Handwriting Thread!!

[muyongshi]

Heck unless I use two lines of paper in a word like 囊 (Even with a nice small .5 mechanical pencil) it looks like the java the hun.

[Myriam]

Heck unless I use two lines of paper in a word like 囊 (Even with a nice small .5 mechanical pencil) it looks like the java the hun.

muyongshi, maybe you should try cursive handwriting.

Thanks to cursive, one can see that the simplified script makes sense after all.

[muyongshi]

Yeah well not opposed to learning it but at the moment my teachers are opposed to me learning it

[mythia]

to yonglin

I like the song that the lyric is for.

and kudos to you non native speakers, i am really impressed by how, urm..local, your handwritings look, and very surprised to see writings in tradional characters! man, I cannot even do that...

[shibole]

That sounds scary...how militant are we talking?

Well, I draw the line short of stabbing people with them... don't worry. But they're cool. You can fill them with colors of ink you mix yourself. They don't generate lots of waste like disposable pens. And they have interesting writing characteristics like line width that varies with pressure and stuff like that.

Unfortunately I'm still too embarrassed at my poor handwriting to upload a sample. My wife says it looks like something she would write in elementary school no matter how carefully and neatly I write.

[adrianlondon]

no matter how carefully and neatly I write

That's also the comments/problem I have with my writing. In fact, the neater I write it, the more childish it looks. This is why you need to learn cursive writing if you want to write a bit more like an adult.

It would be like writing English really slowly, with all the letters perfectly formed and none of them joining up. Again, it would look like a (neat, studious) child's writing.

As far as I'm concerned, I don't mind writing chinese characters like a child. It matches my speaking level anyway ;)

[xiaocai]

I feel people these days care less and less about handwriting than they did, say, 20 years ago (when I was in kindergarten). Two of my cousins have atrocious handwriting, but seem to deal with their studies in high schools quite OK. So I guess that it is fine if you don't write in cursive or any of the calligraphic styles to write "natively". However, if you do wish to write in a neat but less "childish" way, there are some books for practice out there which can be used as both guide books and quick references, and I still remember I used this back in secondary school. Of course it is not for everyone and if you don't like his style, there are many others to choose from. Just drop into a bookshop and you might find the right one you need.

[shibole]

That book looks like it teaches fountain pen writing similar to this English book that I've been using occasionally:

http://www.amazon.com/Learn-Write-Chinese-Characters-Language/dp/0300057717/

Though no matter how well I write characters in that style my wife tells me it looks like elementary school writing, probably just because it isn't cursive-looking and my strokes aren't perfect, even if the proportions are all dead-on.

But I don't care. If kids eventually learned to write like adults then hopefully I'll be able to eventually learn to write like an adult too.

[skylee]

The OP asks members to post their handwriting. I don't see any in recent posts.

[i've posted mine on another thread.]

[shibole]

I'd post mine but I'm too embarrassed at how little Chinese I know

[m.ellison]

I have had that said of me too, that I write like a primary school pupil. It is like carefully printing each letter, when adults run all the letters together (or used to at least; these days students learn to touch type instead).

[skylee]

BUMP!

Let's revive this thread and post samples of our handwriting here. Some said on a thread discussing stroke orders that it hardly made any difference in what order a word was written. I think sometimes it is true. But let's look at the samples. Post them here.

I've posted my handwriting here -> http://www.chinese-forums.com/index.php?/topic/10633-requesting-some-handwriting-samples

[coolsteven2]

I am a beginner in Chinese ^_^.

[Hofmann]

Lots of handwriting here (They like attaching stuff. You need an account to see the attachments.)

and here.

[semantic nuance]

I am a native speaker of Chinese. The attachment is my handwriting. It's a poem from 方文山.

變心 by 方文山

在確定你離開的那一天

我打開字典

開始查什麼是厭倦

在第兩百三十七頁

斤字部

九畫的那一面

我只查到兩個字

新鮮

[xiaocai]

Just attached my handwriting below. I scribbled the first line and then tried to rewrite it in a relatively "neater" script. However, the scribble didn't flow and the supposedly neat writing is a bit like scribble...

[anonymoose]

Here's mine. This is my normal neat handwriting, in other words, not done especially for this thread. It is part of an assignment for my writing class. The teacher's comments are included for comparison

[imron]

The teacher's comments are included for comparison

What a lovely patronising comment

Attached is what passes for my handwriting. It's just the first few sentences from Wang Xiaobo's 黄金时代

[c_redman]

I've been wondering, is the everyday handwriting that native Chinese use a formally learned script, or just individually adopted shortcuts in order to write quickly? The red pen writing 2 posts up is completely indecipherable. If I learn caoshu, will I have any better chance of reading it?

[imron]

I've been wondering, is the everyday handwriting that native Chinese use a formally learned script, or just individually adopted shortcuts in order to write quickly?

A mix of both. I would recommend this book and this book if you want to get a good handle on learning to read chinese handwriting. Incidentally, the red characters read: 对汉语的知识了解不少，语句也很通顺，汉字书写也很规范，作为西方人，真不容易。You might find it helps to compare them against each other.