Chapter V: Appendix: Criticism of Esperanto

In connection with the foregoing some critical remarks on Esperanto may be made, from which one will readily perceive the reasons which made it impossible for the _Délégation pour l'Adoption d'une Langue Internationale_ to adopt Esperanto in its present form as the international auxiliary language.

Dr. Zamenhof has given us an interesting account of the way in which his language gradually developed in his mind while he was at the Warsaw Gymnasium. Before he arrived at the conviction that the material for the vocabulary must be obtained from the Romance and Germanic languages, and that the already existing stock of international words must be used, he had "simply invented" his words, that is to say, chosen them quite arbitrarily, but with as much regard to system and brevity as possible. Although he himself noticed that such words are difficult to learn and still more difficult to remember, he has unfortunately retained in the finished language a whole series of such _à priori_ formations, which appear in words of such frequent occurrence as _who_, _how_, _where_, _never_, _everywhere_, etc. The _nul tempe_ and _pro quo_ chosen by the Delegation agree, however, much better with the general character of language than the _neniam_ and _kial_ of Dr. Zamenhof.

Some peculiarities may be accounted for by the Slavonic mother tongue of the author: for example, his preference for sibilants and diphthongs, which is especially evident in the invented words (_e.g._, _chi_, here; _chiu_, each; _ech_, even; _ghi_, that; _ghis_, until, _gh_ and _ch_ being pronounced as E. _j_ and _ch_). In an article in Zamenhof's _Krestomatio_ I find, for example (p. 288), _chiuj tiuj senantaujughaj kaj honestaj homoj_, _kiuj_, _anstatau filizofadi pri ghi_, and (p. 293) _tion chi ankorau antau la apero de la unua arta lingvo antauvidis kaj antaudiris chiuj tiuj eminentaj kapoj_, _kiuj_, etc. The method of writing _x_ is also Russian: _ekzameni_, _ekzemplo_, etc., and also _ekspedi_, _eksplodi_; also _kv_ for _qu_. French words with _oi_ take _ua_ in Esperanto when they are spelt in this way in Russian, _e.g._, _trotuaro_, _tualeto_, _vuala_; otherwise they are spelt with _oi_ or _oj_, _e.g._, _foiro_, _fojo_, _foino_. _Nacio_, _tradicio_, etc., instead of _-iono_, is also Russian. Russian usage has doubtless also inspired such word formations as _elparoli_ and _senkulpigi_ instead of the international _pronuncar_ and _exkuzar_ (R. _vygovarivat'_ and _izvin'at'_, corresponding to G. _aussprechen_ and _entschuldigen_). The peculiarity of using the adverb instead of the adjective in such cases as _estas necese vidi_, "it is necessary to see," is probably to be ascribed to the correspondence of the Russian adverb with the neuter predicate adjective. This rule cannot be permitted, however, in an international language, because, with a free word order, it would be impossible to say whether _estas vere necese_ means "it is really necessary" or "it is necessarily true." The compound perfect (_mi estas aminta_, "I have loved" = "I am having loved") reminds one of the Polish _kochal-em_. Finally, the frequent use of the adjective (in _-a_) instead of the genitive (_Zamenhofa lingvo_) and of the two sorts of action expressed by _ek_ and _ad_ (_ekvidi_ and _vidadi_ used in many cases where the simple _vidi_ would be sufficient) are to be accounted for by Russian usages.

Naturally I do not object to the importation of national peculiarities into the international auxiliary language when the latter is enriched thereby. For example, one must make use of the facility for forming compound words common to the Germanic and Slavonic languages in preference to the poverty of Romance languages in this respect, and combine it with the more Romance characteristic of forming new words by means of derivative syllables. But peculiarities of national language which render mutual comprehension and international usage difficult must be most carefully avoided.

The unpractical nature of the circumflexed letters has been indicated previously. It may be remarked here, however, that in point of system Zamenhof's letters are very inferior to the similar ones employed in the Czech language, since the parallelism in sound between _s_ and _ŝ_, _z_ and _ĵ_, _dz_ and _ĝ_, is disguised by the choice of letters. This produces a very amateurish effect.

Besides the familiar parts of speech which are indicated by special terminations, Zamenhof invented a new class characterised by the termination _-au_ (_kontrau_, _almenau_); but the limits of this class, which includes some, but not all, adverbs and prepositions, are not clearly defined.

Many words taken from existing languages are disguised, almost after the fashion of Volapük: _boji_, F. _aboyer_; _parkere_, F. _par cœur_; _shvit_, G. _schwitzen_, E. _sweat_; _char_, F. _car_; _faruno_ instead of _farin_; _lerta_, F. _alerte_ (with a changed meaning), etc. In this category is to be classed the astonishing _nepre_ (entirely) which is derived from the Russian _nepremenno_, just as if one were to take from the German word _unbedingt_ the two first syllables and propose _unbe_ as an international word instead of _absolute_. The economy in the use of stems was carried much too far in Esperanto, necessitating the employment of all sorts of compound words, the discovery of whose meaning requires much racking of one's brains. The employment of all the derivative syllables also as independent words is very ingenious, but produces a very strange impression on the uninitiated.

The method of word formation is greatly wanting in precision, the limits of the so-called direct derivation in particular being not sufficiently clearly indicated. One example will suffice. Starting out from _kroni_ = to crown, _krono_ ought properly to mean crowning, instead of which it signifies crown, so that one is forced to use _kronado_ for crowning, whereas, according to the rules of Esperanto, _kronado_ must mean continuous or repeated crowning, as if a king were being constantly or repeatedly crowned.[4]

I have brought together here the most important defects in Esperanto, the removal of which formed one of the tasks of the Delegation Committee. The knowledge of these imperfections does not prevent me from recognising the meritorious services of Zamenhof, who, at a time when the question of the best construction of an international language was not seriously discussed, succeeded in producing one which was in many respects superior to the attempts of that time, and which has proved in practice a serviceable, though very imperfect, means of international communication.

OTTO JESPERSEN.