tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Fri Dec 04 11:24:42 2009

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Re: Comments sought on Klingon poem

David Trimboli ([email protected]) [KLI Member] [Hol po'wI']

Christopher Doty wrote:
> On Fri, Dec 4, 2009 at 06:29, Agnieszka Solska <[email protected]> wrote:

>>> 1. chenmoHbogh Qun HoH tlhingan tiqpu'.
>>> 2. 'ej 'u' lumeQpu' tiq.
>>> 3. qulvo' Hov
>>> 4. qIjghach je
>>> 5. chenmoHpu' tiq. DaHjaj,
>> I'm not sure if {qulvo' Hov qIjghach je chenmoHpu' tiq}
>> is a good way of expressing the idea that "The Klingon
>> hearts turned the heavens to ashes.". Literally, it says
>> "From fire, i.e. from where the fire was, the hearts made
>> a star and blackation."
> 
> And for "blackation," I would have this as "blackness." The emails
 > about <-ghach> that went around earlier made me think that "-ness"
 > is an often acceptable English equivalent for it.  I'll go look at
 > that again, though.

'ISqu' translated this as "blackation" to evoke the marked sense that 
the Klingon word {qIjghach} has. {-ghach} is not usually supposed to 
appear on a verb without an intervening suffix. A speaker only does so 
for effect: the equivalent of coining a word you know isn't legitimate 
and making air quotes while you say it. Okrand goes into detail about 
this in an issue of HolQeD.

Whether poetic license would allow use of this device whenever you feel 
like it is best left up to Klingon poets. I can only imagine that one 
should restrain oneself.

-- 
SuStel
tlhIngan Hol MUSH
http://trimboli.name/mush

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