Customer Reviews

I Can Read That: A Traveler's Introduction to Chinese Characters

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For the most part, Chinese is really two languages - a written one and a spoken one. One really cannot "sound out" written Chinese Characters, like they can with English. Most books for travelers to China dwell on the spoken language. This is actually a very good idea, because it helps you communicate and get around. But this book is different and fun, because it concentrates on Chinese characters which are beautiful and interesting.

I lived in the city of Shenyang, China for almost a year and a half. I dealt with a lot of Chinese people and Westerners that had been there for varying lengths of time. The Westerners had varying levels of oral Chinese language skills, but it was very rare for me to find a Westerner who knew how to read Chinese. The Westerners that I knew who could read Chinese were for the most part long time scholors on the topic or they learned it from their Chinese relatives.

I read this book, and learned most of the characters in it. I could not even come close to reading a magazine or newspaper, even those for children. But, I knew more Chinese characters than 95% of the Westerners that I knew in China. Most of these foreigners would be impressed when I could read the little I did. For most of the Chinese people I met, I was the only Westerner that they ever met who could read even a few characters. I'd figure a sign out, and they could not believe it. This skill was a great conversation topic, and I soon learned several other characters in the conversations that I had with the locals.

For the most part, this book is not required reading for someone who travels to China. In places where a lot of Westerners travel, many signs are in English, or pin-yin, or "Chinglish" (poor translations from Chinese to English.) But when I went to places less traveled, I can tell you that it was nice to be able to read the sign on the restroom door so I did not get into an embarrassing situation. (I had plenty of other embarrassing experiences without going into the wrong public toilet.)

I highly recommend the book. Have fun!

This easy book does exactly what it claims to be able to: teaches you a small vocabulary of chinese characters. You won't be able to read much with it, but you will be able to pick out enough characters to get the jist of what some things are getting at.

Well written. Very accessible. Excellent compliment to chinese language tapes for anybody trying to learn basic language skills before a trip.

This is a remarkably good book for a non-Chinese speaking tourist to have. The reviews which say that this book is not for the student of Chinese are correct. It's not a very "deep" book, and it doesn't teach you very many characters. But that's not who the book is meant for.

I travelled to China last year, not knowing a word of Chinese and certainly not having any ability to make out the characters. Prior to that trip, I might occasionally read an article or website which would show me the characters for, say, "China", but they'd so to speak go in one eyeball and out the other -- I simply couldn't retain or learn or even really *see* the characters.

A travel article recommended _I Can Read That_ so I bought it, and it was a miracle. Literally on the first page, in the first few minutes of reading it, I at last started to realize "oh, there's a system behind all these characters". I could now look at Chinese characters, and though I couldn't truly read them (since I don't even know Chinese), I could start to truly see them, recognize them, and learn them.

After 5 minutes of reading, I'd learned 5 characters. After another 5 minutes, 5 more. After that, well there's a limit to how much information my brain can take in at once, but I kept reading the book and learning characters.

It was as exciting an experience as learning to read must have been (I actually don't remember).

And, to return to the first theme, this could all be done without "studying" per se, or taking a class. It can be done on the run, while travelling in China (or on the plane to China).

So, the book is no substitute for actually taking a Chinese class or learning from an in-depth book. But for the traveller who doesn't have time to actually take a Chinese class, but who is willing to spend a few hours poring over a small but useful book, this book is ideal.

I never would have believed that I could start reading Chinese in 3 minutes, but this book makes it possible. And the characters presented in the book are the ones that are especially useful for tourists (characters which are common in place names, such as "jing" for "capital", directions such as "bei" for "north" -- and if you put those together and say "Aha! Beijing!", you can now see how this book makes the Chinese language suddenly start to come together for the tourist).

So this book gave me a gift of (partial) literacy that no phrase book or guidebook did. I only learned a few dozen characters and I still do not know Chinese. But I could use that literacy skill to read some signs, to pick out bus stops (assuming that I knew the characters for the destination), etc.

A marvelous, marvelous book.

P.S. The book is most useful for mainland China, because it teaches the "simplified" characters, not the "traditional" characters, which are used most other places in the world.

My wife and I got a copy of "I Can Read That" before a recent trip to China. While the complexities of a tonal language were more than we could grasp in the weeks before our trip, Julie Sussman's very intelligent and easy little book let us have some idea of what we were looking at by reading signs when we were on the ground in China. You can learn to read enough characters to find the right rest room, figure out what is a street name and what is a business, and many other useful things. We were able to find the right gates at Chinese ariports because we could read the characters for Xian and Shanghai. I was amazed at what someone with no gift for languages was able usefully learn with a very modest investment in studying this little book. It was fun, too.

This book handles one of the most difficult languages in the world and focuses on its most intriguing element in a manner that allows the average person a chance to understand and actually read the Chinese Character.

I first read the book while State-side and was intrigued that so much common sense was behind the making of the Chinese Character. Because I was planning a trip to China I thought a book along these lines would be useful. The title gave me confidence that the author's purpose was to equip me to read Chinese in character form.

I was and am still amazed with the simplicity that the author addresses this subject. Having studied the Chinese language now for a year and a half, I can really appreciate Julie Sussman's keen ability to employ simplification.

Anyone who reads this book will gain a real appreciation for the Chinese language, and if they ever plan on making a trip to China, they will find this book a wonderful resource. I still enjoy reading through it and I am able to learn from it each time. If you are interested in learning Chinese this is a great little book to introduce you to the Chinese Character.

Not exactly a text on Chinese characters, this pocketbook is a great starter for those who have a curiosity of how Chinese writing works and don't want to be burdened with the extraneous info found in a serious textbook. Seventy-one characters frequently encountered by tourists are introduced but you'll wind up learning much more than that because many of these characters are also used in combination to form new compound words. The format is well-designed and makes the book fun and easy to use without being too simplistic. You'll learn the traditional and simplified form of the character, how these characters are rendered in the Western alphabet (i.e. the pinyin), and, thankfully towards the back of the book, how to write the character. Throughout the book are cultural tidbits and photographs of signs, ticket stubs, stamps, and advertisements which contains the characters introduced. This little book will take the intimidation out of trying to learn what far too many Westerners find as beyond their capacity to understand.

I recently went to China for a few weeks to teach English, and found that after a little bit of study with this book I could easily recognize the basic characters for such handy words as entrance, man, woman, Beijing, etc. But my work really paid off when a friend and I got lost on top of the Great Wall in a sea of Chinese people, none of whom spoke English (how one gets lost on top of a wall is another story altogether!). Anyway, I knew the characters for exit and after I sketched them out on a piece of paper a helpful man pointed us in the right direction. I really liked being able to interpret the otherwise undecipherable scribbles that are everywhere in China. This book was well worth the modest price.

This book is intended for people traveling to China who want to master some basic characters so that they can find it easier to find their way around.

The book is very enjoyable to read and the characters presented are rather easy to learn. Beside each character and character combinations, the author has provided mnemonic devices to make it easier to remember the character.

At the end of the book the author has also provided a brief section with guidelines for writing Chinese characters.

Some of what you'd be able to read by the time you're done with this little book are numbers, dates, currencies, public utilities, directions, names of public places, signs, tickets, and few other words.

On a side note, if you want to get deeper into learning how to write Chinese characters easily, you may also want to check out Easy Chinese Tutor.

This book is intended for people traveling to China who want to master some basic characters so that they can find it easier to find their way around.
The book is very enjoyable to read and the characters presented are rather easy to learn. Beside each character and character combinations, the author has provided mnemonic devices to make it easier to remember the character.

At the end of the book the author has also provided a brief section with guidelines for writing Chinese characters.

Some of what you'd be able to read by the time you're done with this little book are numbers, dates, currencies, public utilities, directions, names of public places, signs, tickets, and few other words.

On a side note, if you want to get deeper into learning how to write Chinese characters easily, you may also want to check out Easy Chinese Tutor.

I've learned to recognize more Chinese characters by reading this little book than by studying Mandarin for 6 months!