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Jul. 26th, 2010
Compare and Contrast
Jul. 26th, 2010 02:08 amEphesians 6:12
G'Kar, Babylon 5
One last little surprise for you. :)
cha'maH vagh DISmey poH Dun!
Jul. 26th, 2010 05:36 pmThat's "25 glorious years!" in tlhIngan Hol.
Back in 1985, Pocket Books (a division of Simon & Schuster, yadda yadda) published a tiny blue book by the then - obscure author Marc Okrand. Titled "The Klingon Dictionary," it never generated much publicity.
The Blue Book, paq SuD, came out a year after Star Trek III and about a year or so before Star Trek IV - the latter having little or no actual Klingon. We would not hear any more spoken tlhIngan Hol in a Star Trek film until Star Trek V in 1991.
However, in 1987 Star Trek: The Next Generation saw the return of Star Trek to the small screen, and the love affair with Klingons began very slowly - next to Lt Worf, the word "Klingon" was barely mentioned, making it almost seem as if the Klingons had become so sanitised that they were just another race of the Federation.
Then came "Heart of Glory" in 1988, and the Empire lived again.
Through TNG, we began to see a slow revelation of more and more Klingon culture. By 1990 / 91, we had explored Klingon politics in "Sins of The Father," witnessed Klingon mating and relationships in "The Emissary," and in 1991 in Season 4 of TNG, we had the tragedy of "Reunion" and the continuation of Worf's personal storyline taking a sideways step with the addition of a Klingon called Alexander to his family.
Yes, that has never been lost on me. :)
So, with four seasons of TNG, five movies and the final Kirk - era Star Trek film promising to be a good one (which ST VI really was), what better time than 1992 for Pocket Books to relaunch TKD in a brand new format.
Trade paperback, bigger, more pages, with an Addendum featuring a couple of new rules and a brand new cover - the "white book" TKD, or paq chIS.
Not long afterwards, Pocket Books followed up with two Klingon language audio cassette tapes, Conversational Klingon and Power Klingon, and two further Klingon language books made it onto the shelves - The Klingon Way and Klingon for the Galactic Traveler.
And now, here we are. 2010, twenty five years on from TKD's original, inconspicuous paq SuD launch, and not one glass of blood wine raised to commemorate the publication of what is probably one of the most well-known books never read. Estimates put the circulation of copies of paq chIS at between 250,000 and 300,000, yet the number of actual Klingon speakers who can manage a decent bit of extemporaneous tlhIngan Hol could really be numbered in the hundreds, at most.
But fans of the films worldwide recognise when Klingon is being spoken, even if they don't understand a word - and literally millions of people know that Qapla'! Success! even if they've never watched an episode of Star Trek (thanks, in part, to mention of the Klingon language appearing in TV shows all over the place, being at least mentioned in shows such as Stargate SG-1 and Farscape, and actually quoted in an episode of Frasier.
Has tlhIngan Hol ever made it to The Big Bang Theory or The IT Crowd so far? I can imagine Evil Wil Wheaton and Sheldon facing off with a bout of mu'qaD veS if they haven't already done so. Yes, it means I've missed out on so much by not watching those series. My time, which I chose to spend writing.
But yes ... back to the present. 2010 has passed without an anniversary of the original TKD so far. I think that, seeing as this means that tlhIngan Hol is actually twenty five years old, the Klingon speaking community should do something about this.
At the very least we can start sending emails to Pocket Books, asking for a relaunch of TKD, or even a third edition TKD incorporating material from the old Addendum and various other sources into the book to update the language.
The Klingon language must rise again. And we must place ourselves in the forefront of any efforts to make it so, to paraphrase Picard.
Back in 1985, Pocket Books (a division of Simon & Schuster, yadda yadda) published a tiny blue book by the then - obscure author Marc Okrand. Titled "The Klingon Dictionary," it never generated much publicity.
The Blue Book, paq SuD, came out a year after Star Trek III and about a year or so before Star Trek IV - the latter having little or no actual Klingon. We would not hear any more spoken tlhIngan Hol in a Star Trek film until Star Trek V in 1991.
However, in 1987 Star Trek: The Next Generation saw the return of Star Trek to the small screen, and the love affair with Klingons began very slowly - next to Lt Worf, the word "Klingon" was barely mentioned, making it almost seem as if the Klingons had become so sanitised that they were just another race of the Federation.
Then came "Heart of Glory" in 1988, and the Empire lived again.
Through TNG, we began to see a slow revelation of more and more Klingon culture. By 1990 / 91, we had explored Klingon politics in "Sins of The Father," witnessed Klingon mating and relationships in "The Emissary," and in 1991 in Season 4 of TNG, we had the tragedy of "Reunion" and the continuation of Worf's personal storyline taking a sideways step with the addition of a Klingon called Alexander to his family.
Yes, that has never been lost on me. :)
So, with four seasons of TNG, five movies and the final Kirk - era Star Trek film promising to be a good one (which ST VI really was), what better time than 1992 for Pocket Books to relaunch TKD in a brand new format.
Trade paperback, bigger, more pages, with an Addendum featuring a couple of new rules and a brand new cover - the "white book" TKD, or paq chIS.
Not long afterwards, Pocket Books followed up with two Klingon language audio cassette tapes, Conversational Klingon and Power Klingon, and two further Klingon language books made it onto the shelves - The Klingon Way and Klingon for the Galactic Traveler.
And now, here we are. 2010, twenty five years on from TKD's original, inconspicuous paq SuD launch, and not one glass of blood wine raised to commemorate the publication of what is probably one of the most well-known books never read. Estimates put the circulation of copies of paq chIS at between 250,000 and 300,000, yet the number of actual Klingon speakers who can manage a decent bit of extemporaneous tlhIngan Hol could really be numbered in the hundreds, at most.
But fans of the films worldwide recognise when Klingon is being spoken, even if they don't understand a word - and literally millions of people know that Qapla'! Success! even if they've never watched an episode of Star Trek (thanks, in part, to mention of the Klingon language appearing in TV shows all over the place, being at least mentioned in shows such as Stargate SG-1 and Farscape, and actually quoted in an episode of Frasier.
Has tlhIngan Hol ever made it to The Big Bang Theory or The IT Crowd so far? I can imagine Evil Wil Wheaton and Sheldon facing off with a bout of mu'qaD veS if they haven't already done so. Yes, it means I've missed out on so much by not watching those series. My time, which I chose to spend writing.
But yes ... back to the present. 2010 has passed without an anniversary of the original TKD so far. I think that, seeing as this means that tlhIngan Hol is actually twenty five years old, the Klingon speaking community should do something about this.
At the very least we can start sending emails to Pocket Books, asking for a relaunch of TKD, or even a third edition TKD incorporating material from the old Addendum and various other sources into the book to update the language.
The Klingon language must rise again. And we must place ourselves in the forefront of any efforts to make it so, to paraphrase Picard.
