/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.18527413]

French,German & Italian.

Which one is the easiest to learn?
Which one is the most useful one?

I do NOT know if this thread is /lit/ approved but it seems like I will get the best answers here.

[Anonymous No.18527417]

>>18527413
Depends of your native tongue.

[Anonymous No.18527419]

>>18527417
Greek(it's a very difficult language) and English.

[Anonymous No.18527430]

>>18527413
It depends on you, how you learn, what your mother tongue and a million different other factors.
As for usefulness, French would be your best option. Though German is not that far behind.

[Anonymous No.18527440]

>>18527419
Italian would probably be the easiest and French probably the most useful.

[Anonymous No.18527447]

>>18527417
Not OP but same question. My native tongue is spanish.

[Anonymous No.18527454]

>>18527447
French an italian of course, romance languages are very close to each other.

[Anonymous No.18527459]

>>18527454
Thanks for the answer

[Anonymous No.18527553]

>>18527413
French and Italian rougly follow the exact same grammar rules. But French have an annoying pronunciations system that make it overall harder to learn
German is for sure the hardest, regardless of your native tounge

[Anonymous No.18527584]

>>18527413
>Which one is the easiest to learn?
German is the hardest. Italian the easiest.
>Which one is the most useful one?
Useful for what? They all open different doors.

[Anonymous No.18527603]

>>18527553
Not sure of that, German passes as hard because of the declension system and the more synthetic nature of the language as compared to more analytic english or romance languages. Greek has declension and works quite this way if I'm right.

[Anonymous No.18527633]

Assuming you are vaguely autistic, German is the easiest. Yes it retains the most grammatical and morphological complexity, but it is still much much simpler compared to something like Latin, and any half intelligent autist can easily learn it all in in a few weeks. German vocabulary is quite easy to pick up on account of the great number of compound words, and although the meaning of compounds is not always entirely semantic, the word itself still serves as a mnemonic for remembering its meaning. On the speaking side, German has a relatively simple pronunciation that corresponds to the spelling. There are no/few unfamiliar phonemes to an English speaker. Also most Germans speak fairly slowly and clearly.

French, on the other hand, is grammatically simpler, but in all other aspects I would say it is the harder tongue. The language is spoken rapidly, the pronunciation does not correspond to the spelling, and there are a bunch of weird phonemes you most likely don't know how to make and will require actual training to learn how to. There are a lot of exceptions in all aspects of the language. Also French people generally have a very low tolerance for errors in the written language, and they will judge you to be a retard if you can't get it perfectly right.

On the literary side of things, both languages will open the door to top tier segments of European culture and literature of course. But I would say French is arguably more "useful" here because French is more difficult to translate literally into English, so there is more to be gained from reading French originals, plus French people generally don't speak English but Germans increasing do know good English and are happy to use it.

t. learned French and German (both at least B1-B2+ level) as a non-native

[Anonymous No.18528965]

>>18527633
This anon knows. I know greek and latin (low intermediate for both) and learning German has been piss easy. French always ruins me because there are so many exceptions and the grammar is so much more annoying.

[Anonymous No.18528991]

>>18527633
>German has a relatively simple pronunciation that corresponds to the spelling
No it doesn't. For the most part it corresponds but you can't just look at a word and pronounce it correctly, the types of sounds rules to follow are easier after learning spoken.

[Anonymous No.18529008]

my native language is portuguese

french is kinda ''easy'' for me

[Anonymous No.18529016]

>>18527633
>French is arguably more "useful" here because French is more difficult to translate literally into English, so there is more to be gained from reading French originals

I'm not sure the value of literal understanding is that important. Can you post an example of this to clarify? The weird thing is that even extremely difficult long novels get translated fairly quickly between these two languages, so the list of untranslated works between the two quickly gets diminished.

[Anonymous No.18529365]

>>18527633
>French people generally have a very low tolerance for errors in the written language, and they will judge you to be a retard if you can't get it perfectly right.
i've noticed this. they get really pissy if you make spelling errors. ironic when you consider how retarded french spelling is

[Anonymous No.18529441]

>>18529365
>i've noticed this. they get really pissy if you make spelling errors.
No, especially if you're not native.
>ironic when you consider how retarded french spelling is
Much less than english spelling, english words could be ideograms at this point, it would make no difference.

[Anonymous No.18529460]

>>18527633
booba

[Anonymous No.18529478]

>>18529365
kek not only spelling errors but also pronunciation

[Anonymous No.18529490]

>qu'est que ce que ca
meme language

[Anonymous No.18529498]

>>18529441
in my experience they do.

french comedy also has this ass pained characteristic where they make fun of other people but get pissy when others try to humiliate them in turn. they do this to a higher degree than anglos or germans, to the point its a stereotype.

weirdly they care a lot less about grammatical gender, which they admit is random.

[Anonymous No.18529521]

>>18529498
>french comedy also has this ass pained characteristic where they make fun of other people but get pissy when others try to humiliate them in turn. they do this to a higher degree than anglos or germans, to the point its a stereotype.
Well if your conception of comedy is to humiliate people the problem is probably you.
>weirdly they care a lot less about grammatical gender, which they admit is random.
Total bullshit.
A peu près sûr que tu parles pas français.

[Anonymous No.18529533]

>>18529521
>A peu près sûr que tu parles pas français
i try to learn but you mean frogs always make fun of my accent and i get discouraged. baguette eating motherfuckers

[Anonymous No.18529549]

>>18527454
Seconding Italian. I've found that I can understand a lot of Italian without ever studying it just because I spent several years learning Spanish. Same thing with Portuguese to an extent

[Anonymous No.18529596]

>>18527413
I learnt Italian first then started French but was getting the two mixed so I went with German instead as my second.

[Anonymous No.18529599]

>language thread
Any "natural method" learners for Ancient Greek?

[Anonymous No.18529632]

>>18529521
>Well if your conception of comedy is to humiliate people the problem is probably you.
no you stupid faggot, it's common knowledge that this is a feature of french comedy. if youre some francophone orphan, look it up on google.

>A peu près sûr que tu parles pas français.
plus loquor quam scit barbarum.

[Anonymous No.18529678]

>>18529632
>no you stupid faggot, it's common knowledge that this is a feature of french comedy. if youre some francophone orphan, look it up on google.
Argumentum ad populum
>plus loquor quam scit barbarum.
Non loqueris linguam latinam barbare britane.

[Anonymous No.18529706]

>>18529678
That's not what AAP means. If you don't have anything worthwhile to say, just accept the loss.

[Anonymous No.18529721]

>>18529678
i do but you dont. nice awkward google translation.

[Anonymous No.18529780]

>>18529706
>>18529706
Certe AAP significat eam.
Ceterum murus aedificandus est atque America solvet.

[Anonymous No.18529812]

>>18529780
trump victus est

[Anonymous No.18529846]

>>18529812
D.I.Trumpus redibit, dixit Q. Credite consilium.

[Anonymous No.18529874]

>>18527413
LEARN LATIN

[Anonymous No.18529988]

>>18529874
>pictura illa
tam solitarius sum

[Anonymous No.18530517]

Italian is easiest, French probably most useful, German is very hard and useful.

[Anonymous No.18530544]

>>18527413
French > Italian > German (for usefulness).

[Anonymous No.18530725]

>>18527413
You study the one you most love, because only love will carry you to the end, since learning a language to native fluency--the only proper end--- takes A LOT of dedication. It cannot be overstated just how time consuming it really is.

[Anonymous No.18531087]

>>18529016
Emphasis on literally. He meant there are more nuances lost in the process of translating a French work.

[Anonymous No.18531096]

>>18527633
So true. French speak so fast and nonstandard (I mean spoken language is fairly different) I cannot catch anything. German is much better in this regard.

[Anonymous No.18532287]

>>18530544
Wrong. German gives you the most spread of civilized beautiful land across Europe as an auxiliary language, after English.

>>18531087
How many of these nuances are actually relevant? Does it end up changing an entire work, or are they merely dregs of footnote interest?

[Anonymous No.18532429]

>>18529490
*qu'est-ce que c'est que ça?
At least get your jokes right, anon
t. pissy frog

[Anonymous No.18532438]

>>18529533
Get in touch with me, anon, we'll schedule some lessons, I'm a French/English mongrel; are you a hot chick, perchance?

[Anonymous No.18532463]

>>18532429
that's even more retarded

[Anonymous No.18532476]

Currently learning French (few months in) what really worked for me is first learning IPA and then getting the most common 1000 words or so off of anki with audio.

After that the best resources for me for different reasons are a natural method book, Michel Thomas or similar course, and French in Action (not sure if something this good exists for other languages),

A Natural Method book is ideal for a natural acquisition of grammar and structure of the language as well as for reading. My method of the method is finding accompanying audio on youtube and listening to a whole chapter while reading along, using the audio with the text a second time but analyzing the structure of each sentence and repeating the audio sentence by sentence and repeat if necessary. Here are some Natural Method resources that may be helpful for your target language:
https://blog.nina.coffee/2018/08/27/all_nature_method_books.html
https://www.youtube.com/c/AyanAcademy/playlists

Michel Thomas (older courses) primary use is for introverts and self learners who need the push to actually start speaking in their target language. I was able to comprehend easy texts and simple youtube videos but when it actually came to trying to write or say anything simple I always came to a blank. This was essential for getting over that hump. I'd say use the old Michel Thomas in your target language or if there isn't one use this:
https://www.languagetransfer.org/

French In Action is perfect for pure listening and understanding of normal speech without accompanying texts. Only 30 minutes an episode so it's easy to add on to anything else. I would really try finding something like this in your target language.

The best thing about these is that they are entirely (except Michel Thomas but for some reason it just works) in the target language, so it forces you to really think in that language for certain length of time without using another language as a crutch.

[Anonymous No.18532482]

>>18532429
>what is that which that is which that
what the fuck?

[Anonymous No.18532561]

>>18532463
*complex and beautiful

[Anonymous No.18532781]

>>18532482
>>18532429
>>18532463

inorite

>defending a gibberish babble language
kill all francoids

[Anonymous No.18533731]

>>18532287
>German gives you the most spread of civilized beautiful land across Europe as an auxiliary language, after English.
I'm talking about literarily useful, meaning offering the best selection of literature. French > Italian > German. German literature is relatively meagre in the only category that really matters, viz. poetry. Philos*phyfags can cope all they want but no one cares apart from them about Kant, Hegel, Marx, etc. Who does German poetry have? Goethe, Heine, maybe a couple others? French and Italians dominate poetry, along with other Mediterranean languages and English.

[Anonymous No.18533849]

>>18533731
kant hegel and goethe each reward lifetimes of study to the point we are still behind in understanding each of them. maybe the focus for each is more narrow and autistic, but that still makes your point about geographic advantages moot.

while literature is probably more useful than common travel/socializing, as far as research and commentary goes, the german character goes much farther. so their nonfiction and critiques may actually outweigh both frances and italys.

reducing things to the best surface selection of literature isnt the best way to frame things.

[Anonymous No.18534431]

>>18533849
>kant hegel each reward lifetimes of study
If you want to waste your life, maybe.

[Anonymous No.18534993]

>>18532429
no wonder you frogs are so bitter having to speak this nonsense language

[Anonymous No.18535297]

>>18527413
Going to have to go against the grain and say Italian is the most difficult of the three, at least for a native English speaker.

French is surprisingly close to English, given that much of the English language is borrowed from French (owing to the French having conquered and ruled Britain for hundreds of years). The only real difficulty at first is the pronunciation, but so as long as one does a short pronunciation course (like the free one from FSI) first you won't encounter much difficulty. French also has a wealth of resources for language learning for all levels.

Because of the above points, native English speakers who need to be able to read French for post-grad studies are consistently able to learn to do so with only a few weeks study (pic related).

German is much the same (English being a Germanic language, and there being a wealth of resources).

In comparison Italian is an extremely latinate, literary language that will trip the beginner up in all sorts of areas. It's viewed as "easy" partially because of the prestige of French.

For an example of some of the difficulties of Italian, here's a good overview:

http://www.asiteaboutnothing.net/w_italian-vs-spanish.html

He compares it to Spanish rather than French or German, but it will give you the general idea.

As for usefulness: French > German > Italian

[Anonymous No.18535331]

>>18535297
>against the grain
What grain, pussy? This is /lit/, not your great-granddaddy's fucking corn field, stupid faggot American scum.

[Anonymous No.18535386]

>>18535331
shut up faggot, lit still broadly follows the expert view that de>fr>it in hardness

i dont think he realizes that germans stupefying rules are still more mystifying than italians

[Anonymous No.18535395]

>>18535386
WHAT FUCKING GRAIN THOUGH? RETARD.

[Anonymous No.18535720]

>>18535395
>being too much of a stupid faggot to understand metaphor

[Anonymous No.18535725]

Did any French person point out how much literal meaning etc is lost in translation to English? So far seems like a myth. I don't approve of the ganging up you guys did on Qu'est-ce poster btw guys.

[Anonymous No.18535730]

>>18535395
lmao esl retard

[Anonymous No.18535740]

What's the best English Grammar book?

[Anonymous No.18535752]

>>18527419
Literally not options.

[Anonymous No.18535805]

>>18535720
>>18535730
>using farming metaphors like poor rednecks
Yup, just end it.

[Anonymous No.18535890]

>>18535805
>farming
yup retarded esl

[Anonymous No.18535911]

>>18527417
>>18527413
Yeah, for exemple my native language is french, so french would be the easiest.

[Anonymous No.18535920]

>>18527633
Did you just use autistic as a stand in word for smart?

[Anonymous No.18535949]

>>18532287
You"re reading literature, not an account of events, language is a big part of thay and by reading translation you're cucking yourself out of it.
My golden rule is: if your intend to spend more time (something like 10 time more) reading in a language that it would take learning it to the point where you can read its lit with a dictionary,then learn the language first.
You can learn french to that point in 100/200 hours, and it has one of the biggest literary tradition so i'd say it it worse learning.

[Anonymous No.18535953]

>>18529441
Well as a french native i do, not intentionally it just bother me a lot.

[Anonymous No.18535958]

>>18529498
Using the wrong grammatical gender in french make you sound like a fag.

[Anonymous No.18536015]

>>18535725
I'm french and while i don't think literal meaning would be lost, if we're talking of our classical literature then you're losing a lot.
Akso you won't ever be able to enjoy kaamelott.

[Anonymous No.18536110]

>>18535949
okay can you provide examples of the kinds of details lost in translation. so far everyone i've asked who has insists on nuance lost haven't mustered clear examples of them. so far the sonorousness lost from french to english translations is a clearer loss to me. english makes the language sound muddier, but ultimately it's a minor inconvenience.

>>18536015
why for classical literature? rare old words that convey a lot of concentrated meaning? that's significant but i'll have to likewise request examples :)

it has english subtitles on the dvd releases.

[Anonymous No.18536140]

>>18536015
C'est pas faux.

OP, language learning should be a labor of love. Which one tickles your ear most when your hear it?

[Anonymous No.18536159]

>>18536140
They're all fucking deficient language bro.

[Anonymous No.18536169]

Friendly reminder: learning french allows you to read the best never untranslated sci fi novel of all time.

[Anonymous No.18536208]

>>18536169
>never untranslated.

[Anonymous No.18536216]

>>18536110
It's more about features of language that are used a lot, things like vous tu, the fact that we use a ton of idoms, things like that.
Meaning is not lost translation but something that feel essential is.
Classical literature is the pinnacle of french languag, so of course somethig would be lost, like victor hugo or cyrano de bergerac are so great in fench because of the language.I can't give you exemple because it's not the meaning but the feeling of the phrase.
Kamelott play a lot with language, intonation, invent expressions...it's extremly funny and a france favorite, but strangers tend to dislike it.Even french subtitle don't fully retranscript the exact words because it's extremly coloquial, there is play on language registre (you vs vous...it's very developped in french)...

[Anonymous No.18536224]

>>18536140
Italian

[Anonymous No.18536309]

>>18536216
>play a lot with language, intonation, invent expressions
>idioms as well
>levels of language register
okay these are legit reasons that have tons of depth, but at the same time, i still don't have a grasp on specific examples, how good they are, how commensurable they are with similar english expressions, how many survive such comparisons, and how frequent they are.

[Anonymous No.18536310]

>>18536208
There was a thunderstorm last night and i didn't sleep much, sue me.

[Anonymous No.18536311]

>>18527413
>Which one is the easiest to learn?
English is closer to German. French and Italian are closer to latin.

>Which one is the most useful one?
French.

[Anonymous No.18536324]

>>18536311
>English is closer to German.
lmao no

[Anonymous No.18536342]

learn chinese

[Anonymous No.18536374]

>>18536324
Yes, english is a germanic language and with a few rules, you can spot a lot of cognates (way more than with the other two).

[Anonymous No.18536394]

>>18527553
>French have an annoying pronunciations system that make it overall harder to learn
do they? I learnt it living there as a kid and can't really think of any examples

[Anonymous No.18536410]

>>18536342
this

[Anonymous No.18536459]

>>18536342
no thanks i'm not interested in disgusting bug noises

[Anonymous No.18536510]

>>18536394
For instance foreigners tend to struggle a lot with in/an/on/un and the guttural r. And despite the fact that Anglo complaints about it are laughable, the spelling is hard even for native speakers, especially as far as conjugation is concerned.

[Anonymous No.18536663]

>>18527413
Italian and French are the most beautiful languages in the world, perfect for poetry and literary experimentalism. Italian sounds better than French, and not by chance it's the language of music. But on the other hand French is more widespread than Italian.

German is okay only if you're very very interested in philosophy and word formation. It's meticulously attentive to etymologies, it uses a lot of prefixes and suffixes, and it's highly malleable and opened to the creation of neologisms.

As for usefulness from a literary standpoint, Italian. Tons of works still untranslated.

[Anonymous No.18536695]

French and Italian are basically the same language with stupid rules and pronunciations. German is like Dutch but disgusting to read. Dutch is English spoken by someone who is half retarded.

[Anonymous No.18536745]

>>18536695
>German is like Dutch but disgusting to read.
imo it's the other way around

[Anonymous No.18536845]

>>18536745
Yes, odder het toom mud german deserves no love

[Anonymous No.18537282]

>>18527633
>On the speaking side, German has a relatively simple pronunciation that corresponds to the spelling. There are no/few unfamiliar phonemes to an English speaker. Also most Germans speak fairly slowly and clearly.
That's only the case if we know we're talking to a stranger. Otherwise, German people pretty much never talk in High German (the standardized way of German spelling and pronunciation) but in one of the various regional dialects, which can be pretty hard to understand even for Germans from another region of the country. When we use those dialects, we leave out a lot of letters and syllables and pronounce stuff differently. There are even some words which only exist in a certain dialect. And those dialects themselves are only families of languages since there can be significant differences in the way people speak, even if their villages are just 20km away from each other.
The differences are not as significant as they used to be some decades ago, since people from different regions are interacting with each other a lot more than they used to, but they're still there, especially when you're going to Bavaria, Austria or Switzerland.
No German actually speaks the way you learn to speak German as a foreigner. And it even sounds stilted to a German if you use High German in private life.

[Anonymous No.18537296]

>>18537282
But this doesn't really matter unless one is listening in on a conversation.

Either one understands the dialect, in which case there is no problem, or one doesn't, in which case the other party will fall back to standard German (and everyone worth speaking to is able to do so).

[Anonymous No.18537320]

>>18527413
French is the easiest for English speakers and opens up the greatest variety of writers. German is usually acquired for philosophy. Italy's corpus is less influential but good. Dante is not easy to read because his Italian is archaic in places, though I imagine reading Hegel or Kant in German is no small feat. French is easily the one you can hit the ground running most quickly after a year or two of studying, especially if English is your native language.

[Anonymous No.18537324]

>>18537282
Same in Italy. Someone from Turin can hardly understand a terrone and viceversa. Europe is so fascinating.

[Anonymous No.18537336]

>>18532476
What the fuck is that font on the nature method german book

[Anonymous No.18537341]

>>18536309
There's a passage in Dante's Comedia where he's speaking to the people which were condemned for lying. As a punishment, their tongue was split.
When they speak, Dante uses a lot of "s" and "sh" sounds, like you'd imagine a snake would speak. It's pretty much impossible to transfer both the meaning and the sound of their speech into another language. You have to choose between one of them.

[Anonymous No.18537607]

>>18532429
>C'est quoi?
>Qu'est ce?
>Qu'est ce que c'est?
>Qu'est ce que c'est que ça?
Imagine having a language that doesn't distinguish between these.

[Anonymous No.18537618]

>>18527413
From easiest to hardest if you're a native English speaker:
French < Italian < German.

[Anonymous No.18537797]

>>18536374
Not him, but you have absolutely no clue on what you're saying.

[Anonymous No.18538018]

>>18537324
Fun fact: Italians didn't even establish a standard language until nineteenfiftysomething when they started national TV and had to choose a standard language everyone in Italy could understand. They chose the Florentine dialect (over the Roman and Venetian one) because of the classics iirc.

That's what all those grammar Nazis and the people who think anything concerning the use of language can be "right" or "wrong" don't understand: a standard language is an artificial product, and its words, rules and pronunciations are kind of artificially frozen in time; real language on the other hand constantly creates new words and changes their meaning. It changes its grammatical rules and the way you pronounce stuff. It's not used in a right or wrong way, it simply works (when people understand its meaning) or it doesn't work (when people don't understand its meaning).

[Anonymous No.18538162]

>>18538018
Yeah. Such arbitrary decisions on language are also at the root of many literary destinies. Ariosto is much more famous than Boiardo because he wrote in Florentine Italian, while based Boiardo used a courtly version of the Emilian vernacular. In truth, they're equally great. Francesco Colonna (alleged author of the Hypnerotomachia Poliphili) remained unknown until the 1960s because he wrote his masterpiece in a weird mash of Venetian vernacular and Latin. Dante survived through 5 centuries of relative obscurity solely because Bembo decreed that his language was "impure" and not as good as the style of Petrarch. If it wasn't for modern revaluations we wouldn't even know a large part of European literature.

[Anonymous No.18538239]

>>18527413
best resources for learning French? there are some good ones anons posted in this thread but if anyone has any others feel free to post, thanks

[Anonymous No.18538290]

>>18538239
I second this but for someone that is a native spanish speaker

[Anonymous No.18538293]

angloids are in a fortunate position for language-learning being as they speak a german-french creole. so many english words that are almost identical to french/german i get them mixed up

[Anonymous No.18538301]

>>18537341
>There's a passage in Dante's Comedia where he's speaking to the people which were condemned for lying. As a punishment, their tongue was split.
>When they speak, Dante uses a lot of "s" and "sh" sounds, like you'd imagine a snake would speak. It's pretty much impossible to transfer both the meaning and the sound of their speech into another language. You have to choose between one of them.

That is a deficiency in translation, but it's practically solved in footnotes. Not as good as naturally including the sounds, but almost as good.

A book that's majority word play is practically untranslatable without footnotes, but how many of those exist in a particular language enough to warrant learning it just for that? Arguably English has the most of these (Lewis Carroll, Joyce, etc).

[Anonymous No.18538546]

>>18538239
get very basic pronunciation and 1000 most common vocab down

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLBZcHkPESuK-2a6SHfP45aJSGp8a3dxwP
https://ankiweb.net/shared/info/397151029

Then go through any or some of these:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0uS5WSeH8iM&list=PLf8XN5kNFkhdIS7NMcdUdxibD1UyzNFTP
https://www.learner.org/series/french-in-action/
http://english.franklang.ru/index.php/french/5-french-with-the-little-prince
https://www.languagetransfer.org/french
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2afwvUMFnsU&list=PLycTNLUo2y2HCxxHcT7PPNHRTMiDa4Q6l

Find which of these work for you a stick with one of them all the way through.

[Anonymous No.18538550]

>>18537797
Yes have been learning german before learnuing english and after, it's been like night and day.
They are not one to one coresponance though and can take a little bit using to before being spotted (german grammar is easy anyway, what is really going to cut down you're learning time are the vocab gains).
Silber-silver,nail nagel for exemple.

[Anonymous No.18538587]

What do y’all think of Assimil?

[Anonymous No.18538590]

>>18538239
I'm french so it might not be that helpful, but we have an extremly good set of ressource called assimil, and i hear that the assimil method is the best for learning french (which make sens because most fo the other books are exclsuively in french, so english are the proof the methof is good and your gateway into assimil goodness).
The method consist of arround a 100 lessons with a lot of reading material, all voiced and cover all of french grammar (that's the base of the method).

[Anonymous No.18538602]

>>18538550
French and English still have way more similarities than German and English lexicon-wise.

[Anonymous No.18538605]

>>18538602
Some, but it might come from the fact that i already had acquired most of the low hanging fruits as far as french cognates goes, so the english gains might have seemed more than what they were (so yeah, i might be biased).

[Anonymous No.18538612]

>>18538605
https://www.state.gov/foreign-language-training/

[Anonymous No.18538936]

>>18538301
>but how many of those exist in a particular language enough to warrant learning it just for that? Arguably English has the most of these (Lewis Carroll, Joyce, etc)
Italian too. Gadda, Manganelli, Landolfi, D'Arrigo, etc

[Anonymous No.18539065]

>>18538301
all your answers in this thread are monolingual cope. No matter what we tell you, you will only understand once you learn another language.

[Anonymous No.18539100]

>>18538612
Woah, so Italian is more similar to English than French?

[Anonymous No.18539120]

>>18527413
>easiest
Italian
>most useful
None of them

[Anonymous No.18539258]

>>18539100
We accept your defeat.

[Anonymous No.18539538]

>>18539065
no youre the ones coping.

i already learned several languages and am convinced that while there may be something to it, the responses ive seen arent that significant.

japaneses worldview and abstract language being so different from the west is the closest to justifying the lost in translation argument.

[Anonymous No.18539550]

>>18538936
I actually agree about this from what I've seen. There's also tons of gems, even beyond those in that one chart.

[Anonymous No.18539587]

>>18527440
>French probably the most useful.
lol if you want to visit Africa, maybe.
Italian is more interesting and German is more useful in the EU.

[Anonymous No.18539665]

>>18539587
More literature and philosophy in French than in German tho

[Anonymous No.18539996]

>>18539665
>More literature and philosophy in French than in German tho

[Anonymous No.18540135]

>>18539538
>i already learned several languages
then you would know translations are not in the same ballpark as originals, unless you are a brainlet that only cares about plot.

[Anonymous No.18540183]

>>18539996
I meant Italian lol

[Anonymous No.18540271]

>>18540183
>>More literature and philosophy in French than in Italian tho

[Anonymous No.18540304]

>>18540135
its not the dichotomy you wish for faggot

[Anonymous No.18540372]

>Unironically asking 4chan for serious advice

[Anonymous No.18540447]

>>18540304
cope

[Anonymous No.18540575]

>>18540271
Come on now

[Anonymous No.18540699]

>>18535805
Grain here is referring to the direction of the muscle in a slice of meat, you don't cut against it.

[Anonymous No.18540715]

>>18527413
Polish. they were one of the first to speak several languages at once in terms of european entities and have a metric fuck ton of incredible literature

[Anonymous No.18540827]

>>18540715
Good, what are some of their best works not yet translated to English?

[Anonymous No.18541726]

Learn French. Next.

[Anonymous No.18543995]

bump

[Anonymous No.18544151]

>>18538018
>NOOOOO!!! Latin is eternally unchanging. The superior language of the intellects the cradle of many modern European languages, which are just degenerate versions of Latin mixed barbarian languages like a dirty mutt!!

[Anonymous No.18544397]

>>18544151

[Anonymous No.18544580]

>>18533731
lol what a fucking pleb you are. german poetry is so insanely rich. benn, george, trakl, hoffmannsthal, beer-hofmann, lasker-schüler, heym, rilke, arendt, celan, brecht, brinkmann, kolmar, eich, loerke. those are just a few 20th century names off the top of my head. even hölderlin alone would be enough for a few years.

[Anonymous No.18544637]

>>18527413
>Which one is the easiest to learn?
subjective
>Which one is the most useful one?
again subjective. Depends what you want to do with the language

Italian and French are linguistically closer though. Also German preserves a case system and has one gender more than the romance languages

[Anonymous No.18544658]

>>18544580
German poetry is also the richest in terms of converting transcendence.

[Anonymous No.18544665]

>>18544658
*conveying

[Anonymous No.18544805]

>>18532476
Thanks for the tips, anon.

[Anonymous No.18545558]

Bump because I prefer discussions on language over the absolute garbage that is overcrowding the catalog right now.

[Anonymous No.18545586]

Ciao sono italiano e ho amici che studiano lingue all'università. Spesso capita di parlare delle lingue straniere e spesso dicono che l'italiano è una lingua difficile da imparare per uno straniero (sono degli idioti inaffidabili, quindi prendete le mie parole con le pinze) dato che ha molti tempi verbali (vedi indicativo, condizionale, congiuntivo, imperativo ,infinito participio e gerundio) rispetto all'inglese. Quindi dicono che l'inglese è più versatile dell'italiano

[Anonymous No.18545661]

>>18545586
sei autismo?

[Anonymous No.18545671]

>>18545661
Ma vaffanculo