"Reveni, Interlingua. Toto es pardonate!""Come back, Interlingua. All is forgiven!"

Interlingua          dictionario          grammatica

Hodie io legeva alcun paginas ex Le Defuncte Mattia Pascal de Luigi Pirandello, traducite per Pian Boalt. Iste libro es le plus difficile del libros in mi parve bibliotheca de libros in interlingua. Le traduction vermente meraviliose e bellissime del polyglotta Pian Boalt es diabolicamente difficile ma vale le pena. Il es como on lege le texte italiano original. Il es como on ascolta le voce de Pirandello e anque su riso sapente e jocose. Ita, reveni, Interlingua. Toto es pardonate!

English

Today I read a few pages from The Late Mattia Pascal by Luigi Pirandello, translated by Pian Bolt. This book is the most difficult of the books in my small library of books in interlingua. The genuinely marvellous and most beautiful translation by the polyglot Pian Boalt is diabolically difficult but worth the pain. It is as if you are reading the original Italian text. It is as if you are listening to the voice of Pirandello and also his wise and playful laughter. So, come back, Interlingua. All is forgiven!


I have very recently come to understand that, for literary purposes, we should not be talking about one year to learn international auxiliary languages (IALs or auxlangs) but five years. I now believe that IALs should properly be called five-year languages (5YLs).


After five years of serious part-time study you can expect to be fluent enough to read sophisticated literature and to use the language well in general. Although this sounds like a long time, it actually isn't. It is realistic. The advantage of a good auxlang is not that you can learn it miraculously quickly (unless it happens by chance to closely resemble your native language) but that after you have invested five years in studying it you can expect to use it much more accurately, more correctly, and more easily than a native language. In other words, after five years seriously studying Interlingua or Esperanto, with a good teacher or with good learning materials, you can expect to speak the language well enough to communicate very effectively. Whereas after five years seriously studying English you will probably not communicate very effectively (unless speaking it every day) and you will probably always feel inferior to native English speakers.


For me this is the breakthrough. It took me more than a year and a half to realise that what has completely sabotaged me from succeeding until now has been the unrealistic expectation that I should be able to learn and fluently use an auxlang in a short period of time such as a few months or one, two or even three years. Incorrectly, I had assumed that an auxlang which would take longer than that to learn would not be worth learning. Incorrectly, I had assumed that if readers could not learn an auxlang in just a few months they would then not read a novel written in an auxlang. Both incorrect assumptions. I am now convinced that my previous belief that about three years is necessary to achieve fluency in Esperanto or Interlingua was a gross underestimate. We should be talking about five years, approximately half a decade on average, as being required to learn them well.


I think the propaganda, especially by Esperantists but also by those promoting Interlingua and other languages, which loudly trumpets that one can learn to use these languages after very little study and in very short timeframes, is an enormous strategic mistake by the auxlang community. That propaganda nearly made me abandon auxlangs forever because I became bitterly disappointed and disillusioned that I was not able to get big results in one year. The propaganda gave me unrealistic expectations and when those unrealistic expectations were not met, I quit. As indeed I presume most students of auxlangs similarly quit.


I even incorrectly reached the conclusion that all auxlangs based primarily on Romance languages were a waste of time because one could not effectively use them without learning countless Romance-language idioms; it is correct that one must learn countless Romance-language idioms and that doing so indeed does take several years, but it is not correct that therefore such a language is a waste of time. On the contrary, it means that at the end of that five years of study not only can you understand Interlingua but also you can understand a considerable amount of written Spanish, Portuguese and Italian. In fact you can even have simple conversations with speakers of those languages. Just because something takes five years does not mean it is a waste of time. I understand that now.


Incidentally, Esperanto has its own countless idioms to learn and to learn it well enough to write a good novel would I am sure also take about five years. In other words, to truly master any language takes at least about five years; good auxlangs are able to deliver mastery in that timeframe whereas most natural languages probably require ten or fifteen years to really master.


Anyway, back to the subject of Interlingua...


Come back, Interlingua. All is forgiven!


I no longer need Interlingua to deliver results to me in one year. If it delivers results in five years, that is fine. I have given up on the "magical thinking", on the "impossible dream" that somehow readers around the world could read an auxlang novel after just a few months of study. As much as I would love that to be possible, it is not possible. My journey so far in the world of auxlangs has taught me that much. On that dream I must give up. But there are many people around the world who are motivated to communicate internationally and a good number of those people would be willing to invest five years of study in a good auxlang if they judged that the language concerned could be useful to them. Interlingua is an unusual case since, somewhat contrary to what I have just said, highly educated speakers of popular Romance languages could probably learn Interlingua for the purpose of reading a novel in less than a year, because Interlingua so closely resembles their own languages that there is relatively little for them to learn; for others it remains a five-year language, however.


The spelling of Interlingua needs to be reformed. Its difficult spelling and inconsistent pronunciation is a significant problem, although ten times less so than English. However, I have decided to have faith that at some point in the future professional linguists will probably be invited to reform the spelling of Interlingua, since we have recently seen official spelling reforms of French, German and Portuguese which are all source languages for Interlingua! Sooner or later the Union Mundial de Interlingua (UMI) will wake up and come to its senses and realise that if it ever wants to attract a large number of students it will need to reform the spelling; the current collateral orthography however is not suitable. The eventual reform will probably eliminate most but not all doubled consonants but will probably preserve the final -e of most adjectives (the collateral orthography goes too far in removing these) and will probably either mark stress with an acute accent or will standardise pronunciation such that stress is entirely regular. Eventually we will end up with an Interlingua almost but not quite as easy to spell as Spanish; a little extra difficulty is justifiable for international recognition. Anyway, for now I will use the traditional orthography of Interlingua until such time as professional linguists or officials of the UMI carry out a reform. Once they have finally done so it will be a simple matter to convert manuscripts from the traditional orthography to the reformed orthography.


Yes, Interlingua is difficult. Yes, it has a problem with drift towards the native language of the writer or speaker. However, for literature this is a double-edged sword. Suitably annotated with explanations for any obscure idiomatic expressions used, an Interlingua novel has the power to let the user experience the literary flavour of a natural Romance language without learning the natural language. This will be difficult for the reader but still easier than learning Spanish, Portuguese or Italian. And I for one am enjoying Pirandello in Interlingua enormously, although ironically its extreme difficulty was a major factor in me previously quitting.


Spoken Interlingua, as spoken in the Scandinavian style, is easy to understand. Despite its somewhat diabolical spelling, Interlingua works very well when spoken aloud. I find understanding Radio Interlingua quite easy and I was even able to clearly understand a recent video interview of participants at a recent Interlingua conference in Bulgaria. Written Interlingua in the Scandinavian style is not very difficult either. Five years should be ample time to master that kind of general conversational use and general technical writing. Written Interlingua in the style used by native speakers of Romance languages is generally difficult.


So, I am enjoying reading Interlingua literature but I do not expect to be able to read the most sophisticated novels, such as Pirandello's, with complete and effortless ease for another four years yet. At that time however I expect to probably be able to read a little Spanish, Portuguese and Italian as a result and also to be able to make myself understood in basic conversation with speakers of those languages. I also expect to be able to start writing really well, including to start writing really good novels in Interlingua, around 2015.


In the meantime, the recent incipient revival of Mondial, a very similar language to Interlingua but considerably easier in spelling and pronunciation, and with a slightly more precise grammar, is of great interest. The UMI had better hurry up and get serious about spelling reform or they may start to lose out against competitors like Mondial which might as it gains popularity cause users of Interlingua, including myself, to jump ship to Mondial or something similar. The UMI should not make the mistake of assuming that Mondial will fail as Interlingue Occidental did; unlike Occidental, the Mondial language was never really greatly promoted and has thus never really failed. With a little promotion it could conceivably reach the same number of users as Interlingua (about two hundred) within a few years and, unhindered by excessively difficult spelling and pronunciation, could quite conceivably overtake Interlingua in popularity, especially if it were strategically promoted in Asia, which is quite likely since its current promoter speaks fluent Korean. Interlingua by comparison, with its current orthography, is a very difficult proposition for promotion in Asia. Anyway, it's great to see Mondial rising again.


The other thing to bear in mind is that, on a five-year timeframe of study, once upcoming 'world languages' like Lingwa de Planeta and Sambahsa have proper textbooks available they may become very viable alternatives for the novelist; these are not artificial languages like Esperanto but are similar to natural languages either conceptually or in vocabulary and are likely to be relatively attractive to a global public, especially given their world vocabularies.


Compared to Mondial, the chief (and possibly only temporary) advantage of Interlingua is that it has an established body of literature which is enjoyable to read. I look forward to an official spelling reform being announced as soon as possible, so that it becomes easier and more enjoyable to write as well.


I wish every international auxiliary language ongoing success.


But for now, I am really enjoying reading Interlingua.


Interlingua, all is forgiven.