tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Sat Jan 11 03:56:49 1997

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Re: Sorta new



Terrence Donnelly wrote:
> In a story I wrote, I used {naDev jatlh <pong>} '<name> is speaking
> here,' when someone answered the phone, to indicate who was on the
> line and that he was ready to talk (an exact parallel to the Russian
> usage: "zdyes' govorit Ivan").

Isn't that too exact a parallel to the Russian construction?  The
{naDev} seems redundant (and by virtue of that unKlingonish), and
it's the listening that matters, not the speaking.  How about
{'IjtaH <pong>} or just {<pong> jIH}?  Or simply {SuH}/{Su'}?

> For goodbye, I used {pItlh. DaH vIchu'Ha'.} 'Done. I'm deactivating
> (the phone) now.'

Shouldn't {pItlh} be the very last thing you say?  Surely it implies
that the line will be deactivated.

--'Iwvan

-- 
"mIw'e' lo'lu'ta'bogh batlh tlhIHvaD vIlIH [...]
 poH vIghajchugh neH jIH, yab boghajchugh neH tlhIH"
                                  (Lewis Carroll, "_Snark_ wamlu'")
Ivan A Derzhanski  <[email protected], [email protected]>
Dept for Math Lx,  Inst for Maths & CompSci,  Bulg Acad of Sciences
Home:  cplx Iztok  bl 91,  1113 Sofia,  Bulgaria


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