All the Nuance

One of my tasks today was generating pronoun tables for Ai-Naidari. Like Latin and Sanskrit, two of Ai-Naidari's major influences, the language has declensions, and allllllllllll the pronouns go through this process. And Ai-Naidari has a ton of pronouns.

Now, verbs conjugate rigorously, which means you don't often need the pronouns. Adding them is more a matter of social positioning/emphasis. And then you get sooooooooooo much lovely nuance.

So for instance, I can say "I love you," in English. Check out (only some!) of the translations of that into Ai-Naidari:

• lurelas qininith (I love you!... as an equal/peer, and I am currently loving you and I habitually do so. Also, you're right here, I'm talking to you.)
• lurulas qininith (I love you forever, habitually, my peer/equal, who is right here with me.)
• lurelaj qininith (my peer/equal, I'm not done loving you, and I'm telling you so to your face!)
• lurulaj qininith (...but in this instance, my peer/equal, I'll never be done loving you, and you're here to hear me say it).
• lurelas nininith (oh my peer/equal, I am currently and habitually loving you but you are far away!)
• lurulas quninith (my beloved servant, I love you habitually and forever, and we are having this conversation in person).
• lurulas nuninith (...I still love you my beloved servant, habitually and forever, though you are far from me.)
• launi lurulas qeninith (This abject servant loves you, habitually and forever, my lord/lady, and I am telling you so in person.)
• launi luralaj neninith (This abject person was loving you, without ever reaching an end to that loving, you-my-better, who was so distant from me.)
• lini luralan nuninith (I, who am better than what you made of me, am done loving you, scoundrel who was never near to me emotionally.)

Of course, if your response to this is confusion, you can say ihh?, which is the Ai-Naidari version of 'huh?' (The other acceptable response is sol?, "What?", and if you're flailing a lot, jzi sol?!).

All of this work is in support of Kherishdar 4, which I am working on when I'm done with the day's progress on Dreamstorm. Black Blossom was a story about culture clash from inside the heads of the Ai-Naidar, who had very little congress with humanity. Kherishdar's Exception, though, is about the Ai-Naidar evaluating humanity closely through the person of Haraa, and for that I need even more insight into the differences and friction between cultures. Language helps me see those differences better. So all this clarifies things for me. (And it also means that you all can write calligraphy and sing songs in Ai-Naidari, which is mind-blowingly amazing!)

Anyway, I hope you're looking forward to going back to the Gate-house. We're going to have a good time!