The bestselling guide to learning a new language and remembering what you learned, now revised and updated. Gabriel Wyner speaks seven languages fluently. He didn’t learn them in school--who does? Rather, he mastered each one on his own, drawing on free online resources, quick daily practice sessions, and his knowledge of neuroscience and linguistics. In With suggestions for helpful study aids, a wealth of free resources, and summaries to reinforce important concepts, the intuitive techniques and easy-to-find resources in this book will offer you the most efficient and rewarding way to learn a new language.

Autorentext

Gabriel Wyner is the founder of Fluent Forever, a bestselling author, an opera singer, and a polyglot based in Chicago. He can now hold comfortable conversations in Spanish, German, French, Russian, Italian, Hungarian, and Japanese.

Leseprobe
Chapter 1

Introduction: Stab, Stab, Stab

If you talk to a man in a language he understands, that goes to his head. If you talk to him in his language, that goes to his heart. Nelson Mandela

Americans who travel abroad for the first time are often shocked to discover that, despite all the progress that has been made in the last 30 years, many foreign people still speak in foreign languages. Dave Barry

Language learning is a sport. I say this as someone who is in no way qualified to speak about sports; I joined the fencing team in high school in order to get out of gym class. Still, stabbing friends with pointy metal objects resembles language learning more than you might think. Your goal in fencing is to stab people automatically. You spend time learning the names of the weapons and the rules of the game, and you drill the proper posture, every parry, riposte, and lunge. Finally, you play the game, hoping to reach that magical moment when you forget about the rules: Your arm moves of its own accord, you deftly parry your friend s sword, and you stab him squarely in the chest. Point!

We want to walk up to someone, open our mouths, forget the rules, and speak automatically. This goal can seem out of reach because languages seem hard, but they re not. There is no such thing as a hard language; any idiot can speak whatever language his parents spoke when he was a child. The real challenge lies in finding a path that conforms to the demands of a busy life.

In the midst of my own busy life as an opera singer, I needed to learn German, Italian, French, and Russian. Out of those experiences, I found the underpinnings for this book. My methods are the results of an obsessive need to tinker, research, and tinker again. My language-learning toolbox has, over time, turned into a well-oiled machine that transforms fixed amounts of daily time into noticeable, continuous improvement in my languages and in the languages of every person I ve taught. In sharing it, I hope to enable you to visit the peculiar world of language learning. In the process, you ll better understand the inner workings of your mind and the minds of others. You ll learn to speak a new language, too.

Beginnings

So far, my favorite moment of this crazy language-learning adventure took place in a Viennese subway station in 2012. I was returning home from a show when I saw a Russian colleague coming toward me. Our common language had always been German, and so, in that language, we greeted and caught up on the events of the past year. Then I dropped the bomb. You know, I speak Russian now, I told her in Russian.

The expression on her face was priceless. Her jaw actually dropped, like in the cartoons. She stammered, What? When? How? as we launched into a long conversation in Russian about language learning, life, and the intersection between the two.

My first attempts to learn languages were significantly less jaw dropping. I went to Hebrew school for seven years. We sang songs, learned the alphabet, lit lots of candles, drank lots of grape juice, and didn t learn much of anything. Well, except the alphabet; I had that alphabet nailed.

In high school, I fell in love with my Russian teacher, Mrs. Nowakowsky. She was smart and pretty, she had a wacky Russian last name, and I did whatever she asked, whenever she asked. Five years later, I had learned a few phrases, memorized a few poems, and learned that alphabet quite well, thank you very much. By the end of it, I got the impression that something was seriously wrong. Why can I only remember alphabets? Why was everything else so hard?

Fast-forward to June of 2004, at the start of a German immersion program for opera singers in Vermont. At the time, I was an engineer with an oversized singing habit. This habit demanded that I learn basi