A silly idea for a self-referential fiction
It's a story set in a distant fantasy future where everybody speaks completely logical and unambiguous languages such as Lojban, but one is capable of performing magical acts and spells if one speaks or writes in the ancient, long-forgotten and nigh-incomprehensible language of English. Every grammatically correct phrase of English spoken or inscribed is akin to casting a magical spell, and the more complex, esoteric and verbose the phrase, the more powerful the spell. However, the people of this strange world find the inconsistent and illogical rules of English grammar, spelling and pronunciation tremendously difficult to apprehend, and only a few can master it and become powerful and fearsome English Majors.
Anyway, the central point of the story set in this world is that the English language is so powerful that if one were to write a full book consisting entirely of English phrases, it would be akin to casting a spell that would create, ex nihilo, an entire world - an entire planet, its history and its people.
This was originally posted on my Blogger blog on 7/1/2010.