Learning by reading

[PfifltriggPi]

Having finished Pratchett's "Monstrous Regiment", I replaced it with Deon Meyer's "Kobra" as my main book. I have read 2 or 3 of Meyer's crime novels in Swedish or English translations, but this is my first one in Afrikaans. While I didn't like the other books much, I quite enjoy this one. Not for the story or the characters (which aren't better than in the other books), but for the language, or better, languages. The Afrikaans is quite easy to read, not many unguessable words, which of course is nice. However it's the frequent code switching between Afrikaans and English, which I find truely fascinating. While the plot is narrated in Afrikaans, some of the interrogations are entirely in English, or in Afrikaans, and some conversations are in a wild mixture of both.
For example (page 133):

Nee, Benna. Here's an academic wat skielik 'n false passport het. How? I don't buy it. Here's dié innocent professor wat 'n hele ander Morris identity het, en hy maak sy Gmail skoner as 'n virgin se gewete? I mean, come on. Hier's en ou wat maande lank kwaai protest oor terrorists and organised crime, and than he goes suspiciously quiet? Hier's 'n middle-aged bok met 'n mooi jong blaartjie, but what can he offer her?

Fascinating, isn't it? This language switching is unfortunately lost in translations. I have read several books in Afrikaans, but not encountered such an amount of English in any of them. There there were some English phrases, exclamations or swearing, but no whole sentences and definitely not entire conversations.

That is really cool. I once wrote a sort of short story kind of like that, but I have never seen such code switching in a real published work. Very interesting.

As for Polish, you may be pleased to discover that LibriVox has a decent number of public domain audiobooks in Polish, along with other languages. All of the works recorded are old enough to be in the public domain. This might, I suppose, make them a bit more difficult, but it has the advantage that the books should not be very hard to find online in text form as well.

[Nogon]

As for Polish, you may be pleased to discover that LibriVox has a decent number of public domain audiobooks in Polish, along with other languages. All of the works recorded are old enough to be in the public domain. This might, I suppose, make them a bit more difficult, but it has the advantage that the books should not be very hard to find online in text form as well.

Thanks! I'll take a closer look at Librivox next time I'm in need of an audiobook.

[Nogon]

Third week:
I've studied a lot, so I'm content with this week's progress.

Polish:
More Assimil, today I finished lesson 16. I'm still 4 lessons from the point where I gave up last year. My progress is smoother this time, but today's lesson was brain-melting.

Yiddish:
Assimil even her, now lesson 19. Would be difficult to study both Polish and Yiddish at the same time, if I hadn't German as my native language. I fully realised this by reading the English grammar explanations. I read them carefully, not to understand how Yiddish "works", but to find the tiny differences between German and Yiddish grammar. Have finished reading Nikolay Olniansky - Di anatomye mit Alef un Beys, and started reading Antoine de Saint-Exupery - Der kleyner prints. It contains the text in both hebrew script and in latin transcription. I try to read the hebrew script, and check the transcription when getting stuck.

French:
Finished listening-reading Fred Vargas - Pars vite et reviens tard/Have Mercy on Us All. I've listened to it twice, while reading the English translation during the first time, and the French text during the second. I've done that with other mysteries by Vargas, although then I read the Swedish or German translation, which was much easier than reading in English. Here I quite often lost the place when there were long sentences and/or paragraphs, which didn't happen with German or Swedish.
Haven't started the next listening-reading book yet. Instead I borrowed a bunch of Astérix comic books from the library. First time I read them in the original language. I don't understand all the puns, but remember the books well enough to know which they are (at least which they were in German translation).

Dutch:
I listened-read two books by Astrid Lindgren, "Rasmus en de landlooper" and "Mio, mijn Mio". For me Lindgren's books are, what Harry Potter is for many of you. (I read some of the Potters, but wasn't very impressed, while I still like Lindgren's books.) My aim was to get a better grip on Dutch pronunciation. I never studied Dutch, but only learned to read it by doing parallel reading. The speaker (Sander de Heer) did a good job in the narrative parts, but unfortunately changed his voice far too much in the dialogues. Especially the femaly characters sounded stupid.
Not sure what to read next.

Afrikaans:
Finished Deon Meyer - Kobra. It got very gripping towards the end, so I read the last 150 pages in one go yesterday. I'd like to do listening-reading in Afrikaans too, as I know even less about Afrikaans pronunciation, but haven't found any audiobook yet.
Not sure what to read next.

Esperanto:
Slowly continuing Erich Maria Remarque - En okcidento nenio nova. Now on page 160 of 245.

Other reading:
Some comic books in Swedish, and still Terry Pratchett - Jingo in English.

[crush]

Afrikaans:
Finished Deon Meyer - Kobra. It got very gripping towards the end, so I read the last 150 pages in one go yesterday. I'd like to do listening-reading in Afrikaans too, as I know even less about Afrikaans pronunciation, but haven't found any audiobook yet.
Not sure what to read next.

If you find any nice audiobooks in Afrikaans please share!

[cjareck]

More Assimil, today I finished lesson 16. I'm still 4 lessons from the point where I gave up last year. My progress is smoother this time, but today's lesson was brain-melting.

In case you need any help - just let me know!

[Nogon]

Fourth week:
Very little active learning, and less reading than I'd wish.

Polish:
Suddenly lost all desire to continue. Couldn't make me open the Assimil book since last Thursday. WILL continue this week! Yeah .

Yiddish:
No Assimil here neither, but I read a page or two of "Der kleyner prints". Still struggeling with some letters. I feel like a pupil in first grade, who just has learned all the letters, but still has a hard time combining them and deciphering the words.
I got reminded of when I, many years ago, visited my sister. When I arrived, her son was just reading aloud to her. Full of pride he said to me: "I'm no longer reading the letters, now I read the words!" I wish I had reached that stage in Yiddish. Some frequent words I see in their entirety, but most I have to sound out letter by letter.
For now I ignore the Hebrew words. I just check their pronunciation in the transcribed text, but don't bother about their meaning.

French:
A couple of Astérix, nothing else. Plan on reading Christine Féret-Fleury - La fille qui lisait dans le métro this week. Not a book I would read in one of my good reading languages, but it seems to be a quite easy read, so...

Dutch:
Reading Baert Moeyart - Broere. Some of the stories I listened-read, as the books includes a CD with a few stories read by the author himself. I'm on page 66/167.

Esperanto:
Continued reading Remarque's "En okcidento nenio nova". Am now on page 210/252, and hope to finish it this week.

Afrikaans:
Nothing . Can't decide whether I should read Marita van der Vyver - Vergenoeg or Dalene Matthee - Brug van die esels next. I've already read (and liked) a book of each of them. Guess I'll read a couple of pages of each book and then choose the easier one.

Other reading:
Several books in Swedish, English and German, my usual reading languages.

[Nogon]

Fifth (and last) week:
No actual studying and less reading in my less good languages than I'd have liked to.
But I felt down, and needed some "feel-good literature", which distracted me from life's less good sides, and didn't take effort deciphering. So some books in German and English, plus...

French:
Read the first chapter of Christine Féret-Fleury - La fille qui lisait dans le métro, and felt bored. Now I'm listening-reading Fred Vargas - L'armée furieuse.

Yiddish:
Read a few pages of Antoine de Saint-Exupery - Der kleyner prints. Didn't like that book much when I was young, and still don't like it. Don't know whether I'll continue, although it has the right level of difficulty to train reading the hebrew letters, and I don't know what to choose instead. I like Crashen's idea of "compelling" input, and this isn't compelling to me at all.

Dutch:
Finished Baert Moeyart - Broere. Now listening-reading Hella S. Haasse - Oeroeg.

Afrikaans:
Read about 50 pages of Dalene Matthee - Brug van die esels and liked it so far. Not enough "feel-good" though, so I stopped for the moment.

Esperanto:
Finished Erich Maria Remarque - En okcidento nenio nova. Won't start another book in Esperanto until the next sumoo.

[guyome]

Yiddish:
Read a few pages of Antoine de Saint-Exupery - Der kleyner prints. Didn't like that book much when I was young, and still don't like it. Don't know whether I'll continue, although it has the right level of difficulty to train reading the hebrew letters, and I don't know what to choose instead. I like Crashen's idea of "compelling" input, and this isn't compelling to me at all.

Hi Nogon,

Good to see someone studying Yiddish here.

What would you find compelling? Maybe I can help.
Apart from their main collection, the Yiddish Book Center has put together a collection of easier works you can download. You may be able to find something of interest there.

[Nogon]

What would you find compelling? Maybe I can help.
Apart from their main collection, the Yiddish Book Center has put together a collection of easier works you can download. You may be able to find something of interest there.

Thank you very much for pointing out this collection of children's literature, guyome! I had seen the Yiddish Book Center's main collection, but not this one. I'm sure, I'll find some good reading there.

[guyome]

You're welcome! If you're looking for a starting point, Mani Leib's Yingl Tsingl Khvat is kind of a classic, with gorgeous illustrations by Lissitzky (just beware that pages 3-4 have been swapped in the file). It is a poem so the word order maybe slightly more convoluted than prose, but nothing crazy I'd say.

Kh'hob a maysele a sheyne,
Far di kinder mayne kleyne.
Zayt zhe, kinder, shtil un sha,
S'iz mayn maysele aza:

I have a nice little story,
For my little children.
Be then, children, quiet and silent,
My little story is such: