How to pronounce "Dai stihó"

[Captain Marvel]

Seriously. I want to know how to pronounce stuff in the Speech. Especially how to pronounce my sig. Anyone know??

Dai stiho. Go well.

[Captain Marvel]

Seriously. I want to know how to pronounce stuff in the Speech. Especially how to pronounce my sig. Anyone know??

Dai stiho. Go well.

[Nathan]

As far as I know, 'dai stihó' is the only phrase in the Speech that we have a 'canonical' pronunciation for, and is pretty much the only phrase for which we ought to expect one (considering that, if my memory serves me correctly, it is practically the only phrase that we come across a transliteration of in the books --the other one ['dai stiheh'] is so closely related that it hardly counts as a separate phrase). That said, according to DD (see her post in the thread 'dai sthio?' [sic] in this section of the forums), 'dai stihó' is pronounced " 'die stee-ho'. Pretty much. "

Considering that DD has clearly stated her opposition to developing the Speech much further than its current (rather amorphous) state (see, e.g., her posts in the thread 'Specific Symbols' in this section of the forums), I should not expect to find out much more than this in the way of pronunciations of words in the Speech.

Nathan

Pauca sed matura. --Karl Friedrich Gauss

Non doctrinam, sed perspicuitatem quaero.

[Poliester]

I really don't get it. why shouldn't we know how to pronounce or how to write in the speech?! It's just really confusing. If we knew all of that information there would be more wizards in the world! That would be GOOD wouldn't it?

[Pop Tart Kitten]

Yes it would.

[drea]

If you were DD, would you really want to create your own language from scratch? I mean, dude, think Tolkien and his elvish language.

[Gryphon]

Well, if you bring up Tolkein, he liked to create all kinds of different languages. Elvish was only one of them.

Callahan:
I really don't get it. why shouldn't we know how to pronounce or how to write in the speech?! It's just really confusing. If we knew all of that information there would be more wizards in the world! That would be GOOD wouldn't it?

People probably wouldn't know how to pronounce or write things in the Speech like that. Simply, not all of the sounds that can be made can be displayed with English letters. Take, for an example, the chittering noise a squirrel makes. Humans can't imitate that exactly, nor can they write it. 'Chitter chitter' isn't what squirrels say.

As for more wizards... no, I'm not too sure about that. Each planet has as many wizards as it needs, according to DD's books. In the Wizard's Holiday, the one planet only had one wizard. Why? Because it needs only one wizard! It says that in the book, though I think it's questionable.

[Big Time Harry Potter Fan]

They all created their own language if the didn't their books wouldn't be so unique and different.Isn't that what makes makes each book so good.

[talkingbeast]

Maybe it's like church Latin: you pronounce the letters the way you would in your own language even if that's not the "proper" pronunciation?

I think Gryphon has a real point about the limits of human language. I love the description of how trees talk, but I just don't think I could reproduce it!

[Delphi]

While the subject is pronounciation, how do you pronounce Dairine?I pronounce it two ways, but I am nnot sure which one is correct.

[talkingbeast]

I thought this was answered somewhere else on the site, but I can't seem to find it now. I think DD has said it's "dare-een." I checked out one of the audio books and it sounded like the narrator was saying "day-reen." (or I spose we could just call her "Fred.")