From: Mark E. Shoulson (mark@kli.org)
Date: Thu Nov 22 2007 - 22:36:42 CST
At my parents' house for Thanksgiving today, they gave me a copy of a
book that might interest some of the readers here. A friend of my
mother's, over ten years ago, started collecting translations of the
"Four Questions" from the Passover Seder into as many languages as he
could. According to him, finding out about me and getting from me the
Klingon version gave him the impetus to really pursue the project and
turn it into a book. The book has translations into 300 languages, each
printed in its native script (if applicable), and comes with a CD and a
DVD full of performances and readings of the various translations.
(Things like signed languages couldn't be printed and are thus really
only available in video on the DVD). I'm actually pretty impressed with
the quality of the work and the explanations they give for each and
every language. I'm sure not all the typography is 100% perfect, but
there was definitely a lot of effort put into it. All the languages
have the appropriate font, often with a transliteration as well.
Mongolian, relevant to recent discussion, is shown in Cyrillic
transcription, but in the "ancient/extinct languages" section there is
an entry for "Ancient Mongolian" which is written in proper vertical
fashion.
Take a look: http://whyisthisnight.com/ The book is called "300 Ways to
Ask the Four Questions: From Zulu to Abkhaz". The languages are
somewhat annoyingly arranged in *reverse* alphabetical order, on the
grounds that Hebrew reads right to left. Go figure.
~mark
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