Fluent Forever: How to Learn Any Language Fast and Never Forget It

by Gabriel Wyner

three basic keys to language learning: 1. Learn pronunciation first. 2. Don’t translate. 3. Use spaced repetition systems.

English vocabulary is 28 percent French and 28 percent Latin. As soon as an English speaker learns proper French pronunciation, he already knows thousands of words.

avoid books systematically detailing every single solitary rule and detail and exception, all at once, in an uncontrollable torrent of grammatical despair. I used to love these books—until I tried learning from them.

frequency dictionary typically contains the most important five thousand words of your target language, arranged in order of frequency. (The number one word in English, the, shows up once every twenty-five words.)