[683] in tlhIngan-Hol
Re: mu''IH
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU)
Sun Apr 25 05:16:17 1993
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Reply-To: "Klingon Language List" <tlhIngan-Hol@village.boston.ma.us>
From: Captain Krankor <krankor@codex.prds.cdx.mot.com>
To: "Klingon Language List" <tlhIngan-Hol@village.boston.ma.us>
Date: Sun, 25 Apr 93 03:35:37 -0400
>"mu''IH"Daq nIghachwIj:
>Finally, what *do* we know about tlhIngan poetry (which I took the liberty of
>translating as "mu''IH", for want of a proper translation. I hope I didn't
>confuse anyone!)?
Well you sure confused me. That kind of
making-up-a-word-by-using-a-descriptive-phrase seldom works, and I
repeatedly caution against it. If you want people to understand
you, just say "poetry", in quotes. Yeah, I know it sucks, but
otherwise people are just going to be guessing and confused.
>bangvaD not vIghajlaHbogh jIyIn.
>veSDaq not vIQaplaHbogh jISuv.
>First, are the first and second lines vague about where "never" occurs? My
>intention was to say (in the second line): "I fight in a war which I can neve
r
>win," but due to the liberty of placement of adverbial elements, what I have
>can almost be translated as: "I never fight in a war which I cannot win" whic
h
>is an entirely different meaning. Help?
Actually, I think you did splendidly. I completely understood your
intent. While there is no hard rule to back this up that I know of,
my understanding of Klingon "look and feel" says that you got the
point across well by putting the "not"s as close to the verb the go
with as is legally possible. To say "I never fight in a war I can
win", I would expect the "not" to be at the beginning:
not veSDaq vIQaplaHbogh jISuv
Actually, now that I look at it, there *is* rather a rule to cover
it. You are using a noun phrase with -bogh; thus, the question
becomes: did you put the adverbial *in* the noun phrase or *before*
it? If it's *in* it, it must go with the verb in the noun phrase;
otherwise, it probably goes with the main noun of the sentence.
So, again, yes, you did it right.
As a side note: bang really seems to mean "a loved one", not "love"
as the abstract emotion. Hope that was the intent of the poem. {{:-)
>tIqwIjDaq yItvIS, 'oH ghajlaw' nov.
>Second, I was trying to say for the last line: "*The* Stranger walks in my
>heart, as if he owns it." The first part was easy. "tIqwIjDaq yIt nov'a'"
>("The Stranger walks in my heart"), but I found there was no way to say "as
>if". Looking through the various type 9 suffixes didn't do a whole lot of
>good... -DI' implies that he will at some point, truely own my heart (which is
>not implied by "as if"), -bogh and -vIS imply he actually does own it, and
>-chugh is a qualifier. I don't know how well my intended meaning came across.
I'll let others offer solutions to this, though you have a decent
start, methinks. I do just want to point out a small bug: it has
to be yIttaHvIS. Verbs with -vIS always take -taH.
>tlhIHvo' Qoy jIloSlI',
This translates as: I'm waiting he hears from you. If you meant
"I'm waiting to hear from you", it would be something like:
tlhIHvo' jIQoy 'e' vIloSlI'
or maybe
tlhIHvo' jIQoymeH jIloSlI'
I enjoyed the poem, by the way. {{:-)
--Krankor
