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

[David Stockhoff]

On 2/19/2011 12:59 PM, Gerry Quinn wrote:
>
> 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 ;-)
No question of that. But "lepton" is still a Greek word in origin. By 
using a Greek word out of its context (not sure if it existed at all in 
Greek, but since the meaning is new it hardly matters), he performs an 
act similar to Wolfe's.

Is this a more subtle point than I thought, or do you see what I mean 
and just disagree? I have no doubt Lepton would indeed make that 
argument, but my point is more or less that Lepton is an obtuse, 
pedantic moron.
>
>>> 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)
>
>
>
I did misunderstand. Now that you lay it out, it is pretty much what I 
think: the language of the dawn men is certainly older than the language 
that confuses "present" and "gift." And "Latin" is a contemporary dead 
language, however closely its lapidary utterances resemble Latin phrases 
we know.


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