From Lognet 94/3. Used with the permission of The Loglan Institute, Inc.)
Mi gatytaa tu lepo srite le fidsesmao kamkystu notlenfoa la Lognet. I mi mutce haispe nei. I lemi merji mou haispe nei, e buo djacue li, Lo dzabi fidsesmao no ga spuciu lopo dupma guo, le nu simci ceu je le fidsesmao ji vi le kamkystu, lu. I mi cnida lepo klimao toi.
Na lepo fei pa marmao lefei kosta lo tokri guo, fei durbiesni lepo djacue lepo fei papa godzi le CaiERaiNai. Ibuo, na lepo fei kukygoi lefei merji guo, fei nu tedtoa su fidsensi vidre. I na lepo fei vizka lefei merji guo, fei pa nornaodri lefei nu stucue, e stutaa mei lo tradu.
Nao lo merji je su fidsenmao ga kuodja lepu lo fidsenmao ga durdrifiu guo, e gua drimao feo lo nu nordri. I levi merji pa canjui lefei stuci go nu durbiesni, e donsu fei ne vidpiu, e ne bilbiu nabdapli je lepo fei napa bivdu go no socdre.
Mi spopa lepo le ri modvi je fei, e mei na pertyfeokli.
--Hue Djeimz Djeninz
O, Professor Brown, Sir.
This letter is from James Jennings. Normally JJ uses Hoi Djim, fie = O Jim, Friend when addressing JCB. But for this meant-to-be-published letter he elected to use kae = Sir/Madam, which is a couple of grades above fie on the Loglan respectability-difference scale (which was borrowed by Steve Rice from the Japanese in 1990; see SLK 90/1). Notice that JJ did not use rie = Sire, which would have meant treating JCB as his shogun, or lord and master...as he is certainly not, soi clafo, even in things loglandical! In short, we logli can now be as subtle in these matters as lo ponji.
I thank (gratefully-speak to) you for (the act of) writing the physicist (physical-science-maker) joke (comical story) translation (other-language-form) in Lognet.
Notice how JJ uses the 3rd place of srite = X writes Y on surface Z to specify where the translation appeared...a quite loglandical extension of the meaning of the predicate and very unEnglish. (If JJ submitted a LOD edit suggesting that on/in surface/document Z would be a better characterization of the 3rd place of srite than the current one, which is simply on surface Z, then other LOD-users would be able to profit from his insight for the rest of loglandical time, soi crano fibsange. In general this is what logli who find themselves improving LOD while using it should do.) Notice also that the predicate string fidsesmao kamkystu notlenfoa is unmarked; this means that it has the default, left-grouping modification structure ((preda prede) predi).
(And) I much enjoy (happily-experience) n (the translation).
JJ's use of the timeless tense here is interestingly loglandical. It suggests that JJ wants JCB to know that his enjoyment of the joke is a timeless property of himself and the joke, like his profession or his character, not momentary or timebound like a sneeze, making the remark a higher compliment than pa mutce haispe would have been.
(And) My spouse more enjoys n, and however claims (know-says) (quote) Real physicists are not as skillful (expert-equal) at deception as the appearance, anyway, of the physicist in the joke (i.e., as was apparently true of the physicist in the joke) (close-quote)
Notice that spuciu , a new preda not yet in LOD, has been made with the 4-place pattern of ckamou (X is kinder to Y than Z is to W) and carries the default assumption that, if the 4th place is not specified, W = Y. Also note JJ's use of the new PA-word mou as an inflector; it gives the sense that his wife's enjoying the joke is more than something else that is current and local, in this case, his own enjoyment of it! The E phrase even more would catch this elusive L meaning equally well.
(And) I need to explain (clear-make) this (the last remark).
Notice the use of toi here rather than tio. It's not the situation alluded to in the remark that needs clarifying; it's the remark itself.
(New para) When f (the physicist in the joke) marked the-f (his) coat with chalk (close-clause), f was on the verge of claiming/was about to claim that f had been to CERN.
Notice that the narrative past is established by the first use of pa in the story, namely in pa marmao, and is then assumed to extend to later predicates like durbiesni. But then we do have to use papa to get the pluperfect of godzi in the lepo-clause. If we had contented ourselves with using pa again--on the theory that a pa departure from a pa is a papa--it could have been heard as merely a repetition of the already-established pa. Surely the speaker of L, as of any language, must be allowed to repeat s-self now and then without the risk of generating false assumptions about s's rigor!
(And) However, when f rushed (quickly-went) to the-f (his) spouse (close-clause), f was distracted by one-or-more physics ideas (ideas that had to do with physics).
We're assuming that the pluperfect died with the lepo-clause in the previous sentence; so we're still in the simple past here. Thus we don't need a pa on either kukygoi or nu tedtoa...although JJ could have used it in either place for emphasis.
(And) When f sees the-f spouse (close-clause), f temporarily forgot (not-now-remembered) the-f story-to-be-told (the thing to be story-said), and told (story-talked to) m (the spouse) (about) the truth.
Notice the use of two senses of the E word tell here: stucue, to tell a story, i.e., to say it, vs. stutaa, to tell someone a story. This is one of the ways we avoid the ambiguities of unary metaphor.
(New para) Spouses of one or more physicists (i.e., physicists' spouses) are acquainted with (customarily-know) the property of physicists being absent-minded (do-remember-weak) (close-clause), and customarily remind phi (them, the physicists just referred to en masse) of forgotten (things).
Lo merji je su fidsenmao designates the mass of all spouses such that each is married to one or more physicists. This incorporates the spouses of physicists in polygamous as well as monogamous societies, and of those in countries like Russia and China where many scientists are women. Also, using lepu rather than lepo to form the argument of kuodja makes this a property of physicists rather than a state in which they participate, although either descriptor would do. Feo is necessary as the replacing variable for this new lot of physicists because fei is still attached to the physicist of the joke.
(And) This spouse guessed (chance-opined) the-f story that was on-the-verge-of-being-acted-on (i.e., told), and gave f a hint, and a graceful (beautifully-behaving) solution (problem-answer) to f's having behaved improperly (not socially-correctly).
You may infer from donsu fei ne vidpiu that the places of donsu have been returned to their 1989, L1 values, that is, that the recipient is again in 2nd place. This is the order of the untagged E: X gives Y Z. We're finally beginning to understand what these untagged natural word-orders mean. In this case we think it means that the recipient of a gift is often designated very briefly --for example, by a name or a pronoun--while the designation of the gift itself is often very long and, as in this case, grammatically complex. Putting a short, simple, untagged argument after a long, complex, untagged one puts quite a strain on the memory of the auditor for what has gone before. Putting the short argument first and the long one last substantially reduces the parsing/understanding load.
(New para) I hope that the several motives of f and m are now evident (pertinent-fact-clear).
The place-structure of modvi has been changed to X is a motive of actor Y for doing action Z under circumstances W for substantially the same reasons as those cited above for putting the recipient in the second place of donsu; that is, this change in the untagged order seems to reduce the parsing load.
(New para) Said James Jennings.
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