"Du côté de chez Swann" par Marcel Proust...
"People often say: "Well, I had a couple of years of French in high school but I've forgotten it all." What they mean is not normally, "I had a couple of years of French in high school, but when I looked at the first paragraph of Du côté de chez Swann I couldn't understand a word," what they mean is, "If I cast about in my mind the only French sentences I come up with are 'Bon jour' and 'Comment-allez vous?' so there's no point in even looking at a difficult writer like Proust."
The fact is, they may or may not have enough latent memory of the language - they actually don't know. They may or may not have enough latent memory so that a little help from a translation brings more back - they actually don't know. But it's entirely possible that the reason they gave up French was that they were forced to exchange banalities in the language and got bored; if they had been introduced to Baudelaire, Verlaine, Rimbaud early on, if they had been introduced to Proust, it might not have seemed so dreary and pointless."
- Paperpools
Well, I may not be doing very much tonight but this seems like a good way to spend the time betwixt now and starting fourth year: learning French through re-reading Proust. I already ordered the first volume but am leaving it until I finish the English translation. I've always dreamt of reading the great French authors in their original texts and I never read Balzac or Rimbaud because I imagined the content would be diluted somewhat. What better way to spend my time than to follow this valuable suggestion? I completely understand when this writer refers to the way language is learned by trudging through banal and repetitive exercise; it's exactly why I lost interest in learning a second language. But I suppose there is always time to surprise oneself.
The fact is, they may or may not have enough latent memory of the language - they actually don't know. They may or may not have enough latent memory so that a little help from a translation brings more back - they actually don't know. But it's entirely possible that the reason they gave up French was that they were forced to exchange banalities in the language and got bored; if they had been introduced to Baudelaire, Verlaine, Rimbaud early on, if they had been introduced to Proust, it might not have seemed so dreary and pointless."
- Paperpools
Well, I may not be doing very much tonight but this seems like a good way to spend the time betwixt now and starting fourth year: learning French through re-reading Proust. I already ordered the first volume but am leaving it until I finish the English translation. I've always dreamt of reading the great French authors in their original texts and I never read Balzac or Rimbaud because I imagined the content would be diluted somewhat. What better way to spend my time than to follow this valuable suggestion? I completely understand when this writer refers to the way language is learned by trudging through banal and repetitive exercise; it's exactly why I lost interest in learning a second language. But I suppose there is always time to surprise oneself.
Comments
Post a Comment