Jump to content
Chinese-Forums
  • Sign Up

The Best book for learning to read & write!


nathanuk88

Recommended Posts

Reading & Writing Chinese, by William McNaughton, is a great book.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0804832064/qid=1092436425/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/104-9065925-5493562?v=glance&s=books

Also, Rick Harbaugh's book is great too, but is more of a dictionary.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0966075005/qid%3D1092436531/sr%3D11-1/ref%3Dsr%5F11%5F1/104-9065925-5493562

I'd start with McNaughton first.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Get the "Cheng & Tsui Chinese Character Dictionary", by Wang Huidi. It is an excellent book, similar to the McNaughton book, but in simplified characters. Also, it gives the complete stroke order information for 2000 characters, rather than 1062 as in the McNaughton book (which has 2000 characters, but only 1062 with full stroke order information). You can buy this book online. The link below should take you directly to the book's page in the catalogue. If not, go to the Cheng & Tsui site (www.cheng-tsui.com) and search for it. The price is $19.95 U.S., which is about the same as the McNaughton book.

http://www.cheng-tsui.com/sb_catalog-csm.asp?grp=PC++&item=++++++++0887273149

Best wishes,

Learner

Link to comment
Share on other sites

McNaughton's book has both traditional and simplified characters and uses Hanyu Pinyin. It's great because he teaches you to look at Chinese characters the way the Chinese do.

With the partial exception of Rita Choy's books (which I think are just ok in other regards), I haven't seen any that use the calligraphic stroke order (pet peeve of mine) including the popular but wrong book by Bjorksten. But most Chinese don't use the calligraphic stroke order, so big deal. Still, I think it is more useful for adult foreign learners who don't spend the kind of time a kid does in school writing characters.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and select your username and password later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Unfortunately, your content contains terms that we do not allow. Please edit your content to remove the highlighted words below.
Click here to reply. Select text to quote.

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...