...

On Aug 16, 2021, at 8:06 AM, mayqel qunen'oS <mihkoun@gmail.com> wrote:

 < nucholpu' jaghpu' > jIjatlhpu' HoDvaD 'e' yIjatlh tell the captain that I've said "the enemies have approached us".

Grammatically, is there something wrong with this? On 8/16/2021 8:28 AM, Will Martin wrote: Interesting. A command to give a quotation.

For one thing, I’d use {ja’} instead of {jatlh} for the command, since “say” is not quite the same thing as “tell”.

Yes, *ja'* is the correct verb here.

The safer way to say what you’ve said is less intuitive than your choice:

nucholpu’ jaghpu’. jIjatlh. HoD yIja’.

Quotations in Klingon are more simply pairs of sentences next to each other. One is the quotation. The other informs you of who says it, using the verb of speech. If you are going to nest quotations, just make it three sentences. I strongly suspect that the {‘e’} is a mistake.

Also, I’m saying this now. You can add the perfective when you tell the captain, but it’s not perfective while I’m saying it. Just an opinion here.

I think it's clear that the command is to say that I /have/ said the enemies have approached us. "The captain wants to know why you didn't tell him that the enemies have approached us." "Tell the captain that I /did/ say that the enemies have approached us." *nucholpu' jaghpu', jIjatlhpu'; HoD yIja'.* The real question is whether you can say *'e' yIja'*/tell that./ It seems that the answer is no. Whatever you want to report about is either a noun or a quotation. I don't personally feel that it should be possible to next multiple layers of quotation, except when you're employing a /he said she said/ kind of thing, which isn't going to be accepted in normal speech. -- SuStel http://trimboli.name

On 8/18/2021 8:33 AM, mayqel qunen'oS wrote:

SuStel:

...

The real question is whether you can say 'e' yIja' tell that. It seems that the answer is no. Whatever you want to report about is either a noun or a quotation. I'm afraid I can't understand this; doesn't the {'e'} of a sao serve as a noun?

*'e'* is a pronoun. It stands in for a sentence, not a noun. When I said "either a noun or a quotation," I meant exactly that. -- SuStel http://trimboli.name

I'm sorry, SuStel, I've to ask again on this matter, and don't misunderstand me; I'm not trying to find a way to write nested quotations. In fact, even if I could use them in klingon I wouldn't, since the whole "he said that she said that they said.." gives me a feeling of old grannies gossiping in the village. But it seems that I've stumbled here on something I ignored, so I'd like to clarify this further. SuStel:

The real question is whether you can say 'e' yIja' tell that. It seems that the answer is no. Whatever you want to report about is either a noun or a quotation. jIH: I'm afraid I can't understand this; doesn't the {'e'} of a sao serve as a noun? SuStel: 'e' is a pronoun. It stands in for a sentence, not a noun. When I said "either a noun or a quotation," I meant exactly that.

What I was about to ask next, was this: Ok, but we *can* write {ghaH vIja'pu'} for "I've told him". Isn't {ghaH} a pronoun too? So why can't we say too {'e' yIja'}? The only explanation which came to mind, was that pronouns such as {jIH}, {SoH}, {ghaH}, etc can function as nouns too, something which the {'e'} of a sao can't do. The {jIH}, {SoH}, {ghaH}, etc are pronouns and can be nouns too, but the {'e'} can only be a pronoun. Am I right? ~ Dana'an

My wild guess at why the exceptional {‘e’ neHbe’ vavoy} exists is that the expression is already exceptional, since she’s already using {‘e’} to represent something someone ELSE said. It’s probably similar to my own use of uppercase for the word “else” in the previous sentence. She doesn’t want it to be unclear what her dear father did not want, without having to repeat it herself, especially since, if I remember correctly, the {‘e’} is not representing a single sentence, but more like a paragraph. Context makes it clear when someone utters a sentence that they immediately follow with {neHbe’ vav’oy}, all spoken by the same person, but if you just say {neHbe’ vav’oy} as your only utterance, intending to refer back to what the previous speaker said, some may follow you, while others are likely to ask {nuq neHbe’ vavlI’’?} Meanwhile, my understanding was that {ja’} could take nouns (in particular people or languages} as objects, but I didn’t remember canon showing it taking quotations as objects. I know it can be used as the speech verb in the sentence pair with a quotation as one sentence and the speech-verb-sentence as the other member of the pair, but grammatically, they are independent. One is not the object of the other. That’s why the order of the two sentences is completely unimportant. DuneH HoD. qaja’ta’. qaja’ta’. DuneH HoD. It means, “I told you, ’The captain wants you,’” regardless of what order the sentences are presented. The quotation isn’t the object of {ja’}. I won’t be remarkably surprised if you present canon contrary to this because I know how careful you are and I respect your encyclopedic memory of canon. I’ll just be disappointed in Okrand for yet more problematic canon. pItlh charghwI’ ‘utlh (ghaH, ghaH, -Daj)

On Aug 19, 2021, at 9:00 AM, SuStel <sustel@trimboli.name> wrote:

On 8/19/2021 7:56 AM, mayqel qunen'oS wrote:

...

I'm sorry, SuStel, I've to ask again on this matter, and don't misunderstand me; I'm not trying to find a way to write nested quotations. In fact, even if I could use them in klingon I wouldn't, since the whole "he said that she said that they said.." gives me a feeling of old grannies gossiping in the village.

But it seems that I've stumbled here on something I ignored, so I'd like to clarify this further.

SuStel:

...

The real question is whether you can say 'e' yIja' tell that. It seems that the answer is no. Whatever you want to report about is either a noun or a quotation. jIH: I'm afraid I can't understand this; doesn't the {'e'} of a sao serve as a noun? SuStel: 'e' is a pronoun. It stands in for a sentence, not a noun. When I said "either a noun or a quotation," I meant exactly that.

What I was about to ask next, was this:

Ok, but we *can* write {ghaH vIja'pu'} for "I've told him". Isn't {ghaH} a pronoun too? So why can't we say too {'e' yIja'}?

The only explanation which came to mind, was that pronouns such as {jIH}, {SoH}, {ghaH}, etc can function as nouns too, something which the {'e'} of a sao can't do. The {jIH}, {SoH}, {ghaH}, etc are pronouns and can be nouns too, but the {'e'} can only be a pronoun. You are mistaking my description of observed canon for a rule. I'm not saying "the rule is that the object of ja' can be only a noun or a quotation." I'm saying we've only ever seen actual nouns or actual quotations as the thing ja' is referencing, with no sign of the standard sentence-as-object construction anywhere in sight.

The rule is stated in TKD: "Similarly, with verbs of saying (say, tell, ask, etc.), 'e' and net are not used. The two phrases simply follow one another, in either order."

So we have the basic rule, and we haven't seen any exceptions to the rule. We've seen nouns be the object of ja' and we've seen ja' work with quotations.

neH has a similar rule, but we've seen an exception to it in Star Trek VI, where Azetbur says 'e' neHbe' vavoy. So I'm not about to state that it's impossible that ja' can have an exception to it as well. But we haven't seen this exception so far, so I'm also not about to state that exceptions occur.

The bottom line: don't use 'e' with quotations.

-- SuStel http://trimboli.name <http://trimboli.name/>_______________________________________________ tlhIngan-Hol mailing list tlhIngan-Hol@lists.kli.org http://lists.kli.org/listinfo.cgi/tlhingan-hol-kli.org

SuStel:

The rule is stated in TKD: "Similarly, with verbs of saying (say, tell, ask, etc.), 'e' and net are not used. The two phrases simply follow one another, in either order."

Ok, wait. Does that rule concern too cases, where the purpose of the speaker isn't to actually quote something? I knew that we can't quote things with the {'e'} of a sao; and because of this reason, in my initial post I wrote: {< nucholpu' jaghpu' > jIjatlhpu' HoDvaD 'e' yIjatlh} I didn't write: {jIjatlhpu' < nucholpu' jaghpu' > HoDvaD 'e' yIjatlh} And intentionally I didn't write it this way, because if I wrote it this way, then in the sao, the object would be the quotation indeed. And this shows where my confusion is: When we say "quotation" what do we actually mean? The way I understand it, if there's: {yaDDa yaDDa yaDDa, jIjatlhpu'}, then the quotation is *only* the {yaDDa yaDDa yaDDa}. The quotation isn't the {jIjatlhpu'} (which I don't know what it actually is..). So, in the {< nucholpu' jaghpu' > jIjatlhpu' HoDvaD 'e' yIjatlh}, no rules are broken, because the object of the sao isn't the quotation, but only the {jIjatlhpu'}. Look at it another way.. Q waved his hand and an officer was rendered unable to talk for a period of time; then Q's power wears off, and the officer starts speaking again. So, he says to another member of the crew: jIjatlhqa'pu' HoDvaD 'e' yIja' tell to the captain that I've spoken again There's no quotation here. There are no words to be repeated for the captain. Similarly, in the {< nucholpu' jaghpu' > jIjatlhpu' HoDvaD 'e' yIjatlh}, the object is the {jIjatlhpu'} and the < nucholpu' jaghpu' > is something which happily just happens to sit by, away from the {'e'}. So we're all happy, yes? ~ Dana'an

On 8/20/2021 7:53 AM, mayqel qunen'oS wrote:

SuStel:

...

The rule is stated in TKD: "Similarly, with verbs of saying (say, tell, ask, etc.),   'e' and net are not used. The two phrases simply follow one another, in either order."

Ok, wait. Does that rule concern too cases, where the purpose of the speaker isn't to actually quote something?

I know where you're going with this, and you're on the wrong track.

When we say "quotation" what do we actually mean? The way I understand it, if there's: {yaDDa yaDDa yaDDa, jIjatlhpu'}, then the quotation is *only* the {yaDDa yaDDa yaDDa}. The quotation isn't the {jIjatlhpu'} (which I don't know what it actually is..).

This is correct. A quotation is the exact words someone says. The *jIjatlhpu'* is a "verb of saying."

So, in the  {< nucholpu' jaghpu' > jIjatlhpu' HoDvaD 'e' yIjatlh}, no rules are broken, because the object of the sao isn't the quotation, but only the {jIjatlhpu'}.

And here's the problem: all the evidence points to the fact that you cannot describe the content of a quotation indirectly in Klingon. You're trying to do this. Okrand, for instance, has told us that the object of *jatlh* must be the speech event. For instance, you can *jatlh* a *SoQ* or a *mu'.* A description of the /contents/ of a speech event is not the same as a word representing a speech event. That means you can't say things like *bImoH 'e' vIjatlh* /I say that you are ugly/ because *bImoH* is a representation of the contents of what I say, not a word that refers to a type of speech event.

Look at it another way..

Q waved his hand and an officer was rendered unable to talk for a period of time; then Q's power wears off, and the officer starts speaking again. So, he says to another member of the crew:

jIjatlhqa'pu' HoDvaD 'e' yIja' tell to the captain that I've spoken again

There's no quotation here. There are no words to be repeated for the captain. Similarly, in the {< nucholpu' jaghpu' > jIjatlhpu' HoDvaD 'e' yIjatlh}, the object is the {jIjatlhpu'} and the < nucholpu' jaghpu' > is something which happily just happens to sit by, away from the {'e'}.

So we're all happy, yes?

No. There is no evidence that you can use *'e'* on *ja'* by changing the person of the quotation. You can't transform the quotation to make it a not-quotation, then use it the way you were told not to use it. If Klingon can do this, Okrand hasn't said so. For your Q example, all you have to do is this: *jIjatlhqa'pu' HoD yIja'*/Tell the captain I have spoken again./ (Alternatively, *HoD yIja' jIjatlhqa'pu'.*) See, for example, how Okrand handles quotations and non-quotations in /paq'batlh/ (and remember that this explicitly given to us as an English text translated into Klingon, not an original Klingon text): /Kahless tells his brother and father     to go their separate ways,     And travel the lands./ *loDnI'Daj vavDaj je ja' qeylIS     nIteb peghoS     HatlhDaq peghoS* Do you see how Okrand has particularly avoided using *'e'* and a non-quotation here? He gave us Kahless's exact words, even though the English original did not. Whenever using a verb of saying to describe what is said, always use a quotation, even if you're translating and your original does not have a quotation. Otherwise you need to find another way of saying it. -- SuStel http://trimboli.name

I just had a new thought about a recent thread. If a Klingon might misquote a direct quotation, but would never express an indirect quotation, what exactly is an indirect quotation? The knee-jerk difference one suspects as a speaker of a language that has accepted grammatical constructions for both direct and indirect quotation is to think that indirect quotation paraphrases what a person has said, focusing on the intent or meaning of the quote, while direct quotation is a word-for-word reenactment of original speech, but that misses the potential higher level of understanding of a language that doesn’t have a grammatical form to represent indirect speech. ************************************************************************************************************************ The grammatical difference is all about the person of the subject and objects of the verbs in the quotation. ************************************************************************************************************************ Imagine that SuStel says to De’vID, “I will not leave until charghwI’ arrives.” Now, charghwI’ says one of the following to De’vID: 1. SuStel said, “I will not leave until charghwI’ arrives.” 2. SuStel said, “I’m waiting for charghwI’ to show up.” 3. SuStel said that he would not leave until I arrive. 4. SuStel said that he’s waiting for me to show up. Grammatically, both 1 and 2 are direct quotations. One is accurate and the other is paraphrased, but grammatically, both are “direct”. Both 3 and 4 are indirect quotation. The First Person subject of 1 and 2 became a third person subject in 3 and 4, and the third person object of 1 and 2 became a first person object of 3 and 4. Either grammatical construction can accurately or inaccurately depict the original speech. The word “Direct” doesn’t imply “word-for-word”. It more simply refers to whether the “Person” anchor of the retold speech is kept to the grammatical context of the original, or modified to apply to the grammatical context of the current speaker, retelling the story. So, when we say that Klingon only supports direct quotation, it doesn’t imply anything about it being “word for word”. pItlh charghwI’ ‘utlh (ghaH, ghaH, -Daj)

On Aug 18, 2021, at 10:44 AM, Will Martin <willmartin2@mac.com> wrote:

... There may be other ways to express quotations, but these are the rules we’ve been given and we haven’t seen good examples in canon to expand on our resources for expressing quotation. We’re not sure that Klingon has grammar to express an indirect quotation. We have only been given means of expressing direct quotation. ...