tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Sun Aug 02 17:13:13 1998
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Re: KLBC - attempt at translation, v 1.1
On Sun, 2 Aug 1998, David Trimboli wrote:
>From: Alan Anderson <[email protected]>
>>One can take "concise" too far. In written communication, {Dochvam nuq}
>>seems a bit out of place, something along the lines of "whatsit?" When
>>speaking, many imperfectly grammatical "shortcuts" are accepted without
>>complaint, but I think written text should be held to a higher standard.
>
>I was under the under the impression that {Dochvam nuq} was a grammatically
>correct way to say this, not an incorrect but accepted shortcut. Perhaps
>Voragh will be so kind as to repost the appropriate passage from Okrand's
>post on the subject.
Actually, {Dochvam nuq} "What is this?" comes from the list of question words
with examples on CK, along with {SoH 'Iv} and {nuqDaq 'oH puchpa''e'}. Since
the tape is called "Conversational Klingon", presumable these are common
colloquial forms. However, one example of the longer form is provided in the
discussion of (Morskan) dialect in "Power Klingon":
WHAT is that food?!
Dial. sojvets oh nook
Std. Sojvetlh 'oH nuq'e'
Here, the longer form seems to be emphasizing {nuq}, and perhaps a better
translation would be "What in the world is that food?" On the tape, "what"
was "punched" (as the actors say) -- given extra emphasis. The only other
place I could find an example of the longer {... 'oH nuq'e'?} form is, in
fact, our Morskan friend, Sentinel Kesla from ST6:
What ship is that? ...over.
Dial. dujvets oh nook? reen.
Std. Dujvetlh 'oH nuq? rIn.
The short form may turn out to be more common on Qo'nos, while the longer is
used by Morskan speakers (albeit without the final {-'e'}. And while
considering colloquialisms, don't forget:
nuq mI'lIj, tera'ngan?
What is your number, Terran?
also from CK. Okrand did translate "What is a tribble?" as {yIH nuq} on the
old MSN Expert Forum, which is what David is probably remembering. Here is
the relevant portion of that fairly long post:
************************************************************************
From: [email protected]
Newsgroups: msn.onstage.startrek.expert.okrand
Date: December 12, 1996
Subject: What do you think?
(2) You suggested translating "What is your favorite month?" as:
jarlIj qaq nuq?
This one's a little easier to deal with. Your sentence literally means
"What is your preferable month?" The basic syntax is correct. Question
words (in this case, nuq "what?") function the same way pronouns do in
questions with "to be" in the English translations. Thus, the question
yIH nuq? "What is a tribble?" is exactly parallel the statement yIH 'oH
"It is a tribble" (where yIH is "tribble" and 'oH is "it"). The answer to
the question yIH nuq? ("What is a tribble?") would presumably be a
definition or description of a tribble. This being the case, then, the
answer to the question jarlIj qaq nuq? ("What is your preferable month?")
would presumably be a definition of "your favorite month." But this is not
what you want to find out by asking your question. What you really mean
to ask is something like "Of all the months, which one do you prefer?"
[snip]
So what about the "what" (or "which") of your original question
("What/which is your favorite month?")? When asking someone a question of
this type, you are really asking him or her to make a choice. So just be
a Klingon and order them to do so: "Identify the month that you very much
prefer!": jar DamaSqu'bogh yIngu'!
*************************************************************************
>In English, and probably in many other languages, the written word is more
>formal and scrutinized than the spoken word (unless you frequent chat
>rooms). However, we don't *know* anything about written Klingon, except
>what some of the characters look like. We have no way to tell if written
>Klingon is more or less formal than spoken Klingon.
>
>Our Klingon text simulates Klingon speech, not Klingon writing. What you
>say is what you write. If you are taking a shortcut when you *say* it,
>you'd better write that shortcut down just as you said it. Who knows what
>{pIqaD} does? Maybe written, it looks like {Dochvam 'oH nuq'e'}, but when
>the same sentence is spoken, it sometimes comes out as {Dochvam nuq}.
>Perhaps there's a unique way to write {Dochvam nuq} in {pIqaD}.
You're right, we don't know what written Klingon *looks* like, colloquial or
formal. Is {pIqaD} alphabetic, syllabic, ideographic, or a mixture of these?
For that matter, is there more than one way to write it, depending on the
purpose and intended audience (like modern Japanese or ancient Egyptian)?
Trek graphic designer Okuda refuses to commit himself. But however it's
written, presumably Okrand's transcription does represent what the text
*sounds* like when read aloud by a literate Klingon, like science officer
Maltz.
BTW, we do have examples of more formal Klingon: the brief texts on the
SkyBox cards, which so often give us trouble as they are written in a more
complex style than the elementary examples in TKD or CK, or even the more
intermediate level PK and TKW.
--
/\
| | Voragh
.-| |-. Ca'Non Master of the Klingons
/ / \ \
/~~ \\ //\_|_ [email protected]
| ___\\// /
|/`\ `---' "Grammatici certant et adhuc sub judice
`-.__.-' lis est." Horace (Ars Poetica)