How can I read 2666 in Spanish faster?
September 18, 2010 2:38 PM Subscribe
I've just started reading 2666...in Spanish. I'm proficient at reading Spanish, but I'm missing a lot of vocabulary, so the process is taking forever. How can I make it go faster?
My current strategy is to underline words or phrases that I don't know or that I need clarified, and then once I've gotten to a good stopping point after three to five pages I go and look all the things up. I like this approach better than looking things up as they come because it lets me take in a fair amount of reading at a time, instead of turning it into a piecemeal affair. Unfortunately, the looking up part is exceedingly slow; I take the book to my computer and check wordreference.com for all of the things that I want to look up.
I've read a fair amount of literature in Spanish before, but being a non-native speaker, I usually have this problem whenever I encounter a new author's personal lexicon. I've always done it the way I described above, which works okay for short stories, poems and novellas, but not this.
So, Metafilter, is there any way I can simplify or speed up this process? If I keep going at this rate it's going to take me several months to finish this book.
My current strategy is to underline words or phrases that I don't know or that I need clarified, and then once I've gotten to a good stopping point after three to five pages I go and look all the things up. I like this approach better than looking things up as they come because it lets me take in a fair amount of reading at a time, instead of turning it into a piecemeal affair. Unfortunately, the looking up part is exceedingly slow; I take the book to my computer and check wordreference.com for all of the things that I want to look up.
I've read a fair amount of literature in Spanish before, but being a non-native speaker, I usually have this problem whenever I encounter a new author's personal lexicon. I've always done it the way I described above, which works okay for short stories, poems and novellas, but not this.
So, Metafilter, is there any way I can simplify or speed up this process? If I keep going at this rate it's going to take me several months to finish this book.
Best answer: Yeah, it sounds like the bottleneck in your process is going to your computer. Can't you get some kind of portable dictionary? The Kindle idea is good; if your phone is good enough you should be able to get a dictionary app or access wordreference.com on the go; I bet you could even find a cheap, dedicated, Spanish-English electronic dictionary for not too much money.
Once you have the fast lookup method in place, I do recommend checking words individually as you need them rather than your current approach. If you can check words fast enough, it won't feel piecemeal to do it this way. On the other hand, the backlog approach will always be slower because you actually end up reading the book twice, a few pages at a time — not to mention the time spent underlining, etc. Get into a groove where you check words as needed and then move on, and things will move much faster. (Also, I agree with lysimache that you don't have to look up every word you don't know if you're just reading for pleasure and practice.)
Also, 2666 is crazy long. I know native English speakers who took several months to finish reading it in English. It's going to take you a while no matter what. If you find it hard to fend off frustration and rushiness and just enjoy the reading, consider reframing it for yourself as a series of small accomplishments (a chapter a week or whatever) rather than a checkpoint-free slog.
posted by No-sword at 3:30 PM on September 18, 2010
Once you have the fast lookup method in place, I do recommend checking words individually as you need them rather than your current approach. If you can check words fast enough, it won't feel piecemeal to do it this way. On the other hand, the backlog approach will always be slower because you actually end up reading the book twice, a few pages at a time — not to mention the time spent underlining, etc. Get into a groove where you check words as needed and then move on, and things will move much faster. (Also, I agree with lysimache that you don't have to look up every word you don't know if you're just reading for pleasure and practice.)
Also, 2666 is crazy long. I know native English speakers who took several months to finish reading it in English. It's going to take you a while no matter what. If you find it hard to fend off frustration and rushiness and just enjoy the reading, consider reframing it for yourself as a series of small accomplishments (a chapter a week or whatever) rather than a checkpoint-free slog.
posted by No-sword at 3:30 PM on September 18, 2010
I have nothing to offer except that I'm very jealous you can read this in Spanish. I just finished 2666 (in English) and loved it like crazy. Hang in there!
posted by Kloryne at 6:34 PM on September 18, 2010
posted by Kloryne at 6:34 PM on September 18, 2010
I'm also envious of your ability to read Spanish proficiently enough to understand much of a Bolaño novel. Bolaño is difficult even in translation. I don't think that Bolaño is meant to be read speedily as much as absorbed, though. Good luck in your quest, but don't feel bad if it's not easily achievable.
posted by blucevalo at 8:59 PM on September 18, 2010
posted by blucevalo at 8:59 PM on September 18, 2010
Response by poster: Thanks for the tips, folks. Unfortunately, I don't own a Kindle or a smartphone, so I won't really be able to take advantage of those ideas (though it sounds to me like they're probably the ideal solutions to the problem). I do like the idea of just not looking things up nearly as often -- I'm always afraid that I'll assume wrongly about the meaning of a word, but when I think about it, even if I get it wrong in the initial context, there's usually something that comes up later that rules out the initial assumption and guides me to the actual meaning.
Kloryne and bluecevalo, thanks, I'm flattered! I should clarify that "non-native" is maybe less accurate than "semi-non-native," because I grew up in a house where Spanish was spoken incidentally. My mom elected not to speak Spanish to me because she didn't want me to have an accent (I have only recently forgiven her in my heart for this), but I think I benefitted from having heard it -- in learning Spanish I always felt like I had some small ghost of the ability to speak it inside me that made it much easier than when I've tried to learn other languages. It's funny the way that works.
posted by invitapriore at 5:08 PM on September 19, 2010
Kloryne and bluecevalo, thanks, I'm flattered! I should clarify that "non-native" is maybe less accurate than "semi-non-native," because I grew up in a house where Spanish was spoken incidentally. My mom elected not to speak Spanish to me because she didn't want me to have an accent (I have only recently forgiven her in my heart for this), but I think I benefitted from having heard it -- in learning Spanish I always felt like I had some small ghost of the ability to speak it inside me that made it much easier than when I've tried to learn other languages. It's funny the way that works.
posted by invitapriore at 5:08 PM on September 19, 2010
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Two, if you're reading on a Kindle (or thinking of getting a Kindle), I *adore* the feature where you can change the default dictionary and buy foreign language dictionaries. I have the French-English one, and while it has its faults (it can't, for instance, find anything that's contracted -- it won't find l'homme or s'en or whatever), it is so much better than using a separate dictionary! And I still try to keep the looking-up to a minimum. :)
posted by lysimache at 2:45 PM on September 18, 2010