Hebrew by osmosis

[cellio]

I've had poor results trying to learn Hebrew formally, and some ok results just picking things up by osmosis, so it's time to ask for some pointers from my Hebrew-literate friends. (Ok, my timing probably stinks what with Pesach and all. If I don't get any replies, I'll try this again in a week. But I'm thinking of it now.)

I think it's time for me to read.

I should probably aim for a mix of children's books (real young children) and books that are a little less, err, intellectually lame. I mean, most adults will tire pretty quickly of "see Dick run", and I'm no exception. I'm wondering if books with simpler vocabulary that are already familiar to me would be reasonable candidates -- things like The Little Prince or some of Aesop's fables or the like. I read that stuff in English as a young child (definitely fables before kindergarten), so it should be possible.

Anything I try to read has to have full nikud (vowels), at least for now. Larger print is a plus. And I'd like to be able to buy it by mail, to avoid funny looks in Pinsker's (or, worse yet, them assuming I have children).

Does anyone have any suggestions?

And no, I'm not interested in reading Harry Potter in Hebrew. Didn't read it in English; don't want to read it in another language. And anyway, it doesn't have nikud. :-)

Comments

[estherchaya.livejournal.com]

Harry Potter is actually pretty darned advanced Hebrew, from what I understand. So I wouldn't recommend that even if you hadn't already ruled that out.

I have some Dr. Seuss books in Hebrew, but they are less than intuitive, since Dr. Seuss made up a lot of words. On the other hand, you know that you can get the English versions of those books to compare notes, which is sometimes useful.

http://www.eichlers.com has some children's books in Hebrew, though I can't make any specific suggestions right now as it's 2am and I'm a bit out of it. Plus, as you may know, MY Hebrew is atrocious.

[cellio]

I would expect Dr. Seuss to be hard to translate. Not because of the made-up words, but because getting the word play, meter, rhyme, and meaning to all line up has got to be a real bear.

You just gave me an idea. I should ask our associate rabbi, who runs the school, what they use to teach the kids Hebrew, and if I can borrow any of the books over the summer when school's not in session anyway. (That's assuming they try to teach the language and not just pronunciation and a few key words, and that might be the downfall of this plan. I don't know the answer, so I'll have to ask.)

[figmo.livejournal.com]

That was what I was going to suggest.

The reading will be incredibly boring (I know this firsthand; that's how I learned Hebrew), but it's a start.

Beyond that you may want to check any local colleges that teach Hebrew to see what they use for textbooks and for supplemental reading material.

[cellio]

Harry Potter is actually pretty darned advanced Hebrew, from what I understand. So I wouldn't recommend that even if you hadn't already ruled that out.

Besides, I flunked the test. Dani suggested Harry Potter, I said no, and he suggested that I'd probably recognize words like mem-gimel-lamed anyway, and I had to ask. :-)

("Muggle".)

Re:

[estherchaya.livejournal.com]

I refused to read Harry Potter for a long time. Now I'm addicted. But if you haven't read them in English, they might be a bit tricky in Hebrew. So it's still not a suggestion...

[cellio]

I'm interested enough in HP to be willing to spend 3 hours per movie, but not 8-20 hours per book. (I've actually lost track of page counts, though I know the last one was huge. But I'm not intentionally exaggerating; I'm a slow reader. Paperback fiction ranges from 30-60 pages per hour depending on size/density of type.)

Re:

[estherchaya.livejournal.com]

I can understand that. I definitely prefer the books to the movies...but the nice thing about the movies is that you can enjoy them without reading the books first.