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The "Happy Traub" guitar book (get the one with a CD!) will teach you guitar about as fast as you can learn it. It even starts with TUNING your guitar and also provides DUETS you can play along with the CD.

Even devoting a couple of hours a day, it’s going to take a couple of weeks! "Got to pay your dues if you want to sing the blues — and you know it don’t come easy!" to quote Ringo.

There are self taught books you can buy at any music store. You can teach yourself but honestly you can’t do it fast. It takes A LOT of practice! Good luck though.

I was forced to play sax in my elementary school band and hated it. I say the Beatles on Ed Sulivan and the sax never came out of the case again. I took two beginning guitar lessons and they were a crock of nothing, I got a Mel Bay guitar book and learned some basics from it and sat in and played with guitar playing friends and picked up tips and tricks, formed an original garage band and played skating rinks and had to figure out how to play what was on the radio. I latter studied with several professional musicians and was a school teacher at that time. Quite my job, got a guitar I liked that played well and hit the road. Somehow I turned some of my poetry into songs and have since performed alongside major artists from small coffeehouses to 10,000 fans. It’s what I wanted to do and one thing led to another and I still play.

Unless you are a true mental genius, learning to play guitar is like any other skill, such as playing tennis, needlework, juggling, gymnastic stunts and the like. It will take time to get past the extreme novice stage.

I was outplaying the fellow that showed me 11 chords within two month’s time, but I believe that is not common.

Stay dedicated, motivated, and willing to move past the hurting fingertips, your first great hurdle.

As mentioned by other respondents, purchase a beginner’s guitar book having chords and basic music theory. You’ll have to learn rhythm techniques as well as not develop bad habits. Without one-on-one instruction, you will be prone to develop those habits that can hinder your progress.