Beginning Polish: Revised edition, Volume 1 (Yale Language Series)

Not wanting to give up, I contacted the Yale Center for Language Study which, according to the book, has a set of tapes you can obtain. After a long and drawn out request that took a month (and maybe would have even taken longer if it hadn't been for a friend in Yale who physically went up to the center to get the tapes and post it for me) I listened to the tapes and found they were actually drills to Volume II (the classroon drill book). Which meant they were useful but not as useful as I had hoped.

I think this book, if you stuck with it, maybe could be a brillant course. I'm going to try it some more. The fact that it has no pictures and is not 'fun' makes it less appealing for me than other self study courses. After surveying a bunch, I think the Pimsleur tapes - expensive as they are - were the best in getting me started.


The best out there!   August 17, 2000
Timothy Benson (USA)
53 out of 54 found this review helpful

This is without a doubt the most useful and versatile Polish language instruction book I have found. It's not the colorful, cartoon-filled textbook you might remember from high-school or college French class; rather, it's organized in a way that makes it wonderful for independent study for anybody beginning Polish.

Each chapter begins with a large number of mini-dialogues one sentence in length. For example, "Co to jest? To jest pioro." Translations are included with each example, of course. The earlier chapters then proceed with sections describing spelling and phonological rules of the Polish language. Following that is my personal favorite section, grammar! Grammar is explained in a way that may perhaps be a little unclear in the beginning, but as your familiarity with the language improves, it WILL become clear quickly.

Nearly every topic you could want to learn about is covered by Mr. Schenker in this book, including noun and pronoun usage, verb inflection, verbal particles, prepositions, dependent clauses, conditional phrases, and so on. I don't think I would be exaggerating to say that you could pick up this book with no knowledge of Polish whatsoever, and with a reasonable effort become quite capable of conversing, reading, and writing in Polish.

Whether you're looking for a starting point or have studied some and want to improve, this is an invaluable resource.


Wonderful book   June 21, 2000
32 out of 33 found this review helpful

i have purchased several other books from amazon in order to learn polish in addition to the few that i have picked up on ebay. most of them have been helpful to an extent but NOTHING has come close to helping as much as this book. after reading the other person's review, i purchased this and everything that was mentioned was completely correct. you will learn a tremendous amount in a very short amount of time when studying this book. there are exercises that will test your knowledge and will benefit you greatly. 1000 people could purchase this book and have a money back refund and none would send it back. this book is invaluable. don't spend your money on 12 dollar books because you think it's a better value. just drop the 30 dollars and this is the only book you'll need.


An effective tool for learning a difficult language   January 14, 1999
100 out of 101 found this review helpful

For some years I have STARTED to learn the Polish language as a mental exercise. Didn't think it would be too difficult, since I had already taught myself German and Italian and used these languages when visiting Germany and Italy: and had used my high school French and Spanish to good effect when visiting France and Mexico. So you can see that I thought of myself as a natural linguist without formal training. Wanted to learn a slavic language, but not Russian because of the cyrillic (sp?) alphabet, so settled on Polish. I started with the Hugo series. Was baffled. Went on to... shall I name them or only count them? FOUR other teach-yourself methods. I think the trick was the organisation. I'd almost given up hope when I ordered Schenker's Beginning Polish. I opened on Page 1 sometime in October 1998, and now, in January 1999 I am starting on Lesson Eight on page 117 and going to the races. Gentlemen, I raise my proverbial hat to a text which is slowly and inexorably opening the mystery of slavic language to me. The complexity and beauty of Polish are evident even at this early stage. The lessons are so subtly organised, so logically presented, that I am only held up by the need to memorize words that used to leave me baffled and upset, but which in this text gain for me an expanding picture of the interrelationships of words that have very little reference in the languages I already know. Am I making sense? Alexander Schenker in a master at putting the puzzle together in logical baby steps. The only possible problem is that the student had better read EVERY WORD of the explanations, because every word is vital. And when we study alone like this, we don't have a professor to answer questions, but the answers are there if you read carefully. My only regret is that I cannot seem to obtain Volume Two, which is no longer in print.