Reddit reviews The Klingon Dictionary (Star Trek)

For the movie Star Trek III: The Search for Spock, Paramount Pictures contracted a linguist, Marc Okrand, to invent a Klingon language for the movie. (Klingon was originally heard in Star Trek: The Motion Picture, with the basic sound and a few words invented by the actor for Scotty, James Doohan. Okrand took this sound and the few words, and developed a real language around that.) Paramount and CBS continued to work with Okrand on the remaining movies and TV series so that Klingon remained consistent with itself.

Since then, Okrand has published some reference material, including The Klingon Dictionary, Klingon for the Galactic Traveler, and The Klingon Way. You can also find selected works translated into Klingon - including Hamlet.

Other television shows and movies have constructed languages, too. Dothraki from Game of Thrones, Na'vi from Avatar, and Elvish languages by J.R.R. Tolkien for The Lord of the Rings.

To add something further: there have actually been several great works of literature translated into Klingon, including Hamlet and Much Ado About Nothing".

In Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, we hear Klingons quoting the "To Be Or Not To Be" soliloquy from Hamlet. Below, I've included the Shakespearean original, the Klingon translation of that piece, and then included the backtranslation from Klingon into English. You'll see that while the Klingon translation takes some liberties, referring for example to the "torpedoes and phasers of aggressive fate" instead of the "slings and arrows" thereof, it's still quite well able to capture the original.

Shakespeare:
To be, or not to be, that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles
And by opposing end them. To die—to sleep,
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to: 'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd. To die, to sleep;
To sleep, perchance to dream—ay, there's the rub:
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come,
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause—there's the respect
That makes calamity of so long life.

Klingon:
taH pagh taHbe’. DaH mu’tlheghvam vIqelnIS.
quv’a’, yabDaq San vaQ cha, pu’ je SIQDI’?
pagh, Seng bIQ’a’Hey SuvmeH nuHmey SuqDI’,
‘ej, Suvmo’, rInmoHDI’? Hegh. Qong — Qong neH —
‘ej QongDI’, tIq ‘oy’, wa’SanID Daw”e’ je
cho’nISbogh porghDaj rInmoHlaH net Har.
yIn mevbogh mIwvam’e’ wIruchqangbej.
Hegh. Qong. QongDI’ chaq naj. toH, waQlaw’ ghu’vam!
HeghDaq maQongtaHvIS, tugh nuq wInajlaH,
volchaHmajvo’ jubbe’wI’ bep wIwoDDI’;
‘e’ wIqelDI’, maHeDnIS. Qugh DISIQnIS,
SIQmoHmo’ qechvam. Qugh yIn nI’moH ‘oH.

Back-translation:
It either endures, or it does not endure. Now, I must consider this sentence.
Is it honorable, when one endures the torpedoes and phasers of aggressive fate?
Or, when one obtains weapons to fight a seeming ocean of troubles,
And when, by fighting, one finishes them? One dies. One sleeps. One merely sleeps.
And when one sleeps, it is believed that one can finish the pain of the heart
And the thousand revolts which one’s body must succeed to.
We are certainly willing to initiate this way to finish life.
One dies. One sleeps. When one sleeps, perhaps one dreams. Well, this situation seems to be the obstacle!
What we can soon dream of, while sleeping in death,
Having thrown away from our shoulders the cargo of the mortal —
When we consider that, we must retreat. We must endure disasters,
Because this idea makes us endure them. It lengthens the life of the disasters.

Marc Okrand also published The Klingon Dictionary, which, especially for language + Star Trek nerds, is actually quite fun and funny, with lots of in-jokes alongside actual linguistics stuff. I highly recommend.

Another interesting point that I'm not seeing discussed much in fan circles: the new Star Trek series, Discovery (which I highly recommend) features spoken Klingon more prominently than any series prior. Entire scenes are conducted in subtitled Klingon, which had been seen previously, most prominently in the third and sixth Star Trek films, but nothing approaching this extent. In 15 episodes, Discovery may have tripled or more the amount of canonical on-screen dialogue in Klingon. What's of note is that Marc Okrand is not actively involved in the show's production (as I understand it). Instead, a Canadian woman who might otherwise be described as a "superfan" is the show's primary Klingon consultant and translator (with Okrand's blessing). I believe she does correspond with him, particularly with regard to new words, but she does all of the actual legwork of bringing the Klingon language to screen.

So we're seeing an interesting shift in the process of the Klingon language, inching it away from the artistic creation of one individual, and moving more in the direction that /u/gloubenterder describes Tolkien languages as having arrived at-- taking on a life of their own, beyond the imagination of their original creator. (Love your post, by the way, /u/gloubenterder!)

Another interesting thing about the Klingon in Discovery: as discussed in this somewhat spoilery thread (and, by the way, I should say that all* discussions at /r/DaystromInstitute are fair game for all spoilers, without spoiler tags, so read at your own risk), the showrunners this time around have taken the language, particularly in accuracy of grammar and punctuation, much more seriously. Looking back at that thread, I actually see /u/gloubenterder themself makes a good overview of how Klingon was used well and not-so-well in various iterations of the franchise.

If you're interested in phonology and phonetics, I myself got into the action with some discussion on the topic (particularly in my reply later downthread from this link), drawing entirely on material from Okrand's dictionary.

So, going back to your original question: while the growing vocabulary base is still not as large as a natural language, Klingon itself has been extensively described and documented to provide sufficient detail to enable its continued development. All that's left to be done is give it time.

DIS chu' 'Ip Da'Ipta''a'? ("Have you sworn a new year's oath?")

First of all, you should be aware that most of the Klingon dialogue heard throughout Star Trek is not what Klingon-speakers would consider proper tlhIngan Hol. Mastering a language takes time, and that's something that TV scriptwriters tend to have no great abundance of. There are six movies and a handful of episodes with proper tlhIngan Hol, but the rest is mostly gibberish. Klingon-speakers tend to chalk this down to linguistic variation.

The most important resource for any new language learner is The Klingon Dictionary by Marc Okrand, which reads like a textbook and covers all the basics of the language.

His follow-up book, Klingon for the Galactic Traveler, reads like a tourist guide and uses the Klingon language as a vehicle to explore Klingon culture; it covers less linguistic ground than TKD, but it's also much more of a page-turner, and gives a more nuanced look at the language. It's worth a read for anyone interested in Klingons, even if one isn't interested in the language specifically.

There is also the excellent audio course Conversational Klingon, narrated by Marc Okrand and Michael Dorn. It's available for digital download, for example on Amazon and iTunes. It's self-contained, though you may want to read up on the basics of Klingon spelling before listening to it, so that you can better "visualize" the words being spoken.

There is also the follow-up audio course Power Klingon, but unfortunately it's not available for digital purchase (to the best of my knowledge, anyway).

• More licensed sources
  
  
• In other media
  
  You may also want to check out Quvar, "The Klingon Teacher from Germany". Quvar is a very skilled speaker who has a few dozen online video lessons in both English and German.
  
  Useful websites:
  
  
• Klingonska Akademien
  
  
• Hol 'ampaS
  
  Of course, the most important thing when learning a language is: Practice! The best place to do that is arguably the Facebook group Learn Klingon, which has many active users; both newbies and fluent speakers.
  
  (Note that we can sometimes come off as brusque when correcting people. This is not meant to be condescending, but rather it's usually because people are trying to cover a lot of ground in a small amount of time.)
  
  There is also /r/tlhInganHol here on Reddit, but I'm afraid it's not very active.

Unfortunately, it's super impractical since it was designed for Star Trek and most words have to do with battle and space/technology. The Klingon Language Institute (apparently this is a real thing) might be helpful. Here's a cd, but there's also The Klingon Hamlet, Klingon for the Galactic Traveler, and The Klingon Dictionary

Yes, there are books. I've been learning from here:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/067174559X/ref=oh_details_o03_s00_i00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

It was written by the linguist that helped develop Klingon in the first place. However, you must have some previous understanding of grammar and linguistics in general.

Qapla'

I remember getting the Klingon Dictionary as a kid and thinking I was pretty badass. Looking back on it, a prepubescent uttering the guttural Klingon dialect may not have been the most intimidating thing ever.

Relevant: http://www.amazon.com/The-Klingon-Dictionary-Star-Trek/dp/067174559X

Neckbeard Kama Sutra.

https://www.amazon.de/Klingon-Dictionary-English-Star-Trek/dp/067174559X

Isn't Klingon copy written?

http://www.amazon.com/The-Klingon-Dictionary-Star-Trek/dp/067174559X

Not quite the best way to learn thlIngan Hol, but definitely doable would be the Adnroid App boQwI'.

You could also pay around 20$ and 10$ once for the official books, Klingon for the Galactic Traveller and The Klingon Dictionary.

Concerning the KLI, I never even considered using it for my thlIngan studies, but from the looks of it, could it be possible that just registering allows you to access the lessons already?

PS: I am not aware of a Telegram or Teamspeak server.

No but I got a Klingon Dictionary and the (completely awesome) ST Star Charts.

Umm that is a very old picture...this picture was used on the paperback for the Klingon dictionary.

https://www.amazon.com/Klingon-Dictionary-Star-Trek/dp/067174559X