Re: Are conlangs fictional?

On Fri, 22 Mar 2002 10:53:11 +0100, Christophe Grandsire
<christophe.grandsire@...> wrote:

>You cannot talk about this bad guy without referring to one of the
>fictions he appears in. You can talk about Quenya or Sindarin without
>referring once to LotR.
Yes, but you can hardly talk about Quenya or Sindarin without referring to
The Master Hymselve.

>> If you apply this criterium to languages, is would mean that the only
>> fictional languages are those that exist only within the limits of a
>> book or fictional setting (Hergé's Syldavian would be a nice example of
>> this),
>Indeed. But Mark Rosenfelder did a reconstruction of Syldavian, and this,
like
>the Necronomicon of my former example, can hardly be called fiction.
Of course. Tintin is fiction, but a book about Tintin is not. If a book
contains fiction, it does not mean that you can't hold a (far from
fictional) paper copy in your hands :)

>> Literature can be divided into fiction and non-fiction. The latter tells
>> stories that have really happened and discusses their background, while
>> fiction is made up by the author.
>Well, I'm not sure of this. First, where do you put scientific literature
>in that picture? Is a scientific theory fictional? Is it fictional until
>it's proven right?
Even a scientific theory proven wrong deals with reality. It presents a way
of looking at it and understanding it.

>But then the distinction between fictional and constructed disappears! Is
>Esperanto fictional? Was it fictional and became non-fiction later?
Difficult. I thought about Esperanto. My conclusion would be that it flows
somewhere in the grey air between fiction and non-fiction. But I agree with
you, it's extremely difficult, not to say hopeless, to draw a line.

>Even if it appears in a story, the poem in itself, the entity "poem" is
>not a fiction: it has been written down, it can be read, studied outside
>the context where it appeared, like any poem.
I got your point. But still, if I would have to subdivide the
different "dimensions" of the poem or book, I would do it like this:
- on kilo ink on paper = no fiction, we all agree on that
- the story itself. You say no fiction, I say fiction
- fictional objects referred to in the story = fiction, of course

This reminds me of Magritte's famous painting "Ceci n'est pas une pipe"
(just paint on canvas)

>Yep, a piece of music referred to in a story but never actually written and
>played. But a piece of music part of a movie plot and which is actually
>written down and used in the movie is not fiction, because it exists by
>itself from now on, even outside the context of fiction.
Q.E.D.

>If we agree that "fiction" refers to "stories made up by their author"
>however vague that is, I think we should define "fictional" as: "existing
>only in the setting of fiction" (without specifying "a fiction" or "the
>fiction"). As soon as you *can* (it doesn't mean that you have to or that
>you always do) refer to something outside the setting of fiction (that's
>to say outside the setting of any story), it's no longer fictional.
That's just how you look at it ;) Let's say, according to your definition I
believe you are absolutely right. I just does not satisfy my own feeling
of "fiction".

The same way we distinguish between "a book of fiction" and "a fictional
book", we ought to distinguish between "a fictional language" and (a
language of fiction?)

>Christophe.
Cheerio,
Jan

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