Tim Ferriss Quotes

There is a certain age at which a child looks at you in all earnestness and delivers a long, pleased speech in all the true inflections of spoken English, but with not one recognizable syllable. There is no way you can tell the child that if language had been a melody, he had mastered it and done well, but that since it was in fact a sense, he had botched it utterly.

It's important to me to work in my own language now and then. I love English, but you can never learn to master a foreign language if you're not brought up with it.

What's always a challenge for me is that my Spanish is not the level of my English. Nor do I read in Spanish the way I read in English.

I had a quick ear and could pick up languages.

When I was in Mexico and started to dream in Spanish, I knew that was a good sign that I was learning the language. It was cool.

I've been working in three-four languages. I'm happy to do it.

There is a way in which all writing is connected. In a second language, for example, a workshop can liberate the students' use of the vocabulary they're acquiring.

If I had mastered the Spanish language to any extent, I might have gone in that direction.

I have been challenged with the fictional languages I have to learn. I wasn't terrible at languages at school - I got an A in French, so I did well enough - but I didn't enjoy them. I'm not even sure if that plays into how well you learn a fictional language!

If you have the language gift, you can use it as a tool.

It is much easier to learn another language when you are young, enthusiastic and unembarrassed.

Obviously no language is innate. Take any kid from any race, bring them up in any culture and they will learn the language equally quickly. So no particular language is in the genes. But what might be in the genes is the ability to acquire language.

It is no secret that the fruits of language study are in no sort of relation to the labour spent on teaching and learning them.

I never had to learn English, French and German because I was brought up as all three languages. I had a private French teacher before I even went to school. That helped a lot.

Henceforth, language studies were no longer directed merely towards correcting grammar.

When I came back from Bolivia, my Spanish was in some ways as good as my English. I am rusty today. But I am comfortable talking in Spanish. I am not flawless or fluent, but I am comfortable. It takes me a day or two speaking a lot of Spanish to get back into a rhythm.

I sing in Hungarian. I read Hungarian. I do not pretend to speak Hungarian, but I sing in languages that I have studied as languages. And I find that to be central and very, very helpful. I think if you're not really cognizant of what every single word means, I think that might be a little tricky.

The only language men ever speak perfectly is the one they learn in babyhood, when no one can teach them anything!

When I last went to Italy, over two years ago, I had a lot more trouble understanding the language than I used to when I lived there for a year. I used to speak very little but I could understand very well.

The child, merely by going on with his life, learns to speak the language belonging to his race. It is like a mental chemistry that takes place in the child.

English, for me, is an acquired language. I started with English at the age of 10. At the time, it was my third language.

All the kids are learning different languages. I asked them what languages they wanted to learn, and Shi is learning Khmai, which is a Cambodian language; Pax is focusing on Vietnamese, Mad has taken to German and Russian, Z is speaking French, Vivienne really wanted to learn Arabic, and Knox is learning sign language.

I learned Romanian very late, when I was fifteen, in town, and I wanted to learn it. I like the language very much.

It is not easy, but young people have to learn languages.

I just can't stop doing Telugu films just when I have started speaking a little better Telugu.