Latinate Auxiliary Languages

The other night, I was listening to music, and I suddenly realized: Latin really is the most attractive language for singing. I decided then that I wanted to learn a Latin-based auxiliary language. The question then is, which one? I've narrowed it down to either Latino Sine Flexione (LSF) or Lingua Franca Nova (LFN).  LSF is an older language, from the beginning of the 20th century and isn't used much anymore (although that's not important to me). It's not really well documented on the internet, either. LFN is a much more recent language, has many more users, and is very well documented.

In order to compare the two and get a better idea about them, I decided to try a little translation. I'm going to take the New National First Reader published in 1888 and translate it little by little into both languages.

Here's the first lesson in LSF:

Lectione Uno:
Illo es cane.

Short and simple. Here's the same lesson in LFN:

Leson Un
El es un can.

If I make mistakes, please feel free to correct them. I'll be back later with Lesson Two.

International Languages

I enjoy languages. You'll probably see posts here in other languages from time to time. That's just the way it is. Recently, I've been looking at some international auxiliary languages (IAL), seeing which one I like best. Here's my thoughts so far.

Esperanto - Probably the most popular and widely used IAL today. I've tried to learn it before, but I just can't seem to do it. It uses some odd diacritics which make it more difficult to use in the electronic age (I still don't know how to get them on my BlackBerry). The vocabulary is an odd mix. Some of it's familiar and some isn't. As far as grammar is concerned, it's needlessly complicated. Case in point: pick up any Esperanto grammar and find the "Table of Correlatives." I'm sorry, but that's just a mess! I'm going to give up on Esperanto for a while.

Interlingua - A very attractive language, in both written and spoken form. My guess is it's probably the second most widely used IAL. If you know any of the Romance languages (Italian, French, Spanish or Portuguese) the vocabulary will be pretty familiar. The pronunciation occasionally seems to be a little vague, though. The grammar is pretty simple. I think it's still a little more than necessary. I mean, who really needs an accusative case? Still, I like it a lot, and can generally sight read texts.

toki pona - A fascinating concept, and I like the way it looks and sounds. Both the vocabulary and the grammar are extremely simplified. The entire vocabulary is 118 words. Or maybe as many as 125 (some words might not be official yet). Of the four languages, toki pona is probably my favorite. It may be too simple, though. I have real trouble trying to communicate anything beyond simple sentences in it. As for understanding it, I need a lot more study time yet.

Lingua Franca Nova - Another Romance-based language. Pronunciation is simple, phonetic and well designed. The vocabulary seems more familiar to me than Interlingua's. I think it came more from the Spanish side of the family. The grammar is simpler than Interlingua's, which is something I like. To be honest, it's even easier than English grammar. I believe this is going to be the language I focus on learning.

If you've looked at any of the IAL's, I'd be interested in hearing your views. Especially if it's a language I've overlooked.