I got started on Italian in 2009 with an intensive 6 months to learn the basics. In the latter part of that period I had started to read my first book, which was really challenging, and took me about 3 months to complete. It was probably the single biggest breakthrough for me in Italian. The second book took 23 days.

A couple of months later I was out of books and ready to order more. As a complete joke I also ordered books by Umberto Eco (from 1980), Niccolò Machiavelli (1513) and Dante Alighieri (1304), thinking "there's no way I'll actually be able to read those". But I was curious as to how hard it would be.

Within 18 months I had read Eco, within 24 I had read Machiavelli and only Dante was left.

He's a tough nut to crack, but I've cracked it. I mostly understand him now linguistically, and I know that with more work I could get almost all the way there. It's not very rewarding reading, because even once you follow the language you still have to understand the countless references to historical persons and other works. And it's poetry (which I don't care for and never read), where every word is far more crucial than in prose. I'm satisfied, I'm not going to be a Dante scholar.

This is good news for us language students. At some point I was starting to doubt whether I could do it. Obviously not that it could be done, but that I could get there with my ability to motivate myself and do it within the limit of things that seem worth doing.

I think it's pretty mind blowing that in 2.5 years you can start from zero and cover the entire 700 year history of a language to be able to read anything in that period. When I compare that to my 3 years of high school French having achieved maybe A2 I feel very silly.

It's a clear demonstration of the difference between thinking for yourself and someone thinking for you. When you study on your own you don't know where to start and you get stuck sometimes. While this doesn't seem like a good thing, it is. Because you learn to overcome these obstacles by the power of your own cognitive skills. You try different approaches, you ask for advice. It's up to you - there is no program you can just follow blindly. And as you learn, you grow.

Some highlights

• August 2009: Inception. Didn't have much faith in this project, but I felt inspired to try after a vacation in Italy/France.
• 2009: Intensive language study with a textbook, doing tons of exercises and working to crack the grammar.
• Early 2010: Took various online tests to measure my level. Tested B2/C1 across the various categories. Progress and expectation on different planets.
• 2010: Made reading my main learning method.
• Summer of 2010: a 3 week tour of southern Italy to many areas where people simply don't speak English. You either speak Italian or you have to rely on hand gestures. No safety net.
• 2011: Wrote an Italian course for beginners exactly the way that I would have wished a course to be. It was huge fun putting this together. It was also a good exercise, because to explain something well you first have to understand it clearly.
• Early 2012: Completed my Italian 20th century reading project. Read 15,000 pages of Italian up to this point.
• Early 2012: Started a writing regimen where I try to post a daily entry. Stats so far:
  - 11 in Italian
  - 4 in Dutch
  - 1 in French
  - 1 in Spanish

A man enters a department store.

- Hello, I'd like to pick up some moisturiser.

- Certainly, what color would you like?

- I umh... sorry, I don't follow. Do you mean what color would I like my skin to be after using it?

- No no no, what color would you like the moisturizer itself to be?

- I guess I haven't given it much thought. I suppose any color will do, as long as it doesn't disturb the color of my skin. I rather like having all my skin be the same color.

- Oh rest assured, it doesn't, perfectly safe to use.

- Great, so can you give it to me?

- Actually that's not how we do things around here. I will give you this order form and you'll have to go pick it up.

- Whereabouts?

- On the fifth floor, take the elevator.

- Great, thanks.

The man exist the elevator.

- Hi, I have this order form, I need to pick up some moisturizer.

- I'm afraid you're on the wrong floor, that's one floor down.

- Isn't this the fifth?

- It's the sixth.

- But I took the elevator and I pressed +5.

- And where did you start off?

- On the ground floor.

- Oh, that's a common mistake. There is no ground floor.

- Okay, the one at street level.

- That's the first floor.

- Isn't it called the ground floor?

- Why would it be? It's the first floor above the ground, so it's the first floor.

- But some people call that the ground floor.

- Look, have you ever counted thermometers?

- Why thermometers?

- Nevermind, just answer the question.

- I have.

- And how many did you have in all?

- Three.

- And which one was the ground thermometer?

- So one floor down?

- One floor down.

The man exits the elevator anew.

- Is this the fifth floor?

- The fourth.

- But but. I was just on the sixth and I pressed -1.

- I guess you must have been on the fifth then.

- But the guy up there told me it was the fifth.

- Maybe he miscounted.

- That's what I said! Anyway, so how do I get to the fifth?

- +1.

- Thanks.

The man exits the elevator on a new floor.

- Is this the fifth floor?

- The sixth.

- What?? But I've been to the sixth already and the guy that was there is not you, this can't be sixth.

- Oh, that doesn't necessarily mean anything. The staff here rotate frequently, he could be on break.

- Okay look, I was just on the fourth and I pressed +1.

- You know, some elevators only run in two floor increments.

- But there's only one elevator.

- It looks that way, but actually there are several.

- But how can that be? They would collide with each other.

- Oh, they don't run on the same line. It's just that you can't tell from inside the elevator, because they built it in such a way as to model the traditional upwards and downwards sensation of movement so people wouldn't freak out.

- But if I pressed +1 shouldn't it go one floor up?

- The number is multiplied by the increment, so if it's one of those that only move in two floor increments, you'd be going 2 up.

- So how do I know what the increment is in the elevator that I'm in?

- Oh, that's a bug. They were supposed to have a panel to display that, but by the time it was built they noticed they forgot it.

- So how can you ever be sure which floor you're on?

- You develop a certain sixth sense when you work here.

- And if you don't work here?

- Well, you can always ask us.

- Okay, so how do I get to the fifth?

- Here's a tip. If you're in the by-two-floors elevator you can just type in -0.5. And if it turns out to be the one that moves in single floor increments, it will round up to -1 anyway.

The man exits the elevator yet again.

- You again! But you're the guy I spoke to originally, the guy who gave me this form!

- Welcome back.

- But I was just on the sixth floor, I typed in -0.5 to get to the fifth to pick up my blasted moisturizer and I come down all the way here!

- That's a simple misunderstanding. You see, some elevators don't work in increments, they work in absolute values.

- So.. wait, if that's the case and I typed in -0.5 then it should round up to -1.

- No, it rounds up to 0. Otherwise it would be rounding down.

- So what floor is this?

- The zeroth.

- Ma, where are we?

- In the desert.

- Why is there nothing here?

- Because we're in the desert. Nothing ever happens in the desert.

Welcome, reader, to a new segment in which I leave behind my customary essay-like writing and dip my toes in a genre I've never written, namely fiction. The theme is: the desert. It means an empty stage, it means a blank slate, it means sand (in your shoes).

I was able to reach an intermediate level in Italian after 6 months of study, which was very satisfying. But then the question was what to do next and I didn't have much of a plan. I had read a couple of books by then and enjoyed the experience, but they were spy novels, because that was easy for me to read.

20th century track

It was around this time I was in the library one day and I stumbled upon Introduction to Twentieth Century Italian Literature by Robert Gordon. It hadn't been my goal in learning Italian to use it for literature, but here was a very practical guide that gives you a great overview of the most important works. I recommend the book; it has a thematic presentation so if you want to read about war, there's a chapter on books about that, if you want gender issues there's one for that etc.

Inspired, I read Gordon's guide making a note of every book that seemed interesting. It was clear that it was going to take quite a while to read all those books, but I wasn't in a hurry. And I thought what better way to learn about the Italian identity while simultaneously expanding my knowledge of the language.

It turned out to be a worthwhile pursuit, both culturally and linguistically. These books basically cover the 20th century canon (if it isn't too early to use a big word like that). I've added a couple of my own, but for the most part they are from the guide.

Reading all these books is well and good, but how would I know if it's "working"? Well, for one thing, reading books by many different authors, on various topics, and from different periods, ought to make it plain that I have certain blind spots if I have them.

Historical track

But I wanted to raise the bar and read some older works too, going right back to Dante, basically the gold standard of Italian literature. This would truly validate my strategy and answer the question of whether the 20th century reading was teaching me enough. It would also make my reading more well rounded.

My selection here is less deliberate, because I didn't research the topic as much. I suppose I could do the same here, starting with the well known Storia della letteratura italiana by Francesco De Sanctis to get an overview of what there is to read and then make a selection. But since I'm more motivated by language than literature I was more curious to see how far back in time I could go and still read the books and I'm fairly satisfied with what I've covered. Besides, much of the influential early literature in Italian is poetry (eg. Petrarca), and I don't particularly care for that.

Conclusions

So there you have it, a successful strategy and a nice way to spend the time. It took me about two years and while not every book was a hit, doing a broad survey like this put me onto many authors I would otherwise have dismissed because they didn't seem like my thing. And if you are picking from a guide like this, even blindly, you can be reasonably confident that a certain amount of effort went into producing it, so you're unlikely to encounter complete garbage.

It's been another prolific year in page turning. I've decided to scrap the idea of doing a long list like last year, it's too dull. Instead I'm doing a brief review.

The best of the best (of the best)

The credit goes to the indomitable Steve Yegge for making a strong recommendation for it. And boy did it check out.

Gödel, Escher, Bach ~ Douglas Hofstadter

GED is simply the most important book I've ever read. Hofstadter sets out to do one thing and do it well, namely to give a description of how consciousness works, or could work. He does this by way of countless enticing analogies across different fields, chiefly mathematics, art, music, computer science and genetics. It's a challenging book and a very rewarding one. In order to get through it profitably I had to put myself on a relatively intense schedule to make sure I had enough context in mind at all times.

The better books

Looking back over the year there are quite a few that deserve a mention here.

Culture

Apocalittici e integrati ~ Umberto Eco

Economics

SuperFreakonomics ~ Steven Levitt

Literature

	Due di due ~ Andrea Di Carlo
	Il fu Mattia Pascal ~ Luigi Pirandello
	Il nome della rosa ~ Umberto Eco

Philosophy

	A History of Western Philosophy ~ Bertrand Russell
	Man is the Measure ~ Reuben Abel
	Religion and Science ~ Bertrand Russell
	The Moral Landscape ~ Sam Harris
	Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance ~ Robert Pirsig

Purely for fun

	Kruistocht in spijkerbroek ~ Thea Beckman
	The Broker ~ John Grisham
	The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy ~ Douglas Adams

Socio-political

	Cose di Cosa Nostra ~ Giovanni Falcone
	La baia dei pirati ~ Luca Neri
	Lettera a una professoressa ~ Lorenzo Milani
	Se questo è un uomo ~ Primo Levi
	Todo modo ~ Leonardo Sciascia

Less compelling, but worth a look

Literature

	Il conformista ~ Alberto Moravia
	L'avventura di un povero cristiano ~ Ignazio Silone
	Le cosmicomiche ~ Italo Calvino

Philosophy

	Le Rire ~ Henri Bergson
	The Problems of Philosophy ~ Bertrand Russell

Purely for fun

Le Petit Prince ~ Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

Science

A Short History Of Nearly Everything ~ Bill Bryson

Socio-political

	Morte dell'inquisitore ~ Leonardo Sciascia
	Vaticano S.p.A. ~ Gianluigi Nuzzi

Classics that work

A special mention for Il principe which is quite fascinating, both for the time it was written, the frankness of the analysis and the efficacy of its insights.

	A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man ~ James Joyce
	I promessi sposi ~ Alessandro Manzoni
	Il principe ~ Niccolò Machiavelli
	Le comte de Monte Cristo ~ Alexandre Dumas
	Les Trois Mousquetaires ~ Alexandre Dumas
	The Picture of Dorian Gray ~ Oscar Wilde

Classics that don't check out

For every batch of classics there are those that just aren't particularly worth reading. Either because they are too boring (Kafka), the characters are so annoying that you never begin to care what happens to them (Karamazov), because the language is abstruse to the point of being near impenetrable (Nietzsche), because the reasoning is so dated it bears little relevance to present times (Descartes), because the events are so remote they are of little interest today (Discorsi), or because the author is simply a dullard narcissist (Thoreau).

	Beyond Good and Evil ~ Friedrich Nietzsche
	Discorsi sulla prima deca di Tito Livio ~ Niccolò Machiavelli
	Il piacere ~ Gabriele d'Annunzio
	Méditations métaphysiques ~ René Descartes
	The Brothers Karamazov ~ Fyodor Dostoyevsky
	The Castle ~ Franz Kafka
	Thus Spoke Zarathustra ~ Friedrich Nietzsche
	Walden ~ Henry David Thoreau

Žižek

Žižek is fascinating and great fun to read, although he tends to recycle his jokes and analogies quite a bit. This year I set out to read all his of books that I could find in Dutch.

	Actuele filosofie ~ Alain Badiou
	Conversations with Žižek ~ Slavoj Žižek
	Intolerantie ~ Slavoj Žižek
	Violence ~ Slavoj Žižek
	Welcome to the Desert of the Real ~ Slavoj Žižek

Scoreboard

It's been a good year for Italian. And for Dutch. But I so rarely find anything worth reading in the Scandinavian languages, which is a bit of a shame. I'm about ready now to wind down with Italian next year, and have more time for Dutch and French.

As last year I managed to introduce some new languages.

1		*afrikaans
33		english
1		*español
16		*français
44		italiano
28		nederlands
3		polski
2		svenska
128		Total

* debut in 2011