I've always had a fascination for words and their meaning in different languages, so when I saw this book at the airport in Perth, I had to buy it. In Other Words written by C.J.Moore and beautifully illustrated by Neil Packer, explores the world of so called untranslatable words, or at least words that have complex meaning that don't map easily to other words. Of course this is written from the English speaking point of view so it doesn't really cover some of the english words that are difficult to translate in other languages, but it definitely kept me entertained during the 5 hour flight from Perth to Sydney.

Here's a few of my favorites:

Yoko meshi [yoh-koh mesh-ee] (noun)
How Japanese define the peculiar stress of speaking a foreign language. Translates to "boiled rice horizontal" or "a meal eaten sideways".

Saudade [sow-dah-day] (noun)
A uniquely Portuguese yearning for something that doesn't and probably can't exists, not an active discontent or poignant sadness but an indolent dreaming wistfulness.

Litost [lee-tosst] (noun)
A Czech word defined by Milan Kundera as "a state of torment created by the sudden sight of one's own misery".

Razbliuto [ros-blee-oo-toe] (noun)
Only the Russians would have a word to express "the melancholie of a love lost", the feeling you have towards a person you used to love but no longer feel the same way about.

Lagom [lag-ohm] (adverb, adjective, noun)
If a single word can summarize the Swedish culture and psyche it would be Lagom which means an undefined state between extremes "not too much, not too little, but just right".

Ilunga [ee-lun-ga] (noun)
From the Tshiluba language in the Republic of Congo, describes a person that is ready to forgive any transgression a first time, to tolerate it a second time, but never a third time.

Interestingly enough, I didn't find any of the proposed words in French or Italian (both languages that I speak fluently) particularly interesting or untranslatable. Possibly because they all evoke a precise mental picture and that I would probably use different expressions when speaking english and I wouldn't necessarely try to transpose the concepts directly anyway.

Similar books in the strange and mostly untranslatable words vein include They Have a Word For It: A Lighthearted Lexicon of Untranslatable Words and Phrases by Howard Rheingold, or The Meaning of Tingo: And Other Extraordinary Words from Around the World by Adam Jacot de Boinod.

Other language books, or rather books about the languages that I would also recommend would be A Mouthful of Air by Anthony Burgess. A very interesting  exploration of language and languages by the author of A Clockwork Orange. There is another book, but while I can remember to cover perfectly, I can't possibly think of the author or title, or even the person I loaned it to... it was very interesting in that it traced the origins of simple words and how words would travel from one culture to another.