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Copyrighted Words? Can I use fuligin?

#1 User is offline   Baco Xtath 

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Posted 03 November 2011 - 02:29 PM

I've been working on a series of books for a while (plot, outline, characters, and world, specifically) and am now to the point of writing the meat. I want to throw some acknowlegements to some of my favorite writers, nothing obvious just a word or two here and there. The question is: can I use the word fuligin (Gene Wolfes' coined word meaning blacker than the deepest black - for those who don't know) or other words that are author specific? Or is that stepping on toes? I just want to use the word once, not repeatedly, as that would be obvious and toe-stepping, in my opinion. I mean, a lot of words have been created in science fiction and fantasy by single authors (though, they may have been married - I dont know) and are now universal throughout the genre (ex. android, robotics, ....hell, I can't really think of anymore, and I guessed at those - I think Asimov coined quite a few robotics' terms - anyway, point delivered, though, half-assedly - and on that note, can I make up words?).
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#2 User is offline   Use Of Weapons 

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Posted 03 November 2011 - 04:30 PM

Fuligin has entered normal parlance, and is used by companies -- there's even a fuligin.com. I'd say it's fair game.

And by all means, make up words! Try to give them some kind of realism though, assonance and a good mouth-feel. It's not a good idea just to throw a load of consonants and vowels at the wall and see what sticks. That would be most vilfitudinous.
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#3 User is offline   Use Of Weapons 

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Posted 03 November 2011 - 04:33 PM

P.S. The word "robot" was coined by Karel Čapek (sp?) in a Czech book. 'Robota' in Czech means 'slave or menial worker'.
It is perfectly monstrous the way people go about nowadays saying things against one, behind one's back, that are absolutely and entirely true.
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#4 User is offline   Salt-Man Z 

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Posted 03 November 2011 - 05:59 PM

  • Asimov came up with "robotics", as in the field of study.
  • Gene Wolfe's "invented" words are all real; they're just archaic or obscure or based on such. Fuliginous for example, means "sooty", hence Wolfe uses fuligin to refer to a black color.
  • Authors borrow words from each other all the time. Orson Scott Card's "ansible" from the Ender books was borrowed from Ursula K. Le Guin.

"Here is light. You will say that it is not a living entity, but you miss the point that it is more, not less. Without occupying space, it fills the universe. It nourishes everything, yet itself feeds upon destruction. We claim to control it, but does it not perhaps cultivate us as a source of food? May it not be that all wood grows so that it can be set ablaze, and that men and women are born to kindle fires?"
―Gene Wolfe, The Citadel of the Autarch
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#5 User is offline   Baco Xtath 

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Posted 03 November 2011 - 07:53 PM

Alright, how about words you thought might be words but found out are not but still want to use. Examples: vertigous - a place that causes vertigo, cliency - as in "a candidate for cliency (being a client)". Basically, could-be and almost words. Is using those faux pas? Not that there aren't words for what I described or other scenarios I'll be visiting, I just can't think of them and so don't want my narrators to be able to either. Two of my books are written in the first person and I don't want them to have a vocabulary greater than my own -- that is, I want them to have pretty shallow vocabularies and just sort of winging it with words.

My magnum opus will be written in 3rd person and as such I won't be making up words like I descibed in it.

This post has been edited by Baco Xtath: 03 November 2011 - 08:31 PM

"Give a man a fire and he's warm for the day. But set fire to him and he's warm for the rest of his life." - Terry Pratchett, Jingo"Just erotic. Nothing kinky. It's the difference between using a feather and using a chicken." - Terry Pratchett, Eric
"Wisdom comes from experience. Experience is often a result of a lack of wisdom." - Terry Pratchett
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