staf250 Pentaglot Senior Member Belgium emmerick.be Joined 5700 days ago 352 posts - 414 votes Speaks: French, Dutch*, Italian, English, German Studies: Arabic (Written)
| Message 89 of 177 03 July 2010 at 11:44am | IP Logged |
I'm reading:
Antonia Arslan, La Strada di Smirne. The original in Italian.
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tricoteuse Pentaglot Senior Member Norway littlang.blogspot.co Joined 6681 days ago 745 posts - 845 votes Speaks: Swedish*, Norwegian, EnglishC1, Russian, French Studies: Ukrainian, Bulgarian
| Message 90 of 177 03 July 2010 at 11:52am | IP Logged |
Fun thread!
German: Feuchtgebiete by Charlotte Roche
Russian: Родная Речь by Вайль и Генис
Norwegian: Kruttårnet by Jens Bjørneboe
Hungarian: Ciróka by Gábor Éva :)
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ladanoise Groupie United States Joined 5296 days ago 45 posts - 46 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French, Danish
| Message 91 of 177 15 July 2010 at 7:37pm | IP Logged |
I just finished a book called "I am Nujood, Age 10 and Divorced" - excellent
thought -provoking book about a Yemen girl - the original was in French with
the title "Moi Nujood, Age 10, Divorce".
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Violaine Diglot Newbie United Kingdom Joined 5247 days ago 6 posts - 13 votes Speaks: French*, English Studies: German
| Message 92 of 177 17 July 2010 at 4:31pm | IP Logged |
I am so admirative to see in so many different languages some of you can read.
I am reading the Collected Poems by Sylvia Plath. I love them.
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aarontp Groupie United States Joined 5270 days ago 94 posts - 139 votes
| Message 93 of 177 19 August 2010 at 9:18am | IP Logged |
Juan M. wrote:
Volte wrote:
I don't particularly like using dictionaries more than
absolutely necessary, and prefer to acquire vocabulary from context
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I must say, I tried this method for a long time for English and Spanish with terrible
results; my writing suffered a lot from an imprecise knowledge and use of vocabulary,
particularly in my native tongue. I think one learns vocabulary from a dictionary and
masters it through context. Nowadays I don't sit down to read in any language unless I
have a dictionary by my side, either in physical or online format.
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I know this was posted a while ago, but I have to point out that I agree. I have no
idea how people acquire vocabulary exclusively through context. I tried to do it for a
little while, and then went back to what has worked best for me in my native language.
I usually don't even read books in my native language without a dictionary close by. I
typically look up every new word I see. As a result, my vocabulary has improved
immensely, both in my native language and in foreign languages I study.
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Jezrul Newbie United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5235 days ago 27 posts - 44 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish
| Message 94 of 177 19 August 2010 at 9:26am | IP Logged |
I'm reading Letter to a Christian Nation by Sam Harris.
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Leivo Tetraglot Newbie Finland Joined 5212 days ago 2 posts - 2 votes Speaks: Finnish*, French, English, Swedish Studies: German, Hungarian
| Message 95 of 177 27 August 2010 at 5:36pm | IP Logged |
aarontp wrote:
I know this was posted a while ago, but I have to point out that I agree. I have no
idea how people acquire vocabulary exclusively through context. I tried to do it for a
little while, and then went back to what has worked best for me in my native language.
I usually don't even read books in my native language without a dictionary close by. I
typically look up every new word I see. As a result, my vocabulary has improved
immensely, both in my native language and in foreign languages I study. |
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Well, I'm one of the people who try to figure out as much from the context as possible, but I really like to use a mixed method: sometimes I look things up from the dictionary and write them down / put them on flashcards, sometimes I just read on, try to pick things up from context and only look up what's necessary for understanding what's going on. It always worked for me, and I think it's a better way to learn the language if you at least occasionally try to understand things from context. If you really want to learn the language, you're not always going to be in a situation where you can have a dictionary. Also, a translation to your native language is not necessarily going to be 100 % accurate because languages don't always have words for the same things, and the nuances can be different and hard to explain in a dictionary, so you always have to pay attention to the context if you want to really learn the word.
But dictionaries are definitely an important tool because you can't figure out everything from the context, and you may also guess things wrong if you never check them. I don't almost ever look up things in my native language, though, there are very few words coming up I don't know, and those are usually regional/archaic words. Or cases where I go "What do you mean, MS Word spellcheck, that it's spelled like that? I've always spelled it like this!"
Pardon the digression. Now, my current foreign-language books are:
"Die unendliche Geschichte" by Michael Ende (German; this was one of my greatest favourite books as a child, and now I'm reading it for the first time in German and loving it as much as before)
"Szív a kerítésen" by Katalin Nagy (Hungarian; it's a children's/YA book and the best thing I found for my current language level, but it's also a lot of fun to read
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Volte Tetraglot Senior Member Switzerland Joined 6442 days ago 4474 posts - 6726 votes Speaks: English*, Esperanto, German, Italian Studies: French, Finnish, Mandarin, Japanese
| Message 96 of 177 28 August 2010 at 1:36pm | IP Logged |
I'm reading books of Kolomano Kalocsay's poetry. Yesterday, I read "Izolo", and today "Versojn oni ne aĉetas", and I've started "Ezopa saĝo." Kalocsay is sometimes called the Chaucer of Esperanto, and is usually hailed as its greatest poet.
On the whole, I'd say that he writes stunningly well, but I've come to share William Auld's* opinion that Eŭgeno Miĥalski is a better poet. Miĥalski's "fajro kuracas" is rather disturbing in terms of content (he very strongly advocates politics and actions I could never condone), but is absolutely stunning nonetheless, as poetry.
That said, I'm yet to read "Streĉita kordo", which is usually considered Kalocsay's best book of original Esperanto poetry.
William Auld is another Esperanto poet, notable for having written an epic poem in Esperanto, "La infana raso", which was repeatedly nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature before his death.
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