Alright y’all, so I’ve been away for . . . a hot minute . . . but I’m back now. So, let’s get caught up, shall we?
Back in June and July, I took a break from writing my latest novel to focus on worldbuilding due to burnout and returned to my laptop at the end of August ready to finish Echoes in Reed House only to discover that my laptop refused to connect to Microsoft Word, thus murdering my plans. “However,” I thought, “I have my phone. Everything should be fine.”
What a naïve child I was.
I tried drafting on my phone and it went horribly. My fingers were faster than my phone’s attention-span, or they’d slip and hit buttons they weren’t supposed to, so I had to slow down. BUT, when I get in the flow and my creative writer juices get flowing . . . I cannot slow down. So, suffice it to say, I was stuck.
I decided to put off drafting new chapters until I could get a new laptop and type like a madman, instead continuing to focus on conlanging as I can do that with pen and paper and slowly transcribe the finished product into graphs and painfully consider each word for clinical definitions and explanation. And, as it would make me that much closer to being done when it comes time to put these languages to proper use, I could — and still do — consider that work. And, if I say so myself ( I do), I’ve made quite a bit of progress.
As I’ve addressed in previous posts here and elsewhere, I’m currently working on a language that sits at the precipice of being the ancestor to every language that will actually be seen in my novels, which is thrilling! However, it also means I have to document every single grammatical feature and form I can think of so I don’t have to reference anything else — regarding grammar — but this ancestral tongue. Although sound changes would require me to look back from the very beginning, but that doesn’t take too much time; and I’d need to doublecheck the validity of my work, but that’s just necessary.
This means the language requires much more attention to detail than the others, because I’ve been able to develop quite a bit of grammar over the course of just three languages in preparation of others to come.
At the moment, the only thing I’ve been able to document is information about nouns — with verbs and modifiers still to go — but what I’ve gotten done is an enormous weight off my shoulders. Every noun already had case endings (suffixes that tell you what the noun does in a sentence instead of prepositions) from the previous ancestral language, but four special adjectives got used as classifiers that glommed onto each case and became four new genders that replaced the original three. However, because I like to make things as complicated for myself as possible, the original three genders are still grammatically relevant as fossilized forms which I call type-1, 2, and 3.
Alongside the four genders unevenly distributed amongst the three types, there are also five declensions (groups of words varied by slight differences in grammatical form due to certain sounds the words had millennia ago changing systematically) which each have several subgroups.
Then I decided, “well that’s not enough detail! Let’s go bigger!” because of course I did. So, I decided one of the descendants, which’ll feature regularly, needs to be convoluted, so I should plant the seeds for that now instead of invent it all later. As a result of this, every noun also got assigned into either the animate or inanimate category and all inanimate nouns are treated as mass nouns (things you can’t count, like gold, wood, air, etc.) and require a classifier to be grammatical.
For those who aren’t aware, a classifier is a word which gives more information about a noun than the noun alone can demonstrate, but it must appear with certain nouns or else the sentence just doesn’t work. English doesn’t really do this, so it’s difficult to give an example other than “head of cattle,” wherein the pseudo-classifier “head” is used with the mass noun “cattle” to show a specific instance of cattle instead of cattle as a concept. Consequently, very much like in my conlang, this phrase can’t take any plural marking, instead assuming a single instance with the possible addition of numerals to show specific number — though the phrase doesn’t change for number. One says “a head of cattle” and “five head of cattle,” but never “five heads of cattle.”
Having said that, I made classifiers . . . frickin NINETEEN of them. Which, by the way, is actually a pretty standard if not slightly modest number of classifiers — some have over thirty or more. Classifiers in natural languages can range in category from “human,” “animal,” “tool,” and “dangerous thing,” to extremely detailed lists that describe shape, utility, animacy, danger, edibility, elemental form, various terrain, etc. So, with mine I decided to mainly focus on mainly quality and utility as mostly only inanimate things take classifiers and the living things that do all fall into existing classes.
This means nouns can take three to four numbers (singular, dual, plural, and collective), three types, which are strictly fossilized genders from previous languages, four genders (solar, lunar, terran, and aerial), and nineteen classifiers depending on if its animate or inanimate.
But wait! There’s more!
Because the classifiers are repurposed words, they aren’t all the same kind and, therefore, don’t have identical strategies. Classifiers from nouns were so easy, they just use the genitive on their nouns while the classifiers, themselves, take all the case marking. Classifiers from adjectives, however, were a whole other monster.
In order to create classifiers from adjectives, I had to create regular adjective morphology, deciding that adjectives must agree with their nouns in type, gender, and number, but couldn’t agree with case because they technically took the genitival ending and the speakers didn’t want to stack cases on cases. This meant classifiers from adjectives couldn’t take case agreement, so I had to create a slew of prepositions that would go before the classifiers to communicate the same information.
But this is all assuming the speaker isn’t using the definite article (“the”). If that’s used, then something special happens — nouns and adjectives take a completely different set of endings, I call the “definite cases.” These special endings aren’t all that complicated, though — they’re just the original endings without the gender added on. In the event the definite article is used, then, because the definite article takes case, the prepositions aren’t necessary.
So, all in all, I have essentially everything I need for nouns — apart from a few loose ends with special derivational suffixes, and the forms of the definite article and pronouns — and a head start on adjectives. Not too shabby.
With regard to finishing Echoes in Reed House, though, I’m still no closer to finishing it than I was three months ago thanks to the absence of a laptop that loves me. But that’s soon to change because — drumroll please — I now have a new laptop, went over a few of the later chapters in my head, and planned some dramatic scenes for chapters to come. I can’t wait to get started again! Honestly, just typing this has made me feel better than I’ve felt in ages.
As for the absence on my blog . . . that I can’t blame on my laptop — my routine’s been a little all over the place because of personal matters and general negative emotions. And, I know, I say all the time that one can’t just let oneself be overcome by depression, anxiety, or any negative emotion — anything accomplished, no matter how small, is an accomplishment when you’re being dragged through the mud by your own feelings — but, I’m not perfect. Like everyone, sometimes I don’t always practice what I preach — we’re all hypocrites at least once in our lives.
But, armed with a laptop and three months worth of creative energy, I will soon burst forth and finish this dadgum novel so I can get to other things — like editing . . . and finishing other novels.
Alright y’all, this has been a rather long update, I think, so I’ll end it here. Remember to keep going — climb the mountain and rest at the peek to take in the view, but don’t stop; the valley’s just as beautiful and waiting for you to visit. Keep kind and courteous. Stay strong and brave in the face of your own fears, and stand courageously beside others in the face of theirs. And, maybe not above all but certainly an important thing to remember, is to never give up on your dreams — they may never see us through to fame and fortune, but we sure can see them through to flourish and flower into something beautiful that anyone can appreciate if they stop and look. Bye!