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Re: Another little translation exercise

From:Gerald Koenig <jlk@...>
Date:Saturday, April 3, 1999, 23:01
>From: Irina Rempt <ira@...> >Subject: Another little translation exercise > >A motto occurred to me that I read on a seventeenth-century house in >Haarlem (my native town) and that I've more or less adopted as my >own:
My father, whose mother was Dutch from "Goor", wherever it is, made sure I could recite: "If a task is once begun, Never leave it till it's done, Be the labor great or small, Do it well or not at all." I've tried to live by it, but I never realized that the sentiment, at least, might have a Dutch origin.
> > Beginnen can ick, volherden wil ick, volbringhen sal ick > >In English: > > I can begin, I want to persevere, I will succeed. > >In Valdyan: > > Vesta veran, terna puran, farenin. > >vesta veran terna puran farenin >begin-INF can-1s-PRS persevere desire-1s-PRS succeed-PERF-1s-FUT > >_farenin_ is perfective future; the simple future _farin_ "I will >succeed" is too indefinite for the meaning, as it might imply that >it will always be in the future. > >Anyone else want to have a go? > > Irina >
------------------------------------------------------------------------- NGL, vector tense flavor: Mi ka yirun, mi di tiroron, mi la dulaor. OR: Mik yirun, mid tiroron, mil dulaor. (using Vector Tense contractions of modals and tense) I am able to begin, I want to persevere, I will have succeeded. "la" is a future perfective tense marker. The verbs are not conjugated in Vector tense, the root form is used for all tenses but the infinitive. The infinitive is formed by infixing -ir- before the first vowel of the root. Jerry Koenig ------------------------------------------------------------ NGL vocabulary proposals: *dulaor::-to succeed. From dul, join; baor, goal. *toron::- to keep on, to persevere. (NGLers, I'm still looking for a second for this word :) We may need it!)