tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Sat Aug 13 04:27:16 1994
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Re: archaic style?
- From: [email protected] (Douglas A. McLeod)
- Subject: Re: archaic style?
- Date: Sat, 13 Aug 1994 16:23:49 -0400
>I'm currently in the process of contemplating my writing of a tlhIngan novel,
>in which a couple of very regal characters speak what I would like to be
>archaic Hol.
>
>Well, what I propose to do in my novel is have these two characters speak in
>OSV in all their speech. I think it would carry the same literary
>connotations observed when modern English literature has its characters use
>the archaic, "thou, thee, thy/thine."
>
>But what do y'all think of this idea. I don't know how else to go about
>archaizing tlhIngan Hol.
Have you thought about vocabulary? TKD page 20 speaks of Old Klingon
words that have found their way into modern Klingon compound words. TKD
contains many two-syllable words for which we have a meaning for one
syllable but not the other. Take chamwI' (=technician). Does it follow
that cham means technology, technique, or metier? Could cham be an
archaic word? Many two-syllable words in TKD defy analysis, but some are
fairly obvious. -nal in be'nal and loDnal could be an archaic word for
spouse, and -nI' must mean some kind of relative as it appears in be'nI',
loDnI', SoSnI' and vavnI'. Maybe your characters could use words like nal
and nI' if the context made their meanings clear. (Of course, the word
nI' *is* medieval - it's used extensively in _Monty Python and the Holy
Grail_.)
--
The opinions expressed above are not necessarily those of Krell and
Brothers, Doorhangers, or of the Klingon Guild of Doorhangers.
}}:-) Douglas A.McLeod [email protected] )-:{{