L. L. Zamenhof (1859 - 1917) was a Polish-Jewish ophthalmologist, linguist and writer, best known as the creator of Esperanto. [1] Publishing the language in 1887 under the pseudonym Doktoro Esperanto, he intended it as a politically neutral second language that could ease communication between peoples divided by nationality and faith. Esperanto remains by a wide margin the most successful constructed language ever devised. [2]
Early life
Ludwik Lejzer Zamenhof was born on 15 December 1859 in Białystok, then part of the Russian Empire and now in Poland. [1] The town's population was divided among Poles, Russians, Germans and a large Jewish community, each with its own language, and Zamenhof later wrote that the hostility he saw between these groups as a child convinced him that a shared neutral language might reduce it.
His father taught languages, and Zamenhof grew up with Russian and Yiddish at home and learned Polish, German, French, Latin, Greek and Hebrew. [2] He began constructing an international language while still at school, working through several early drafts, one of which his father destroyed while he was away studying.
Medicine
Zamenhof studied medicine at Moscow University and completed his degree at the Imperial University of Warsaw in 1885. [1] He specialised in ophthalmology after finding general practice emotionally unbearable, and worked for most of his life as an eye doctor, much of it among the poor of Warsaw's Jewish quarter. Medicine provided his income throughout; the language work was unpaid.
Esperanto
In July 1887, with financial help from his future father-in-law, Zamenhof published in Warsaw the booklet later known as Unua Libro (First Book), setting out the grammar and a basic vocabulary of the new language under the pen name Doktoro Esperanto, meaning "one who hopes". [2] The name attached itself to the language.
Esperanto was designed for rapid learning: sixteen grammatical rules without exceptions, a regular system of affixes for building words from a limited root stock, and a phonetic spelling. [3] Its vocabulary draws chiefly on Romance and Germanic languages with some Slavic elements. Zamenhof renounced personal ownership of the language, placing it in the public domain so that its speakers would develop it collectively.
He published the Fundamento de Esperanto in 1905 as a fixed reference to prevent the language fragmenting, and the same year the first World Esperanto Congress met at Boulogne-sur-Mer in France, conducted entirely in the language. [2] He translated extensively into Esperanto, including Shakespeare's Hamlet, works of Goethe and Gogol, and the entire Hebrew Bible.
Later years and death
Zamenhof also developed a universalist ethical doctrine he called Homaranismo, intended to complement the language, though it gained far fewer adherents. [1] He declined the honour of being treated as the movement's leader and resisted attempts to make Esperanto the vehicle of any single ideology. He was nominated repeatedly for the Nobel Peace Prize but never received it.
The outbreak of the First World War, which separated the Esperanto community and cancelled its congress, affected him deeply. He died in Warsaw on 14 April 1917. His three children were murdered by the Nazis during the Holocaust. [1]
Legacy
Esperanto is spoken by an estimated one to two million people worldwide, with a literature, periodicals, congresses and a small number of native speakers raised in bilingual families. [4] Streets, schools and an asteroid are named after Zamenhof, and 15 December is observed as Zamenhof Day. [2]
