Communities

Writing
Writing
Codidact Meta
Codidact Meta
The Great Outdoors
The Great Outdoors
Photography & Video
Photography & Video
Scientific Speculation
Scientific Speculation
Cooking
Cooking
Electrical Engineering
Electrical Engineering
Judaism
Judaism
Languages & Linguistics
Languages & Linguistics
Software Development
Software Development
Mathematics
Mathematics
Christianity
Christianity
Code Golf
Code Golf
Music
Music
Physics
Physics
Linux Systems
Linux Systems
Power Users
Power Users
Tabletop RPGs
Tabletop RPGs
Community Proposals
Community Proposals
tag:snake search within a tag
answers:0 unanswered questions
user:xxxx search by author id
score:0.5 posts with 0.5+ score
"snake oil" exact phrase
votes:4 posts with 4+ votes
created:<1w created < 1 week ago
post_type:xxxx type of post
Search help
Notifications
Mark all as read See all your notifications »
Q&A

Post History

60%
+1 −0
Q&A Need a bit of verse in my prose

Since you are writing in the fantasy genre, is there any reason that the poetry needs to be in a human readable tongue? I can imagine that humans, living among other older species, might know j...

posted 6y ago by Henry Taylor‭  ·  last activity 5y ago by System‭

Answer
#3: Attribution notice added by user avatar System‭ · 2019-12-08T08:54:46Z (about 5 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/36386
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#2: Initial revision by user avatar Henry Taylor‭ · 2019-12-08T08:54:46Z (about 5 years ago)
Since you are writing in the fantasy genre, is there any reason that the poetry needs to be in a human readable tongue?

I can imagine that humans, living among other older species, might know just enough elvish or dragon-tongue to properly pronounce a few lines of ancient verse; with no real understanding of that languages' subtleties such as meter or rhythm.

The more learned among your human characters might even be able to translate the ancient verses into human words, such that the meaning and beauty of the previously presented nonsense words can be offered to the reader, without any poetic artistry being required of the translation.

#1: Imported from external source by user avatar System‭ · 2018-05-24T01:01:52Z (over 6 years ago)
Original score: 3