4 ms·
its largely correct based on a lot of what I read. i think it may have been a more organic process of co-creation, where the language informed the world&story b
by jonnycomputer 8y ago
its largely correct based on a lot of what I read. i think it may have been a more organic process of co-creation, where the language informed the world&story building, and vice-versa. But its definitely mistaken to think that he just created the languages to populate his world, as some kind of afterthought.
- garmaine 8y agoThe fact that the elves have this one-way trip they can make over the sea to some sort of magical neverland, a central part of the plot for elves in the lord of the rings and in fact all of his stories, is pretty much only for the reason that it makes an interesting playground for linguistic evolution. He has the two main elvish languages evolve in different contexts, with one receiving influence from the other languages of middle earth and new generations of elves (think: the romance languages), and the other having more conservative influences (think: ecclesiastical latin) but sometimes influenced by middle earth elves making a one-way return trip over the sea. He explicitly talks about major parts of middle earth history being invented for the purpose of exploring the languages, not the other way around IIRC from the biographies.