Re: Conlangs in fiction/movies

> > The thread on conlangs in music got me curious about other conlangs that
> > have been used on-screen or in popular books.  Resources are easy to find
> > regarding Klingon and Quenya.  Personally, I'd also be interested in seeing
> > published references about Vulcan (also done by Marc Okrand, of Klingon
> > fame.  Sadly, I've spoken to Mr. Okrand, and he informed me that no Vulcan
> > Dictionary is forthcoming.)
There's a book called _Riddley Walker_ by Russell Hoban, who "has
imagined a humanity regressed to an iron-age, semi-literate state--and
invented a language to represent it", according to the back-cover
blurb. Here's the first few sentences:

"On my naming day when I come 12 I gone front spear and kilt a wyld
boar he parbly ben the las wyld pig on the Bundel Downs any how there
hadnt ben none for a long time befor him nor I aint looking to seee
non agen. He dint make the groun shake nor nothig like that when he
comee on to my spear he wernt all that big plus he lookit poorly. He
done the reqwyrt he ternt and stood and clattert his teef and made his
rush and there we wer then."

More or less, I'm sure I've typoed it up a bit.

I don't think I have the patience to read more and find out what
actual changes the author has made, beyond the spelling and
intentional incoherence. The first page hasn't impressed me much, but
I'd be interested if any of you know of someone who's gone through the
trouble and posted their results. =)

> Most "conlangs" in commercial media products are not only poorly
> documented, but also lack linguistic substance
Since most readers/audience members don't understand what constitutes
a language, and wouldn't notice all of the hard work if the "conlang"
actually did have linguistic substance, it seems like a pretty poor
investment...

If the passage I quoted above is described as being written in an
invented language, then it seems like the effort required to fool
people is very low.

--
kutsuwamushi
(BEWARE OF GMAIL)

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