(urth) This Week in Google Alerts: story with Gaiman

[Gerry Quinn]

From: "David Stockhoff" <dstockhoff at verizon.net>
> On 2/19/2011 8:14 AM, Gerry Quinn wrote:
>> From: "David Stockhoff" <dstockhoff at verizon.net>
>>
>>> Funny that the guy who complained about Wolfe's use of Latin calls 
>>> himself Lepton. I am assuming he is not actually Greek, yet he 
>>> resurrects this archaic language and reuses its dead, worn-out words. ;)
>>
>> I suppose he might say that 'lepton' is now an English word, signifying a 
>> member of a family of sub-nuclear particles, the best known of which is 
>> the electron.
>
> Exactly. He's guilty of the crime of which he accuses Wolfe.

Not really, since 'lepton' is now an English word.  Still, he's clearly a 
lightweight ;-)

>> I read that too.  My first thought was that it was not English, because 
>> English is clearly referenced by Thea in her speech about "when the damn 
>> men went to Verthandi".  In the ancient language of the dawn men, 
>> "Present" means both "Now" and "The Gift".  She is baffled as to how 
>> anyone could use a language so confusing.
>>
>> But still the question arises as to whether "Terminus Est" may be written 
>> in that ancient language, rather than some other.  On the face of it 
>> there is no firm reason why it should not be English, but I don't really 
>> believe it. Latin is part of the public consciousness of the modern 
>> world - most people could not read it but few would not recognise it. And 
>> it is a close ancestor of English - we use many words derived from it. 
>> The language Thea speaks of seems older, and at least as incomprehensible 
>> as Egyptian hieroglyphics are to us.

> ---if Latin is so close to English, especially from 20,000 years on, then 
> why try to distinguish them at all? They are both the language of the dawn 
> men. And it is the dawn men, after all, who used Latin and Greek and 
> English---the language of physics---to invent rockets and space ships and 
> colonize the stars.

I think you misread me.  I don't believe there is any reference to actual 
Latin. As you say, Latin and English would be nearly indistinguishable in 
Severian's day. What I think is that the language represented as Latin in 
BotNS is to the contemporary language of Severian's day as Latin is to the 
English of today.  And I don't think the language Thea speaks of (which is 
actually the English we speak)  holds that position.  It seems more distant.

I other words I think:

<Terminus Est> : <Sev's language> :: Latin : English
<language Thea mentions> : <Sev's language> :: <really ancient language> : 
English

The language Thea mentions is clearly present-day English.  So the timeline 
is like:

<really ancient language> (not mentioned(
-----
-----
<Latin> (not mentioned)
<English>  (referenced by Thea)
-----
-----
<'Terminus Est' language> (translated to Latin by Gene Wolfe)
<Severian's language> (translated to English by Gene Wolfe)


- Gerry Quinn