tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Thu Oct 15 06:06:00 1998
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Re: That' ol' {-meH} again (was: Ha'DIbaHHom)
On Wed, 14 Oct 1998 21:40:10 -0700 (PDT) David Trimboli
<[email protected]> wrote:
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Andeen, Eric <[email protected]>
> To: Multiple recipients of list <[email protected]>
> Date: Wednesday, October 07, 1998 10:52 PM
> Subject: RE: Ha'DIbaHHom
>
>
> >If you wanted to say "It's sufficient to feed a warrior", <SuvwI'
> >je'meH, yap 'oH> works just fine.
>
> Ouch! No it doesn't! It is not in the state of being sufficient for the
> purpose of feeding the warrior. Feeding a warrior is not a purpose which
> being sufficient is trying to achieve. If it were, you could say {SuvwI'
> je'meH yapbe'} just as correctly as you can say {batlh bIHeghbe'}.
>
> SuvwI' je'lu'. yap.
> A warrior is fed. It is sufficient. (Whatever the "it" was in context; I
> don't know.)
>
> SuStel
> Stardate 98785.0
How about another approach? I admit that I don't perfectly
understand precisely which meaning the English is trying to
depict (being such a vague, wittering and indecisive language,
after all), so I'll give a couple different glosses at it:
SuvwI' ghungHa'moHbej.
SuvwI' yonmoH Sojvam.
If you mean that it barely makes it to sufficiency:
SuvwI' yonmoH Sojvam 'ach belmoHbe'.
Or if it is slightly less satisfying:
SuvwI' ghunHa'moH Sojvam 'ach yonmoHbe'.
And for the insuffient part, there is no conflict with just
slapping {-be'} in an appropriate place, since there are no
purpose clauses here to make things thorny. Meanwhile, none of
this establishes whether you are talking about quantity or
quality. Just add {'ey'mo'} or {law'mo'} for the positive and
{'ey'Ha'mo'} or {puSqu'mo'} for the negative, preferably at the
beginning of the sentence where it sets the context for the rest
of the sentence.
This is also a good place for a {rur} statement.
SuvwI' ghungHa'moHbe' Sojvam. Qa'Hom nay' rur.
SuvwI' yonmoHbe' Sojvam. targh qan nay' rur.
Or just better describe the context:
SuvwI' yonmoHbe'ba' Sojvam non.
I think people got hung up on using {-meH} here and as SuStel
points out here, it doesn't really fit the task all that well.
That's when it is time to seek some other tool.
You might start out in English thinking that "It is not
sufficient to feed a warrior," is a cool thing to say in
Klingon, and then once you tangle with the problems this
sentence creates actually using the language, recast the meaning
into a different statement using other grammar or phrasing.
Don't get too attached to the specific wording you started out
with in English.
charghwI' 'utlh