Re: Changes of conlangs and their speakers (was Re: Skerre Play Online)

David J. Peterson wrote:

> I still have these documents.  Gejdr was the largest, but all of
> these had one thing in common: they were terrible.  Some time
> after Zidaan I created Kamakawi, which was what I considered
> my first real language (it still had a lot of problems, but they're
> very slowly being ironed out).  Everything I created after Kamakawi
> counts as a real language; everything before...not so much.
>
> Because my languages were expanding in number, and not in
> girth, I decided one day not to start anymore languages, and
> just to work on the languages I'd already started.  The loophole
> here is that if I totally rework a language I've already started,
> it doesn't count as a new language...
Sometimes it's hard to know what to count as a language and what not to
count. I had a lot of sketchlangs in the years after I started on
Olaetian, and most of those weren't very good. Somehow I lucked out with
Olaetian, which ended up getting a lot more use than the others. But I
think it's like an artist learning how to draw -- I learned things from
the experience of doing these sketches that helped me with future
language ideas.

Some of these sketches were developed enough to actually use for writing
brief paragraphs. I'd usually write something about the language or the
world where the language is spoken, like this early Keluathi example:

Keluat de Kërishka-Kelëthai Oziria Gisathi azëlinsa kelëtha. Än de
këlevado naeë idileë käro Kelidëthë dileëin. Än de kovitho beridaë
idethë ash kothilë ahiraëin.

"Keluat is a planet near the edge of the Elliptical Galaxy of
Krýschë-Kéleta. It is inhabited by many intelligent beings called
Kelidëthë. It is covered by strange blue-green and orange-red liquids."

But the vocabulary and grammar of most of these early languages was
pretty limited. Still, the idea of using the language to write about the
world (even something as pointless as the world being covered in strange
multicolored liquids) is something that might be nice to get back in the
habit of doing.

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