There is certainly magic in language, in being able to put a name to previously elusive concept and give it form, which is one reason I love learning new words. However, the older I get, the more clear it becomes to me there is equal magic in the unnameable, that which is knowable only through direct experience and cannot be fully conveyed in words. Ironically, it is the understanding that words are simultaneously empty and meaningful that allows me to use them that much more effectively as a writer. It also makes me appreciate culturally specific and seemingly untranslatable concepts that much more.

I daydreamed about being a taxonomist at one point -- I gave it up when I realized that life was a slippery and elusive concept, one that didn't fit so nicely into human-constructed languages and concepts, and I did not have the personality to either ignore that truth OR handle the cognitive dissonance that inevitably resulted. It's not that taxonomy and names are useless, just that at a granular level, they start to break down and one has to become accustomed to a certain level of uncertainty within a model not quite flexible enough to fully accommodate reality-as-it-is.

I also saw a lot of people learn the names of creatures around them and believed that they knew everything there was to know about them as a result. I believe that knowing the name of something is like knowing the name of a person: a good first step, an introduction, but only the beginning of a relationship.

Obviously, things are different in Earthsea where true names are possible, and it's a fantastic metaphor! But I think true names must be verbs, not nouns; alive, not static; and slippery and elusive in ways that the Masters of Roke might not be comfortable admitting to themselves, and I wonder what the witches and wise-women might say of them.