tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Thu Mar 22 21:24:37 2001
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RE: KLBC: Patience makes perfect
- From: "Will Martin" <[email protected]>
- Subject: RE: KLBC: Patience makes perfect
- Date: Fri, 23 Mar 2001 00:24:21 -0500
- Importance: Normal
- In-Reply-To: <[email protected]>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Robert Bracey [mailto:[email protected]]
> Sent: Monday, March 19, 2001 4:37 PM
> To: [email protected]
> Subject: KLBC: Patience makes perfect
>
>
> qesDajvad Qon jabbI'IDmey JIlad. ngeDmo' tlhingan Hol pab tlhIngan Hol
> mu'tey lo'laHlaw' law' pab lo'laHlaw'pus.qechmey jIqel jInID.
>
> I read Qon's posting for his suggestions. Because Klingon Grammar is easy
> Klingon Vocabulary seems more valuable than the Grammar. I will try to
> consider ideas.
Without grammar, vocabulary is nothing more than sounds to cry at the moon.
Without words, grammar is nothing more than a dream that one can never
share. It is the dance between grammar and vocabulary that fascinates those
of us who love language.
> I also read Pagh-le' mail. You will inevitably have to include non-klingon
> words as terms like mahayana, buddha, boddhisatva, dharma, sangha are
> practically untranslatable. You might be best off transliterating these
> words and then explaining them, which is how English translators of
> Buddhism work. Rather than coining new terms.
It never ceases to amaze me how little interest beginners have in expressing
their own ideas in Klingon. Always, they seek to translate something so
profound that they almost certainly don't understand it deeply enough to
really translate it. They choose poems and songs and ancient texts; anything
but their own thoughts. Too often, the effort ends up insulting the original
text and the language it is being translated into.
If you want to learn to speak Kling well, then just speak it. Learn to use
the words we have before spending too much time trying to translate highly
specialized terms and proper names. There is so much that can be said with
the vocabulary we already have. If only a simple head butting could get this
idea through to people, I'd do it more often. So far, it hasn't worked.
> Questions
>
> Can anyone suggest a better word than valuable lo'laH?
Don't think of {lo'laH} as if it still means "can use". There are two
different words in the vocabulary. One is {lo'}, and it can optionally have
the suffix {-laH} added to it to mean "can use". The other word is {lo'laH}
and while it possibly springs from the same root at {lo'}, IT IS NOT THE
SAME WORD AND NO LONGER HAS THAT MEANING. It now means "be valuable". Accept
it at that meaning and don't be disappointed with it because as an outsider,
you still falsely associate it with {lo'}.
Do you refuse to use the word "sale" because it seems to have so little to
do with the word "sail"? In Klingon, we spell things the way they sound, so
homonyms are spelled alike, even when they are definitely not the same word.
> I wasn't sure where to place ngeDmo' tlhIngan Hol pab, it seemed best to
> put it at the start of the sentence.
Legally, it can preceed or follow the main clause, though I usually prefer
to have it preceed the main clause. If you use the NOUN suffix {-mo'}
grammar requires that it go at the beginning of the sentence. The verb
suffix {-mo'} can preceed or follow, though as a matter of style, I tend to
favor placing dependent clauses first, since they tend to function as time
stamps or adverbials, which would themselves always come first.
> Robert
SarrIS