Some peculiarities may be accounted for by the Slavonic mother tongue of the author: for example, his preference for sibilants and diphthongs, which is especially evident in the invented words (e.g., chi, here; chiu, each; ech, even; ghi, that; ghis, until, gh and ch being pronounced as E. j and ch). In an article in Zamenhof's Krestomatio I find, for example (p. 288), chiuj tiuj senantaujughaj kaj honestaj homoj, kiuj, anstatau filizofadi pri ghi, and (p. 293) tion chi ankorau antau la apero de la unua arta lingvo antauvidis kaj antaudiris chiuj tiuj eminentaj kapoj, kiuj, etc. The method of writing x is also Russian: ekzameni, ekzemplo, etc., and also ekspedi, eksplodi; also kv for qu. French words with oi take ua in Esperanto when they are spelt in this way in Russian, e.g., trotuaro, tualeto, vuala; otherwise they are spelt with oi or oj, e.g., foiro, fojo, foino. Nacio, tradicio, etc., instead of -iono, is also Russian. Russian usage has doubtless also inspired such word formations as elparoli and senkulpigi instead of the international pronuncar and exkuzar (R. vygovarivat' and izvin'at', corresponding to G. aussprechen and entschuldigen). The peculiarity of using the adverb instead of the adjective in such cases as estas necese vidi, "it is necessary to see," is probably to be ascribed to the correspondence of the Russian adverb with the neuter predicate adjective. This rule cannot be permitted, however, in an international language, because, with a free word order, it would be impossible to say whether estas vere necese means "it is really necessary" or "it is necessarily true." The compound perfect (mi estas aminta, "I have loved" = "I am having loved") reminds one of the Polish kochal-em. Finally, the frequent use of the adjective (in -a) instead of the genitive (Zamenhofa lingvo) and of the two sorts of action expressed by ek and ad (ekvidi and vidadi used in many cases where the simple vidi would be sufficient) are to be accounted for by Russian usages.
Naturally I do not object to the importation of national peculiarities into the international auxiliary language when the latter is enriched thereby. For example, one must make use of the facility for forming compound words common to the Germanic and Slavonic languages in preference to the poverty of Romance languages in this respect, and combine it with the more Romance characteristic of forming new words by means of derivative syllables. But peculiarities of national language which render mutual comprehension and international usage difficult must be most carefully avoided.
The unpractical nature of the circumflexed letters has been indicated previously. It may be remarked here, however, that in point of system Zamenhof's letters are very inferior to the similar ones employed in the Czech language, since the parallelism in sound between s and ŝ, z and ĵ, dz and ĝ, is disguised by the choice of letters. This produces a very amateurish effect.
Besides the familiar parts of speech which are indicated by special terminations, Zamenhof invented a new class characterised by the termination -au (kontrau, almenau); but the limits of this class, which includes some, but not all, adverbs and prepositions, are not clearly defined.
Many words taken from existing languages are disguised, almost after the fashion of Volapük: boji, F. aboyer; parkere, F. par cœur; shvit, G. schwitzen, E. sweat; char, F. car; faruno instead of farin; lerta, F. alerte (with a changed meaning), etc. In this category is to be classed the astonishing nepre (entirely) which is derived from the Russian nepremenno, just as if one were to take from the German word unbedingt the two first syllables and propose unbe as an international word instead of absolute. The economy in the use of stems was carried much too far in Esperanto, necessitating the employment of all sorts of compound words, the discovery of whose meaning requires much racking of one's brains. The employment of all the derivative syllables also as independent words is very ingenious, but produces a very strange impression on the uninitiated.
The method of word formation is greatly wanting in precision, the limits of the so-called direct derivation in particular being not sufficiently clearly indicated. One example will suffice. Starting out from kroni = to crown, krono ought properly to mean crowning, instead of which it signifies crown, so that one is forced to use kronado for crowning, whereas, according to the rules of Esperanto, kronado must mean continuous or repeated crowning, as if a king were being constantly or repeatedly crowned.[4]
I have brought together here the most important defects in Esperanto, the removal of which formed one of the tasks of the Delegation Committee. The knowledge of these imperfections does not prevent me from recognising the meritorious services of Zamenhof, who, at a time when the question of the best construction of an international language was not seriously discussed, succeeded in producing one which was in many respects superior to the attempts of that time, and which has proved in practice a serviceable, though very imperfect, means of international communication.
Otto Jespersen.