French: My ex is the dean of a French Lit department and 18th century lit. specialist so I've read a boatload but my favourite books in French are translations of Arto Paasilinna (anything and everything from Finnish) and Antonio Tabucchi (from Italian and Portuguese), Daniel Pennac (again, everything), Perec... oh, damn it, French just has so many good authors - ask me again tomorrow and I'll say something else.
German: Suprisingly - Arto's - Die Welt zu Retten pops to mind. Maybe Schlink's Der Vorleser/'The Reader' - I bought both the German and English but have only read the German.
I'm going to look up emk's Déchronologue!!
Best Book Only Read in L2
- zenmonkey
- Black Belt - 2nd Dan
- Posts: 2528
- Joined: Sun Jul 26, 2015 7:21 pm
- Location: California, Germany and France
- Languages: Spanish, English, French trilingual - German (B2/C1) on/off study: Persian, Hebrew, Tibetan, Setswana.
Some knowledge of Italian, Portuguese, Ladino, Yiddish ...
Want to tackle Tzotzil, Nahuatl - Language Log: viewtopic.php?f=15&t=859
- x 7032
- Contact:
-
- White Belt
- Posts: 38
- Joined: Sat Jan 14, 2017 8:12 pm
- Languages: English (N), French (C1), Spanish (B2), Italian (B1)
I can read menus in many languages. - x 85
Re: Best Book Only Read in L2
Yes, Daniel Pennac. I also like the short essays of Philippe Delorme.
0 x
-
- White Belt
- Posts: 43
- Joined: Fri Apr 08, 2016 5:53 am
- x 28
Re: Best Book Only Read in L2
That's an awesome topic for a thread!
English: Gravity's Rainbow
French: Les beinveillantes
German: Merlin oder Das wüste Land
Italian: Corporale
Spanish: Los Sorias
Catalan: El Troiacord
English: Gravity's Rainbow
French: Les beinveillantes
German: Merlin oder Das wüste Land
Italian: Corporale
Spanish: Los Sorias
Catalan: El Troiacord
2 x
- stormj
- White Belt
- Posts: 10
- Joined: Sun Jun 12, 2016 4:50 pm
- Location: USA
- Languages: English (N), español (C1), עברית (intermediate), Arabic (beginner), 中文 (HSK 2)
- Language Log: viewtopic.php?f=15&t=5798
- x 5
Re: Best Book Only Read in L2
Conversación en la catedral por Mario Vargas Llosa y Cien años de soledad por Gabo.
ספר איוב. / Sefer 'Yob.
ספר איוב. / Sefer 'Yob.
2 x
- Zegpoddle
- Yellow Belt
- Posts: 54
- Joined: Fri Aug 28, 2015 5:29 am
- Location: Shanghai
- Languages: English (N), rusty French and German (formerly B2 in each), Russian (beginner), Mandarin Chinese (A2/HSK3)
- x 221
Re: Best Book Only Read in L2
French: Les enfants terribles [Jean Cocteau]
German: Der Leviathan [Joseph Roth]
They were the "best" not because of their plots, but because of their language. They were so beautifully written that they gave me a peak experience, which is a polite way of saying "literary orgasm." I kept reciting whole paragraphs out loud because the rhythms were so musical. It didn't matter that I was only at a B1-B2 level in the languages in which they were written. In fact, that might have helped.
I don't often have that experience in my native language, perhaps because it's too familiar to me. I remember parts of Willa Cather's Death Comes for the Archbishop, Alan Paton's Cry, the Beloved Country, or the closing paragraph of James Joyce's "The Dead" being shiver-inducing in the same way. Each word seems like a cut jewel. You almost forget to pay attention to the story because the prose is so radiant. (I hesitate to say "poetic" because I generally dislike poems.)
I've never read Cocteau or Roth in English, and I don't want to. I picked up an English translation of Les enfant terribles in a bookstore years ago, and I couldn't bear to read more than half a page. All of the magic had been sucked out of it. I know it makes me sound terribly snobbish to say "You've got to read them in the original," but in these two cases, it is absolutely true. It's the difference between the King James Bible and the operating manual for a washing machine.
What books have you read in your L2 that were so beautifully written as to make you think "THAT was worth studying the language for"?
German: Der Leviathan [Joseph Roth]
They were the "best" not because of their plots, but because of their language. They were so beautifully written that they gave me a peak experience, which is a polite way of saying "literary orgasm." I kept reciting whole paragraphs out loud because the rhythms were so musical. It didn't matter that I was only at a B1-B2 level in the languages in which they were written. In fact, that might have helped.
I don't often have that experience in my native language, perhaps because it's too familiar to me. I remember parts of Willa Cather's Death Comes for the Archbishop, Alan Paton's Cry, the Beloved Country, or the closing paragraph of James Joyce's "The Dead" being shiver-inducing in the same way. Each word seems like a cut jewel. You almost forget to pay attention to the story because the prose is so radiant. (I hesitate to say "poetic" because I generally dislike poems.)
I've never read Cocteau or Roth in English, and I don't want to. I picked up an English translation of Les enfant terribles in a bookstore years ago, and I couldn't bear to read more than half a page. All of the magic had been sucked out of it. I know it makes me sound terribly snobbish to say "You've got to read them in the original," but in these two cases, it is absolutely true. It's the difference between the King James Bible and the operating manual for a washing machine.
What books have you read in your L2 that were so beautifully written as to make you think "THAT was worth studying the language for"?
2 x
Graciously begging our alien overlords to remember to refresh the batteries regularly in their toddler’s cosmic Game Boy on which the simulation that is my life is running
- zenmonkey
- Black Belt - 2nd Dan
- Posts: 2528
- Joined: Sun Jul 26, 2015 7:21 pm
- Location: California, Germany and France
- Languages: Spanish, English, French trilingual - German (B2/C1) on/off study: Persian, Hebrew, Tibetan, Setswana.
Some knowledge of Italian, Portuguese, Ladino, Yiddish ...
Want to tackle Tzotzil, Nahuatl - Language Log: viewtopic.php?f=15&t=859
- x 7032
- Contact:
Re: Best Book Only Read in L2
Zegpoddle wrote:What books have you read in your L2 that were so beautifully written as to make you think "THAT was worth studying the language for"?
Since you are working on French - Aurélian d'Aragon.
Oh, and then there are all of these: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Le_Monde% ... he_Century
1 x
I am a leaf on the wind, watch how I soar
- arthaey
- Brown Belt
- Posts: 1080
- Joined: Sat Jul 18, 2015 9:11 pm
- Location: Seattle, WA, USA
- Languages: :
EN (native);
ES (adv receptive, int productive);
FR (false beginner);
DE (lapsed beg);
ASL (lapsed beg);
HU (tourist) - Language Log: viewtopic.php?f=15&t=3864&view=unread#unread
- x 1675
- Contact:
Re: Best Book Only Read in L2
Andy Weir's "The Martian", translated into Spanish as "El Marciano".
The translation hits the original tone so spot-on, I was able to translate back into English word-for-word. (My sister with her English copy was rather amazed, and I was pleased with myself, but I think it reflects most positively on the translator. )
The translation hits the original tone so spot-on, I was able to translate back into English word-for-word. (My sister with her English copy was rather amazed, and I was pleased with myself, but I think it reflects most positively on the translator. )
0 x
Posts in: French • German • Hungarian • Spanish
NaNoWriMo: 10,000 words
Corrections welcome in any language; I prefer an informal register.
NaNoWriMo: 10,000 words
Corrections welcome in any language; I prefer an informal register.
- PeterMollenburg
- Black Belt - 3rd Dan
- Posts: 3239
- Joined: Wed Jul 22, 2015 11:54 am
- Location: Australia
- Languages: English (N), French (B2-certified), Dutch (High A2?), Spanish (~A1), German (long-forgotten 99%), Norwegian (false starts in 2020 & 2021)
- Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 15&t=18080
- x 8066
-
- Green Belt
- Posts: 384
- Joined: Sat Nov 14, 2015 2:47 am
- Location: Greenwich Mean Time zone
- Languages: English (N), German (fluent), Turkish (fluent), Russian (fluent), French (semi-fluent), Spanish (semi-fluent), am studying Polish, have some knowledge of it, also studying modern Greek, basic knowledge of Arabic (mostly MSA, some exposure to colloquial dialects), basic knowledge of Latin and Italian, beginner in Scottish Gaelic.
- x 476
Re: Best Book Only Read in L2
arthaey wrote:Andy Weir's "The Martian", translated into Spanish as "El Marciano".
The translation hits the original tone so spot-on, I was able to translate back into English word-for-word. (My sister with her English copy was rather amazed, and I was pleased with myself, but I think it reflects most positively on the translator. )
For language-learners, if not necessarily for literary connoisseurs, the more literal a translation, the better.
Comparing translations of books, I have encountered a wide range, from close to the original to quite distant, to the point where a witty turn of phrase in the original is clunkily replaced by something quite pedestrian. Once or twice I have suspected that the translator did not fully understand the original language.
1 x
: Greek Memrise
- arthaey
- Brown Belt
- Posts: 1080
- Joined: Sat Jul 18, 2015 9:11 pm
- Location: Seattle, WA, USA
- Languages: :
EN (native);
ES (adv receptive, int productive);
FR (false beginner);
DE (lapsed beg);
ASL (lapsed beg);
HU (tourist) - Language Log: viewtopic.php?f=15&t=3864&view=unread#unread
- x 1675
- Contact:
Re: Best Book Only Read in L2
William Camden wrote:arthaey wrote:Andy Weir's "The Martian", translated into Spanish as "El Marciano".
The translation hits the original tone so spot-on, I was able to translate back into English word-for-word. (My sister with her English copy was rather amazed, and I was pleased with myself, but I think it reflects most positively on the translator. )
For language-learners, if not necessarily for literary connoisseurs, the more literal a translation, the better.
Comparing translations of books, I have encountered a wide range, from close to the original to quite distant, to the point where a witty turn of phrase in the original is clunkily replaced by something quite pedestrian. Once or twice I have suspected that the translator did not fully understand the original language.
This felt the opposite of clunky. When I back-translated, I usually thought I must be taking great liberties but I wanted to convey the same snarky tone… and then it turned out that my own sense of how to get the point across in English was in fact the original way. I was surprised that I'd ended up back at the original. My impression was that the translator had a very good grasp of the languages.
1 x
Posts in: French • German • Hungarian • Spanish
NaNoWriMo: 10,000 words
Corrections welcome in any language; I prefer an informal register.
NaNoWriMo: 10,000 words
Corrections welcome in any language; I prefer an informal register.
Return to “General Language Discussion”
Who is online
Users browsing this forum: dubendorf and 2 guests