tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Thu Nov 27 19:58:00 1997
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Re: TLHINGAN-HOL digest 514
- From: Nick Nicholas <[email protected]>
- Subject: Re: TLHINGAN-HOL digest 514
- Date: Fri, 28 Nov 1997 15:01:12 +1100
- Organization: Ling & App Ling, Uni of Melbourne
- References: <[email protected]>
[email protected] wrote:
> Date: Wed, 26 Nov 1997 13:03:58 -0500
> From: "David Trimboli" <[email protected]>
> To: <[email protected]>
> Subject: Re: KGT new words
> Message-ID: <[email protected]>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Alan Anderson <[email protected]>
> To: Multiple recipients of list <[email protected]>
> Date: Tuesday, November 25, 1997 9:56 PM
> Subject: Re: KGT new words
> I would have *killed* to have {mI'}, {tlhay}, {nguv}, and a few
> others from KGT while editing the play!
I recall I faked mI' in the new version with something like moQbara', which is
at least tolerable. The old version had yItchu' as an attempt at "march"; that
will not be missed! tlhay would have been nice; yIvbeH HeH or what we had
instead is clumsy.
> The newest word which made an
> appearance is {parmaq}, though most of the play still uses {muSHa'},
> {muSHa'ghach}, and other assorted things. (Unless Lawrence and Nick are
> making changes they're not telling me about!)
Well, *I* ain't been told! :-)
> >*I* think enough work was done on Hamlet. It's not perfect. There are
> >certainly more appropriate words available now, and I've noticed a couple
> >of places where the grammar is a bit odd. (I haven't given much thought
> >to changing it without losing the iambic pentameter, though.) But let's
> >not start trying to second-guess it just yet, okay?
Changing the grammar without losing the iambic pentameter is possible ---
after all, I've had to rejig the grammar of both plays when it transpired
something new came up, and the pentameter had to follow. Of course, I'd rather
it be me doing the rejigging... :-)
> There's no real need to, anyway. I find it fun to read most of the {Hoch}'s
> in Hamlet backwards. The Terran conception of Shakespeare certainly didn't
> worry too much about breaking rules, or being consistent, and I'm sure that
> was inspired by the writings of the original SeQpIr. It gives it a good
> "language in flux" feel.
I disagree, as I do with your advocating we ease up on the rules in advanced
Klingon, as you say further down (and you guess correctly that I would). Our
brief, as I see it (I may not have seen it so at the beginning, but I do now)
is to render Shakespeare into proper Klingon, and not to take any convenient
shortcuts in doing so. Hamlet was restored into Klingon to the best of our
abilities and knowledge at the time. As it turns out, we made some wrong
guesses; this was beyond our control. For that reason, I consider it proper
that Hamlet be revised. But for purely practical reasons, this will not happen
for a fair while; nor will Much Ado be revised to incorporate KGT Klingon.
> After all, we're writing (well, "restoring") fiction for a fictional
> culture, not trying to be philologists and linguists.
Er, *I*'m a linguist... :-)
--
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Nick Nicholas. Linguistics, "Rode like foam on the river of pity
University of Melbourne Turned its tide to strength
http://www.lexicon.net.au/~opoudjis Healed the hole that ripped in living"
[email protected] - Suzanne Vega, Book Of Dreams
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