Learning French - Apprendre le français

With such rich comic art culture and the enormity of books originating from the Franco-Belgian part of the world, at some point in time one begins to think... maybe we should learn French.

If one were to look at the quality of art, storyline, albums and literature on the art and artists like Herge, what we see translated in English is a fraction of what actually gets created in French.

A look at Casterman's catalog is sufficient to know what we are missing out. Of course a lot of it does get translated in English, for instance Cine Book does a great job, as does Egmont.

Still some great books are only in French. For instance there is this two-volume book on how to create and draw comics based on Herge's works,

(1) tome 1 - J'Apprends a Dessiner les Personnages (Volume 1 - Learning how to Draw Characters)

(2) tome 2 - J'Apprends a Raconter une Histoire ( Volume 2 - I'm learning to Tell a Story)

Then there are some exotic editions of the Tintin albums, for instance,

Le Temple du Soleil - Nouvelle édition (The Prisoners of the Sun - New Edition)

There are some outstanding works by famed artists such as Edgar Jacobs, Jacques Martin, Roger Leloup.. just a pick from Studios Hergé alone! and there were so many from where they came from!! Many of their works are coming in to the English domain and other languages, but at one or two albums a year!

So..... there does seem enough reasons to learn French.

A few quick links to get started... with the moderate goal of being able to read French.

(Learning to speak French.... well... lets add the to our next birth's To Do list :)

http://ielanguages.com/french1.html

http://www.jump-gate.com/languages/french/index.html

A good dictionary is a must to get going. Of course one can use Google Translate. It is a fantastic tool. But... where fans of Tintin always can use an excuse to buy this dictionary..

Harrap's 'Tintin au Pays des Mots '. Though out of print, used ones can be sourced.

So lets get going then.....

le, la, un, une, les, des, Bonjour, Bonsoir, Merci !!