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In the newsletter, we have discussed language once before. Actually @daeus answered that question because I didn’t know. So I’m going to post his reply here. And maybe he’ll have other people to tag since I’m woefully out of date when it comes to who is active on the forum right now.

First of all, I wouldn’t be Tolkien until I’d already mastered writing fairly well. It makes a story deep, but it’s far from essential for good writing.

From Daeus:

I suggest not getting overzealous and to just work with what you already know. The language I invented was based on the ones I had some familiarity with—Greek, Latin, and English.

If writers are trying to be original, focusing on making up dialects and slang like Brandon Sanderson may be easier.

Finally, if you do invent a language, I think it’d be neat to make the way the words are formed symbolic. For instance, in the language I created, each noun has a prefix from one of five categories, each symbolically linked to one of the four races + monsters. A noun with a prefix linked to a certain race is thought to have qualities similar to the stereotypes of that race. It could even be possible to make the construction of language grammar thematic, though I can’t say I’ve heard of it being done.

There is also a professional book on this topic that I haven’t read called The Art of Language Invention.