Dear Adam78,

Which Hungarian book are you translating? I'd be curious to check the original, if I can find it in my university library (Leiden, the Netherlands).

The sentence you mention does not seem correct to me. As it stands, it would not be meaningful, but it looks correctable: my first guess at correcting it would be: "Danob oli, o pükatidel volapüka!" (I thank you, o language-teacher of Volapük!), which would agree with your description of the context. Maybe it was written by someone with some but not enough knowledge of Volapük? Do you hapen to know if Mór Jókai had had much contact with the language? (He's not listed in my sources for Hungarian Volapükists.) What do you mean, the author only remembers the text vaguely? He wrote it, didn't he? Or do you mean that the character - the girl - is supposed to remember the words vaguely? (But she speaks Volapük, or else how would she know how to thank her teacher?)

As for counting references to Volapük: no, we do not keep a list of literary references -- if only because present-day Volapükists basically work on something else (Volapük is nobody's bread winner), so we don't have time for literary reserach... and, as far as I can recal, there's been only one or two university theses on Volapük in the last 20-40 years. Volapükology is a small field, with only a few people in it who mostly do something else. Anyway, out of curiosity, would this information help you in your translation? I happen to know of a recent reference to Volapük; in fact, a whole novel written about Volapük: it's A Hand-book of Volapük, by Scottish author Andrew Drummond (you can read a short review of this book here). I hope it helps!

All the best, --Smeira 23:06, 26 febul 2007 (UTC)

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