Colloquial Romanian: The Complete Course for Beginners (Colloquial Series) [Paperback]

Ramona Gonczol-Davies (Author), Dennis Deletant (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0415237831 | ISBN-13: 978-0415237833 | Publication Date: November 8, 2002 | Edition: 3

The third edition of this popular course in Romanian for beginners has been completely revised and updated to make learning Romanian easier and more enjoyable than ever before. These two 60-minute CDs accompany the course. Recorded by native speakers, these will help you perfect your pronunciation and comprehension skills.

Editorial Reviews

Language Notes

Text: English

About the Author

Dennis Deletant is Professor of Romanian Studies at the School of Slavonic and East European Studies, University College, London. Ramona Gönczöl-Davies is a native speaker of Romanian and Lector in Romanian at the School of Slavonic and East European Studies. _ _ _ _

Product Details

• Paperback: 344 pages
• Publisher: Routledge; 3 edition (November 8, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0415237831
• ISBN-13: 978-0415237833
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.3 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.1 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #738,053 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #8 in Books > Education & Reference > Foreign Language Nonfiction > More Languages > Romanian
  • #14 in Books > Education & Reference > Dictionaries & Thesauruses > Foreign Language > Romanian

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars A huge step backwards from the previous edition, January 12, 2008

By 

Gwilym - See all my reviews

This review is from: Colloquial Romanian: The Complete Course for Beginners (Colloquial Series) (Paperback)

It is not often that, when a new edition of language course is published, it is actually much worse than the previous one. Unfortunately, this course is one of those exceptions. I'll briefly outline why you'd be much better off with the earlier edition of Colloquial Romanian by the same author.

1. Help with pronunciation. In Romanian, any syllable of a word can be stressed. In almost all Romanian courses I've seen, this syllable is market to help the learner get the pronunciation right. It was marked in the earlier edition of Colloquial Romanian but for some strange reason it has been droppen in this edition.

2. Vocabulary lists. In any good language course, each new chapter contains a vocabulary lists of all the new words in that chapter. That was the case in the previous edition, but not so in this one. There are still vocabulary lists in each chapter, but they are very short and arbitary.

3. Grammar. In the earlier edition of Colloquial Romanian, the Romanian grammar was described in a detailed yet very user-friendly way. In the new edition, there aren't many explanations and they are likely to be confusing for the beginner.

In short, this book is more mysterious than any detective store. I have no idea why the author decided to downgrade his own book to this extent. The one improvement made is that the conversations are more up to date and relevant in this course. If the author would have made those changes but kept the pronunciation help, stuck to complete vocabulary lists and maintained the same grammar explanations, this would have been the best Romanian course on the market. Now, it's not only a rather useless course, it's a course that's much worse than its own previous edition.

18 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Great!, February 24, 2004

By 

Adalberto Pereira de Arruda (Guaratinguetá, Săo Paulo Brazil) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Colloquial Romanian: The Complete Course for Beginners (Colloquial Series) (Paperback)

It is a very good book covering all the structures to live in Romania, and now to travel. It contains all the grammar, verbs, conjunctions, prepositions, etc. It lacks only the useful vocabulary to travel as how to buy tickets to catch a train, how to find out an address, to get a taxi an so forth.
I recommend this book to all who want to acquire romanian language to a full level. The tapes are good, except for the fact there are only three different voices (and two of then of old people. The young people have better voice!).
The glossary is not complete. The book has about 1.300 words.
It is a good purchase.

6 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great book to learn Romanian, November 8, 2005

By 

Peter D. Hofflund "Language Lover" (Southern California) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Colloquial Romanian: The Complete Course for Beginners (Colloquial Series) (Paperback)

While there are not many books on the market to learn Romanian, Colloquial Romanian is one of the better ones. Grammar is easily explained, and one can learn much from the dialoques. New grammar is introduced inside the dialogues, so that one can understand the grammar easier. This is great book; however, one the best tools to learn a lanague is Pimsleur. I highly recommend Pimsleur language courses.