<p>So over the summer for Spanish we have to read a book that isn't translated into English, or at least isn't a well-known English book (ie Harry Potter). </p>
<p>I have no idea what to read. Has anybody had to do this before or have some suggestions? Thanks =].</p>
<p>The Spanish book that first pops into my head is Don Quixote de la Mancha. Read that.</p>
<p>Ficciones by Jorges Luis Borges. It's a book of creepy short stories. It's kind of like H. P. Lovecraft, only more philosophical and well-written. It's also quite difficult to understand, even in English.</p>
<p>El amor en los tiempos del c</p>
<p>Haha, thanks all (I actually wasn't expecting any answers to this random question.)</p>
<p>How hard are these? Roughly. I'm only going to be in Spanish 4 so... yeah. I'm up for a challenge though.</p>
<p>I've heard moderately difficult (but beautiful!)</p>
<p>^^ I just checked out the first one you named, it looks interesting. I'll definitely look at all of these =].</p>
<p>Ficciones is pretty hard, even in English. I'm near the middle of the first story (Tlon, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius), and it's about trying to find a civilization called Uqbar, which may or may not exist, in which Berkelian idealism is taken to the extreme (their language contains no nouns!). Ironically, it's written as if it's a non-fiction story.</p>
<p>Don Quixote uses some archaic forms of Spanish, so it's analogous to Shakespeare in English (except that it's in prose).</p>
<p>The two books by Marquez are also pretty thematically difficult, but I doubt the language will be too hard.</p>
<p>I went to our local library and they only had one poem book in English and Spanish. They had all of these books in English but not in Spanish (tear), so I'll be going to another library and when that fails, Barnes and Nobles for me! Haha. Thanks so much guys =].</p>
<p>Borges is hard! Don't do it! And Cien Anos de Soledad has lots of characters with the same name. VERY confusing even in english, but the language is pretty simple.</p>
<p>Try some stuff by Miguel de Unamuno-- San Manuel Bueno, Martir. It's a very very good novel, easy to read, and very interesting. Other stuff by him should also be good. Carmen Gaite also has some nice novels.</p>
<p>And always try poetry when in doubt. Julia de Burgos, Neruda, Sor Juan Ines, Gabriel Garcia Lorca, the like.</p>
<p>What about Isabel Allende?</p>
<p>I love Garcia Marquez, but believe that Cien Anos y Amor en el tiempo are much too difficult for you right now. When yo get the chance you should definitely read them as they are wondrous novels (As well the short stories by Gabo, they are great too).
What I do recommend is Bodas de Sangre by Frederico Garcia Lorca as we read it in Spanish 4 and it was not too difficult, but still entertaining</p>
<p>My two cents.</p>
<p>I just came across this great short story collection and MUST bring your attention to it. The stories 1) are not too complex to read and 2) give a great insight into Latin American society. I would definitely recommend this read. I also think it’s really great to support a young author like her. You can obtain her book at her website [Alicia</a> Robinson, author, ebook, por que hay silencio, stanford, pdf](<a href=“http://www.alicia-robinson.com%5DAlicia”>http://www.alicia-robinson.com)</p>
<p>Therese, how on earth did you manage to dog up my thread from four years ago?</p>
<p>Obviously this assignment is long over…</p>
<p>People bumping old threads seems more prominent now…</p>
<p>It has happened like 3 times per two days</p>
<p>I mean… I’m used to it from new posters who are using it to obviously spam (post 13…), but TR seems to like to dig up posts from years ago. I’m just curious as to how she found it at all. There’s not really any distinctive terms in the OP that one would be looking for. </p>
<p>Fwiw, 4 years later, I spent my summer LISTENING to Spanish books this summer at work bahaha.</p>