Missed an important anniversary

[hmpf]

2008 is, as I noted earlier, the year I turn ten in fandom. I just noticed that 2007 also was the year of an important anniversary for me. Sometime in the latter part of that year I should have celebrated the 20th anniversary of my first acquaintance with another great love of my life: 1987 was the year I began to learn English. Heh.

(ETA: It was not, however, the year I fell in *love* with English. That happened later - around 1993, I think.)

Comments

[amonitrate.livejournal.com]

out of curiosity from one who's never been able to learn a language other than English - what made you fall in love with it? I'm intrigued.

Well...

[hmpf.livejournal.com]

I know that for most people the number one 'beauty criterion' for languages is musicality (which is why French and Italian usually lead the polls about languages people love), but I really appreciate the *rhythmicality* of English. Or rather, that's the first thing I learned to appreciate about English - due in no small part to the fact that the first English book I read was Fahrenheit 451. Ray Bradbury does some pretty interesting things with rhythm there.

Later, as my vocabularly grew, I began to love English also for its incredible wealth of words. I've read that English has about twice as many or even triple the number of words as German, and, speaking as someone who knows both languages intimately by now, I can totally believe that. So, especially as a writer, I appreciate that range of choice and nuance.

Also, I love the flexibility of the language. The way you can bend and twist it in the most amazing and ridiculous ways.

And then there's how alive it is.

Re: Well...

[amonitrate.livejournal.com]

that's cool. I'd agree that it's not the most musical language, but I can totally see rhythmic. And twisty. I didn't kno wthat about the number of words. Wow.

[jazzymegster.livejournal.com]

Happy anniversaries :)

[nick-101.livejournal.com]

Fandom's a pretty good thing. Happy anniversaries.

Is gobsmacked

[mikes-grrl.livejournal.com]

Just because I can sound like an ignorant American, allow me:
English isn't your native language? Holy hell. You sure have a fabulous grasp of it.

I've known a number of 'forgieners' (from Orlando, FL, we get a lot of travelers) and usually even people who have been in country for years still have that linguistic twitch or two left over from their native tongue that makes them toss adjectives around or put verbs in 'strange' places. I know writing is different than speaking, of course, but still, had you not posted this I would never have suspected.

And I think it is interesting that part of your love of the language stems from the breadth of words in it. I do not speak any other languages, so not like I can compare, but I do LOVE the ability to say something such as "she walked into the room" in about 4,000 different ways. <3

So, congrats on the anniveraries! I admire your language skills. (I keep meaning to learn Spanish -- helpful in these parts -- but...)

Thanks.

[hmpf.livejournal.com]

This is a compliment I really appreciate. :-)

But really... twenty years of constant learning. Fifteen years of reading English books. Eleven years of reading *predominantly* in English. Nine years of using - written - English every day. Eight years of writing fiction in it. Six years of watching predominantly English-language TV and movies. One year spent living and studying in Britain... I dare say I've probably had more exposure to English in my life than even most immigrants in an English-speaking country do (unless they also read a lot in English). Living in a country will only get you so far - you get a good grasp of the spoken language there (though my year in Britain didn't even do that much for me, language-wise), but it's easy to stagnate. To learn more, you need to read.

I think I have the advantage of having acquired my English largely by reading, which means I got to absorb a wide vocabulary and grammatical complexity early on. My English grades started to go through the roof a mere year or so after I started reading English books (as you can imagine, I'm a great proponent of learning languages by reading now *g*).

It's a disadvantage, too, though, because it essentially means my main language (besides German) is not simply English but 'written English'. I don't do half as well with spoken English, which is one reason why I find dialogue incredibly hard to write (and particularly scary if it's supposed to be for Gene).

(More on languages - esp. word numbers - here: http://hmpf.livejournal.com/176309.html)

I'm pretty sure that my grammar is occasionally a bit off, btw.

[hmpf.livejournal.com]

But then, that happens to native speakers too, doesn't it? And on the net you can always blame it on typos etc. *g*

Anyway. Now you know *why* it's off when it's off. *g*