Chapter 22 The art of transmutation
Practice: your own transmutations
The method only becomes yours by doing. These exercises rise in difficulty; each targets a specific skill from the case studies. Work with the lexicon open, the compound registry (documents/reference/compounds.md) beside it, and no shame in sitting with a sentence for a long time. The sitting is the practice.
Exercise 1: A proverb (restructuring)
Transmute:
"Actions speak louder than words."
Hints: Phi has phoa (do), haolu (speak), phelui (word), and the comparative mo with sheo (than). But before assembling them: Step 1. What is this proverb doing? It ranks two kinds of truthfulness. Is there a way to say it that observes rather than ranks? Both a comparative version and a parallel-statement version are defensible; build each and feel the difference.
Exercise 2: A feeling (the anger pattern)
Transmute:
"I'm jealous of my friend's garden."
The compound registry gives phelu pula, holding-wish, for envy or jealousy. Test its possession relation against this sentence: what does the friend hold, and what does the speaker want? If fear of loss or comparison is doing more of the work, name that instead of forcing the compound. Preserve the source term exactly if jealousy itself is under discussion.
Exercise 3: Small news (evidentials and numbers)
Transmute something from today's news in one sentence. Every claim received from the report carries ti. Render a number in Phi when its exact or approximate form is adequate, and preserve its source notation when that form matters. Keep names and identifiers beside the Phi passage. Units and money stay with their source notation. Then write one sentence about anything the transmutation omitted or reframed.
Exercise 4: A poem (the gap as collaborator)
Choose a short poem you love, two to four lines. Attempt both a close translation and a transmutation, and keep a gap log for each missing distinction and what you did instead. Compare the results. If the transmutation changes details without gaining a coherent Phi work, keep the translation; permission to depart is not a duty to do so.
Exercise 5: Your own words (the full arc)
Write three sentences about your day directly in Phi, without an English draft. Then validate them. If the thought needs a distinction the language lacks, compare a transparent composition with a new root and record the question before choosing. Ordinary source-bound detail may instead stay in an accompanying record.
The habit
When "How do I say this in Phi?" produces a tidy answer, test it against a second question: "What changed while I was saying it?" Sometimes the answer is nothing, and the close translation stands. Sometimes the change is the whole work. The gap log keeps the two from borrowing each other's name.