Encyclopedia of Fictional and Fantastic Languages

Subjects:

• Literature » Science Fiction & Fantasy
• Literature » English Literature
• Literature » American Literature
• Literature » World Literature

Reviews:

• Conley and Cain provide over 200 entries on fictional languages in prose literature, film, and television. Most of the entries cover languages in science fiction and fantasy genre texts, whereas others present linguistic exploration in diverse works, e.g., Casanova's 1788 novel Icosameron....[t]he encyclopedia includes many excellent figures, diagrams, and illustrations of fictional scripts, alphabets, and grammatical constructions. Entries are usefully cross-indexed, and the book includes a handy list of topical groupings like "dinosaur languages" and "gender-based languages." The authors write with enthusiasm and authority, as does Ursula LeGuin in the foreword....Lower-level undergraduates through researchers/faculty; general readers.
  —Choice December 2006
• [T]here are no other comparable reference works available on the topic. (It should be noted that this book is thus far the only one with the Library of Congress subject heading "Imaginary languages--Encyclopedias.") This volume is recommended for academic libraries.
  —Reference & User Services Quarterly Spring 2007
• A unique addition to the literary reference shelf, this overview of synthetic languages covers the gamut of classic and popular works that feature idiosyncratic speech, writing, or code. Impeccably summarized are the syntactic and verbal elements of argot from works by Edgar Rice Burroughs, H. P. Lovecraft, George Orwell, Edgar Allan Poe, William Shakespeare, Jonathan Swift, and Kurt Vonnegut; as well as from films such as Blade Runner and Close Encounters of the Third Kind and television shows such as Alien Nation and Buffy the Vampire Slayer....A succinct bibliography and indexing by subject and named language round out the book, which is an essential resource tool for the teacher, researcher, librarian, linguist, and reader.
  —Booklist/Reference Books Bulletin October 15, 2006

Table of Contents:

• List of Entries
• Guide to Related Topics
• Forward by Ursula K. Le Guin
• Preface
• Introduction
• The Encyclopedia
• Selected Bibliography
• Index of Languages
• General Subject Index

PDF Catalogs:

Greenwood Literature Spring 2008.pdf