From RJ's blog...

[Rifty]

So, Dragonmount.com let RJ have a blog. I'm not totally convinced of
the wisdom of this, but then, I'm not running a 7 year old world-famous
fan site that is really one of the only places to go for any sort of
quality news about the Wheel of TIme, so what do I know?

I think that RJ's going to find out that sharing his thoughts with the
world at large, outside of books, is going to be more addictive than he
thought it would, and will slow down the final book EVEN MORE, but I
don't know, maybe it'll be alright. Anyway, i wanted to serve up a
snippet of something he wrote, and then give my thought on it.

"On a lighter note, I understand that some of you are unhappy with the
pronunciation of Taim's name. Sorry, guys, but it is tah-EEM, not
tame. Never tame. Not that one. In the same vein, Shaido is
shah-EE-doh, not SHY-doh."

If you want people to pronounce the names correctly, you shouldn't
spell them in a way that's completely counter to what we have been
taught throughout our lives.

The dipthong "AI" is prounced like a long A, or a long I. Anyone
reading the book for the first time, with no prior knowledge, is going
to go straight for "Taym." There may be the odd person who goes for
"Time" but most people will read Tame, cause that's how we were taught
to read those two letters together.

The same goes for Shaido.

Apparently Randland never came up with the concept of dipthongs. Oh
wait, Caemlyn being pronounded "Kayme-lyn" and Cairhien being
prounounced "K-eye-ree-en" and Aiel being "Eye-eel" are all examples,
two of which have the same "AI" being pronounced differently. And those
pronunciations may be off. It's been a while since I've cared enough
about how the words are pronounced to look in the glossary.

I suppose I'm just beating a dead horse though. I'll shut up now.

-Rifty

[Young Blandford]

Rifty wrote:

snip RJ's blog, which discussed pronunciantions.

RJ dropped the ball and all this kind of stuff just
seems to be hype.

I'm in for the long haul, its fantasy crack, but fuck,
how any author can get away with writing such fanwank
and hold his big fat hairy face high. I'm dissapoited.
I'm off to read some Terry Goodkind.

[ConquerorMarr]

Yeah. It is a good thing that outside of Randland we have perfect
phonetic consistency. Rough, tough, dough :P. Seriously, there are
many times that words are not pronounced like they look. But if it
makes you happy to call him Tame (which I think is somewhat of a whimp
name) then feel free. I doubt RJ will hunt you down and beat you for
it, but you never know. My main issue with the language in Randland is
how damn consistent it is. The Seanchan are isolated for 1,000 years
and all that happens is a Southern drawl. It took English less than
1,000 years to develop from old French and old English (ever tried
reading the original Canterbury Tales?).
As for Terry Goodkind...I feel the same way about him as I do about
Jordan. Started strong, then sagged.

[Daniel Holm]

Post by ConquerorMarr
Yeah. It is a good thing that outside of Randland we have perfect
phonetic consistency. Rough, tough, dough :P.

None of them are names.

--Daniel

[Colin Zealley]

OK, then - here in Milton Keynes, we have three neighbourhoods whose names
are Broughton, Loughton and Woughton.

They are pronounced like 'Brought On', 'Lout On' and 'Woof Ton'.

Does that satisfy you? <g>

RJ is entitled to have arbitrary pronunciations when the names are derived
from over 1,000 years of language drift; but as conq said, the idea that
everybody speaks a mutually comprehensible language after this much time and
cultural separation is not realistic.

And if he is going to have arbitrary pronunciations, then I wish he'd
supplied the 'official' pronunciation in the Glossary of the book that a new
name appears in, so we could check up on it.

Colin

Post by Daniel Holm

Post by ConquerorMarr
Yeah. It is a good thing that outside of Randland we have perfect
phonetic consistency. Rough, tough, dough :P.

None of them are names.
--Daniel

[Daniel Holm]

Post by Colin Zealley

Post by Daniel Holm

Post by ConquerorMarr
Yeah. It is a good thing that outside of Randland we have perfect
phonetic consistency. Rough, tough, dough :P.

None of them are names.

OK, then - here in Milton Keynes, we have three neighbourhoods whose names
are Broughton, Loughton and Woughton.
They are pronounced like 'Brought On', 'Lout On' and 'Woof Ton'.
Does that satisfy you? <g>

Not really, for various reasons... But I'll let it pass.

Post by Colin Zealley
RJ is entitled to have arbitrary pronunciations when the names are derived
from over 1,000 years of language drift; but as conq said, the idea that
everybody speaks a mutually comprehensible language after this much time and
cultural separation is not realistic.

Of course it's not realistic. To take a real life example, Denmark,
Norway and Sweden has been pretty darn close the last 1,000 years, yet
if a Dane meets a Swede and they start to talk, they could probably do
so moderately well--if they wait to figure out what the other person
means with every sentence. Of course, most of this is because of the
influx of new words--Randland probably doesn't have too many "new"
words, as there's been virtually no actual progress (in any field) for
the past 3,000 years.

Post by Colin Zealley
And if he is going to have arbitrary pronunciations, then I wish he'd
supplied the 'official' pronunciation in the Glossary of the book that a new
name appears in, so we could check up on it.

Most of the time, the official pronounciation is noted in parantheses
behind new names, but not all terms are included in the Glossary.

--Daniel Holm

[Colin Zealley]

[snip]

Post by Daniel Holm
Most of the time, the official pronounciation is noted in parantheses
behind new names, but not all terms are included in the Glossary.

Yes, but quite frequently (or so it seemed to me) the pronunciation of a new
name isn't given till a volume or two later than the first mention of that
person or place.

Maybe ny nenory is faulty, but after a recent full reread in anticipation of
V11, it always seems to me that when I look a new name up in the Glossary it
often isn't there - then it turns up a volume or two later, with the
pronuciation given after I've made my own mind up. But maybe I'm just
getting old.

Colin

[Tim Bruening]

Post by ConquerorMarr
Yeah. It is a good thing that outside of Randland we have perfect
phonetic consistency. Rough, tough, dough :P. Seriously, there are
many times that words are not pronounced like they look. But if it
makes you happy to call him Tame (which I think is somewhat of a whimp
name) then feel free. I doubt RJ will hunt you down and beat you for
it, but you never know. My main issue with the language in Randland is
how damn consistent it is. The Seanchan are isolated for 1,000 years
and all that happens is a Southern drawl. It took English less than
1,000 years to develop from old French and old English (ever tried
reading the original Canterbury Tales?).
As for Terry Goodkind...I feel the same way about him as I do about
Jordan. Started strong, then sagged.

I have wondered that too.

[John S Novak, III]

Post by Rifty
So, Dragonmount.com let RJ have a blog. I'm not totally convinced of
the wisdom of this, but then, I'm not running a 7 year old world-famous
fan site that is really one of the only places to go for any sort of
quality news about the Wheel of TIme, so what do I know?
I think that RJ's going to find out that sharing his thoughts with the
world at large, outside of books, is going to be more addictive than he
thought it would, and will slow down the final book EVEN MORE, but I
don't know, maybe it'll be alright. Anyway, i wanted to serve up a
snippet of something he wrote, and then give my thought on it.

No good will come of this, I tell you.

[Will Frank]

Post by John S Novak, III

Post by Rifty
So, Dragonmount.com let RJ have a blog.

No good will come of this, I tell you.

No kidding. Didn't the WOTFAQ use to say that Jordan "understood the
addictiveness of the Internet and couldn't afford the time," or something
close?

[Rast]

Post by Will Frank

Post by John S Novak, III

Post by Rifty
So, Dragonmount.com let RJ have a blog.

No good will come of this, I tell you.

No kidding. Didn't the WOTFAQ use to say that Jordan "understood the
addictiveness of the Internet and couldn't afford the time," or something
close?

Maybe that was code for "RJ uses the internet but doesn't want any of his
freak fans to contact him".

[Will Frank]

Post by Rast

Post by Will Frank
No kidding. Didn't the WOTFAQ use to say that Jordan "understood the
addictiveness of the Internet and couldn't afford the time," or something
close?

Maybe that was code for "RJ uses the internet but doesn't want any of his
freak fans to contact him".

Opening a weblog on Dragonmount isn't exactly a way to keep the freak fans
from getting to him...

[Andreas Vox]

Post by Rifty
So, Dragonmount.com let RJ have a blog. I'm not totally convinced of
the wisdom of this, but then, I'm not running a 7 year old world-famous
fan site that is really one of the only places to go for any sort of
quality news about the Wheel of TIme, so what do I know?
I think that RJ's going to find out that sharing his thoughts with the
world at large, outside of books, is going to be more addictive than he
thought it would, and will slow down the final book EVEN MORE, but I
don't know, maybe it'll be alright. Anyway, i wanted to serve up a
snippet of something he wrote, and then give my thought on it.
"On a lighter note, I understand that some of you are unhappy with the
pronunciation of Taim's name. Sorry, guys, but it is tah-EEM, not
tame. Never tame. Not that one. In the same vein, Shaido is
shah-EE-doh, not SHY-doh."
If you want people to pronounce the names correctly, you shouldn't
spell them in a way that's completely counter to what we have been
taught throughout our lives.
The dipthong "AI" is prounced like a long A, or a long I. Anyone

DIP-thongs? Dip-THONGS??? Err... TBH I don't want those in any word,
whatever it is! ;-)

Back to topic: maybe someone can convince the publisher to put a second
dot on top of the 'i' (umlaut accent). That should make the
pronounciation pretty clear.

/Andreas