Good Russian <-> English <-> Russian Dictionaries

[Jake White]

Hi Kenneth,

A dictionary that I found extremely useful (and also great fun!) is the :
Russian learners' dictionary : 10,000 words in frequency order by Nicholas
J. Brown    (London ; New York : Routledge, 1996)  This is in print and
fairly easily obtained.  The dictionary takes you from the absolutely most
common words (in texts) to words that appear statistically only a few times
in a million words of common usage.  While I quibble somewhat with the exact
frequency rankings,  the layout of the dictionary makes it easy and fun to
test yourself,  and measure  learning progress from word 1 through 10,000.
I continue to find it useful for review and wish there was something similar
for Polish!

Best wishes,   Jake White  / UW Libraries, Seattle


----- Original Message -----
From: UDUT, KENNETH <KENNETH.UDUT at spcorp.com>
To: <SEELANGS at CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU>
Sent: Tuesday, March 30, 1999 7:08 AM
Subject: Good Russian <-> English <-> Russian Dictionaries


> Hello again SEELANGers!
>
> You have all been so incredibly helpful - I am still in awe!
>
>
> A few days ago, I purchased an Oxford Russian/English dictionary - I
> believe it said 180,000 translations in it (price was $55 US @ Barnes &
> Noble).  I am happy with it, but am curious:
>
> 1) What are some good Russian/English dictionaries in book form?
>
> 2) What is a good portable electronic Russian/English translator?
>
> 3) What is a good computer-based Russian/English dictionary?
>
>
> I am still learning very basic grammer, and a few words each day.  One
> of my on-going projects is to try to jump in and translate word-by-word
> little short stories, Scripture verses (I have the Online Bible's 1917
> Synodal Russian edition on my computer at home, and I am quite amazed at
> how exact the Scripture is compared with English versions - even the
> word order, at least so far).  I even have a little Russian 1st level
> primer on Grammer, that I purchased at Brighton Beach (my immeasurable
> thanks to Igor, who is on this list, and walked me through Brighton
> Beach), and will start working with, word by word.
>
> I had taken tons of personality tests in the past, am insanely
> introspective, and this seems to fit my learning style.  [i.e. - give me
> a complex, insanely large project involving many possible values, allow
> me infinite amounts of time to slowly go over it, piece by piece, and
> let me make the mental connections between related things, while
> providing reference tables as backup in case I get stuck, which I always
> do].
>
>
> My goal in learning Russian is not so much in speaking Russian, although
> that will be a part of it, but in translation projects.
>
>
>
> That reminds me: Final question for the moment:
>
> -- Is anybody aware of decent Church Slavonik reference books, which
> either: 1) Compare/contrast modern Russian and Church Slavonik (in
> Russian, I would imagine) or better still 2) Assist an English-speaker
> in learning Church Slavonik?
>
> I suspect #1 will be more readily available, and will probably be more
> advanced than I could possibly handle at this point in time, but it is
> something that would be quite useful down the road.
>
> #2 would be an amazing find, although I have my doubts that such a beast
> exists :)
>
>
> Thank you, one and all.  Is there a SEELANGS FAQ?  I'm sure that the
> questions I've been asking over the past month are common enough.
>
>
> -Kenneth
> kenneth.udut at spcorp.com
>