Why you should read the book only in the original and does not believe the translators: the view of the reader

Our reader Timofeychuk Elizabeth shared her thoughts on why it is necessary to read the book in the original, not in translation. Arguments Elizabeth - it's a great food for thought. We encourage you to be active and share their views on the topic.

I've always loved the poems of Rudyard Kipling. Recently, I took up the reading of these verses in the original and was surprised by how much sense these great verses simply vanished in translation. Even very good, closest to the original translation. And before you think that in order to read the original, you need a level of proficiency of at least Upper-Intermediate, I will make you happy - my level is not higher than Pre-Intermediate.

Many are hesitant to read books in the original, considering this thing is incredibly complex and requires a high level of language proficiency. I also thought so for a long time, has not yet wanted to read a book by Douglas Adams Last Chance To See. The translation of this book in the Russian language is not, and is not planned. So I picked up the book and began to read. In this book, humor and stunning sarcasm found on almost every page, and I'm even afraid to think about how much of it was lost in translation when reading.

When reading the book, I have experimented with different approaches to the text, which read or that came to my mind in the course of reading. For those who have not decided yet to step on the way of reading the original, I wrote 10 the conclusions drawn by experimenting with different approaches to reading in the original.

Start could and should be, regardless of your level of English knowledge. You know the alphabet, so you can start reading.

Do not read books or adapted books that someone recommends for the first reading. Select the book you want to read it is YOU! Then you will be interested. Better yet, take a book you really want to read but it has not yet been transferred.

The main problem that the reading of the original is exhausting and boring, that's what we're trying to translate every word. As a result, a couple of pages of fascinating reading turns into a terribly boring and irritating.

Conclusion: do not try to translate every word! It is important that makes a monkey stick - knocks or hits, most importantly, that the monkey does something!

The translation is not more than 5-10 words from the page. It seems that this is not enough, but believe me, this is more than enough! So you do not get bored of the constant tearing of the text, to dive into the dictionary. And besides, you'll remember a lot more words and do it faster.

If you convert too many words, they are all mixed up and not stay in your head for a long time.

Many people believe that if you take a book of 50 thousand words, then they have to learn 50,000 words, and this, of course, impossible. But the fact is that most of the words and phrases repeated in the book almost on every page! When there are such words in the text, write on top of their translation. And so on until the end of the book. Such repetition simply drives a word in your vocabulary.

If you at some time reading do not want to get into the dictionary - miss. Skip paragraphs and even pages. Just read, even if the word did not understand. You will have a rest, and a couple of pages, I guarantee you will want to transfer back some special interest to you word.

While reading is very well absorbed by the grammar of the language. If you do not know it or do not know well - it's not a problem.

Use audio or video course to learn a language (I used "Polyglot" Dmitry Petrov). Listen to or watch a course parallel to the reading of the book.

When translating words, do not use online translators. It is better to take a paper version of the dictionary. So you can avoid the temptation to translate entire passages, just hammering text into an online translator. I used the Oxford English Dictionary.

For the assimilation of the text by ear, you can listen along with reading and audio books in the original, if any.

At first reading I knew no more than 30-40% of the book. But it is 30-40% more than if I had not tried. At the second reading of this book, I understand already 60-70%. And after reading the book for the third time - already 100%.

So, reading a book in the original is not such a difficult task. The main thing - to give it at least 15 minutes a day, and then very quickly move from a dead point. And most importantly - you will not miss the unique product that is lost, even with the best translation.