Reading in a Foreign Language

You used to be able to choose between a British and an American translation. That's happening less often now because publishing companies have merged or been taken over, so there is only one translation with slight adjustments.

The only boosk I read not in english are books by Japanese authors, simply because their some cultural differences that greatly effect book content.

Their are authors who have westernised their style in Japan like Haruki Murakami, but it's still preferabel to me in Japanese, and you can't read true Yukio Mishima, or Kobo Abe if your reading it anything but Japanese.

One obvious book that differs depending on even which english translations you get is Tolstoy's War and Peace, the discrepencies made for inetresting comparisons.

Kookamoor said:

Thanks lies! I've always wondered about that...

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You're welcome! It's nice to see someone take an interest in our little country.

I don't speak any language but english, though my SO, a montrealer, has been lining children's books in French with me outloud. However, I do read Neruda in spanish first, always, because lyrically it is SO beautiful. I've actually started to be able to understand a little bit too.

My first language is German, so I do read books in a foreign language: English. So far I've read only a few books in english, but I want to read much more. That was one of my reasons for entering this forum . I'm always looking for plain books in english. In the next time I want to read "the curious incident of the dog in the night-time". I bought this book in London/Stansted a year ago.

My mother-tongue is Danish - so naturally I read in that language - but only when the book is originally in Danish or if I don't understand the original language of the book (my Kikuyu is rusty to say the least hehe)

I am somewhat in doubt as to what is my second language - German or English. You see by the time I was 5 my family had spent so many holidays in Germany that I was fluent in German (child-level naturally, but still...) plus, I live in a part of Denmark where we have more German tv-channels than Danish ones - especially back when I was a kid was the difference big. At the age of 10 I started learning English in school. During my first years of school and the adding of English to the mix meant that I forgot much of my German... So I really don't know which is to be considered my first.

At 13 I got German classes in school - it took some time but I did manage to dig out my old German skills, and while I will never claim that I'm fluent in German at this point in time I can get by in German speaking areas.

At 14 I added French to my 'library' of languages.

Aside from that I can read Swedish and Norwegian because they're so close to Danish.

So I can read in all these six languages (though French I will only read with a dictionary at hand), plus simpler texts in Latin which is necessary because I have a lot to do with music from the renaissance. Add to this the ability to translate song texts from Italian (also from my music) but not major texts - that's too advanced.

I think that pretty much sums it up.

I can only speak two languages - English and Maori. I only read books in English, though, as for obvious reasons books are not translated into Maori, and most Maori authors here write in English in order to encompass a wider audience. Some books, such as Whale Rider by Witi Ihimaera, do include some paragraphs in Maori, but mostly it's just English.

I feel so jealous when I read of all the languages that you outher members can speak... it makes me really regret only sticking with French and Japanese for one year of high school.

Im 17 years old and from germany - berlin. Since the 5th class im taking english lessons and at the 7th class I started learning latin.It didnt take long time to notice that im very good at languages.In both subjects english and latin , my marks where pretty good compared to my other ones.
Well, im not bad at school.So i decided to get better,because if i am talanted and if its easy for me to learn langauge. Why shouldnt i improve my schools and take that as an advantage?Basically,from that moment on i started writing english letters to my family in the usa, and i started phonecalling em and writing emails and reading english books.And I took english literature lessons. Now i have engish as my advanced course.^_^All in all, reading english books is of much use, coz i get to know so many new words. My vocabulary and expression are getting better and better .If anyone could recommend some books to me.That would be nice, coz i dont know which ones are good and not to easy for me.
The book can be hard to understand. not minding a little challenge ^^;
i dont care about the genre

English is my first language. However, I spent six years in Guadalajara Mexico as a child. I attended school there, so most of my reading was in Spanish. Spanish is such a delightful language to read. One book I clearly remember reading in Spanish was "The Little Prince". I studied French for three years and enjoyed reading in French as well.

lies said:

Quite a few members here probably read books in languages that aren't their mother tongue, so I was wondering: why do (or don't) you do it, what do you get out of it, do you have any problems with it?

I remember talking to Tobytook about this back in the day, and he said:

(You can find the original discussion here, if you're interested.)

I for one enjoy reading novels in their original language because if anything gets lost in the translation, it's my own doing. I don't have to worry about whether or not the translator got the meaning of the book and I don't want to get annoyed by bad translations either.

How about you guys?

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Hello. I have just logged in and i found your topic very interesting. It is the first time I participate in a forum in order to exchange opinions so I apologise for my future mistakes. You see, English is not my native language and I feel a bit insecure about using it, that's why I logged in at the first place, so I can imrove my skills and discuss matters that I am keen on.
Refering to the issue above, personally I do read books and articles in foreign languages. The reason is that I like it and I also gain a lot from it. I can exercise my English or Italian and, as you said, I will not be lost in the translation. In addition, I believe that you can learn a lot about the morals and the ideas ingrained in a society from the language people use. Finally, it helps me imagine and feel better the atmosphere to which the writer wants to transfer us.

I speak three languages fluently and therefore, if any of the books I am reading were originally published in one of the languages that I speak, I will want to read the original version. Other than that, I prefer English translations though English is not my mother-tongue.