Product Description

Claire Bretécher's cartoons are an essential part of French life. Funny, controversial, and very true to life, they illustrate how to speak French as the French do in this new Cartoon-strip Vocabulary Builder.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #32045 in Books
• Published on: 2000-03-30
• Original language: French
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 80 pages

Review
The real value of the book will be to language teachers who will find it an enjoyable and stimulating source of material for discussion and language work. The notes and lists provided not only take much of the grind away from preparation but also make the cartoons themselves accessible to less advanced language learners. Indeed, a major attraction of the volume for the teacher is that it offers, in written form, examples of French as it is really spoken whilst the visual component of the cartoon precludes the need for lengthy contextual explanations. As such the material might be profitably exploited by language assistants in oral work with first and second year undergraduates. (Modern Language Review )

About the Author
Was the managing editor of the Oxford-Hachette French Dictionary

Customer Reviews

A brilliant way to brush up on your French
Before buying this book, I found it very helpful to buy French comic books such as "Boule et Bill" to aid in my learning of French as it made the reading enjoyable and light-hearted, and the pictures really helped me to guess the meaning of the French text. However, I still had to have my dictionary and verb book by my side in case I came across some vocab that I did not know. This book from OUP, saves the trouble of having the dictionary and verb book as all the key phrases and verbs are on the opposite page... Great.. now I can read them on the train during my commute without having to go through the embarressment of pulling out my heavy dictionary because of my poor memory! My only disappointment is that they have not published more of these books. Please publish more... P.s. Even better would be to include a audio cassete/CD so that I can get the pronounciation correct.

Far too advanced for me
I'm not saying this is a bad product, but I found it completely incomprehensible with my basic knowledge of French (I'm not clueless but hardly fluent) and it's obviously aimed at people way beyond my skill level. I just wanted other potential buyers to realise it's intermediate at the least.
Perhaps it was the fact that it contained cartoons which threw me off track and made me assume (when purchasing) that it was quite a basic text in a fun format aimed at adults. I think it's actually aimed at people who'd be able to read a whole short story (without pictures!!) in French.
I've decided to try the Rosetta Stone software instead.

An enjoyable way to pick up vocabulary
I've enjoyed using this book. I wanted reading skills so the fact it is designed to help conversation wasn't particularly useful to me but I wanted to be able to write 'forum' French and this has helped - it has also built my vocabulary. As one reviewer says you won't be rolling on the floor with laughter but the cartoons are amusing and the areas of life they cover are ones that you need even if you have long ago said goodbye to sweet 16 or even sweet 30! Don't be fooled by the cartoon layout into thinking the vocabulary is easy - it isn't. It is sometimes quite challenging but I found that useful. There is a glossary at the back and a verb table so the book is self contained. I used it along with several other grammar books and it did all I wanted it to do. I've re-read the stories as my knowledge of French has improved and it hasn't bored me. There are no exercises.