Gostak

The phrase "the gostak distims the doshes" was coined in 1923 by C. K. Ogden and I. A. Richards in their book The Meaning of Meaning. It is an example of how it is possible to derive meaning from the syntax of a sentence even if the referents of the terms are entirely unknown. This can be seen in the following dialogue:

In interactive fiction

The phrase is the namesake of a unique interactive fiction game called The Gostak, written by Carl Muckenhoupt. Most of the text of the game is in an entirely unknown language which the player must decipher. For example, the game opens with the following text:

Related Topics:
Interactive fiction - Carl Muckenhoupt

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:Glauds! How rorm it would be to pell back to the bewl and distunk them, distunk the whole delcot, let the drokes discren them.

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The Gostak won the 1999 XYZZY Award for Best Use of Medium.

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