- Paperback: 208 pages
- Publisher: Teach Yourself Books; New edition edition (Dec 1980)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0340268824
- ISBN-13: 978-0340268827
- Product Dimensions: 19.6 x 13 x 1.5 cm
- Average Customer Review: 3.4 out of 5 stars See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 745,156 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Description
Product Description
A graded course in Icelandic, invaluable both to the absolute beginner and to the student of Icelandic literature and its culture. This course is based on a series of lessons providing a complete grounding in pronunciation, grammar and vocabulary with exercises covering each stage.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
11 of 13 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
It says on the back of this book that it's "invaluable both to the absolute beginner and the student of Icelandic literature and its culture."
But a quick read of the first couple of pages of lesson one will tell you that this simply is NOT TRUE. I'm an absolute beginner and this book baffles me.
Lesson one, page two: "Within this declension we note these variations, which may be looked up in the section called Appendixes: SM 1d; SM 2b..." How is this helping us learn a language? Right from the start, you are drowned in an impenetrable soup of grammatical terms and it never lets up until you get to the idiom section where you will be thrilled to commit to memory such useful phrases as, "To steer between Scylla and Charybdis." You won't be able to ask for a cup of coffee yet, but at least you'll be able to impress the locals with your classical education while you gesture at the menu.
Instead of grinding through this, I would recommend Daisy Neimann's "Colloquial Icelandic" which is a much more friendly and accessible introduction to this difficult language, especially if you get the accompanying CD.
"Teach Yourself Icelandic" is not for beginners, it's written in a very formal, academic style, and I'd say is only useful once you're well on the way to grasping Icelandic.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Glendening's Icelandic is a staple for a serious learner of Icelandic. It appears at first to be very formal and academic, though on closer inspection it's not an unfriendly text.
It does, however, suffer from its age. The book has not been updated to reflect the abolition of the letter 'z' from the Icelandic language, and the usage notes describing formal patterns of Icelandic are a bit outdated.
This book demands to be read carefully: important concepts aren't always emphasised and are on occasion even only noted in a single sentence. It's also fairly heavy going at first, so strong motivation is required, though as concepts start falling into place it becomes easier.
Furthermore, the language it teaches is more scholarly than conversational. This isn't too much of a problem, though, since the grammar is the same in both cases. You'll need another source for conversational vocabulary, though: I recommend the (free) Icelandic Online course offered by Háskoli Íslands and its companion texts (including dictionary) at the University of Wisconsin's digital collection (which is available online to anyone).
This unfortunately can not be appropriately called a 'teach yourself' book, however much it tries, but if you're looking for an affordable grammar reference and don't mind compensating for its age (which isn't too difficult: mainly change 'z's into 's's and be less formal than it suggests), it's a good book. The score I've given it reflects this use, rather than its apparently intended use.
It does, however, suffer from its age. The book has not been updated to reflect the abolition of the letter 'z' from the Icelandic language, and the usage notes describing formal patterns of Icelandic are a bit outdated.
This book demands to be read carefully: important concepts aren't always emphasised and are on occasion even only noted in a single sentence. It's also fairly heavy going at first, so strong motivation is required, though as concepts start falling into place it becomes easier.
Furthermore, the language it teaches is more scholarly than conversational. This isn't too much of a problem, though, since the grammar is the same in both cases. You'll need another source for conversational vocabulary, though: I recommend the (free) Icelandic Online course offered by Háskoli Íslands and its companion texts (including dictionary) at the University of Wisconsin's digital collection (which is available online to anyone).
This unfortunately can not be appropriately called a 'teach yourself' book, however much it tries, but if you're looking for an affordable grammar reference and don't mind compensating for its age (which isn't too difficult: mainly change 'z's into 's's and be less formal than it suggests), it's a good book. The score I've given it reflects this use, rather than its apparently intended use.
Format:Paperback
With any language course, what the student gets out of it depends on how much effort is put in. Constant repetition is the key, with ten minutes a day being better than a long session weekly. Keeping that in mind, this book still has serious flaws.
The first downfall is the pronunciation guide, where many sounds are spelt out so ambiguously it's very hard to guess at the correct pronunciation (while buying an audio kit would remedy this, a better written guide would make it unnecessary). The lessons are badly organised. The grammar is shoved in a big bundle of long lists, instead of being introduced a step at a time as with superior courses.
The long list of idiomatic expressions seems good at first glance, but the book fails to explain them properly. For instance, "Eins daudi er annars braud" is given in the nearest English equivalent ("One man's meat is another's poison") but it doesn't explain that 'daudi' actually means 'death' and 'braud' means 'bread'.
Additionally, the book is only for beginners, with no sequel for intermediate or advanced students.
On the plus side, however, is a chapter explaining the key differences between modern Icelandic and Old Norse.
The first downfall is the pronunciation guide, where many sounds are spelt out so ambiguously it's very hard to guess at the correct pronunciation (while buying an audio kit would remedy this, a better written guide would make it unnecessary). The lessons are badly organised. The grammar is shoved in a big bundle of long lists, instead of being introduced a step at a time as with superior courses.
The long list of idiomatic expressions seems good at first glance, but the book fails to explain them properly. For instance, "Eins daudi er annars braud" is given in the nearest English equivalent ("One man's meat is another's poison") but it doesn't explain that 'daudi' actually means 'death' and 'braud' means 'bread'.
Additionally, the book is only for beginners, with no sequel for intermediate or advanced students.
On the plus side, however, is a chapter explaining the key differences between modern Icelandic and Old Norse.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
An excellent little book for a language seriously lacking grammar...
I have been aware of this book for many years as it is of the 'old school style' Teach Yourself series of language learning manuals, whereby they are essentially books of formal... Read more
Published on 9 Jan 2009 by Jayson Mackie
Not quiet for beginners....
I have been learning Icelandic for many years now and I have only just laid eyes on this book. However, it is clear from the start that this book is heavy on grammar. Read more
Published on 9 Feb 2004 by Daniel
A giant step to a sound, working knowledge of Icelandic.
To learn a language well hard work is necessary; Icelandic is, of course, no exception. As a Germanic language which can be regarded as one of the parent languages of English the... Read more
Published on 14 Jun 2003 by perspicacity7
Old-fashioned and very out of date...
This book is a few years old now and the methods used in this book are very difficult to understand, in particular the pronunciation section which seems incomprehensible. Read more
Published on 11 Aug 2002
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