Essential Dutch Grammar: All The Grammar Really Needed For Speech And Comprehension (Dover Language Guides Essential Grammar)

If you are interested in learning to read or write Dutch, this book is a fantastic tool. It is slim, yet packed with valuable information, all very well organized. The book focuses on the essentials, and the reader is led towards the goal of grasping the basic structure and formulation of the Dutch sentence. No time is wasted on minutiae; instead the author concentrates on the essence, hence the title. Dutch is very much a combination of German vocabulary and English grammatical structure. This makes it relatively easy for the English reader to master the fundamentals of Dutch sentence construction. It does help to have a working knowledge of German, in order to follow the example sentences Stern serves up to illustrate his points. I have been studying Dutch for only two months, and with Stern's help, I am now able to compose short, simple sentences in Dutch, so you can see why I recommend this book highly. Language is not easy to learn, and the more complicated the instructional material, the harder in many ways it is to learn the new language. Stern avoids this trap of trying to teach you everything. Had he gone the other way, the book would have been three times as long, and ten times as difficult to master. Its two greatest virtues are the organized manner of Stern's presentation, and the way in which only the essential points of the language are explored. If you intend to master Dutch, especially reading and writing Dutch, this book will get you off to a great start. I have studied a number of languages, and a number of language books. This is one of the most approachable.

This very concise book is more than adequate to complement an A0-A2 taught course. It is clearly written and easy to understand. The descriptions of the parts of speech are written in layman's terms. You don't need to be academically inclined to use this book. The example sentences are very helpful to get a feel for sentence construction. They are given in Dutch and English. There are also some useful phrases and colloquialisms. I did ask my Dutch colleague about some of the 'mistakes'. None of them were grave enough that I could not get my point across. Many were not strictly incorrect, just awkwardly worded. I do wish that there was more information on Dutch grammatical terms in the book. Everything is described and named in English. In my A0-A2 course book everything is labeled and described in Dutch. It took a fair bit of effort to ensure that I was studying the correct part of speech or verb tense. This is not for formal writing, nor is it for academic writing. My Dutch teacher first suggested NOT getting a grammar book, but saw how practical this was and the impact it made on my conversation skills.

I have been teaching myself Dutch in order to correspond and communicate with friends. I refer to this book almost every day. It is concise, well-organized, and helpful. It is definitely a reference, not a practice tool, and as such it is not the ONLY resource you need, but as a reference I have absolutely no complaints. I would have liked just a few more examples with idiomatic constructions, but all in all, extremely helpful.

Great Book. Would be nice if it had more to offer.

The author is very blunt about this not being comprehensive manual, but it will prove more than sufficient for most of its readers. The book is concise and gives excellent clear examples. Stern is particularly good at comparing English and Dutch equivalents in phrases and tendencies. I need to build up a strong reading knowledge for research and grammar books can be difficult to use by themselves. For grad students, this book goes nicely with duolingo or other internet language options. I keep a notebook and treat duolingo as a guiding lecture service and proceed to use the book for background knowledge and context. I have been building vocabulary on my own, but using a theme-based vocabulary book would make the three services a cost-effective and simple way to learn Dutch at your own pace

I took one semester of Dutch at the college level and I thought I had hardly gotten anywhere, but I learned more than is in this book. This book is lacking on details where it wouldn't take too long to provide them. For example, the book mentions there are several diminutive endings for Dutch nouns and provides a few examples. But it doesn't bother to explain when to use the different types of endings, which is important to know and would not take long to explain. Thus, it is useless to know in the first place that there are different endings if you don't know when to use each one. This book does not explain the essentials as it claims. If you know hardly anything, it's a nice un-intimidating starting point, but if you are looking for something more detailed or technical, get Dutch: A Comprehensive Grammar (Comprehensive Grammars) . I wish I hadn't spent the $7 I did on this book and had gotten Donaldson's in the first place.

Brief book that covers the grammar I need as a beginning Dutch learner. It has been helpful for me as I review grammar I have learned on Babbel plus more. Explanations are clear. It is not a workbook. For exercises, you will need another source. I am not sure if it is up to date on current usage given publication date, but has been quite useful for me.

A very basic and simple, easy to use Dutch grammar book. Goes along well with students learning on apps like Duolingo, that don't teach explicit grammar rules. Gives you just what you really need.