How to Read Novels in a Foreign Language | The Guide

[@DustinSchermaul]

Which book would you really like to read? And in which language? :-)

[@byronwilliams7977]

I really wanted to read A song of Ice and Fire in French, but the level is just way beyond me.

[@DustinSchermaul]

Ah, you'll get there. Probably start with something easier and then level your way up! Maybe Harry Potter?@@byronwilliams7977

[@user-ic4ce8xb5v]

​@@byronwilliams7977Let me tell you something, I read all the Martin books in English. My French is MUCH better than my Spanish and German but I decided to read that in all 3 languages at once. The French translation is TERRIBLE

[@user-ic4ce8xb5v]

​@@byronwilliams7977 I'm writing part 2 because youtube cuts my long comments. Basically the French translator totally distorted George Martin's style making it complex and archaic. Even through my French is MUCH better than my Spanish and German, it was harder to read in French for me because of this unnecessary and artificial complexification.

[@user-ic4ce8xb5v]

​@@byronwilliams7977For example, the classic line "the things I do for love" got translated "Ce que me fait faire l’amour, quand même !" I looked it up on French google and many French speakers hate the translation

[@Ellen_Seokjin]

Thank you so much! I'm an absolute beginner in french, the main goal for me is to be able to read novels by french authors that I like. I've already picked up le mythe de Sisyphe, which is an essay actually, It's quite short, I think that'd be good for a beginner like me, and I've already experienced the author before. My first language is portuguese, and I already noticed some vocabulary similarities, I'm excited. :)

[@DustinSchermaul]

Thank you so much, Ellen :). As long as you are patient, you'll get there. It's one step at a time, and it's really worth it. I won't forget my first paper book that I have read in French, without using translations at all. Baby steps :).

[@tommyhuffman7499]

I've been listening to the audio book Labyrinth of Reflections by Sergey Lukyanyenko. I just listen as I walk at the park and enjoy trying to guess what's going on or even what genre it is. Later, I want to get the text, so I can start over, listening and reading. Good video👍

[@DustinSchermaul]

Nice, that's also a good approach. I think there's a lot of value in working with the content of a book in different forms and at different times, depending on the comprehension. You're welcome Tommy! Happy that you've liked it :).

[@aurelie-ho]

Great video Dustin! I remember the feeling of reading my first novel in English💙 It helped me improve my English, even though I rarely picked up a dictionary to translate. My daughter is 8 and now reads Harry Potter in English too🙂

[@DustinSchermaul]

Thanks for your positive feedback :). Nice, yes I can imagine! Wow, with 8 years already, that's great! If I should have kids at some point, I would really like to raise them bilingual.

[@jasonhudson1840]

I would add to read a book you’ve already read in your primary language; that way your mental resources can concentrate on language learning

[@DustinSchermaul]

Thank you very much for your remark! That's definitely true :).

[@norabalogh5910]

This was very pertinent to me! Reading is indeed a great way to keep working on languages in an enjoyable way when one has several to maintain. It’s interesting to see the use of novels laid out in stages like this! I has to laugh because I’m at the “Harry Potter” stage in Hungarian for the exact reasons that you mentioned (that it’s available, known and not too complicated)…also using Lingq…The subscription fee is really worth it to me at this stage in order to be facilitate reading, so it’s easy and enjoyable!!! I’m just contemplating importing a German novel, my German being much further along….Let’s see which!

[@DustinSchermaul]

Nice! I think being able to read Harry Potter in a foreign language is already a huge achievement and you can be very proud of yourself. Hungarian is also not an easy language to learn. Good question, so I can really recommend Qualityland from Marc-Uwe Kling, who is a well known German author, which is about a kind of dystopian future scenario, but written in a very funny and entertaining way. www.goodreads.com/book/show/36216607-qualityland

[@manuelcruz836]

Your content is great. It´s just what I need!

[@DustinSchermaul]

Thank you so much Manuel! This means a lot to me and drives me forward to making more content :).

[@gondai7026]

I like the idea of reading the first chapter at least twice to facilitate comprehension (and acquisition). Would it be a good idea to also reread the whole book multiple times especially if you really like the book?

[@DustinSchermaul]

Hey Gondai :), thanks for your positive feedback. Yes, so you can definitely read stuff multiple times. It's actually really beneficial to do so, because you will learn each time something new. If it doesn't get boring then it's a great way to improve your comprehension.

[@tahanamarieboughter7667]

Years ago my husband & I did a salvage and in this salvage this person had a lot of miniature books some of these miniature books were in different languages. If I send you a pic of a book could you tell me which language it is and what it says for free. Or if anyone in this group can do that. Or tell me where to go to get that kind of help.

[@DustinSchermaul]

Wow, very nice! I can try to do so. Or what you can also do is to use Google Lens within Google Translator. That uses your smartphone camera to translate text live and also tell you which language it is :). Please let me know if that has worked for you. If not of course I'm also eager to help.

[@TheRealRaygor]

Do you have to do anything special to import a large ebook into LingQ correctly? Do you have any issues with this?

[@DustinSchermaul]

Yes I had the issue that it didn't import the whole book and there were lessons missing at the end. I don't know what caused it, but as soon as I imported it once again it worked. On the other hand the largest book I have imported had a little bit more than 600 pages.

[@yanivo3531]

In my case the foreign language is the english

[@DustinSchermaul]

Very cool! This is just the start! You'll get there :).

[@reallydontc]

This video is very disappointing, your whole strategy is built on lingq which is a paid service. You offer no other way to use audiobooks and novels together without lingq. Your introduction is "without looking up the words" but how could we do it without lingq-which has a built in dictionary already? How is that counts "not looking up"? Very disappointing.

[@DustinSchermaul]

hm, sorry to hear that it's disappointing to you. It's important to first build comprehension, before we can read without translation. You could also do that with an ebook reader of your choice, because they have also translation services built in. Or you could use the app that I have talked about here in my free app video: langbrowser.com/ Further, you can get audiobooks also elsewhere and I'm also using different services like Audible or KZbin for it… In the end, nobody has to spend any money on any app if not wanted, but if we spend hundreds of hours learning a language, I think it's money well spent… Time is limited and we should try to not waste it.

[@jasonhudson1840]

The Kindle mobile app lets you translate words and whole sentences as well

[@jamesbalentine8490]

@reallydontc LingQ is a paid app, that is true. It is currently $13 per month in the USA. But it is so worth it. It will save you immense amounts of time. It will accelerate the speed at which you acquire the target language. And it will be an enjoyable way to study. If you put any value on your time at all, then give LingQ a try for a couple of months. I think you will be glad you did! Good luck!