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Re: Tolkien's "hidden" conlang

From:Wesley Parish <wes.parish@...>
Date:Tuesday, September 28, 2004, 2:00
http://books.fantasticfiction.co.uk/n6/n32941.htm?authorid=8101
http://www.bowjamesbow.net/2004/01/12-were_back.shtml
"Unfortunately, Ms. Wrightson is not well known in North America. I was very
fortunate to come upon her book, The Nargun and the Stars (published in 1973),
in a used bookstore in Halifax. In this book, orphaned Simon Brent is sent to
live with an "aunt" and "uncle" (actually, second cousins to his mother) in a
ranch called Wongadilla, at the foot of a mountain. Exploring the place, Simon
discovers a swamp and a forest, and ancient, playful creatures that lived before
the aboriginies came. But he also discovers the Nargun, an ancient, dangerous
creature of stone, whose slow progress across the mountain has it on a collision
course with the ranch."

I think the translator changed it.  Perhaps the translator was a fan of Tolkien?

Anyway - anywhey? ;) - it's one of those delightful and amusing coincidences -
the Australian rock-spirit and the Dwarves - transmogrified European
rock-spirits - sharing a similar name. ;)  (though one would like to know which
Australian language Ms Wrightson used to get it - it's set in NSW,  FWIW  ;)

> Helge Fauskanger's article on Khuzdul might be interesting to you:
> http://www.uib.no/People/hnohf/khuzdul.htm
> Andreas
Thanks. I've had a look - I think he's missed the d-w-m "dum" part - biconsonantal roots in Semitic languages, unless I am much mistaken, often involve a semiconsonant -w-, -i- as the middle consonant, and Tolkien was knowledgable in Biblical/Classical Hebrew. Wesley Parish Quoting Andreas Johansson <andjo@...>:
> Quoting Wesley Parish <wes.parish@...>: > > > Thanks. I've just had a look at it - you know, there's a story by an > > Australian children's author, called "The Nargun and the Stars"? > > > > It's got nothing to do with Tolkien to the best of my knowledge, and > nothing > > to do with Dwarvish - just a coincidence. ;) > > Unless they changed it in the Swedish translation, it's "Nargon". > > (Which, by shape, could be Sindarin for "tale-rock".) > > Andreas >
"Sharpened hands are happy hands. "Brim the tinfall with mirthful bands" - A Deepness in the Sky, Vernor Vinge "I me. Shape middled me. I would come out into hot!" I from the spicy that day was overcasked mockingly - it's a symbol of the other horizon. - emacs : meta x dissociated-press

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Andreas Johansson <andjo@...>