George Steiner · 1975 · EPUB · Calibre ID 2372
Resurfaced in The Private Core (2026-10-18).
Role in the triad
Source: the theory Friel borrowed close to verbatim (genealogy edge)
Why this book
Friel drew on it while writing Translations; its thesis that speech matured through concealment (‘All developed language has a private core’; the word as ‘pass-word’) frames Shelta as well. Second edition with 1992 preface.
Quotations
Verified against the book’s own text on the day of the reading.
- “A civilization is imprisoned in a linguistic contour which no longer matches, or matches only at certain ritual, arbitrary points, the changing landscape of fact.” (Ch. 1)
- “Languages are wholly arbitrary sets of signals and conventionalized counters.” (Ch. 1)
- “Often, cultures seem to expend on their vocabulary and syntax acquisitive energies and ostentations entirely lacking in their material lives.” (Ch. 2)
- “Obviously, we speak to communicate. But also to conceal, to leave unspoken.” (Ch. 1)
- “In the beginning the word was largely a pass-word, granting admission to a nucleus of like speakers.” (Ch. 3)
- “Streaming outward it thins, losing energy and pressure as it reaches an alien speaker.” (Ch. 3)
Themes
borrowing concordance · concealment · hermeneutic motion · hermeticism · linguistic exogamy · pass-word · privacy of language