Possibly the geekiest thing I have EVER DONE.
Prompted by a comment by twilight_rain , I have produced the "original Eikthali version" of the poem that Tosh translates in " They Still Write Poetry." I am pretty proud of the way the finish product sounds, especially it was really freaking hard to create.
"But!" you say. "Aren't you just making up funny words? How hard can that be?"
...yeah, you'd think that. But, dudes, seriously? I was a linguistics major. I demand that my internal structure be coherent. So three issues were:
So I know none of you really care - except twilight_rain , and even then I'm not sure - but below the cut we have the Eikthali poem, "Ei alor-me dan bretn," and its translation. I prefer the English poem without the line breaks, as it originally appears in "Poetry," but I've given line breaks here that correspond to the breaks in Eikthali for anyone who wants to try and line up the words/translation. But if you care enough to click, then: enjoy!
Eikthali - Ei alor-me dan bretn
Ei alor-me dan bretn,
a Ei-vath-aia pirika-duni bredn,
a Ei-shtaika bredn,
shtaika ika fahas a faru,
a shtaika-avathika koba dunifitaika ko fita-aia korakh a korens;
Ei-stavath eben.
a Ei alor-me dun bretn,
a Ei-vath-aia kipika-kthta-dein drodn,
a Ei panshtaika-panavathika vien bredt.
Ei alor-me fiti-kthta dunifitan.
English - Today I looked out
Today I looked out,
and I saw my name among the stars,
and I saw the worlds,
the many breathing, aching worlds,
and I knew
all things were within my grasp if I would only reach and close my hand.
And today I looked in,
and I heard my name upon your lips,
and I did not need to see any more than this.
Today I reached out and closed my hand around yours.
"But!" you say. "Aren't you just making up funny words? How hard can that be?"
...yeah, you'd think that. But, dudes, seriously? I was a linguistics major. I demand that my internal structure be coherent. So three issues were:
- I had already given Eikthali a somewhat complicated structure within the story, and thus had to adhere to this structure. Despite not having left myself any notes about the language, seriously, what was I thinking?
- I had already created a number of different words and phrases for Boesheiv in " They Still Tell Stories," and thus A) had to make sure the languages sounded distinct, and B) didn't accidentally use some of the same words. This was less hard than I expected, mostly because when writing "Stories" I had done my damnedest to insure they were distinct.
- I used some really complicated phrases in the poem, OH MY GOD. At one point my translation for the longest line was, "a Ei - oh, shit, this is hard." I just about went crazy trying to figure out the structure, and then I had a beer to keep from going crazy, and then it made even less sense, so I was really glad I had left myself good notes.
So I know none of you really care - except twilight_rain , and even then I'm not sure - but below the cut we have the Eikthali poem, "Ei alor-me dan bretn," and its translation. I prefer the English poem without the line breaks, as it originally appears in "Poetry," but I've given line breaks here that correspond to the breaks in Eikthali for anyone who wants to try and line up the words/translation. But if you care enough to click, then: enjoy!
Eikthali - Ei alor-me dan bretn
Ei alor-me dan bretn,
a Ei-vath-aia pirika-duni bredn,
a Ei-shtaika bredn,
shtaika ika fahas a faru,
a shtaika-avathika koba dunifitaika ko fita-aia korakh a korens;
Ei-stavath eben.
a Ei alor-me dun bretn,
a Ei-vath-aia kipika-kthta-dein drodn,
a Ei panshtaika-panavathika vien bredt.
Ei alor-me fiti-kthta dunifitan.
English - Today I looked out
Today I looked out,
and I saw my name among the stars,
and I saw the worlds,
the many breathing, aching worlds,
and I knew
all things were within my grasp if I would only reach and close my hand.
And today I looked in,
and I heard my name upon your lips,
and I did not need to see any more than this.
Today I reached out and closed my hand around yours.