This is an all-round and accessible description of the Russian language and its historical, social, cultural context. It includes extracts representing the best of the language, by renowned writers such as Pushkin, Gogol', Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, Chekhov, Bulgakov, Mandel'shtam, and Kharms.

Setting language learning in an entertaining, real, and enlightening real life framework, the book reveals what most readers want to know about Russian (but are usually too afraid to ask). Learn Russian will not teach you how to buy an ice-cream or ask directions to the Kremlin, but it will give you...

"What's in a Russian Word" works its way from a presentation of the sound structure of Russian, through an examination of the spelling system, the interface between sounds and forms, and the issue of the Church Slavonic and East Slavonic components of the Russian language, to an exploration of over sixty word families. The book should help one to make connections both between Russian words and those in numerous other European languages and between extensive groups of Russian words themselves, greatly facilitating learners at various stages in their acquisition of vocabulary and their...