The road that leads to Hollywood can be hard to find unless you have a map. David Salo, 32, a graduate student in the Department of Linguistics, found that map over 25 years ago.
When Salo was reading a J.R.R. Tolkien novel, he noticed a map within the pages.
\There were words on the map in an alphabet I didn't know,"" Salo said. This was the beginning of his self-described ""long journey of language.""
As Salo grew up, he took an interest in languages and grammars, including the made-up language of Tolkien's creation. Salo would read many different language dictionaries his parents had around the house.
""There were all kinds of interesting things in the house,"" Salo said.
It was not until after his undergraduate studies that Salo felt more confident with his knowledge of Tolkien languages.
""I found the idea of being in uncharted water more interesting,"" he said.
Salo uses the published works of Tolkien to chart his path into the unknown world of Tolkien language. Through studying Tolkien's works, Salo develops theories by examining the end sequences of Tolkien's made-up words and compares them to others.
""You just go through and do the best you can, and hope you have more information along the way,"" Salo said.
Many other people like Salo try to decipher the languages of the elves, dwarves, and orcs within Tolkien's books.
""Probably about 20 to 50 [people] are really into the field of Tolkien and hundreds are interested,"" Salo said.
Although translation of Tolkien languages may seem foreign to many students, an Internet search of Tolkien language translations, novels and original works, and translators who have spent years gathering information on Tolkien yields hundreds of sites dedicated to providing information and translations of the languages created by Tolkien on any given search engine.
Web sites have been created and devoted specifically to teaching others about the correct grammatical usage of Tolkien languages and all of the subsets and new languages that have more recently been developed.
One such Web site allows visitors to enter words in English and translate those words into one of four Tolkien languages: Sindarin, Quenya, Teleri or Silmarillion.
Salo is part of an Internet mailing list for people who share the same interest in translation and ideas about Tolkien. Members of this list post messages discussing their findings of Tolkein translation.
According to Salo, there are about four ""generations"" of Tolkien language followers. Salo himself is part of the third generation, as he learned from the findings of the first generation from the 1970s and 1980s.
According to one Web site dedicated to the translation of Tolkien
languages, the languages evolve over time because they are spoken slightly differently by each generation, and new concepts are coined by the surrounding culture or by competing cultures.
""In the case of the elven tongues, these changed because Tolkien's view of both his personal linguistic aesthetic and ideas of fitness with his own creation changed,"" the site stated.
The studying of Tolkien has made Salo an expert in two elvish languages'Quenya and Sindarin. Quenya is similar to Latin, with ceremonial attributes. Sindarin has similar grammatical characteristics to Welsh, and is commonly spoken in Tolkien's books.
According to Salo, Tolkien developed these languages by using his own linguistic knowledge and making up his own formal and common made-up languages.
It wasn't until Salo had confirmed news that a series of movies would be based on Tolkien's books that he sought the road to Hollywood. He contacted the producer of ""Lord of the Rings"" and offered his expertise of the elven languages.
Salo became a contractor with the film in production, and helped translate words that were on walls in the background of scenes. Salo also worked with the composer and translated lyrics into Sindarin. Dialogue of the film was also translated by Salo. All of his work was done by e-mail or by telephone calls.
""[The producers] would call at midnight because of the different time zones in New Zealand,"" he said. ""I never worked with them face to face.""
Aside from having found the path to Hollywood with the languages of Tolkien, Salo said he plans on continuing his studies and publishing some of his linguistic findings. Salo is also open to working with Hollywood again.
""I wouldn't mind it, if the [producers] were willing to put in the same effort,"" he said.
