two of them). When the name is entirely foreign, we can't distinguish between what was a descriptive term in the original language, and what was an arbitrary name, which is apparently the situation with [the] Yemen.

Incidentally, I'm pretty sure the French stick a definite article in front of most countries, including "L'Engleterre."