Lesson 1
It is beneficial to have a
Quikscript font (preferably "King Plus Monospace" or "King Plus") installed on your system to view the Quikscript words & letters as they were intended to be viewed.
Contents
The Quikscript Alphabet
UpperCase & Punctuation
Ligatures
Abbreviations
The Quikscript Alphabet
The Quikscript alphabet has a core set of 40 letters. Every single word in Quikscript can be made using these 40 letters. The letters have a sequence (much like the standard alphabet "A, B, C...") & a stand-alone "name" (again, much like the standard alphabet, "Aye, Bee, See..."). All the letters should be written going from left to right, from the bottom going upwards.
Quikscript letter symbol
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p
|
b
|
t
|
d
|
k
|
g
|
T
|
H
|
f
|
v
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"Name"
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Poe
|
Bay
|
Tea
|
Day
|
Key
|
Go
|
THaw
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THey
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Fee
|
Vie
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Order
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1
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2
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3
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4
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5
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6
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7
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8
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9
|
10
|
Quikscript letter symbol
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s
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z
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S
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Z
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c
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J
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j
|
w
|
h
|
`
|
"Name"
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See
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Zoo
|
SHe
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J'ai
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CHeer
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Jay
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Ye
|
Way
|
He
|
WHy
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Order
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11
|
12
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13
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14
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15
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16
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17
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18
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19
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20
|
Quikscript letter symbol
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N
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m
|
n
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l
|
r
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"Name"
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INk
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May
|
No
|
Low
|
Roe
|
Order
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21
|
22
|
23
|
24
|
25
|
Quikscript letter symbol
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i
|
I
|
e
|
E
|
A
|
F
|
y
|
Y
|
o
|
q
|
"Name"
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It
|
EAt
|
Ever
|
Able
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At
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EYE
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Ah
|
AWE
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Ox
|
OIL
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Order
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26
|
27
|
28
|
29
|
30
|
31
|
32
|
33
|
34
|
35
|
Quikscript letter symbol
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a
|
Q
|
O
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U
|
M
|
"Name"
|
Us
|
OUt
|
OWE
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fOOt
|
OOze
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Order
|
36
|
37
|
38
|
39
|
40
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Some of the "names" for the letters have been replaced for subjective reasons. For instance, the word "gay" was used for letter #6. While the word is similar to "happy," it is also slang for "homosexual." Also, the original name for letter #21 was the suffix "-ing." Not only is the use of a suffix a bit unorthodox but there is presently a company that goes by that very name.
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Uppercase & Capitalization
It is important to note that Quikscript does not have an "uppercase" letter set. When necessary, a "namer" dot can be used before the first letter of a given word for the equivalent function of capitalization. However, the need for capitalization in Quikscript is not identical to that of the standard alphabet. For instance, the first letter of the first word of a sentence is never capitalized. Also, proper nouns are only capitalized when they could be confused with common words. For instance, the word "jack" & "Jack" or "roam" & "Rome" (remember, those two words are spelt identical in Quikscript).
This sentence needs only three "namer" dots to be completely understood :
At /rOm, /JAk met /mr hErald JOnz.
For acronyms (such as "USA (the United States of America)," "UK (the United Kingdom)" & "UN (the United Nations)"), we are used to either using all capital letters with no periods ("USA") or the older method that uses capital letters with periods ("U.S.A."). Since Quikscript does not have capital letters, we represent an acronym by placing a namer dot beside each letter, such as below...
Quikscript acronym
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/jM/s/a
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/jM/k
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/v/k/r
|
/k/d
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/p/m
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Normal acronym
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USA
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UK
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VCR
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CD
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PM
|
It is recommended that, for those words that begin with a "U" sound (phonetically pronounced "You"), the letter combination
jM should be used for the acronym.
Contractions, such as "Mr.," "Mrs." & "Dr.," are an integral part of English that Quikscript can not ignore. We rarely write "Mister Smith" as opposed to "Mr. Smith" & almost no one writes "Mistress Smith" as opposed to "Mrs. Smith." In turn, Quikscript acknowledges these & other contractions by placing a namer dot
BEFORE the contraction.
Quikscript contraction
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/mr
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/ms
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/mz
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/dar
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Normal contraction
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Mr.
|
Mrs.
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Ms.
|
Dr.
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The contraction for "Mrs." is different from what is in the Quikscript manual, written by Kingsley Read. At the time that Kingsley Read wrote the manual, he may not have taken into consideration the emerging popularity of the contraction "Ms.".
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Ligatures
As with the standard alphabet, Quikscript has "ligatures." A ligature is a letter sequence that forms a different sound then the separate letters themselves. Take, for instance, the NG in the word "Thing." Although Quikscript already has a letter for this in it's initial 40 letters (N), there are other ligatures that Quikscript use that are not in the initial 40 letters. Therefore, it's important to recognize these ligatures...
Quikscript ligature
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jM
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Er
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Yr
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yr
|
ar
|
Sound
|
YOU
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AIR
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OR
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fAR
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tURn
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Optional symbol
|
V
|
X
|
P
|
R
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x
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Abbreviations
Finally, there are some words that are used so often that they can be reduced down to a single symbol. For instance, in the standard alphabet, it is entirely acceptable to use the ampersand symbol (&) for the word "and."
With Quikscript, there are eight letters that can stand for entire words when written alone. At any stage of Quikscript writing (Junior Quikscript, Senior Quikscript or any level in between), these abbreviations are completely acceptable.
Quikscript letter symbol
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H
|
v
|
n
|
t
|
i
|
z
|
f
|
b
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Full word
|
the
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of
|
and
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to
|
it
|
is
|
for
|
be
|
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