Remembering the Kanji, Volume 1: A Complete Course on How Not to Forget the Meaning and Writing of Japanese Characters

James W. Heisig

Jan 2007 · University of Hawaii Press

About this ebook

The aim of this book is to provide the student of Japanese with a simple method for correlating the writing and the meaning of Japanese characters in such a way as to make them both easy to remember. It is intended not only for the beginner, but also for the more advanced student looking for some relief from the constant frustration of how to write the kanji and some way to systematize what he or she already knows. The author begins with writing because--contrary to first impressions--it is in fact the simpler of the two. He abandons the traditional method of ordering the kanji according to their frequency of use and organizes them according to their component parts or "primitive elements." Assigning each of these parts a distinct meaning with its own distinct image, the student is led to harness the powers of "imaginative memory" to learn the various combinations that result. In addition, each kanji is given its own key word to represent the meaning, or one of the principal meanings, of that character. These key words provide the setting for a particular kanji's "story," whose protagonists are the primitive elements. In this way, students are able to complete in a few short months a task that would otherwise take years. Armed with the same skills as Chinese or Korean students, who know the meaning and writing of the kanji but not their pronunciation in Japanese, they are now in a much better position to learn to read (which is treated in a separate volume). For further information and a sample of the contents, visit http: ///www.nanzan-u.ac.jp/SHUBUNKEN/publications/miscPublications/Remembering_the_Kanji_l.htm.

Ratings and reviews

... of an electronic Japanese study book in which the Japanese text is unsearchable? Try to look up any of the Japanese, and you'll see the underlying text is ASCII gobbledygook. Cutting and pasting, for use in dictionary and flashcard apps would also be great, but it's not allowed with this format. WTF!? The content of the book is excellent, and delivering it electronically SHOULD enhance it immensely, but the way it's done here adds no value. You'd be better off buying a hardcopy, scanning it in yourself, and running an OCR.

The book is amazing and got me through the first 2200 kanjis I needed in just 3 months with around 5 to 6h of studying/day on weekdays. It's unfortunate though that it's extremely bad formatted here at google play, to the point I had to search the web for another version. There are so many formatting problems on the book I had to give it 1 star in order to draw attention of the potential buyers, DO NOT BUY IT HERE, there are absolutely NO right character on this book, which means that whenever you're faced with the necessity to look up into a word or to copy the character for creating a serious memorizing material, you'll find out crazy characters that will never match the word you're learning. So given that it's a book for learning kanji that brings none of the digital upsides, it's not worth it. (And btw, even if you copy the text, it also won't always have the right formatting for creating mem cards)

I admire the work put in but but more efforts could have been made to 1) have the Japanese word of the meaning next to the English one. Such as "I" "はたし" 2) could have drawn funny pictures or the like with it. And finally the last one. Far far to many Christian religious examples.