What Character Is That?: An Easy-Access Dictionary of 5,000 Chinese Characters: Amazon.ca: Ping-gam Go: Books

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First Sentence
The origin of Chinese characters goes far back to the early history of China as can be established from word-signs on broken pieces of pottery dating back to around 5,000 BC and from oracle bones made of tortoise shells dating from the Shang Dynasty (1523-1027 BC). Read the first page

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Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Back Cover

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Customer Reviews

7 Reviews

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
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Average Customer Review

3.9 out of 5 stars (7 customer reviews)

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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful

2.0 out of 5 stars Not worth buying, April 17 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: What Character Is That?: An Easy-Access Dictionary of 5,000 Chinese Characters (Paperback)

This book emphasizes traditional Chinese character, but that is not the reason I don't like it. The book is basically a listing of about 5,000 Chinese characters and their definitions. As any student of Chinese know, most Chinese words are not one character, thus this book is really not a "dictionary" in the traditional sense that it define Chinese words. It merely defines Chinese characters, and therefore, it is really not a valuable tool for those who want a real dictionary. But if you do want a character dictionary, this book is fairly good.

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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars What Character Is That? By Ping-Gam Go, Jun 7 2003

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Walter C.Sterling,Jr. (Hillsboro,NH) - See all my reviews

This review is from: What Character Is That?: An Easy-Access Dictionary of 5,000 Chinese Characters (Paperback)

What Character Is That?

This dictionary is a ¡�must¡� for all Americans who want to easily learn to read ,write and speak Chinese. To tour and work in mainland China, I needed a dictionary which would allow me, a non-native speaker, to read Chinese characters on maps, street signs, menus etc. I found all other ¡�Chinese to English¡� dictionaries at bookstores in the USA totally useless to me. Why? They were organized phonetically by Chinese words in alphabetical order. This meant I had to already know Chinese to find out what the character meant!
I was a Yale language major many years ago, joined the Foreign Service and taught English in Brazil. Several years ago, at age 64, I returned to my earlier profession and taught English in southern China. With the help of this extraordinary book, I was able to read and write letters in Chinese characters. It also helped me learn to speak Chinese at the basic level in both Mandarin and Cantonese dialects. I am now 66 years old and continue to learn. Recently I happily married a Chinese woman from Beijing who is only 50 years old. Without Mr.Go's books, I doubt that my new, great happiness in life would be possible.

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5 of 6 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars The Best Chinese Dictionary for an english speaking person., Mar 16 2004

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rayd (USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: What Character Is That?: An Easy-Access Dictionary of 5,000 Chinese Characters (Paperback)

I practically collect chinese dictionaries and books and this is the best book on the subject I own. It's the easiest dictionary to use for an english speaking person because it's alphabetically arranged around the *english* names of the radicals and words.

If I would have to keep only one of my books and dictionaries, I would keep this one and I wouldn't miss a thing.

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Most recent customer reviews

1.0 out of 5 stars Publishers Should Learn To Tell These People To Go Away.
There's a whole stream of books on China and Chinese which are built around the insane notion that the writer has a new and exciting way of making some stupid short-cut into... Read more

Published on Nov 29 2007 by David Lloyd-Jones

4.0 out of 5 stars A Quick, Easy Guide Worth the Money
I was looking for a dictionary with maximum characters, and I found this one to be a great resource if you can pick out the character radical right away. Read more