(Part 2) Top products from r/russian

No promises, but I might be able to write up a document. Depends on how much time I got after I'm done grading these calculus papers.

EDIT: This is taking longer than I thought! I might suggest an EXCELLENT grammar book, though: Schaum's Outline of Russian Grammar by James Levine. It's amazingly comprehensive, shows tons of tables, gives example usages, has exercises with keys in the back... we're using it for my Intermediate Russian course right now, and I love it. It might be a bit overwhelming if you're just starting out, though. But even then, if you take it a bit at a time, it can be a huge help.

I'm not sure if I'll keep going with this, because I want to put so much into it (otherwise I feel I'm just rehashing what can already be found online). I'd like to put:

• A description of patterns found in declensions
  
• Logical explanations for certain features / patterns / historical artifacts that appear
  
• IPA / phonemic charts for declensions (what phonemes make up the endings?)
  
• Orthographic charts for declensions (what do these phonemes end up looking like when written?)
  
• Example declensions for all genders in each of the three declensions (this is like 6 paradigms)
  
• Example declensions for all six stress paradigms
  
• Lists of irregularities...
  
  All of this (except the IPA stuff) is featured in Levine's book, anyway. I'd honestly just recommend buying it.

The New Penguin Russian Course is quite good. The textbook I've used is Russian for Everybody (there's also an accompanying workbook that I highly recommend). Once you start getting a hang of things, Shaum's Outline of Russian Grammar is a good, clear reference for grammar.

As for free websites? I'm not very familiar with them... MasterRussian.com is a popular one. From my experience with free internet lessons, they tend to be lacking in explanations of grammar, and more about giving you "useful" phrases. Everybody learns differently, of course, but I personally find that the more grammar lessons you can integrate, the better off you'll be in the long run.

Other than all that, I definitely recommend finding an easy to read book/article/text/something to work towards understanding -- children's books are good for this. Provides more motivation that way, and it's a way to apply what you're learning. Always keep a goal in mind. :)

That website looks alright. Your biggest hurdle will be Russian grammar, which is very convoluted, and absolutely necessary if you don't want to sound like an idiot. That in mind, your best bet is to take classes or lessons.

If you don't have the time/money for classes or lessons, then best of luck learning on your own. Be sure to pick up The Big Silver Book of Russian Verbs, and the best dictionary you can find, then go to.

Russian Literature: A Very Short Introduction will give you a good idea what to expect. It's a quick read and provides an adequate summary of the main writers and movements.

In prose, a good "course of study" would be Pushkin's The Captain's Daughter, Lermontov's A Hero of Our Time, Gogol's Dead Souls, Turgenev's Fathers and Sons, Dostoevsky's The Idiot/The Brothers Karamazov, Tolstoy's War and Peace/Anna Karenina/The Death of Ivan Ilyich, Zamyatin's We, Bely's Petersburg, Nabokov's The Gift, Bulgakov's Master and Margarita, Solzhenitsyn's One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, Pasternak's Doctor Zhivago

From there you can look for a good list of contemporary Russian fiction, or go back to some 18th century stuff like Radishchev or Karamzin if you're more historically inclined.

Supplement all this with short stories (most of the good authors wrote short stories, there are also some authors like Krylov, Leskov, Chekhov, Garshin, Bunin, Zoshchenko, Andreev, Kharms, Babel, and Shalamov who wrote almost solely in the short format, and you don't want to pass them up - a good collection is here, but there are others).

For plays, make sure you check out Griboyedov's Woe from Wit, Gogol's The Government Inspector, Ostrovsky's The Storm, Chekhov's The Seagull/Uncle Vanya/The Cherry Orchard, Blok's The Puppet Show, Mayakovsky's Mystery-Bouffe, Bulgakov's The Days of the Turbins.

Don't miss out on poetry either: Derzhavin, Zhukovsky, Pushkin, Lermontov, Tyutchev, Fet, Nekrasov, Blok, Mayakovsky, Akhmatova, Tsvetaeva, Mandelstam, Esenin. All are worth your while, especially if you have time to struggle through in the original.

Lingvist has a very good vocabulary app.

Bondar's Simplified Russian Method is the best textbook to get you reading quickly. It was printed by Middlebury College in 1949 and was used by the CIA and DOD. It's a funky way to learn while still being grammatically accurate, even if it uses words like гражданин/гражданка and перо.) Each chapter is between 3-10 pages.

Unlike новая искра! It doesn't waste your time with endless pictures of people saying "Hello, Mr. Smith, how are you" "Good, thank you" "Are you a teacher" "Yes, I am a Russian teacher." etc.
It's all about increasing vocab, methodically teaching grammar and getting used to reading long-ish passages.

You can get a reprint for $35 on Amazon.

https://www.amazon.com/Bondars-Simplified-Russian-Method-English/dp/054844630X

The absolute essentials for learning conversational Russian fast, in my opinion are:

1. Get an audiocourse to help you get used to pronunciation and grammar (I prefer Michel Thomas but others prefer Pimsleur
   
   
2. Get a Russian frequency dictionary. This one has stress marks, romanization and Russian to English example sentences. Since the most common 2000 words make up like 90% of all vocabulary you'll use on a daily basis, I think these are really crucial.
   
   Good luck!

The Meek One: A Fantastic Story includes stress, etymological and historical notes, and a web site that that allows you to read the book on e-devices. The website will even read passages aloud, by a native speaker. Very good source, IMHO. I wish there were more resources like this.

Although this is not considered a full book by Dostoevsky, more a novella or a longish short story.

It gets easier to memorise them, yes—but you still have to get through them all. They don't need to be active, but its pretty important for understanding to know as many words as possible. Try going through this book— https://www.amazon.com/Frequency-Dictionary-Russian-vocabulary-Dictionaries/dp/0415521424

It's modern and the sample size is large.

I learned about 10,000 in a year and a half. But I wouldn't advise that. Just work through that book for a year or two and also follow some grammar books, etc.

The one we used which is like a review of golosa but also with intermediate was В Пути (V Puti: Russian Grammar in Context, 2nd Edition https://www.amazon.com/dp/0130282804/ref=cm_sw_r_api_8rJrybJQDHW9Y). And the for advanced a common one that they use at a lot of advanced programs is this one:
Russian: From Intermediate to Advanced https://www.amazon.com/dp/0415712270/ref=cm_sw_r_api_stJrybCDW7JE

First and foremost, for me, studying is not studying at all. It is interacting with anything that I can in Russian. Talking to people online, in person, reading anything Russian online or books, traveling to Russian areas (here in New York, we have plenty) or to Russia itself. Or just listening to Russian radio or podcasts or music. Anything that I can do to immerse myself helps more than anything else.

Otherwise, I can learn vocabulary with things like Rosetta Stone or Live Mocha. And I make flashcards on my phone of all words I continually come across and find useful to know.

For grammer, I use this book series and do the exercises, usually by typing out all the various sentences and such on my iPad while on the train or just on my computer at home.

What I found to be interesting are Duolingo, memrise intermediate course(after you finish Duolingo) with Russian children's tales, and the Svetlana Le Flemig book(available through our pirate friends at a certain site, hint, hint; or amazon). These are more than enough to get started.

Also, movies and чебурашка.
Edit:link, and correction

This book helped me the most to understand grammar.



And this is the best Russian-English dictionary I've found.

You'll want to carry this around with you to learn the case endings.

Google it, then read this book.

> should be Colours/Colors are

Yay sloppy editing.

This one should be good: https://www.amazon.com/Who-Said-Meow-Maria-Polushkin/dp/0027747700/ref=sr_1_6?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1487522193&sr=1-6&keywords=suteev or https://www.amazon.com/Meow-Vladimir-Grigorievich-Suteev/dp/0823413616/ref=sr_1_7?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1487522193&sr=1-7&keywords=suteev

Just thought of something - you could always pick up an inexpensive copy of the English translation if you were very serious about this and have them side by side :)

/u/Ealantair same for you

Thank you so much! I definitely have noticed that Rosetta Stone is lacking. Most of the time I d I have been going to masterrussian.com to get help with grammar, and I ordered a this book recently, and it should be in soon. I've also have been translating passages from books printed in Russian. Unfortunately, Russian is not offered at my uni, but I'm thinking about purchasing a Russian textbook and workbook anyway.

Спасибо за ссылку. Я обязательно это проверю. Думаю, надо было быть более конкретным. Я читал книгу, которая учит своих читателей, как строить математические доказательства. В книге дается очень общий обзор этих тем, которые я перечислил выше. Я проверю ссылку, но если вы знаете книгу на русском языке, которая учит строить математические доказательства студентам, которые начинают изучать продвинутую математику, напишите Мне пожалуйсте.

Вот книга Для справки. (в случае, если вы знаете английского языка).
How to Prove it - A structured approach

Essential Russian Grammar

Soviet Russian Ak 47 Tactical Patch Kalashnikov Shell Rifle Gun Assault Army Battle Patch Funny Russia Girl With Ak-47 Military Morale Embroidered Patches Badge (AK-47_0) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07QG7BT4W/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_sykUDb0Z256GQ

Amazon