Yambaron

Original:

Jabberwocky

1
Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves
And the mome raths outgrabe.

2
‘Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
The frumious Bandersnatch!’

3
He took his vorpal sword in hand:
Long time the manxome foe he sought—
So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
And stood awhile in thought.

4
And, as in uffish thought he stood,
The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
And burbled as it came!

5
One, two! One, two! And through and through
The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
He went galumphing back.

6
‘And hast thou slain the Jabberwock?
Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!’
He chortled in his joy.

1
Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.

Literal translation of the Quenya (as far as it can be done and necessarily awkward):

1
At welbare the loqua londos
Were drilling in the saire.
And mimsily the laiquarons
Were gyring in the quaire.

2
‘Fear the Jabberwock, my son!
Its jaws bite [dual], its claws rend!
Bad is the Lumno, my friend,
And frumious the Sarkar!’

3
And thus he took up the the mightysword
Against the manxome foe.
And stood under the Aldaril,
His eyes [fixed] into the distance.

4
And thereupon came the Jabberwock,
In a fiery-eyed rage.
He went through the tulgey wood
And burbled wickedly.

5
But cutting this way and that
The mightysword was reaping!
He killed him and alkárala
Our [incl.] hero came back.

6
‘You have slain the Jabberwock?
Come into my arms, my son!
How frabjous is this day!’
How lalkaka my heart!

Commentary:

In translating this famous poem by Lewis Carrol, I have used several strategies:

• Some words are known to be portmanteaus and their formation in English can be imitated in Quenya.
• In some cases there is more to the portmanteaus, they are sound-symbolic in themselves, so that a general feeling is invoked even without knowing the constituents. In such a case it seemed desirable to imitate the sound-symbolic formation in Quenya.
• Sometimes I used vaguely phonetic adaptations by replacing common English sounds with common Quenya sounds.
• I happily took words from Early Qenya (QL). I think that using them in late Quenya adds that certain je-ne-sais-quoi that is captured by Lewis Carrol with his constructions. The poem is therefore not necessarily targeted to a Quenya speaker in Arda, but rather to a Quenya linguist with knowledge of all the stages of the language.
• Following the above idea, some portmanteaus involve two separately attested roots for the same concept, or sometimes a word in Early Qenya compounded with a late Quenya one.
• In some cases, the formations were intuitive and I came up with them on the spot as a result of all the Quenya stuff stored within the so-called default mode network in my brain... I think there is a word for that: 'poetry'.

Glossary:

1

• brillig 'the time when you begin broiling things for dinner': *welbare < QL welba 'boiling, bubbling' (thinking of preparing tea or something similar rather than the unattested 'broiling')
• slythy [ˈslaɪ̯ði] is said to be 'lithe + slimy', but sl is a well-known English phonaestheme, cf. slime, slack, slump, slip, slug. An exact equivalent in Quenya is difficult to find; perhaps a combination of liquid+velar suggests twisting, cf. LOKO 'twine, twist, curl' (GL:54), RIK(H)- 'twist' (VT39:7), LOK- 'bend, loop' (PE17:160). Hence suggestive Q. *loqua.
• tove: an average English wordshape imitated by an average (and alliterating) Quenya wordshape *londo
• gyre 'go round like a gyroscope': The QL root QIŘI for spinning seems to reappear later in Q. quer- 'to turn', hence *quirru-, iterative *quiquirru- 'keep revolving'
• gimble 'make holes like a gimlet': *terehtya- 'drill, make holes' < QL teret, terekt- 'augur, borer, gimlet'
• rath 'a sort of a green pig': *laiquaron, laiquarond- 'a kind of green animal'
• mimsy 'flimsy + miserable': *millípa < milya 'soft, gentle, weak' + nípa 'small (usually with connotation of weakness)'
• *saire, *quaire: just completely made-up and nondescript locations

2

• Jabberwock: semi-adapted phonetically by substituting j for Q. y, bb for Q. mb and adding a name-formative suffix -on(d), hence *Yambaron, *Yambarond-
• Jubjub bird: said to be 'found in a narrow, dark, depressing and isolated valley'; hence *Lumno, suggesting gloom and ominousness, cf. lumna 'lying heavy, burdensome, oppressive, ominous', lumba 'gloomy'.
• frumious 'fuming + furious': *orrúsea as intensification of rúsea 'wrathful' or a combination with or- 'rising'.
• Bandersnatch: said to be ferocious and fast, with a long neck and snapping jaws, here intuitively rendered by *Sarkar, maybe invoking narka- 'to rend' (EQ narka 'snappy, ill-tempered') and perhaps saura 'cruel, foul, evil'.

3

• vorpal blade: *valmakil transparently 'mighty sword'
• manxome: possibly 'manly + buxom', basically 'fearsome' in the context; rendered by *ruxossea combining RUK- and THOS-, two different roots for 'fear'
• Tumtum tree: *Aldaril 'glittering tree', a little homage to Arda

4

• *hendunarya 'having fiery eyes'
• tulgey wood: perhaps 'thick, dense, dark wood', rendered by *túke aldaron 'thicket of trees', cf. tunga 'thick, dense', tiuka 'thick, fat'
• burble 'bleat + murmur + warble', imitated by a portmonteau *nyerru- < *nyéna- 'lament' + *nurru- 'murmur, grumble, mumble'

5

• galumphing 'galloping + triumphant', rendered by *alkárala: present participle of alkar 'glory' interpreted as a verb

6

• frabjous 'fair + fabulous + joyous': imitated by *alkallassea < alkar 'glory' + alasse 'joy, merriment, happiness' + adj. -a
• lalkaka: portmanteau of Q. lala- 'laugh' and QL kaka- 'laugh'