Re: Natlangs in Fantasy Worlds

On Nov 10, 2007 4:30 AM, R A Brown <ray@...> wrote:
> Alex Bicksler wrote:
> > I've always noticed that in fantasy worlds such as Tolkien's Middle Earth, English is often
> > used alongside conlangs.  This seems like it would be highly unlikely.
>
> And is surely a misrepresentation. According to Tolkien's conworld,
> there is *NO* English! Nor are Sindarin, Quenya etc conlangs!
Well, they are conlangs IRL.  I think Alex just meant that they're
fictional, and the presence of a real natlang like English in their
midst would indeed be unlikely (although possible, given a creative
in-world explanation); I don't think he was suggesting that they were
supposed to be conlangs within the Middle-Earthen milieu.

But yes, LoTR is allegedly a translation of the original, and while
JRRT didn't develop Westron enough to do a full back translation,
there are some details about it available.  Most other fantasy works
operate on a premise, explicit or implicit, that the language everyone
is speaking is not, in fact, English, but is merely represented as
such for the benefit of the reader.


--
Mark J. Reed <markjreed@...>

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