Editing Esperanto (section)

=== Creation ===
[[File:Zamenhof portreto.jpg|thumb|right|Zamenhof, {{c.|1895}}]]
[[File:Unua Libro ru 1st ed.pdf|thumb|upright|The first Esperanto book by L. L. Zamenhof, know known as {{lang|eo|Unua Libro|italics=yes}}, published in 1887 in [[Russian language|Russian]]. The title translates to: ''International Language: Preface and Complete Tutorial''.]]
Esperanto was created in the late 1870s and early 1880s by [[L. L. Zamenhof]], a Jewish [[Ophthalmology|ophthalmologist]] from [[Białystok]], then part of the [[Russian Empire]], but now part of [[Poland]]. After several iterations ([[Proto-Esperanto]]), he self-published the first book of Esperanto grammar ({{lang|eo|Unua Libro|italics=yes}}) on July 26, 1887. He did so under the pseudonym {{Lang|eo|[[Doctor (title)|Doktoro]] Esperanto}} ({{lit|one who hopes}}) and simply called the language "the international language" ({{Lang|eo|la lingvo internacia}}). Early speakers grew fond of the name ''Esperanto'' and began to use it as the name for the language.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Schor |first1=Esther |title=[[Bridge of Words]]: Esperanto and the Dream of a Universal Language |date=4 October 2016 |publisher=Henry Holt and Company |isbn=978-1-4299-4341-3|language=en |page=70|author-link=Esther Schor}}</ref>

Zamenhof's goal was to create an easy and flexible language that would serve as a universal [[second language]], to foster [[world peace]] and international understanding, and to build a "community of speakers".<ref>{{Cite web |last=Yaffe |first=Deborah |date=January 11, 2017 |title=A Language for Idealists |url=https://paw.princeton.edu/article/language-idealists |access-date=March 30, 2022 |website=Princeton Alumni Weekly}}</ref> Zamenhof wrote that he wanted mankind to "learn and use ... en masse ... the proposed language as a living one".<ref name="UnuaLibro">L.L.Zamenhof. [http://www.genekeyes.com/Dr_Esperanto.html International Language] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121222105540/http://www.genekeyes.com/Dr_Esperanto.html |date=December 22, 2012 }}. Warsaw. 1887</ref> The goal for Esperanto to become an [[international auxiliary language]] was not Zamenhof's only goal; he also wanted to "enable the learner to make direct use of his knowledge with persons of any nationality, whether the language be universally accepted or not; in other words, the language is to be directly a means of international communication".<ref name="UnuaLibro" />  His feelings and the situation in Białystok may be gleaned from an extract from his letter to Nikolai Borovko:{{sfn|Matthias|2002}}

{{blockquote|In Białystok the inhabitants were divided into four distinct elements: Russians, Poles, Germans, and Jews; each of these spoke their own language and looked on all the others as enemies. In such a town a sensitive nature feels more acutely than elsewhere the misery caused by language division and sees at every step that the diversity of languages is the first, or at least the most influential, basis for the separation of the human family into groups of enemies. I was brought up as an idealist; I was taught that all people were brothers, while outside in the street at every step I felt that there were no people, only Russians, Poles, Germans, Jews, and so on.|L. L. Zamenhof, in a letter to Nikolai Borovko, c. 1895}}

Because people were reluctant to learn a new language which hardly anyone spoke, Zamenhof asked people to sign a promise to start learning Esperanto once ten million people made the same promise. He "was disappointed to receive only a thousand responses".<ref>{{cite journal | journal= New Yorker | author= Joan Acocella | date= October 24, 2016 | title= A Language to Unite Humankind | url= https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/10/31/a-language-to-unite-humankind | access-date= May 24, 2020 | archive-date= May 29, 2020 | archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20200529082013/https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/10/31/a-language-to-unite-humankind | url-status= live }}</ref> Nevertheless, the number of speakers grew rapidly over the next few decades; at first, primarily in the Russian Empire and Central Europe, then in other parts of Europe, the Americas, China, and Japan.

In 1905, Zamenhof published the ''[[Fundamento de Esperanto]]'' as a definitive guide to the language. Later that year, French Esperantists organized with his participation the first [[World Esperanto Congress]], an ongoing annual conference, in [[Boulogne-sur-Mer]], France. Zamenhof also proposed to the first congress that an independent body of linguistic scholars should steward the future evolution of Esperanto, foreshadowing the founding of the [[Akademio de Esperanto]] (in part modeled after the [[Académie Française|Académie française]]), which was established soon thereafter.