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Glossaries for early vernacular novels


fenlan

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Yes, there're published versions of these classics with annotations (注释). The 语文新课标必读丛书 series from 人民文学出版社, designed for high school students, is supposed to be good. http://www.dangdang.com/product_detail/product_detail.asp?product_id=7384651

Here's a review of sorts:

http://www.hongniba.com.cn/101book/con_a03.htm

I've seen annotated versions of Confucian classics and Sima Qian, as well.

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Like gato says, most novels are available in annotated editions; a good general dictionary should include any other problem words you find in vernacular novels, and ought to label certain definitions as "early usage." For Journey to the West you might do well with a glossary of Buddhist terms.

Then for 红楼梦, there's 《红楼梦语言词典》 (周定一, 商务, 1995).

There's also 明清吴语词典 for plays and novels written in the Suzhou dialect.

The 《近代汉语词典》(知识出版社, 1992) covers the premodern spoken language from Tang to Qing and may be of help (but beware of mistakes...)

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There are lots of words in 西游计 that are most definitely not in 现代汉语词典. A few more of them are in the ABCD, but I don't think ABCD is claiming to be the definitive guide to early vernacular Mandarin - or Mandaring as the language is know to most Chinese!

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Well, most of modern Chinese words and expressions are included in《现代汉语词典》. But if you want to better understand traditonal Chinese novels, two more dictionaries are needed------《古汉语字(辞)典》 and 《词源》 published by 商务印书馆. The first one is about RMB 30, while the second one is about RMB 200.

PS:

fenlan, I think it's a typo since you typed '西游' there but it should be '西游'。

计 means tactic, plan, scheme, count etc

记 means (something) u should write down or memorize, a record. :wink:

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