this post was submitted on 27 Dec 2023
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I primarily engage with fiction, particularly fantasy literature, and occasionally delve into non-fiction.

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[–] AteshgaRubyTeeth@lemmy.world 0 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

I also only read English for a long time instead of my own language.

I picked up some books in my native language and was pleasantly surprised.

The language in itself doesn’t matter but I could notice the writer was from my culture. There’re slight cultural references in books written by people from my culture.

In books from American writers theres also these cultural references which I understand because I grew up on the internet but still it’s not my culture.

I would recommend to check if you’re country/culture has some literature award prizes and check out some of the top books. Make sure to try a couple as a well reviewed book might not mean it’s a good fit for you.

[–] DharmaCurious@startrek.website 0 points 10 months ago (2 children)

If you don't mind me asking, were you raised speaking English, too? As a monoglot, it blows my mind when people are fluent enough in a second language to enjoy reading fiction in that language. I've tried to learn Spanish, and would love to get to that point, but I really wonder if I'd be able to enjoy reading for leisure in another language, or if it would feel like a chore.

[–] Mkengine@feddit.de 0 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

I'm not the original commenter, but I am from Germany and was not raised other than learning English from fifth grade onwards. This was just the basics though, the bulk of my English proficiency comes from playing games, watching shows and movies and reading in English. In the beginning I did it to improve my English, but the German synchronization in videogames was especially bad, so I only ever play games in English, and adopted this practice for other types of media as well. On the rare occasion I find German books I like, I read it in German though, for example the fantasy books "Die Zwerge" by Bernhard Hennen.

[–] Turun@feddit.de 0 points 10 months ago

Step 1: learn English for 7 years from grade 5 to 12

Step 2: the Internet exists and is overrun with Americans.

Step 3: profit

Once you are at the level where you don't translate words, but instead the words are linked in your mind to the concept itself, consuming media is no longer a chore.

It will probably be harder to learn a language other than English, because so much content is available in English (I know three YouTubers from the top of my head that create english content despite not being native speakers and one fiction writer). Though I obviously can't properly judge this as I only speak German and English. I have no idea if there is a Spanish focused YouTube for example. Due to the great firewall Chinese will probably be easiest to learn in that regard.

[–] Diplomjodler@feddit.de 0 points 10 months ago

I think it's always better to read a book in the language it was originally written in, provided you can read that language, of course. So if it was written in English I'll read it in English. If it was written in a language I don't know I'll also often pick up the English rather than the German translation because I've often found they have a better flow to them.

[–] Turun@feddit.de 0 points 10 months ago

I have found that my proficiency in my native language is not as high as I would like. Not bad of course, but the way some writers use the perfect adjectives to describe a scene is admirable. If I read that scene description in English I strengthen my knowledge about those English adjectives, but I miss out on exercise in my native tongue.

That being said, /r/hfy is in English and I am very cheap, so for the last few years I have read content exclusively online. Maybe I have to search out hfy stories in my own language.