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From: binder%dosadi.DEC@decwrl.ARPA
Newsgroups: net.sf-lovers
Subject: none
Message-ID: <1638@sri-arpa.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 6-Jul-84 09:28:03 EDT
Article-I.D.: sri-arpa.1638
Posted: Fri Jul  6 09:28:03 1984
Date-Received: Sun, 8-Jul-84 01:18:36 EDT
Lines: 40

From:  binder%dosadi.DEC@decwrl.ARPA  (The Stainless Steel Rat)

Being a lover of English who has also a smattering of other languages, I 
make my best effort at pronunciation of unusual names.  For me there is
a loss of pleasure if I can't savour the sound of a word.  It's quite
interesting that even a simple word can receive two radically different 
treatments; "Dosadi", from Frank Herbert's "The Dosadi Experiment", (and
also my system name) is an example.  It can be pronounced either as
"DOE-suh-dye" or "Doe-SAH-dee".  Which sounds better?  I think the 
second does, but if someone else prefers the first, that's
understandable.  Weird, but understandable.   :-) 

Often, deliberately or not, the author has given a clue to the correct 
pronunciation.  "Klaatu" is an example of this.  The "aa" sound is one 
that appears in Scandinavian languages and also in Dutch.  In Swedish,
it is written as an "a" with a small circle over it, and it represents a
very broad "awh" sound.  (It's transliterated into English by the 
doubled "a".)  In Dutch, it is written as "aa" and represents a broad
"ah"; thus, it's a fairly safe bet to assume that it ought NOT to be
pronounced like a short "a" as in "bat". 

Sometimes one must search rather far afield for the phonetics.  The name 
of the human ship in "First Contact" was "Llanvabon" - this word could 
be of Spanish origin, with the "Ll" at its beginning, but it more likely 
has Welsh roots, and the sound in Welsh of the "Ll" is "Thl", making
"Thlan-VAH-bon" a fairly good guess at the name. 

At the other end of the scale, an author may state explicitly that there 
is no correct pronunciation available to English speakers; this is the 
line chosen by Heinlein in "Glory Road" - after a few lines of 
italicised transliterations, the Hero states that he won't try to render
any more Nevian into English sounds. 

Cheers,
Dick Binder   (The Stainless Steel Rat)

UUCP:  { decvax, allegra, ucbvax... }!decwrl!dec-rhea!dec-dosadi!binder
ARPA:  binder%dosadi.DEC@decwrl.ARPA

Posted Friday 6th July 1984, 09:29 EDT by DOSADI::BINDER