As some of you know, one of the languages I want to improve in the next months is Polish. When I was in Poland five years ago, I bought a bilingual dictionary published by PWN. However, it is not even enough to read an abrieged book of less than 10 pages because some of the words used are missing.
I would like to buy a better dictionary. While I am almost sure there is no Pole learning Italian here who could have a good dictionary to advise, maybe someone from Poland could have a look at a bookshop and let me know.
I have found a “Podręczny słownik polsko-włoski” in 2 volumes (1000 pages each and 48,000 entries) and “Podręczny słownik włosko-polski” (again 2 volumes, 47,000 entries).
The cost of the four volumes is around 81 dollars.
I have also found a bigger dictionary in 4 volumes with 350,000 entries (!), “Wielki słownik włosko-polski”, but the problem is that it’s only Italian-Polish, while the Polish-Italian part, which is the one I most need now, is not available (yet?). This 4-volume one-way dictionary costs 159 dollars!
I don’t want to buy another bad dictionary like the one I have, so I would welcome any feedback, reviews and suggestions.
Thanks,
Michele
Michele,
I’ll help you and investigate the topic. Unfortunately, I don’t have a Polish-Italian, Italian-Polish dictionary at home (I think), but I’ll have look at the most popular bookshops and let you know what I think about dictionaries that are currently available.
As you may have already realised, you shouldn’t expect much of dictionaries labelled “podręczny”, as it usually means they have only the most common words and it’s usually not much for a serious language learner! But “Wielki słownik…” edited by PWN should be all right. I’ll have a look at it and let you know.
It should be “published by PWN”, not “edited”. I hesitated a bit about the right word.
Dziękuję bardzo, Piotrze! By the way, I didn’t mention the publisher of the dictionaries I found, which is Wiedza Powszechna, not PWN.
If no good Polish-Italian-Polish dictionary is available, I think I will have to opt for an English-based one. Any advice?
OK, I see. But I think that actually both of these publishing houses are trustworthy. I e-mailed WP and asked them whether Polish-Italian part is ever going to be published and in the meantime I’ve also found out that there is a “Słownik włosko-polski, polsko-włoski” published by PWN in 2009. It’s not the one you already have, is it? It has 80,000 entries (I always wonder at this point: does it mean 40,000 entries in each part?) and I believe it should be of good quality. Next time I’m in bookshop I will have a look and let you know.
Powodzenia w nauce polskiego!
Dziękuję bardzo! 