Me neither. I think Quilig-hum would be what I’d come up with were I to try to say it.
Well, it’s not Welsh. In the Baroque Cycle and in Cryptonomicon, Stephenson indicates that the Qwlghmians are **pre-**Celtic, like the Picts in Scotland, or the Firbolgs in Ireland, or the Basques in Spain. The name, of course, obviously has been crafted to be unpronounceable.
Meaningless, but not unpronouncible.
If they’re pre-celtic, then a mix of celtic languages seems appropriate - the best combination seems to be ‘cool-im’, the first syllable working from Welsh and using the same vowel as ‘book’, the second vagulely Irish/Gaelic, taking the ‘gh’ as a vowel.
I always just assumed it was a loose phlegmmy throat-clearing sound, which is also how I’ve always pronounced “Ralph Houk”. 
[quL\Gm=]
I like velar fricatives.
Mostly I don’t.
“Colm,” like the actor Colm Meany.
One thing is clear, the name we are given is written in the Roman alphabet. Therefore the spelling we have is post-Celtic since the Romans came to Britain after the Celts.
It seems pretty clear that some of the letters are not pronounced in the manner that English speakers would pronounce them. Most likely the ‘q’ and the ‘w’ represent different sounds and the ‘h’ is either syllabic or represents an entirely different sound. (or perhaps ‘h’ is intended to modify the ‘g’, in whcih case the above comments apply to the m).
I like yBeayf’s analysis since I think you can find those pronunciations in actual languages in the world.
One thing, yBeayf gives ‘gh’ the value of a voiced uvular fricative, I think it might be a velar fricative since this is the way ‘gh’ used to be pronounced in English. It seems like they might have followed the English in this regard.
That’s an astonishing claim. You really suggest that the Romans obliterated every element of Celtic culture from britain? (And if so, how do you explain the survival of non-British cultures?)
I found the pronounciation on that Wikipedia thing a while ago. I’m not going to search for the link now, but Stephenson said that it’s something like a click followed by a swallowing noise, but since only native born Qwghlmians can make those sounds, English speakers say it something like “Taggum.”
Yep, there it is.
It’s pronounced “etaoin shrdlu”.
Probably not much help, but I once had a question about “Qhythsontyd” and this post may be a start.
As others above have mentioned, according to Neal Stephenson himself – captured here on audio – the pronunciation by English-speakers would be “TAG-um”
The two narrators of the Baroque Cycle audiobooks, however, didn’t seem to get the message, because they both pronounce it “Tuh-GOOM.”
(I think the narrator who read Cryptonomicon may have gotten it right, but I can’t verify that right now.)
No, it’s spelled Raymond Luxury-Yacht.
This. T’was a time when my mornings were spent telemarketing to the UK. Other people, mostly from Chicago’s South Side, where words are pronounced as God intended, were totally fucked when calling Wales. I’d shortcut it as “Cool-gum” and nobody would complain, being amazed that a Yank got that close. But between when the phone connected and I had to ask for Mr Qwlghm I often had less than a second to work it out. Not fun.
Qualm
Gollum, gollum.
Just be warned that the most common mispronouncement is also the most dire insult in the entire language.
Cthulhu?