In my earlier days I liked languages. Not sensible, understandable, practical languages like French, Spanish, or German. No, I liked (and still do) made up languages. Things like Klingon, Thieve’s Cant, or Elven. These languages were all created to help flesh out a story world. Klingon, of course, is from Star Trek, Thieves’ Cant is from D&D, and Elven (in two dialects – Quenya and Sindarin) is from Tolkien’s Lord Of The Rings.
These are all examples of constructed languages, or conlangs. They were made up for a specific purpose, usually to enhance a fictional world and make that world feel more ‘real’, whether it is a sci-fi epic full of alien cultures, or an epic fantasy filled with strange races.
Conlangs don’t just show up in sci-fi and fantasy novels. Some are built to help foster communication among people. Esperanto, created by L. L. Zamenhof in 1887, was meant to be an ‘international language’, one that people from any country or culture would be able to learn easily and be able to communicate with others who might not share a common language. So a shopkeeper from Poland might be visiting a restaurant in Italy. The Polish shopkeeper doesn’t speak Italian and the waiter doesn’t speak Polish. If they both learned Esperanto, then they could communicate with each other.
I think the appeal for me has always been not so much to foster communication as to obfuscate my meaning. Over the decades I’ve kept journals. I keep all my private thoughts in the journals. Things I don’t share with others. And I want to keep it that way. So I’ve looked into various encryption methods, codes and ciphers, all the way up to conlangs as a way to keep my private thoughts private. Not that there is anything earth shattering in my thought processes but I’m self-conscious enough to want to keep higns to myself.
I’ve dabbled in learning both Klingon and Esperanto. I got much further in learning Esperanto, and was just fluent enough to get by. I’ve since forgotten most of both languages but I could probably pick up Esperanto again fairly easily.
Interestingly, there was a film called Incubus performed in Esperanto. As far as I know, it is the only movie to have that distinction. It starred William Shatner, he of Capt. Kirk from Star Trek fame, which also gets us a tie back to Klingon. The story revolved around a succubus who tires of luring men into indiscretions that will get them sent to Hell. All the men she deals with are already likely to go to Hell. She goes after a good man (Shatner) with the intent to seduce him to evil, but Shatner truly loves her. The succubus conjures an Incubus to deal with Shatner. Supposed the film was ‘cursed’ as nasty things kept happening to the actors, other than Shatner.
So, why do I bring all this up? As I was cleaning off my desk I came across a printout from an old conlang mailing list for an insult language called Meum. The whole point of the language is to insult people with it. That tickles my fancy. It is a utility language, one that serves a specific purpose. I’ve thought about creating languages for specific things like a magic system in a fantasy novel, or alien languages in my sci-fi novels.
I have no illusions that I’m even on a Tolkien wannabee level when it comes to creating and utilizing languages in a fantasy story. But I think I can come up with a few phrases to add a little spice, a little something exotic to the stories.
What about you, my Hordeling? Any inclinations towards amateur philology? Leave a comment and let me know.
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