People whose first language is not english --- Do you prefer to read novel in your first language or not?

[Puck]

I read german comics in german and everything else in english,
the same like with movies

[surenlicious]

Hell no. I will take English over Dutch any day, any time. XD

[Crusoe]

I prefer reading in english, because the linguistic possibilities for it are just broader than those in my native language. Dutch generally only has one or two words to express something whereas English has more possibilities.

[Llyrel]

I'm a lazy butt and I prefer to read novels translated in my language... unless:

a. The translation is so bad that I can't stand looking at it (as was the case for David Gaider's Dragon Age books: I swear the translator had no effin' idea how to use verbs).
b. The books are unavailable in my own language (like Michael Moorcock's books: the only Italian translation dated all the way back to the 70s and the books were impossible to find anywhere, so I ended up getting myself the e-books in English... and then, of course, Murphy's Law hit me and six months later we got an all new Italian translation of the entire saga <3).

Other than that... gimme the Italian version, plz

[Macarenaoftime]

The novels I usually read are in Spanish, the English works I usually read are here on tapas.
I would like to try to read classic novels in English but I don't know where would be a good place to start since my vocabulary it's pretty small. So if you have any suggestions on what novels to read in English, I'll be very pleased!

[PapaDom]

I usually prefer English works over german ones. But then again, I don't read that many books, to begin with.
But then again I'm not too picky as long as the ones I can read are available in a language I can understand.

[cookieroach]

I prefer the original language if I can read it, otherwise I prefer english translations over my native language. It's often better in my experience, and if there's a lot of specialized vocabulary english is almost always easier to understand.

With that said, I still love my native language and sometimes wish I could use it for my comic. I think every language has some words and concepts that just aren't the same when you try to translate them.

[Jophiel]

English all the way. I don't know man, I feel uncomfortable at anime dubs made in our language AND novels here that are written in our own language have either the same effect of me as dubs OR it's because they're written purely in Tagalog.

Just for reference;; Filipino has 26/28 letters of the alphabet while Tagalog has 20 only. Filipino is more or less derived from other languages like English, Spanish, etc so it's kinda like speaking two languages sometimes if that makes sense. And I feel like Filipino is too casual at many times so I won't read say...Bleach or Naruto in that tone and Tagalog is too serious imo.

[Eiranyx]

it depends on the genre actually, hahahaha although I don't really mind if it was originally written in my language but, when it's a mature romance-heavy themes written in Tagalog/Filipino, some sentences sounds so wrong when you translate it back into english and if there are mature scenes involved it can sound a bit idk... too vulgar(?)
also we have a lot of loan words so sometimes, some literary piece requires a nice grasp of vocabulary to understand ^^

[AmandaJ-art]

I dislike reading books in Latvian. Even though it's my first language I feel like I can't read without getting caught on words. It's easier to read in English.

There's a bigger library for books in English as well.

[lomcia]

I prefer in my language but if you want to find more readers you need to translate it into english T_T

[mlocik97]

Language doesn't matter too much for me.. but I would say, I read more English than Slovak or Czech books. I think, English is better for storytelling than Slovak. So if,.. I prefer Czech or English books even when I'm from Slovakia... btw... CZ and SK is nearly same lang, differences are like between US and UK English, I still don't understand why it is classified as two languages.

[DasIstWunderblyat]

I don't really care.

Yet I admit translation from English to my native language sometimes is a miss and make it either stiff or awkward.

[domisotto]

I have been living, reading and writing in English for over 20 years, so I prefer everything in English. Though I credit my adolescent love for Shakespeare to reading all the plays in awesome translations, because English version is pretty much incomprehensible to me even in a movie format. We tried to watch the famous version of Hamlet by some reason in Victorian costuming and I didn’t last long.

[sushy00]

I read comics in both English and my native language (Dutch).
For novels I find it difficult to read big chunks of English text, so for novels I would prefer my native language.

[Kann]

Depends on how tired I am. xD

[haitchu]

It depends how hard words the novel contains. If there are constantly difficult words and I can't figure out their meaning from the context, I get annoyed. I should be relaxing, not studying! With comics it easier, since I can look up the meaning from the pictures, unless it's something too difficult again.
Some mangas include translator's notes which explain some cultural things seen in the story. I think that should be used in novels too!

[2_YuiAkane_2]

Personally, even when I was in my home country (Italy) I've pushed myself into reading in English, so I would say that I still prefer to read in English in general.

I feel like the words that I read has a deeper meaning and I don't know, makes more sense?

[N1rdaw6]

(post withdrawn by author, will be automatically deleted in 24 hours unless flagged)

[WeighingSwing35]

I prefer reading in English. Filipino, though, I was born with it, is sometimes too wordy.