890 pages of Esperanto
Sir: It is refreshing to find total, blank ignorance posing as punditry, and your remark 'But understanding that Esperanto suffers from a dearth of original literature' is a choice specimen (Leader, 7 Septem-' ber). 'Understanding' — on what basis? Who gives you to understand? The old lady at the zoo at least looked at the giraffe before exclaiming, 'Nonsense, I don't be- lieve it.'
A copy of Esperanta Antologio 1887- 1981 , 890 pages of original verse from 163 poets in 35 countries, would be obviously wasted on you, as well it might be on the MPs you quote — since a language is used for everything under the sun — but your primal innocence does not end here. In speaking of 'a dearth of original literature' — with your prize of a brass farthing glossing 'dearth' as 'nil' — you are suggest- ing that a language can have translated works though not original ones. This is the linguistic bloomer of bloomers. A gram- mar and vocabulary does not constitute a language, there must first be an established original style, otherwise there is no lan- guage to translate into, and Zamenhofs first book of 1887 contained, along with eloquent prose, two original poems. Since then the flow of poetry and prose has been continuous.
I think it would be gracious to offer an apology.
R. M. Rossetti
2 Elmwood Crescent, Luton, Bedfordshire
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