Zamenhof’s hope was that if a global second language existed, the potential for war, racism and xenophobia would be lessened. He invented his language, with simple rules of grammar, phonetic spelling, and no tricky idiom, grammatical quirks or silent letters, in 1887. He was nominated for Nobel peace prize in 1910 by four British MPs including Philip Snowden.
The idea of an international language caught on, especially on the left. Socialists saw it as an expression of internationalism in the years before and after the first world war. For example, in Spain, an Esperanto group was one of the associations involved in the founding of the National Confederation of Labour in 1910.
The British League of Esperantist Socialists was active in the Labour party, trade unions, Cooperative guilds, and among Labour councillors. According to their pamphlet of July 1923 Esperanto and Labour, the language was taught in a dozen schools, including in Barry, Barnoldswick, Burntisland, Coatbridge, Eccles, Huddersfield, Keighley, Leeds, Leigh, Liverpool, Rosyth, Stroud, and Worcester.
Not everyone on the left was a fan. George Orwell came across Esperanto when he was living ‘down and out’ in Paris in the 1920s. He stayed with his posh, bohemian aunt Nellie Limouzin and her socialist husband Eugène Lanti, a leading Esperantist and outspoken critic of Stalinism. Esperanto was the language of the house, which would have left Orwell uncomprehending.
A decade later, he worked as a part-time assistant in ‘Booklover’s Corner’, a second-hand bookshop in Hampstead run by Francis and Myfanwy Westrope, who were friends with Limouzin and Lanti through the Esperanto movement. This exposure to Esperanto left Orwell cold. Indeed, it does not take a great leap of imagination to see Esperanto transmute, in Orwell’s mind, into Newspeak. Newspeak is Orwell’s own invented language in Nineteen Eighty-Four, designed not to liberate humankind, but to constrain its capacity for independent thought by removing words from the lexicon. For example ‘ungood’ in Newspeak is the same as the Esperanto word malbona.
The idea of a universal language, not to supplant the ones already spoken, but as a global method of communication, is a good one. It is easy to see why idealistic people on the left of politics were attracted to Esperanto, and why today Esperanto is alive and well. Its British congress has just taken place at Eastbourne College, and the language is spoken around the world.
Ludwig Lazarus Zamenhof lived long enough to see his dreams of international brotherhood and sisterhood, united by a common tongue, die in the trenches of the first world war. How different the twentieth century might have been if he had succeeded. Instead, it was a century of world war and genocide. Zamenhof’s three children, Adam, Sofia and Lidia were murdered in the Holocaust.
I’m a Labour Party member and long-time speaker of Esperanto. Whilst I don’t think Esperanto is a simple antidote to war, it does allow me to understand the perspective of people with whom I have no other language in common. I hope you’ll allow me to add that the Esperanto Association of Britain offers a free Esperanto postal course. Suitable for those who would like a quick taster, this course gives an overview of the language in twelve bite-sized portions. Once you have received the first lesson, simply return your answers with an SAE. Your volunteer tutor will reply with guidance and the next lesson. All you pay is postage! Tel: 0845 230 1887 or write to: Esperanto House Station Road Barlaston Stoke-on-Trent ST12 9DE [email protected]
I can confirm that Esperanto is a growing living language, as can be seen here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=88YPPl6jJEQ
Another leftist who was very negative to Esperanto was Antonio Gramsci. In Orwell’s case, he hade for a time been a supporter of Basic English, and later turned against it. That, too, may be one of the roots of Newspeak. (I don’t dare to imagine what he would have thought of our days’ Globish…)
To take a look at some Esperanto courses on the internet check out: http://www.lernu.net
Some other reasons for Esperanto can be found in the Prague Manifesto: http://uea.org/info/angle/an_manifesto_prago.html and background info on Esperanto Today here: http://esperantic.org/en/research/eotoday
Success in Esperanto has been the key to my travels to 34 countries , which encouraged me to go on and become conversant in Spanish, Portuguese and Hebrew. I have a degree in Arabic. I define my self as a socialist or social-democrat and between the two world wars, we clarely dominated among advocates of Esperanto (base on my readings–I wasn’t around). Esperanto has numerous advocates among the non-violent, religious quakers, spritists, bahais, shintoistic oomoto and catholics. Secular Jews dominated the early movement in Poland.
“How different the twentieth century might have been if he had succeeded.” Who are you, who tell us that he did not succeed? I use esperanto everyday and I do not agree.
The Esperanto movement was infiltrated from the very beginning. This culminated in the Ido schism of 1907, so just 20 years after the publication of Esperanto. An excellent analysis of this is given in English by lawyer Rik Dalton (http://rik.poreo.org/). There were cries of “Trompo kaj perfido” [Deception and treachery] from the Esperantists when they realised what had happened. There has been something similar pretty well in every generation ever since, but the Esperantists nowadays are much more passive and accepting of what they are told by people in authority. Zamenhof expected there to be opposition from the major language powers, which in those days would have meant French and English speakers. That is exactly what happened. First it was the French speakers, then the English speakers. But came from within. Esperanto could be in for a revival if the Esperantists themselves were as alert as to what was going on as they were in 1907.