tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Mon Nov 14 15:18:01 1994

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Re: Today is a good day...?



According to Andrew Stephen Damick:

> > Subject: Re: Today is a good day...?
> 
> Sorry much. I did not know this.
> Please send me whatever is quickest and shortest and answers my question.
> 
> Really, though, is this not the place to ask such a question?

You are right. This is the right place to ask it. The problem
is that this, of all threads, is the one most worn thin. The
history is this:

The line IN ENGLISH was actually ripped off from the movie
LITTLE BIG MAN. It had nothing to do with Klingons, but one of
the random ST:TNG writers thought it was a cool thing to say
and wrote it into the script. Several times. Meanwhile, there
is not easy, non-controversial way to say it IN KLINGON. Why?

First of all, Klingon does not tend to detach its verbs from
those who are to experience the action. "Today is a good day to
die." Okay, so who is dying? The English statement doesn't tell
us.

Secondly, the {-meH} suffix doesn't do what a lot of beginning
Klingonists THINK it does. It really only means, "In order
that-" with a rather specific sense that the subject is doing
the main verb toward the end of accomplishing the goal of the
verb with {-meH}. A good example would be {jISopmeH jIjaH.} "I
go in order that I eat."

Are we trying to say that in today is being a good day
specifically in order to accomplish the goal that some
unidentified scientient being dies? Not really.

Instead, when I see something like this, I tend to seek the
overall sense of what the speaker is saying AT THE HEART
instead of at the MOUTH. Sit and meditate on "Today is a good
day to die" for a while and think about what it MEANS, not what
it SAYS. While you have that THOUGHT and FEELING in you mind
and heart, IGNORE THE ENGLISH WORDS and say in Klingon what
your mind and heart tell you to say.

Mine says something like:

DaHjaj batlh jIHeghqang.

"Today, I am willing to die with honor."

I honestly think this is MUCH closer to the MEANING of the
sentence as a Klingon would say it than the plug 'n' play
English word replacement that yields:

HeghmeH jaj QaQ 'oH DaHjaj'e'.

Meanwhile, at this point, I feel quite certain that you can use
whatever you like. I doubt anybody who usually cares about this
sort of thing has any endurance left to give a damn HOW you say
it. Most of us simply never say it. It died as a cliche before
anybody reached a standard way to say it.

charghwI'


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