The Lojban Kalevala Project

[Logical Language Group <cbmvax!uunet!grebyn.com!lojbab>]

I'm circulating this primarily on Lojban List, but also on conlang where it
may distract people from the Esperanto-bashing wars and perhaps give some
people who were waiting for an excuse a reason to jump in and learn Lojban.
(There is more to bringing a conlang to life than arguing about accusative
endings.)  We'll happily take ideas from anybody for this effort (conlang
people please cc. all traffic to Lojban List,
<lojban@cuvmb.cc.columbia.edu>, but the bottom line is that only people who
know Lojban will be able to join in the real fun of bringing this project
to life.  (Steve B. - Lojban grammar really is easy to learn; we've had
people produce quite good Lojban text after a weekend studying our latest
generation of materials, and the class now nearing completion after 8 2-
hour sessions has found the grammar fairly trivial to learn, being mostly
held up by the time needed to learn sufficient vocabulary to feel
comfortable talking about any subject).

On Lojban List, there has been discussion for the last month on what I once
called the Lojban Canterbury Tales.  Several major cultures trace their
earliest cultural and linguistic identity to a collection of stories
written in the language.  These include Chaucer's Canterbury tales, which
basically defined the birth of Middle English, Shakespeare, who did the
same for Modern English, the Decameron for Italian, the tales of the
Arabian Nights for Arabic.  Veijo Vilva's moving comments about the
necessary birth of a Lojban stylistics through original literature, written
under the subject title of "The Kalevala", seems to have shifted the focus
of comparison to that relatively unknown mythic collection.  I'll leave it
to people to come up with a suitably jingling name to supplant "The
Kalevala Project".  But with the impending completion of the first Lojban
dictionary, it is time to set forth on people writing originally IN Lojban
(rather than in translation from other languages) and hence to explore the
unique point-of-view and style that Lojban's unusual nature might bring to
narrative (the assumption of the uniqueness of this point-of-view actually
assumes Sapir-Whorf is true, but we'll ignore that problem for now).

Per my intent, we had a long discussion at LogFest, and Veijo's comments
about basing the story(s) on a uniquely Lojbanic world-view, coupled with
Nick Nicholas's identification of what writings seemed to him to best
represent a budding Lojban culture, underlay much of the discussion and its
current resolution, which is still modifiable by those who read this.
Hence, I'm giving more than minimal details on the discussion.

Quickly ruled out was a scenario involving medieval times, which would
severely restrict the scope of stories that could be told, and a space
travel scenario, with people travelling together telling stories of their
home worlds.  Unfortunately, this type of scenario would require a lot of
what SF people call "world-building" - every story would need the added
baggage of devising a believable 'world' wherein it takes place, and making
that unique world come alive.  Even the better SF writers often fail at the
'world-building' game, and it seems too much to ask of the non-expert
writers who will be trying to bring Lojban to life, to ask them to bring
totally new worlds to life as well.

Still the idea is to bring people together in a situation where they will
tend to tell stories, a process that takes time when a lot of stories are
to be told.  In modern society, people are simply not thrown together in
numbers sufficient for such storytelling.  There was a suggestion of a
scenario involving a story-telling contest of some type, but this didn't
fire people's imagination.  In retrospect, I think such a competition would
have caused problems in that some of the short-shorts that beginning
Lojbanists might write won't be in the same story-telling league as longer
stories told by more experienced Lojbanists.  I'd rather see people write
well what they feel comfortable at writing about, and not try to compete
with other Lojbanists, better or worse, which I think a competition theme
would naturally lead to.  The goal is Lojban stories written from a common
narrative starting point, written by as many different people as possible,
each of varying Lojban skill levels.
Instead, we came up with a scenario that allows, and even encourages, a
motley collection of stories of varying lengths.  We decided to draw on the
limited range of 'Lojban culture' that exists today.  The first such
element identified was the "Jimbob" 'rant' (David Twery's description of
it) that Nick started on conlang and summarized on Lojban List, and others
followed upon.  So we talked of the stories that the Jimbobs might tell
each other while "working in the sandpits" while the Esperantists climbed
their wall and the apes came abseiling down.  Several people liked this
idea, but others objected violently.  To them, the Jimbob allegory makes
for a distracting setting for telling a story - it is a story in itself and
not a setting; it is also a humorous, indeed ridiculous setting, and might
ruin a story with a serious tone.

So we turned instead to David Twery's coffee-house (ckafyzda), which Nick
has identified as the first authentic-seeming "Lojban world-view" text.  It
also allows Lojbanists, many of whom are SF fans, to get inspiration from a
variety of similar ideas used in SF stories, including the "White Hart"
tales of Arthur C. Clarke, and the Callahan's Bar tales of Spider Robinson.

For a brief while we had the compromise situation of a coffee house on the
edge of the sand pits, allowing both indoor and outdoor settings for
storytelling, but the anti-pit people eventually came up with a better
approach.  They devised an interesting, Lojban-allegorical coffeehouse
which is interesting enough to serve as the subject of stories, as well as
a backdrop for the telling of stories.  The concept is a coffeehouse with
an international flavor in which Lojban is spoken.  The atmosphere is
vaguely contemporary, but somewhat timeless.  Indeed, one idea was to leave
the outside of the coffeehouse, i.e. its locale, essentially unspecified.
Description #2 below, the current strong favorite, is probably in a rural
or mountainous setting, since it suggests that the sandpits are nearby if
not immediately present, but unlike our starting premise, the sandpits are
not essential to the description (though they clearly inspired the climbing
equipment).  But people voting for description #2 in many cases specified
that they wanted the windows removed from the description, so that the
outside remains undefined.  What will likely happen is that we will see how
things develop from what we have, and add more details as needed by
specific authors as the culture of the coffeehouse becomes further defined.

Whichever description is chosen, the coffeehouse has 6 employees, each a
representative of a culture using one of the source languages for Lojban
(There was a lot of debate over whether to use a British or American
representative for English, and I would have suggested Australian in honor
of Nick, but people settled on American because unfortunately the majority
of Lojbanists, who are mostly Americans, may be familiar only with American
culture, and we don't want to shut people out of this effort for cultural
blindness.)

We were able to identify a number of "roles" to be filled in a coffeehouse:
manager, cook, waiter/waitress, busboy, cashier.  But some of these are
seen as of a lower, subservient nature as compared with others.  Rather
than risk association of some culture being seen as stereotypically
subservient by tying a character of that culture to a particular role
(e.g., the Chinese busboy), the workers rotate jobs, giving the job of cook
to a different person each night, with the effect that the menu is both
international, exotic, and a bit unpredictable.  The manager was assigned
to the Chinese character, based on Chinese as the most populous of the
Lojban languages.

A friend who came to LogFest with Karen Stein, Phil (whose last name I
never did learn), wrote up three descriptions based on this concept, which
follow.  We then voted.  Both descriptions #1 and #3 had their supporters,
but also their detractors.  People didn't like the pictures of description
#1, which also seemed more like a restaurant than a coffeehouse, and not a
great place for a storytelling atmosphere.  The pictures were seen as a
negative, as was the green carpet (it would quickly acquire coffee stains).
To many, description #3 seemed like a familiar coffeeshop they had been in,
but others said it was the type of dive that they would never go into.
Description #2 had a few supporters, but no one was against it provided
that the windows were removed from the description, and thus the need to
describe what is outside the windows.  With no opposition and everyone
listing it as 1st or 2nd choice, #2 is solidly in front at this point; only
a strong groundswell from you people reading this will change the vote to
one of the other two, but balloting remains open for, let us say, one more
week.  You may vote for a first choice and optionally a second choice.
(The posted description #2 is not Phil's original.  At someone's
suggestion, the ladder from Ivan's story was added to the two other Lojban
cultural references in the setting, the climbing sandpits and the
coffeehouse itself.  I added the sentence referring to the ladder based on
the consensus description that resulted.  Forgive any stylistic
incongruity.

Meanwhile there is further work to be done, some of which requires
knowledge of Lojban, some that requires only imagination.  More details of
the setting need to be worked out, eventually giving enough information
that a detailed floor plan of the coffeeshop can be drawn, with locations
of everything marked, so that people writing stories can be consistent in
describing the scene wherein the story is told (given that the exterior
environment is undefined, there is no particular need for consistency, or
even implied truth, in the stories themselves, but it was felt that this
collection, being written by a large number of authors of varying styles,
needed to have some one thing that all authors could share and rely upon to
the finest detail.

Indeed the coffeehouse description will be described and finalized in
English, to make sure that everyone understands all the details in a
consistent manner.  It also allows people to use a variety of Lojban
expressions and forms to describe the English-defined setting.  Thus the
descriptions by various authors will not read exactly the same, yet the
place they are describing will obviously be the same place.

I am thus calling on any and all volunteers to write and post suggested
added details of the setting (preferably compatible with description #2).
Wax as eloquent as you like on whatever manner or level of detail.  Someone
told about the creative writing instructor that told his students to focus
on small details and describe them, with one student eventually submitting
an essay focussing on a single brick of the building he was writing about.
We welcome and indeed encourage people to write descriptions in Lojban,
recognizing that the description will have to be translated into clear
English.  But this gives people something to write about in Lojban, and you
can if you choose use your Lojban text as a starting point for an eventual
story for the collection.  The timeframe for detailed descriptions is a bit
longer than next week, but we'll set a schedule depending on what you-all
think is appropriate.

The third phase of the scenario definition is to define the six characters
in enough depth that people can include them in the backdrop to their
stories and have them recognizably be the same people.  The details should
range from gender, age, and appearance, to personality, distinctive
mannerisms, and outside interests that might serve as jumping off places
for a story when the indicated person comes up to the table with a tray of
food, or coffee.

This phase will be conducted in the manner of a contest followed by a vote.
Write a character sketch of one of the characters, putting as much or as
little detail into your description as you care to.  The contest will be
announced in JL17 (but I'd like to have a couple of samples by then), and
thus people have plenty of time to write good descriptions before a voting
a couple of months later, with the results of all phases of this
introductory work appearing in JL18, I hope.  All those who submit any
ideas, text, description, or otherwise indicate definite interest in
participating in the project will be eligible to vote.  Again, character
descriptions can be written in Lojban, but we will also need English
translations so that those not yet skilled in the language know the
characters they are writing about.

However, the polycultural polylinguistic background of the characters has
led me to identify a fourth task that the more skilled Lojbanists can start
on now, and which is independent of the actual descriptions of the
characters (or at least it may be so).  Each of our 6 cultural
representatives will be a native speaker of their own language - Lojban is
the lingua franca that all share, and the lingua franca of those who
patronize the coffeehouse as well (hence stories told in Lojban therein).
But Lojban has many possible styles, and some of these styles will be
dependent on the native language of the speakers.  Thus, the Hindi speaker
may be prone to SOV-order sentences, the Chinese speaker to strange-to-
English-speakers tanru, and the Arabic speaker to flowery metaphor.  The
Russian speaker may choose lujvo forms that are heavy in consonant
clusters, whereas the Chinese speaker will minimize clusters and maximize
vowels.  I don't pretend to know enough of the non-English source languages
to try to describe them in any detail, but some Lojbanists like Ivan
Derzhanski probably do; others might be willing to research.  The result
will be perhaps a short sample of Lojban "conversation" and of "narrative"
styles for each of the six characters (perhaps each of them describing the
same scene to make for ready comparison), along with an English language
description of the essential linguistic ingredients that comprise the
style, so that others can try to emulate the styles when writing.  The
ideal will thus be, along with distinctive personalities for the 6
characters, a distinctive style of Lojban speech that will identify the
characters and also lend authenticity to the style (something we will
probably need as much as possible when people with a variety of writing
skill, and Lojban skill, start producing our Lojbanic Kalevala).

Here are the actual descriptions.  For #1, the offending-to-some picture
sentences are bracketed.  Someone suggested the carpet might be made brown
to hide coffee stains.

Description #1

     My eyes had to adjust to the difference in lighting.  The light in the
place came from the twelve stain glass tiffany lamps which hung from the
ceiling over a table. Low wattage bulbs cast a pale light around a place
which measured some 10 meters in length and some 5 meters across. The
tables have four chairs set around each of them, and as I sat down in the
green cushioned chair I was shown, I had a chance to survey the rest of
this place I found myself.  The table settings had white linen napkins with
an embroidered design of a type unfamiliar to me.  The silverware was of a
plain though excellent in quality, in addition there was a set of
chopsticks incorporated into the traditional place setting.  There were no
coffee cups set out on the tables.  [Along the walls hung pictures, and
many of these were of people whom I did not recognize, and always with the
same person, presumably the manager of this establishment.]  Each picture
had a gold frame, and the expressions in the pictures ranged across every
known emotion.  The floor was carpeted with a green shag of similar shade
to the chairs, as a result the only sounds that one hears is the gentle
flapping to the door going into the kitchen, and the whispers of
conversations occurring at the nearby tables.  [The place was quiet, still,
at peace, as the man in all the pictures is approaching me. . .]
_____

Description #2 is the current favorite, having references to existing
Lojban texts that might somehow be worked into the stories-to-be-told,
possibly with modification.  The main objection is to the windows, that
would require a description of the outside.  (The outside MIGHT, but need
not, be in a mountainous rural area where rock climbing is done - or sand
pits.  We didn't want to be stuck with Don Harlow's El Capitan reference of
the original Jimbob story - not everyone knows what Yosemite looks like,
and who says that the coffeehouse is even anywhere in America.)  A possible
modification would be to make the windows high up, or frosted so that
people can't see through them.  This provides the light without the
undefined scenery.


Description #2

     As I walked under the crossed climbing axes, and into the coffeehouse,
I felt I was in a place designed to give one the feeling of putting on an
old comfortable pair of shoes.  [The large arched windows filled the dining
area with light, and since all of the booths were lined along the outside,
every booth had a superb view of the  .]  The benches were made of old soft
oak, in which many tales and symbols had been carved.  On the bench I was
seated was the inscription:  "Members of the first sandpit expedition to
find the first digger, or traces thereof- 198?"  The table also bore other
marks of former patrons who had drank their selections and transcribed
their feelings with pitons.The walls were littered with climbing apparel
and debris in what might charitably have been termed a collage.  There were
the rusting remains of pitons and hooks abutting practically new lengths of
the latest high test rope.  Opposite the door from which I had entered was
a ladder - a climbing ladder, of course.  The ladder reached to the
ceiling, and a solid-looking trap door that made me wonder of the unknown
relics that lay beyond, and the stories they might hold.  Underneath these
visible artifacts were the dour reminders of the primary business of this
establishment-coffee.  There were full wooden bins of coffee from just
about every place in the world, with or without caffeine.  The cook was
visible to all and in the process of developing the latest creation on the
current menu, and not without some debate about the amount of spice the
particular dish required.  This happy riot provided the counterpoint to the
hissing, and boiling of a near endless stream of coffee beans in response
to the always cold, often frustrated, and very determined clientele. . .
____

#3 is a distinctly unsavory place, or savory indeed if that is the type of
place you like.  People seemed to feel strongest about this one, in both
positive and negative directions.


Description #3

     The current dart game was in progress, with its normally furious
dispute about scoring from its very stressed participants.  I had walked in
for my usual pot of Jamaican Blue Mountain, this being the only place I
could get it every day, and I sat down in my usual table, one of the few
which had a level table, and reasonably sound chairs.  I reviewed the
familiar surroundings.  Aside from the dart game, which had a wall in which
the number of dart holes appeared to compromise the structural integrity of
the building, there was the varnished hardwood floor, which was again
showing the effects of the heavy traffic of the numbers and shoes of the
customers.  The place closes for a week once every three years, just so the
management can refinish the floor.  The other tables were showing their
wear from the customers. Some of the tables were still in good shape, but
most were worn out from the life that seemed to pour out of the customers
and into the furniture, the poor furniture was not designed for this.  As a
result, these old maple and pine pedestal tables had not only seen better
days, they had seen better years.  However, like the dart game, the often
refinished floor, and the old sunbeam coffee machines, and cast iron
cooking utensils I have often seen cleaned, they are irreplaceable.  There
is an identity to this place, that while the customers may come and go,
this place will be what they share in common.


Chinese- Manager
Russian- Cook/Wait/Bus/Dishwasher
American- Cook/Wait/Bus/Dishwasher
Arabic- Cook/Wait/Bus/Dishwasher
Hindi- Cook/Wait/Bus/Dishwasher
Spanish- Cook/Wait/Bus/Dishwasher

Rotating Menu, With Chinese overtones because of manager
International Menu
_______

lojbab