Yaguello [was: Re: LUNATIC again]

Sally:
> Marina Yaguello made this same mistake, caving in to the same old
> stereotypes about invented languages.  Only HER target was auxiliary
> languages, which she attacks with a personal vengeance that is unsettling
> (most inventors of language are middle-European; most of them don't know a
> thing about linguistics--which she "corroborates" with the remark in a
> note that professional linguists don't do this, despite Jespersen,
> Saussure, etc. etc; most of them are dreamers; most of them are
> middle-aged, wear glasses, have pointy beards !!! --in short, most of them
> are Nikolas Marr, which is the main point of the invective in her book).
> I love it, too, when she plays psychologist, going on and on about Marr's
> fatherless childhood--right after she's accused inventors of languages to
> be out their "depth."  But then, she never addresses artlangs.  Tolkien
> never once makes it into either her book or her index, but she does go on
> somewhat superficially about Jack Vance and Ian Watson, because of a
> thread she wants to develop about sf and language invention.
When I ventured to voice a rather low opinion of this book, you
appeared to me to wish to defend it as variously meritorious. Have
you changed your mind?

--&.