10-02-2026, 10:50 PM
I hope you don't mind if I poke a few holes in your logic.
Some native speaker willingly read out a ~40,000 word manuscript? Really? Had nothing better to do? Either the author understood it as it was being recited or he did not. If he did not then what was the point of a phonetic copy? It would never have been of any use to him.
If he did understand then it would have been simpler just to write in words of his own language the meaning of the recitation. But instead of this he chose to write in an invented phonetic alphabet and then later to entrust this to someone whose ability was 'not much beyond that' of holding a pen, and who would have needed training in the alphabet, just to create a manuscript that only he himself would have been able to read? Why not just keep the paper original and spare himself the amateurish re-writing of this trainee?
He 'was not rich'? But really the only people who would have been able to travel to China would have needed to be wealthy. Either a merchant going for commercial trade, or else an emissary who had the backing of a rich patron, state or church to pay for the journey.
Writing phonetic text from speech in a foreign language is not easy. Let us try it ourselves. Go to You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. and choose a few sentences. Was it easy?
Some native speaker willingly read out a ~40,000 word manuscript? Really? Had nothing better to do? Either the author understood it as it was being recited or he did not. If he did not then what was the point of a phonetic copy? It would never have been of any use to him.
If he did understand then it would have been simpler just to write in words of his own language the meaning of the recitation. But instead of this he chose to write in an invented phonetic alphabet and then later to entrust this to someone whose ability was 'not much beyond that' of holding a pen, and who would have needed training in the alphabet, just to create a manuscript that only he himself would have been able to read? Why not just keep the paper original and spare himself the amateurish re-writing of this trainee?
He 'was not rich'? But really the only people who would have been able to travel to China would have needed to be wealthy. Either a merchant going for commercial trade, or else an emissary who had the backing of a rich patron, state or church to pay for the journey.
Writing phonetic text from speech in a foreign language is not easy. Let us try it ourselves. Go to You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view. and choose a few sentences. Was it easy?