Re: Qosmiani website

Salut Christophe! Ça va?

> :)))) I love this nonsense!!! :))))
Moi aussi!! :) That's why I made the pages!

> Stick Revised English grammar to a lexicon invented by someone in love
with Romance
> languages but who doesn't speak any, and who also hates German, and
you get Qosmîanî!

I was looking at the book again, and I just found this quote, which I
shall have to add to the quotes page:

"I woud hesitate to offer to the world a new international language were
it not that not one expert philologist, so far as I know, has done any
notable constructiv work in formulating international languages."

So it seems that not only did Beatty consider his language to be the
"best illustration" of "maximum internationality" (as he says elsewhere
in the book), but he also comsidered himself to be an "expert
philologist"!


> (that I can't help but pronounce [qOs'mjani] with uvular /q/ :))) .
:)

> Seen the religious beliefs of the man, shouldn't we propose that
language to
> the Vatican to replace Latin as the universal language of the Catholic
> Church? :)))
Now that I would love to see. I'm not Catholic, but I would gleefully
attend church every Sunday if the mass were givenin Qosmiani!

I'm surprised that he didn't translate any Biblical passages in the
book.

> One grammatical question still: is there anywhere in the book a
reference on
> the accentuation of Qosmîanî? Is it intended to have a Romance
stress-like
> system (rather strict and directed towards the end of the word) or an
English-
> style system (very free and more directed towards the beginning of the
word)?

I've looked through the grammar section of the book, and I don't see any
mention of stress or accentuation anywhere. I wonder if he even thought
of it, given that half of it is practically unpronounceable anyway!

> I keep the URL, it's fun! Good luck for your Q2! :))
Merci beaucoup! Je ne sais pas encore ce que je vais faire avec lui,
mais il m'amuse bien... :)

Hey Christophe, while I'm "talking" to you, I have a French question:
I've read that in certain regions like the Midi, people (or some people)
still use the passé défini as the usual past tense in speech (presumably
due to Occitan influence)... it that true?

And, I should confess that I'm a huge Occitanophile, though I hardly
know any of the language yet (I've bought books and tapes, I just don't
have the time to study them!). Anyway, I saw a post from you recently
which said that one of your languages, called Narbonósc (did I spell it
right?), is a romance conlang with Occitan influence. So I was wondering
if you have anything on line that I could look at? Ou en français ou en
anglais. (J'ai étudié le français six années à l'école, mais maintenant
j'ai 30 ans et il y a tant de temps que je ne parle plus ta belle
langue, et j'ai oublié presque tout! Je lis encore français très
lentement avec un dictionnaire, mais je ne peux plus le parler,
malheureusement...)

Thomas

Reply