Customer Reviews

Esperanto a Complete Course for Beginners (Teach Yourself)

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Esperanto is an artificially constructed language created by the Polish physician Ludwik L. Zamenhof in 1887. Derived from Latin, the Romance languages and Germanic languages, it's claim to be a "universal" language is rather dubious, but it has gained more traction over its history than many other artificial languages. This 2-cassette tape volume is an excellent starting point for those native-English speakers to learn Esperanto, and I highly recommend it.

If you are interested in artificial languages, I would also recommend the Klingon language, which was created in the 1990s, and has been growing in popularity, and may take over from Esperanto as the most popular artificial language. I highly recommend Star Trek Conversational Klingon by Marc Okrand.

After taking the free, online 10 lesson Esperanto course available from the Esperanto League of North America, I bought this book and the accompanying tapes. It was an excellent follow-up to the online course, but is also ideally suited for the complete beginner. Teach Yourself Esperanto is well-paced and comprehensive, with interesting situations and dialogues. Even if you have no previous experience with Esperanto, by the end of the book you will be able to communicate in the language at a very high level. You will learn no other second language as quickly and thoroughly as you'll learn Esperanto, even if it's solely through self-instruction. Although the book is often available without the tapes, I absolutely recommend getting the tapes as well. They'll give you a chance to practice your listening skills as well as an opportunity to practice your own spoken Esperanto, by following the dialogues as a model.

When I learned Esperanto in 1968 from the 2nd edition of this book, I had to buy it in the backstore and under the counter because, like in the USSR, the learning was forbidden in Salazar's Portugal. When I received the 1st issue of the magazine "Esperanto" from the Universal Eo Association, I studied the 16 lessons in the afternoon and could read the magazine in the evening from cover to cover by looking only six words in the provided vocabulary and using extensively the appendix. Esperanto was the eighth language I learned...The appendix of the book is very useful with its table of correlatives (all the familly of words like WHo, THat, SOMEwhere, NObody), the list of 37 affixes that automatically extend your word power tenfold and Zamenhof's summary of the grammar in 16 rules. I have bought the new 1994 edition that now comes with 2 cassettes (very convenient to practice) and can tell you that the best became even better with the revisions of J.H.Sullivan. Learn it for the pleasure and join the 8 million speakers community that is one of the biggest group surfing on the Web today!

For those interested in learning Esperanto, "Teach Yourself Esperanto" is a good place to start. The book's finest features are its excellent reading passages (many taken out of Esperanto periodicals) and its inclusion of the most useful vocabulary. My only complaints are that the dialogues could be better, and the exercises are of the rote memory type that works well for Latin and Greek but which tend to bore a person learning a modern language.

Nonetheless, Esperanto is but a tool to experience the wonderful cultural scene of Esperanto and to participate in the movement for Esperanto as the one international language. Along with learning the language through this helpful book, get involved!

I'm a 14 year old language freak. I try to learn as many languages as possible. I already speak French, English, and Armenian. This book makes Esperanto easy to learn, but it is a little long and redundant. I listened/read this book two times and I'm just about to add another language to my list. You finish this book being almost fluent. It's recommended by me highly!

This is a great book, which teaches you everything the basic studen tneeds to know about esperanto the international language. I have been studying fo ronly one year and already feel confident speaking, reading and writing it with people i do not know on the internet. For anyone considering learning this language i highly suggest it.