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German & French Famous Five Series | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Programs, Books & Tapes |  | |
| Gemuse Senior Member Germany Joined 4073 days ago 818 posts - 1189 votes  Speaks: English Studies: German | Message 1 of 18 13 February 2014 at 4:58pm | IP Logged | ||
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I read Enid Blyton as a kid, just discovered these stories have been translated and
continued in German and French. Anyone read these stories? For translated versions, how do the English texts serve as parallel texts? What is the language level required for reading these books? http://famousfivetranslator.angelfire.com/overview_mysadv_fa mousfive.htm Edited by Gemuse on 13 February 2014 at 4:59pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Bakunin Diglot Senior Member Switzerland outerkhmer.blogspot. Joined 5121 days ago 531 posts - 1126 votes Speaks: German*, Thai Studies: Khmer | Message 2 of 18 13 February 2014 at 5:46pm | IP Logged | ||
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I've read a bunch of them (maybe 20-30 books) in Thai. It's good extensive reading stuff at intermediate levels, but the stories get old pretty fast. Well, maybe not the stories per se, but Blyton's narrow set of characters and stereotypes. The good thing, however, is, that books from one series (there are several... just check out the wikipedia entry on Blyton) get easier and easier the more you read. Predictive plots, stereotypical characters, repetitive language - a magical combination for extensive reading at the intermediate stage.
What's special about German and French, or are those just the languages you want to focus on? As far as I know you can get Blyton in dozens of languages. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Gemuse Senior Member Germany Joined 4073 days ago 818 posts - 1189 votes Speaks: English Studies: German | Message 3 of 18 13 February 2014 at 5:52pm | IP Logged | ||
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I didnt know Blyton could be had in languages like Thai!
I googled German, and this page came up with french also in it, thus I just mentioned those two languages. Can these books be read with just an A2 level mastery? 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| t1234 Diglot Newbie South Africa Joined 4129 days ago 38 posts - 83 votes Speaks: English*, Afrikaans Studies: Turkish, Polish | Message 4 of 18 13 February 2014 at 5:54pm | IP Logged | ||
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I read the first two in German. Roughly speaking I had only completed Assimil German Without Toil, the Langensheidt 4000 most common words in German and
Essential German Grammar. It took me about 12 days to read the first book at about 1-2 hours per day. The second book took about 3 days. Generally the grammar was not a problem, not knowing vocabulary was and at the start I was looking up lots of words, sometimes 2 or 3 per sentence. Afterwards I was able to move onto adult novels without a problem. It was certainly easier than Harry Potter if that gives a better yardstick. I wouldn't recommend reading more than a few though, they're pretty boring and too simple, but good practice for beginners. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| t1234 Diglot Newbie South Africa Joined 4129 days ago 38 posts - 83 votes Speaks: English*, Afrikaans Studies: Turkish, Polish | Message 5 of 18 13 February 2014 at 6:01pm | IP Logged | ||
I have a couple of them in Turkish and it's really hard going. Personally I didn't have the persistence to get past chapter 1, there were just too many unknown words for me. I switched over to Roald Dahl which is a bit easier in my opinion. Edit: Here's what it looks like in parallel: http://tinypic.com/r/v2y6iv/8 The vocabulary doesn't always match up, the original was written in 1945 and the translation is from 2009, so the vocabulary in the translation is more current than the original. Probably a good thing though. Edited by t1234 on 13 February 2014 at 6:28pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Bakunin Diglot Senior Member Switzerland outerkhmer.blogspot. Joined 5121 days ago 531 posts - 1126 votes Speaks: German*, Thai Studies: Khmer | Message 6 of 18 13 February 2014 at 6:29pm | IP Logged | ||
I'm not sure. Might be still too difficult. I would suggest you check it out yourself. Take one of the books, read the first two pages, count the number of words you don't recognize and can't guess for the life of you, and then compute the ratio of 'known' (including new but guessable) words. If the ratio is below 90%, don't read the book. If it's between 90% and 95% you should be able to read it but it'll be a painful process in the beginning. Above 95% you should definitively start reading. Above 98% is ideal. I don't known who you are and what your interests are, but I loved the 'Die 3 Fragezeichen' series (three friends in California solving mysteries and criminal cases) and the 'Mark Brandis' series (SF for kids) when I was young. Maybe worth looking into those two series if Blyton annoys you. Ah, and another thing. Should you decide to read the books, I'd suggest you start with book 1 and read through at least a couple (5-10) of the same series, ideally 1-10 or so. If you can stand the stories and the writing style, you'll get a lot more out of books 3-10 than books 1 and 2, and it's really worth it, language-learning-wise, I mean. Mixing different series is more difficult and less rewarding. Enjoy, and let us know how it's going! :) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Gemuse Senior Member Germany Joined 4073 days ago 818 posts - 1189 votes Speaks: English Studies: German | Message 7 of 18 13 February 2014 at 7:10pm | IP Logged | ||
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I used to love The Three Investigators!!! Will definitely check that one out.
I dont think I have encountered Mark Brandis; but I am a sci-fi fan too. I am still at A2.1 level. With these novels as a goal, I hope to grind out A2 in another 6 months, and then start these fun novels. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| t1234 Diglot Newbie South Africa Joined 4129 days ago 38 posts - 83 votes Speaks: English*, Afrikaans Studies: Turkish, Polish | Message 8 of 18 13 February 2014 at 7:18pm | IP Logged | ||
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Actually in German there is also a radio show of The Three Investigators. This site has put together the transcripts of the show:
http://www.rocky-beach.com/hoerspiel/skript/skript.html 1 person has voted this message useful |
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