4 comments about Elmer's Colours (English-Bengali) (Elmer series).

1. When I picked this book from the shelf I was immediately entranced by the extraordinary illustration of an elephant named Elmer. It wasn't so much that I thought my daughter would enjoy the read, I knew I would. Elmer is a character that I'd never encountered before, but the idea of a patchwork elephant struck me as simple but brilliant. Anyway, last Wednesday evening my daughter became the testing ground for this work. She was delighted the moment the book was opened. On the first page we see our patchwork elephant against the backdrop of rainbow colours. And what is he thinking? You can tell from the gorgeous red hearts which represent his thoughts that he is truly in love with colour. His colourful and amusing journeys, which would delight any child, include seeing a snowman, balancing fruit on his trunk and eating a popsicle at the beach. This book can be enjoyed by a very young child with the attention getting colours and shapes and by the same child when they later reach the reading stage. Having read Elmer's Colours I've now determined to track down the other titles in the series.



2. The Turkish and English are not translated faithfully. I bought this book for my bilingual daughter and was dissapointed that it had errors. She likes the pictures though.



3. The book has a very funny translation. We had to retranslated
   every page and sticked it over-
   
   Diem-Tu



4. I like that this book has both languages, but thought the story and vocabulary were pretty weak. My daughter wasn't very interested. I wish amazon had Boynton or Eric Carle avaliable in Italian.

4 comments about Elmer's Friends (English-Bengali) (Elmer series).

1. My son is a huge fan of "Hide and Seek Elmer". I bought "Elmer's Friends" thinking he would love this as well. There is a lion in this book that has the most frightening face. My son would start to cry the page before in anticipation of the upcoming lion. I tore that page out of the book and now my child can enjoy this book again. The other animals are fun, but the lion is terrifying!



2. We picked up a copy of Elmer's Friends from the library as part of a stack of books to read to our two year old. She fell in love with it. So much so that we bought a copy. She loves the different animals, and is learning their names. She particularly likes the the lion.

   Whenever she sees it, she ROARS out loud, and makes us roar too.

   This is the best kind of children's book. One they ask to have read to them over and over.




3. Elmer's Friends was the first book my daughter (1.5 years) took an interactive interest in. She loves the lion. She roars whenever she sees it and it is the first animal sound she has made.



4. This was the book I bought the first time I took my daughter to the zoo. This is where she really learned to wave "bye bye" and "hello" and practice her animal sounds. She enjoyed roaring like a lion and hooting like the owl. But I enjoyed the message the most: "Elmer's friends are all different, but they all love Elmer." A subtle message, but an important one to learn.

2 comments about Rama and the Demon King: An Ancient Tale from India (Bengali-English Bilingual Edition).

1. Whether you are familiar with the Ramayana or not, this is a wonderful introduction to the main plot and characters. My 4-yr old daughter likes this story and actually has grown to love it more. It is very difficult to create a kid-friendly version that is nonviolent but also educational. Jessica Souhami does a wonderful job. I hope such a book will come out regarding the Mahabharta.



2. My children have loved this book since I purchased it about 2 years ago (they are now 4 and 6). The illustrations are wonderful and the story beautifully told. I would highly recommend this to any parent for their young children.

5 comments about Gitanjali: A Collection of Indian Poems by the Nobel Laureate.

1. I don't think I am qualified enough (in Literature) to even comprehend the full meaning of every poem, but his gift is apparent from the first one's. He had an amazing eye for things in life most people will never care to even notice, and he had the talent to put forth those images and feelings in writing. No wonder he is hailed has one of the greatest literary minds in India. for people who want to explore more about Tagore, poetry wasn't his talent..he was a writer (plays and novels), a composer, an artist, and a Humanitarian.



2. Simply one of the best books I have ever read. Very moving, and more importantly gives you a real perspective on life.



3. The shipment and the condition of the book were perfect, and the poems convey unparalleled feelings.



4. This version from Filiquarian is not formatted properly. I myself want to return this book but it would be a hassle for just 4$.
   
   I will be complaining with Amazon to check for the copyright issue with the publishers.



5. I stumbled over these poems for the first time a few years ago and was immediately captivated by the depth,humility and transcendence of spirit that speaks through them. It is almost overwhelming and a great companion for any meditation or prayer practice. For me Tagore definitely ranks among the highest mystic master poets of all time and this collection of "songs" reminds the reader of Rumi quite a bit.
   Unfortunately I don't speak Sanskrit and can only imagine the " true music" created by these poems in their original tongue - and it wouldn't surprise me if the English translation is not more than a meager shadow of its original self - still...that being said the reading of it nevertheless manages to transfer its divine beauty and truly draws the reader's heart close to its spiritual source. It is almost like a healing elixir for heart and mind - and for me the impact is being in breathtaking awe of the sacred origin of all!!!
   For any lover of poems,prayers and sacred,verbal inspirations this is a treasure rarely found in today's world!

No comments about Milet Mini Picture Dictionary: English-Bengali.

3 comments about Lonely Planet Bengali Phrasebook.

1. The author could have expressed more of desire to understand than explain. The phrases are allogorical of the many multilingual facets available in such a small country. Yet she does give some adequate examples of rudimentary uses of phrases. Thus, one can view Bimal Maity's efforts to categorize variations in the languages of Bangladesh fruitless at best. But the truth is, I have not read the book and can only surmise of the book's content by reading the title.



2. I spent 25 days in West Bengal with this book on me at all times. After leaving Calcutta, I found very few people who could speak much English. As it was designed for, it was fast to use to find a phrase, and pretty easy to be understood when reading. I needed few words that were not included in the book. I intend to use phrasebooks every time I want to learn a language - before I leave for the country.



3. I bought this book as one of the several "tools" I am using to learn Bengali. The book starts with an explanation of the transliteration used and a brief explanation of grammar. It then goes into common words and phrases. The book provides both transliteration and the Bengali script for many phrases. There is an excellent glossary at the back of the book that is listed alphabetically in English. It also includes transliteration and Bengali script. This is excellent for building your Bengali vocabulary. For information on how to incorporate a phrase book into your language learning process I recommend "How to Learn Any Language: Quickly, Easily, Inexpensively, Enjoyably and on Your Own" by Barry J. Farber.

1 comments about Introduction to Bengali Part 1:.

1. Second copy I've ordered, thought it might have been updated, but it hasn't . . .still a great tool for learning Bengali, if you have the tapes to go with it, which I do. It was published in 1964 before the computer era, so it is all in courier type, and looks like a photo copy that was turned into a book. The Bengali script is faded in many places, so if you don't know your Bengali script letters, it could be confusing to decipher them. Other than that, I have few complaints. It has lots of repetition for the beginner, which is good, and it concentrates a lot on sentence structure and conjugating verbs, which is also good, as I've found those are the most difficult things to learn in Bengali, from a person like me who has English as their first language.

1 comments about Teach Yourself Bengali (Book + 2CD's) (Teach Yourself Complete Language Courses).

1. For the fifth most spoken language in the world, there are few options to learn Bengali. There were several early in the 20th century, when Calcutta and Bengal was so important to British India and trade. There are more options for other South Asian languages, even those spoken by far fewer people. So it makes a language which has a large amount of literature and film difficult to access. This was written many years ago, and it does not benefit from recent knowledge of language learning. While comprehensive it is a challenging way to learn a language. I wish that a more effective system were available. It gets three stars because of the lack of options, but if there were others, it could easily drop to two.

2 comments about Hindi, Urdu & Bengali: Lonely Planet Phrasebook.

1. Although this combined edition is more accurate than the previous separate phrasebooks for Hindi/Urdu and Bengali, do not expect to use it to actually learn the languages or even get beyond a couple of dozen phrases.
   
   Perhaps in conjunction with a formal language guide to Bengali, this phrasebook would be more helpful, but at the time of my recent travels, there was no English language language study guide available for Bengali/Bangla (I think the Teach Yourself series has one, but that series is currently going through a one-by-one reissue as the cover format and typeface have changed).
   
   The main problem is the Bengali to English dictionary, which is listed from the point of view of the written form vs. how things sound or how they transluterate to Latin characters. This requires first learning Bengali script, which is quite difficult due to the bizarre rules in all South Indian derived scripts (including Thai and Khmer/Cambodian as well as Hindi) vs. Cyryllic, Latin, Greek, Hebrew, and Arabic. And besides which, literacy is not and should not be a requirement for developing the more important day-to-day fluency of speaking and listening skills in a new language while traveling.
   
   The publisher would also be advised to make clear that there are significant regional variants within Bengali (if not also Hindi/Urdu), and thus one is not always understood even with basic everyday phrases as they are published here. They might also be advised to include the related Punjabi language/dialect in the next edition, to be more complete.



2. I've been using the computer program Rosetta Stone to learn Hindi, and it's extremely helpful in getting a person started with learning the grammar, some basic words, and the script. But Rosetta Stone doesn't teach you the really crucial basic phrases, like "Hello, how are you?", "My name is Bob," or "Where is the bathroom?"
   
   That's the specialty of this phrasebook--teaching you the basic phrases you'll need to get by. It also shows the basics of how to read the Urdu and Hindi scripts, but it's not necessary to learn them to use it, since the phrases all have phonetic renderings. One of the other reviewers complained that this phrasebook won't teach you the language. But it's not meant to; it's just supposed to help you get started, or to help you get by when you're not planning to actually learn the language.
   
   The organization of the book is very useful, since it's grouped into sections for different kinds of phrases, making it easy to find the stuff you're most interested in.
   
   The dictionary in the back, when you're going from Hindi or Urdu to English, is arranged in the order of the Hindi or Urdu alphabets. Maybe this doesn't make the most sense for English speakers, who if they're just starting aren't going to memorize the order of all the letters in the Hindi and Urdu alphabets. The other reviewer complained about this, but since the dictionaries aren't very long, I don't think it's a big deal. The dictionaries also have the phonetic spellings, so you can flip through pretty quickly to find the letter you're looking for.
   
   My main complaint is that the Urdu font in this book is kind of hard to read. It might just be because I first learned the script from another book that used a different font, and that's what I'm used to now. But I think that with the font used in this book, it's inherently harder to tell which letter is which, making it harder on a beginner.

5 comments about Teach Yourself Bengali Complete Course Package (Book + 2CDs) (Teach Yourself Language Complete Courses).

1. The cd for this book has some great conversations to practice.
   However, the time allowed to repeat is minimal. It would be SO much better if more time were allowed.
   The book is written, it seems, by a professor using college type language. I had studied Bangla many years ago and was using this as a refresher. If I had been brand new to the language...I would have been lost in the wordage.
   It has, however, been very helpful to me and I would recommend it to someone who plans to be in the country for awhile.



2. used it in class. very useful for reading practice. not so much for the practice exercises.



3. This set appears to be somewhat academic oriented as it focuses on the use of the text and not enough on the audio and just learning how to speak the language. The average user I would imagine wants to focus on learning how to speak and understand Bengali. Reading or writing it, given its unique script, is another matter and not necessarily that important for day-to-day communication.
   
   I've used Pimsleur language programs in the past and I found them to be extremely effective - the most effective actually. Pimsleur's audio programs are self contained. No books are required. They introduce basic words and you have to repeat them over and over and you slowly build up to bigger words and then sentences. They can be expensive, but they're worth every penny. Unfortunately, Pimsleur doesn't have a Bengali program.
   
   I was hoping this set would copy Pimsleur. It doesn't. The CDs are not self contained. You have to use the book along with the CDs which means listening and repeating the words in the car is waste of time. And you have to ask yourself how you learn a language. I'm quite disappointed and skeptical about this set as a result. A child learns by hearing the words and learning the meanings long before they learn how to read or write the language. That seems like a logical way to learn for adults as well. But this set doesn't follow that natural flow.
   
   According to the text, Bengali is the sixth most spoken language in the world. If that's the case, I don't understand why it's so hard to find a good teaching resource. According to many reviews, here and elsewhere, this book and CD set is "the best on the market" for learning Bengali. If that's the case it's unfortunate, because this is not by any stretch the best way to learn a language.
   
   I did find that Transparent Language has a computer program (Languages of the World: Bengali available only directly from TL's web site) that's not sold on Amazon. It's primitive in its interface, limited in scope and I've used it only briefly. But so far I would say that it is a better choice than this set which I immediately saw as useless in terms of learning how to speak Bengali. There's also a 4 CD and book set called "Easy Way to Learn Bengali" by Som N. Konar and Dr. Meera Heera Smith which I have been unable to find anywhere.



4. I used this as a textbook in a 2 month intensive laguage study program. The information is basically good, although there are some annoying details that are frustrating - such as using very small font when introducing new letters (it makes them hard to see clearly) and using random strange vocabulary (ie. "Come with a shirt on." as an example sentence)when covering the script.
   
   Once the script is covered, the book progresses at an awkward pace if you follow the chapter order as presented. Some chapters are packed with seriously heavy grammar and others spend 2 pages on how to make something plural. Overall, the material feels very scattered about. Also, verbs and verb conjugation are introduced very late- which means you won't be able to form sentences until well into the book. I recommend skipping ahead to simple present tense as soon as you have the script down. Finally, Radice uses english transliteration for too long in the book. Sometimes it feels like an exercise in transliteration more than bangla.
   
   This is a good start, but you will need more than this book to learn Bengali. Use this as a resource, but don't expect to become a good Bangla speaker based on this book alone.



5. I would disagree with the reviewer who complained that the book focuses on reading and writing, rather than speaking/listening. I found it to be the reverse.
   
   At first glance, the book seemed to be very well organized. The first dozen or so chapters introduce you to the letters and sounds of Bengali, a few at a time, and let you practice reading/speaking single words and brief phrases. Then you move onto the typical "Teach Yourself" format of dialogues, grammar lessons and practice exercises. The final section offers brief literary excerpts.
   
   The problem is with that first section. The author provides almost excruciatingly detailed explanations of how to pronounce each letter, and shows how the letter is written. But the 'single words and brief phrases' are NOT written in Bengali script, but are transliterated, with some odd symbols intended to stand for sounds that are not easily transliterated into English. Result being, that when you finally make it to the dialogues, (written in Bengali and translated, but NOT transliterated) you are suddenly plunged into reading Bengali ... having had NO practice. Wouldn't it have made more sense to put the 'single words and phrases' in Pt.1 IN Bengali, so the learner can get some practice in reading the script and become familiar with the letters?