[Tlhingan-hol] Story: ghuv = The Recruit - 3

[Robyn Stewart]

We're halfway through the second paragraph of the story in which Torg leaves
home to join the military. He's undergoing a medical exam. 
DIrDaj'e' ghItlhqu'pu'bogh chach leghba' Qel. QIjmeH jatlh torgh, "loSpev
yobwI'." bepbe' Qel. torgh juvDI' Qel, Qamqu' torgh. loS vI' jav 'uj neH
'aDmo' torgh pIj vaqlu' 'ach mI'mey qon neH Qel, pagh jatlhtaHvIS. 
First sentence: DIrDaj'e' ghItlhqu'pu'bogh chach leghba' Qel.
DIr = skin
-Daj = I told you to remember this one
-'e' = N5 topic marker (note that this is a completely different animal from
the word 'e').
ghItlh = write, mark
-qu' = emphatic verb suffix
-pu' = V7 perfective
-bogh = V9 relative clause marker
chach = emergency
legh = sees
-ba' = V6, obviously
Qel = doctor - you had that one last time
Start with the easy end: The subject is Qel and the main verb is legh. "The
doctor obviously sees ..." and the whole remaining mess is the object of the
sentence, what the doctor sees. Parse it by taking off -bogh and reading
what's left like a normal sentence:
DIrDaj'e' ghItlhqu'pu' chach.
Object: His skin (made the topic by -'e')
Verb: write-very much-perfective
Subject: The emergency 
That won't make much sense yet if you are very new, but I want to give you a
chance to see how your initial impression of unintelligibility can coalesce
into sense. We know from Marc Okrand that "To mark (upon)' something is
ghItlh. This isn't just writing; it's any kind of marking."
So "The emergency has severely marked his skin."
There's no Klingon word for accident, but maybe it's weird that English uses
the same word to describe spilling orange juice on someone and getting your
guts split open by a combine harvester. The one Torg experienced was an
emergency.
Now put -bogh back on. DIrDaj'e' ghItlhqu'pu'bogh chach = "his skin which
the emergency has severely marked".
If the clause were DIrDaj ghItlhqu'pu'bogh chach'e' it would be "the
emergency which severely marked his skin" but the doctor didn't see the
emergency.  The doctor just sees the skin that has been so marked, i.e.
"The doctor obviously sees the skin which the emergency has severely
marked."
-pu' is there because it's the result of the marking process that is
important, not the marking itself. 
-qu' can be translated "very much" "a lot" "so" and here "badly" "gravely"
"boldly" "extremely" all might be appropriate translations. You may be able
to guess from all this that we don't know a Klingon word for "scar." A
colloquial translation might be, "Obviously the doctor sees the accident
scars."
Next: QIjmeH jatlh torgh, "loSpev yobwI'."
QIj = explain
-meH = V9 - purpose clause - time to remember this one for yourself
jatlh = say, speak
loSpev = quadrotriticale - a Star Trek supergrain
yob = harvest (v)
-wI' = V9 - one who does, something that does (the action of the verb)
QIjmeH is a plain old purpose clause, so the a null prefix shows that the
subject and object are third person. "In order for him to explain" or "To
explain it"
jatlh torgh = Torg says - this is a normal way to attribute speech in
Klingon. It can go before or after the words they say.
loSpev yobwI' - quadrotriticale harvester
"In order to explain, Torg says, "Quadrotriticale harvester." Maybe when the
doctor "obviously saw" the marks he looked questioningly, or maybe Torg is
just used to people asking. 
Next: bepbe' Qel.
bep = complain
-be' = negation suffix (definitely time to memorize this one)
Qel = doctor (remember this for the rest of this scene, and I'll remind you
again when there's another doctor later)
You know that bep is not the noun "agony" because it has the verb suffix
-be' on it. So it's a very simple sentence:
"The doctor does not complain."
Next: torgh juvDI' Qel, Qamqu' torgh.
juv = measure
-DI' = as soon as, when
Qam = stand
qu' = verb emphasizing suffix
"When the doctor measures Torg, Torg stands very much."
In English you wouldn't repeat the name, but the sentence structure in
Klingon makes it less clear whether the doctor or Torg is doing the extreme
standing. A smooth English translation might be "When the doctor measures
him, Torg stands up tall." Maybe I could have got away with <juvDI' Qel,
Qamqu' torgh> but I learned from my previous story that the more specific I
am with who is performing which action, the clearer it is to my readers,
experts and intermediates alike.
Last sentence: loS vI' jav 'uj neH 'aDmo' torgh pIj vaqlu' 'ach mI'mey qon
neH Qel, pagh jatlhtaHvIS. 
loS = four or waits
vI' = decimal point, marksmanship, or accumulates
jav = six
neH = only
'uj = unit of measurement, about 35 cm
'aD = has a length of
-mo' = V9 - because
pIj = often
vaq = mock
-lu' = indicates an unspecified subject for the verb vaqlu' 

Probably as soon as you see the numbers and measurement words you discard
the "marksmanship" and "accumulate" possibilities for vI' and jump quickly
to "four point six oodges" - which is 161 cm or a little over 5"3.  That's
the object of the verb 'aD and the subject is Torg. 
neH goes after a noun, and isn't in the right position to be the verb want,
so it means "only."
<loS vI' jav 'uj neH 'aD torgh> = "Torg measures only 4.6 'uj."  It's not
explicit, but I hope you'll understand this as the vertical dimension. He's
not very tall. The -mo' makes this into a subordinate clause, so 
"Because Torg measures only five-foot-three he is often mocked, but ..."
mI'  = number, perform calisthenics, but can only be "numbers" because of
the noun suffix.
-mey = N2 plural (remember this)
qon = record, compose
neH = merely, want, only
pagh = nothing, no one, none
jatlh = speak, say
-taH = V7 continuous
-vIS = while - so jatlhtaHvIS = while saying nothing

It could be read as "The doctor wants to record the numbers while saying
nothing" or "The doctor merely records the numbers while saying nothing". I
think one of them obviously makes more sense, but there's nothing following
to indicate that the doctor didn't do what he wanted, so if you read it that
way you won't suffer too badly.
-	Qov





-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://stodi.digitalkingdom.org/pipermail/tlhingan-hol/attachments/20130821/283dde3c/attachment-0001.html>