The personal web site of Rick Koshko (married name Rick Wiegmann Koshko).
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What Esperanto is
Its status
A living language
The future
An uphill battle
An intriguing hobby

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Esperanto was invented by Ludwig Zamenhof, an eye doctor who grew up in Bialystok, Poland. (Poland's borders have moved since that time and Bialystok wasn't in Poland then.) Zamenhof witnessed the distrust and hatred different ethnic groups in his city had for each other. He felt they would learn to trust and respect each other if language barriers didn't prevent them from communicating. But few people are willing to learn someone else's language.

Dr. Ludwig Zamenhof
(Lazar Markovitch)
creator of Esperanto
1859-1917

Even someone who wants to learn a new language will usually have trouble. Languages are just plain hard to learn. They have rules and the rules have many exceptions. A popular expression in one region is misunderstood in another. Useful vocabularies take a long time to acquire. Zamenhof decided to make a new language without these complications. The result was a tongue with few rules and no exceptions and a vocabulary familiar to about half the world's population.

Zamenhof intended for Esperanto to become a second language for the entire world. It still has a way to go toward that end.

Zamenhof's Jewish name was Lazar Markovitch. But Russian Imperial laws required a Christian name and to this day he's usually called "Ludwig Zamenhof". (This information was supplied to me by other Esperantists who have studied Zamenhof's life much more than I.)