Essential French Grammar: All the Grammar Really Needed for Speech and Comprehension

By Seymour Resnick

Book Overview

This is the first French grammar designed specifically for adults with limited learning time who wish to acquire a knowledge of simple, everyday spoken French, and who have no need of all the archaic, highly literary, and seldom used forms that must be covered in a conventional grammar. It is not a simplified study, but a selective grammar that points out many time-saving short cuts. Constantly drawing comparisons with English construction, it covers all of the important points in French grammar (verb forms and tenses, parts of speech, negative sentences, possessives, partitive construction, etc.) fully and logically, and with refreshing clarity. It was created for those who prefer the phrase approach, and all grammatical points are illustrated with phrases and sentences that you can incorporate directly into your working vocabulary. Many of the discussions include a list of common expressions that use the rule under study. In addition to the grammar text itself, there are several unusual features of great value to anyone who wants to build a French vocabulary: a section on common word-endings and their French equivalents, for example, and a 50-page lit of French-English cognates. This grammar does not assume any previous knowledge either of grammatical terms or of French grammar. English grammatical terms are explained in a separate section and all discussion begins with essentials and works up from there. Use it as an introduction to grammar, for independent class courses, with phrase courses, as a refresher, or for beginning self-study.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0486204197
• ISBN13: 9780486204192
• Release Date: June 1961
• Publisher: Dover Publications, Incorporated
• Length: 160 Pages
• Weight: 0.35 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.3" x 5.4" x 8.0"

Customer Reviews

Just want to mention that...

for starters this book is great and adequate enough. But several important components of french grammar are missing from this book. Thus if you are somewhere around intermediate level, go buy a more advanced french grammar reference book. This skimmed version is for starters who have no previous knowledge of french, and want to have a general grasp of the language. Otherwise you are going to waste your money.

Essential for Self Study

I recently spent two weeks taking an immersion course in French - in France. As a complete beginner to the language the classes were difficult at best since they were taught exclusively in French! While this method may be best for learning vocabulary, pronunciation and general speaking methods its not so good for grammar! I spent my evenings reading this book and it completely filled in the gaps about grammar rules, etc. In fact I highly recommend this book at a necessary supplement to any self study approach.

Know Your French Phrases First . . .

"The purpose of this book is to enable you to achieve greater fluency with the phrase approach, not to teach you to construct sentences from rules and vocabulary," says Professor Seymour Resnick, in the Introduction of "Essential French Grammar." He goes on to say that his book is not supposed to be used as a primary text for a university course but for adult self-study. First, read the entire book--it is short but pithy. After this quick overview, one will be familiar with the areas in which one needs to concentrate. This little grammar book is designed to help one speak French better: "On apprend à parler en parlant." (One learns to speak by speaking.) Yes, one does make mistakes, especially with verbs and verb tenses, but with practice one can improve."Essential Grammar" is such a handy little book. It reviews all the parts of speech with practical examples of usage. There are sections on vocabulary-building techniques and tips on how to build a specialized vocabulary based on one's immediate needs, such as travel or business communication. There is a list of 2,500 cognates (the most often used words that share French and English forms); the author recommends several methods for easy memorization of these words. The book concludes with a glossary and index.Highly recommended as an aide to learning or reviewing French grammar and vocabulary!

extremely concise, great examples. fantastic!

Wow! I just finished reading this. I've never seen a french book this good. The first 80 pages go into all the different parts of speech (nouns, adjectives, verbs, adverbs, pronouns, etc), and explains how they're formed and used. States the rule, states the exceptions, gives two or three examples, and then moves on to the next thing. The next fifty pages are lists of idioms and cognates. I get so tired of language books that teach you things in drips and drabs with lots of exercises and dialogs, and this is perfect, because all it does is teach you french grammer as fast as it can. I wish I had found this long ago.

Gives a solid basis for further study in French

I really enjoyed studying from this book. It gives a good solid foundation for first-time learners of French. The book is easy to understand and split up into small chapters. I would really recommend this book to anyone interested in learning French.