Re: Reply to Yitzik (jara: New Survey: Celtic Conlangs)

For some reason I didn't get Yitzik's mail; thanks to Jan for
unwittingly bringing my attention to it!  I went to the Yahoo
archives to get it.

Jan wrote:

> Wouldn't you care to post a list once of your P1-P27, along with a short
> description? I've lost track!
I'd certainly be interested in that too!  For my website I'm putting
together my own catalogue; not a list as impressive as Yitzik's 27
though. :)  But it has a little something for everybody: Celtic,
Romance, Semitic, East Asian, Caucasian, Native American....

> Definitely I favour a posteriori.
Same here.  Even my one "lanugage isolate" is a posteriori in
disguise.  Although I've entertained several ideas for a priori
projects.

> No. I don't construct mythic worlds. I prefer to play with alternative
> history of humankind. All in all, conculturing is only an auxiliary > tool for me.
Same here.  For my "Bahasa Vijaya" project the
con-culture/con-history started happening by accident, mainly
because I needed a cultural and historical context to determine
certain aspects of the language.  Although I use a couple of my
projects in fiction, I've never created an elaborate con-world.  I'm
impressed, though, by those who do.

> Yes, I'm totally indifferent to Tolkien. My "father" in conlanging was
> Zamenhof. That's why I don't avoid Western languages as prototypes.
Zamenhof inspired me too in that I was conlanging at the age of 10
and when I discovered Esperanto shortly after that (thanks to an
article by Mario Pei) Zamenhof re-assured me that I wasn't "weird."
:)

> I make parallels between conlanging and visual arts (my father was a
> painter). I enjoy realism. The pattern for my creativity is set by > "Little Dutchmen"
> (Hals, Vermeer, van Reusdal [sorry for possible > mistakes in spelling, I
> know their names only in Cyrillics]) and > Russian "peredvizhniki" (late 19th
> century).
For me conlanging is a visual art (my Bauhinese I like to call an
"impressionist painting of East Asia") but for me it's also a
literary art - I use it in my own Magic Realist/Magic Expressionist
literature.  I can see where it could be an aural art - if spoken or
sung, of course.

> To learn more linguistics. To express my creativity. To escape from > pressure
> of the Real Life (TM). And just for fun.
Couldn't have said it better!

> Only my best friends know about my "secret vice". And even my wife, a
> philologist, sometimes makes fun of my hobby :-( although we tried to > design a private
> lang about 7 or 8 years ago.
I'm proud to say that I recently "converted" my fiancee to the
secret vice.  She's working on a hybrid Romance language.  Good
start. :)

I was glad you answered the survey; it's always good to hear what
our buddy Yitzik has to say.  Welcome back, btw!

Cheers,
Eamon

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