250 Essential Chinese Characters for Everyday Use, Vol. 1

by Philip Yungkin Lee

This is an invaluable study guide for learning basic Chinese characters.

250 Essential Chinese Characters Volume 1 is a second edition, completely revised and with 50 percent new material. Featuring a new design; tips for Chinese language mastery throughout; exercises in AP-exam format; progressive review sections; and several indices, this volume is a crucial learning tool for anyone interested in Chinese.
After studying this book together with its companion, 250 Essential Chinese Characters, Volume 2 , you'll have learned 500 of the most important characters in Chinese, and thousands of words in which they appear. Whether you're new to Chinese or coming back for review, each of these 250 characters offers you ways to learn Chinese and improve your abilities to read Chinese and write Chinese.

Genres: China, Language, Nonfiction

352 pages, Paperback

First published July 15, 2003

About the author

Philip Yungkin Lee is a native speaker of Chinese. He has taught Chinese both in Adult Education and Chinese Studies at university level, the last being Senior Lecturer at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia. He has published several language learning titles and has received a Teaching Excellence award from his university. He is also the author of Pocket Mandarin Chinese Dictionary, The Essential Mandarin Chinese Phrase Book, Pocket Cantonese Dictionary, The Essential Cantonese Phrase Book, 250 Essential Chinese Characters volumes 1 & II, and A Chinese A Day Practice Pad: Volume I.

Reviews

[Yaotl Altan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Es útil para formar una base de conocimiento sobre los caracteres chinos, pero debe acompañarse con algún otro libro de gramática a fin de complementar el aprendizaje.

[P.H. Wilson · Rating 1 out of 5]

Real rating: 1/10
The characters themselves are invaluable however the English translations are faulted in places and be wary of some of the remarks such as 元 which is marked as meaning dollar that is a poor translation which is likely to occur if you are from Hong Kong as they use a dollar or if you are in a country like Australia that uses the dollar as is the author. 元 implies the money in China which aside from Hong Kong is not called a dollar as well as money in general given that Euro is 欧元 which does not mean European dollar.
It also quite evident that the author is Cantonese given his name and his translation of Hanyu 汉语 to mean mandarin, instead of what most mainland Chinese would refer to as Chinese, instead of putonghua 普通话 which literally means Mandarin. As well as many a reference to Canton. With this said Cantonese is a different language and when they speak Mandarin it is not the equivalent to a mainlander speaking Mandarin, it is like a Welsh person in England or a Quebecois in Canada or the creole from Louisiana in America. Also the written language is not identical and the southerns do tend to use it differently than the mainlanders. So to anyone trying to learn Chinese it is better to look for a more northern author as the writer of your book.
This work also confuses things like spoken English and written English when it is explaining wen 文, it uses the sentence "You speak English very well" but uses 英文 instead of 英语, then two pages later says "I speak English, but I don't speak French" In this instance it use the correct form as in 语. This confusing to the reader and not to their benefit in anyway and is quite often the reason in Chinese we have westerner coming over trying to speak Chinese and really struggling.
Also the usage of phrases are not really Chinese relevant and are more to do with American culture which is bizarre given that it is written by a Chinese in Australia. And given the none Chinese nature of these phrases they would not be readily used or understood by mainland Chinese which represent 96% of population.
Also the book seems to go out of its way to deride Chinese culture through out which is odd for a book promoting the Chinese language. With phrases like "In general Chinese people are poor", "China's international status has improved" "Ethnic Hans are in the minority in Xinjiang" "Bad bureaucratic habits prevail in China" "There are no secure jobs in China now" seems out of place quite anti-Chinese to the point of feeling racist or self-loathing and looks to push the agenda of the author and in a language book we should be teaching the language as it is and not our agenda or our culture which represents only 4% of the total of a country. We should be aspiring to help those who want to learn to the best of our ability and put our personal issues aside.

[Gerard Braad · Rating 4 out of 5]

Learning 250 characters with this book means you will actually learn thousands of words. Each character is described with a short summary, stroke order, radical, the traditional form and lots of examples and compound forms.

For example. Character 32; 再 [zài], means 'again'. But it also teaches you 再次 (once more), 再见 (see you again, goodbye) and 再三 (again and again), etc.