Variable names *as* variables

["John E. Simpson" <simpson@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

I have a feeling that what I'm trying to do can't be done without 
extensions, like Saxon's eval. Unfortunately I can't use an extension 
function for this case, and thought I'd fly it past the list to see if any 
of you have a brainstorm.

Sample XML:
<someroot>
  <event date="2000-10-11">
    <locale place="location1"/>
    <locale place="location2"/>
    <locale place="location3"/>
  </even>
  <event date="2000-10_12">
    <locale place="location1"/>
    <locale place="location3"/>
  </even>
</someroot>

If I want to display literal text (e.g. "Midtown" for place="location1"), I 
could of course use an xsl:choose block, with an xsl:when for each of the 
valid values of the place attribute. What I'd like to do instead (for 
maintainability, whatever) is set up global variables to be used in place 
of the values of the place attributes. Something like:

<xsl:variable name="location1">Midtown</xsl:variable>
<xsl:variable name="location2">Greater Northeast</xsl:variable>
<xsl:variable name="location3">Dallas-Ft. Worth</xsl:variable>

Then in the template (so goes the theory) I'd just need to do something like:

  <xsl:value-of select="concat('$', @place)"/>

But -- duh -- all this does is produce the *string* "$location1," 
"$location2," and "$location3."

Any ideas? Can't be done with straight XSLT, right?
===============================================================
John E. Simpson               | "He asked me if I knew what
http://www.flixml.org         | time it was. I said, 'Yes, but
XML Q&A: http://www.xml.com   | not right now.'" (Steven Wright) 


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