(...) Speakers of the invented language Esperanto, developed by Polish ophthalmologist LL Zamenhof in 1887, have pursued their own hobby on a global scale for more than a century. The language has long been a pastime of brilliant, quixotic visionaries who’ve made a genuine impact in the non-Esperanto world — from the writers Leo Tolstoy and JRR Tolkien to figures such as Ho Chi Minh, Pope John Paul II, and George Soros. (...)