Arnaud wrote:Do you have a good book or online ressources to recommand to master that aspect (sic!) of the language ?
Personaly, I've used the 3rd Vol of the french course "Le russe à votre rythme" that is mainly dedicated to verbs of motion and to the aspect, but I'm far from mastering anything concerning both subjects.
Thanks for the suggestion, I'll definitely look into the french course! Maybe between all my different languages I can amass enough courses on verbs of motion and aspect to get there! So, we've got a French one, a German one,
A Grammar of Aspect in English and in Spanish there is
Practicando los aspectos verbales rusos, but it's out of print and can't really be found used either. There must be more in Russian produced for foreigners, right? It's an advanced subject after all.
Not sure these kinds of books make a big enough dent in the grand scheme of things though. My dad said to me yesterday that the only way to really master aspect is to get a lot of exposure. Learning the rules won't really work, because they're just approximations and don't reflect actual usage very well. He says he doesn't really know why in some situations one aspect is used rather than the other, but "it just sounds wrong". He learned Russian as a teenager, lived in Kiev for 3 years as a student and then spoke Russian with my mum every day for 10 years. He's also read gazillions of books in Russian. Very helpful ... not!
neofight78 wrote:Here's another myth that you see in textbooks and hear from even experienced teachers: "Participles are used only in the written language and not in everyday speech". Total nonsense, people use participles all the time when speaking!
So true! With knowledge in German, participles are not that difficult as a concept, but the word order with participles in Russian is just madness. I can deal with them just fine in written language by now, but in spoken language they throw me every single time. Too many verbs in one go and I miss who is doing what.