Do you read books in more than one language?

[Mr. Dalliard]

English and Japanese mainly, but I want to start reading French books.

[LessPaul]

One of the driving reasons for me buying my Nook was so I could read German language books. Paper books are prohibitivly expensive to import, a problem I don't have with ebooks. Of course with Calibre I also have dozens of German language news sites automatically transferred for easy perusal.

[Squirsier]

I am French but I mostly read in English. This started when I moved to California for a few months with my significant other, a few years back. In order for me to better speak English, we were reading English books out loud - it helped tremendously and I kept the habit of trying to read a book in its native language (I so want to try Japanese...), and since I read mostly fiction from English writing authors...

Plus, reading in English is FASTER than French - less words, less pages

[HansTWN]

I mostly read books in English, some in my native German, and some in Chinese (need to keep reading or I forget some of the characters). For other languages I find reading to tedious, since I don't know them well enough.

[AlfonsVH]

My native language is Dutch, but I read most books in English -- mainly because the digital versions of the books are easier to find in English, but also to improve my language skills.

I occasionally read books in French or German too, but only if the book was originally written in that language.

[ischeriad]

I read in German (native) and English, but mostly English at the moment. Most books I'm interested in are only available in or are originally written in English and I like to read the original if I can.
Of course, there is many literature in German I have to read for university, but that is almost always on paper.

[Sweetpea]

I primarily read in English. Somehow, I don't like most Dutch authors. They either write drama, horror or literature. And I don't like those categories (the literature is generally not entertaining but mostly depressing).

Also, I like to read in the language a book is written. And as there are hardly any non-English translated to Dutch books in electronic format, I read the English version.

[IvyRose]

I voted "to improve my language skills" since there's no multiple choice. I am a native German speaker (actually Swiss German) but read mostly English books to keep my language skills or improve them and because lots of titles are not available in German.

I also read more books in English than in German because I like English very much.

I can also read in French but not as well as in English and therefore it's much more exhausting and I usually am too lazy to read in that language.

[Katti's Cat]

Well, I am German but live in Australia. Easier to get books in English here. Although that has now changed thanks to eReader.

I prefer books in the original so read German Authors in German whenever possible.

I also try and keep in touch with the languages I learnt a lifetime ago and keep reading books in french, italian & russian. Although admittedly that is hard going for me and usually a book can last as long as a year to get through - all that dictionary checking slows me down.

[omk3]

Hmm, I see a trend here that the poll doesn't ask for specifically. People with english as their native language tend to read only english. The rest of us read whatever we can. I wonder, is it because people who speak english as their mother tongue don't learn other languages as often, or is it because more ebooks are available in english than in any other language?

[acolsandra]

I read in my native language that is Dutch and I also read in English, because more books are available in that language. But before I got my reader, I also bought English books, they were sometimes much cheaper than the translated versions.

[Jellby]

I read in my native Spanish, or in other languages I can understand, if they are the original language of the book or if it's the only/best translation available. At the moment it means I read mainly Spanish and English, in part because English is the foreign language I'm more comfortable with, and in part because the vast majority of available stuff is in English.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by omk3

Hmm, I see a trend here that the poll doesn't ask for specifically. People with english as their native language tend to read only english. The rest of us read whatever we can. I wonder, is it because people who speak english as their mother tongue don't learn other languages as often, or is it because more ebooks are available in english than in any other language?

I suspect that it's because native English speakers are notoriously poor language learners, simply because we can get away without it.

[Gaurnim]

My mother tongue is French, but I read in English and Italian for several reasons :
- availability (mostly for english books) : sometimes it's easier or quicker to find the book in english than wait for the french translation
- work : mostly for english documents now, but I used to work also in italian several years ago
- language skills (for Italian) : it's more to keep my fluency in Italian than to improve it, as I can't practice it as much as I'd like
- quality : sometimes the translations are not very well done, so it's better to read the book as it was originally written

[Luxi]

I read mostly in Spanish (native) but I try to read in English as much as I can to improve my language skills.