Re: Book: Lunatic Lovers of Language

Sally Caves wrote:
>
>Fredrik Ekman wrote:
> >
> > Many years ago, I posted a question about conlangs to sci.lang. One of
> > those who replied recommended the book Lunatic Lovers of Language by
> > Marina Yaguello, which is supposed to be about Tolkien's languages and
> > other conlangs.
>
>Marina Yaguello never once mentions Tolkien, and gives precious little
>attention to any art lang.  Her main gripe, and yes, it's a gripe, is
>against auxilliary language makers, wherein she draws some pretty
>insulting
>generalizations.  She thinks she's being artistic, but basically she
>believes
>the rubric of her original French title: fous du langages: "fools for
>language."
>The book is mostly an examination of early IAL makers like the
>seventeenth
>and eighteenth-century, with special attacks made on Helene Smith and
>Russian
>linguist Nikolas Marr--in a chapter entitled "The Emperor's New
>Clothing."
>She dedicates her book to Emile Beneveniste and Roman Jakobson.
>
I am currently reading this book, and I agree about the
generalizations about auxlangers, but it does have some interesting
material on the history of artificial languages.
Her problem seems to be a confusion between glossalalia, language
construction, and linguistic crankery (i.e. Marr).
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