Customer Reviews

Japanese Verbs and Essentials of Grammar : A Practical Guide to the Mastery of Japanese

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

If you look at a new language like a big puzzle to be fit together, you will love this book!

This is not a phrase book (though it contains hundreds of excellent examples), nor a dictionary. Instead, it is a revealing yet amazingly concise summary of how Japanese is assembled. For me, it has been a huge aid toward understanding.

Every page here contains a big "Ahah!". The completely logical discussion of verbs helped me hear and recognize elements of tense and nuance that I had not understood earlier (e.g. How do the Japanese construct a complex form like "If I had not had breakfast, I would be tired while eating lunch").

These are short chapters, but *packed* with information, each piece illustrated by an example. The sections on noun expressions, particles (a troublesome subject for english-speakers), conjunctions, adjectives and adverbs were very clear.

Much of the information is organized in tables where it makes sense to do so: relative times, demonstrative forms, counters, numbers, times, seasons/weather, etc. These were well-ordered and enlightening. There are also useful summaries of common expressions, honorifics, holidays, etc.

This book is not centered on vocabulary. There is a brief vocabulary list, but no pictures; you won't learn your colors or the names of kitchen appliances. You will definitely want a good dictionary as a companion volume. However, the biggest single benefit I got was a new appreciation of how to use my dictionary effectively. Now I can recognize the root ("dictionary") forms of verbs, noun expressions, adjectives, etc. that I didn't get before. This helps me go right to the appropriate word when I hear something new. Even more, I can imagine interesting new forms built from the "raw material" therein.

This book will have you appreciating the richness of the Japanese language without being overwhelmed by it. Japanese is, after all, an orderly and expressive language that just follows different rules. Ms. Lampkin reveals the rules in a tidy and accessible way. A great bargain.

I only wish I had found this book when I first came to Japan four years ago. I have bought maybe 30 textbooks, but this is the first one that really helped me start making sense of the noise around me.

Everything is explained so clearly and compactly, but the book is thin enough to carry around in my purse. The book has all the essentials, but the best feature is in the examples with translations that follow each principle. They are such practical and useful models-and so familiar! I've heard them before in real life but just did not understand, until now.

Some people may not like the omission of Japanese writing in the examples, but as for me, it has been useful to learn the grammar first. I have struggled through the books with Japanese writing-and usually gave up. But this book made everything so easy. Having learned the grammatical principles, and having improved my ability to understand what is being said around me and to respond, I now feel I can start learning the writing with confidence.

Bottom line: Buy this book first. I wish I had.

Simply put, this book is a life saver. Im an exchange student and was completely lost on the subject of Japanese Verbs. I found this book and my Japanese improved almost overnight. Great Book. 8)

I can't stress how freakin useful this book is! I originally found this book at my local library and instantly fell in love with it. I went on Amazon not expecting to find such a "rare" book, but Amazon had it!

This book is a God-send. YOU MUST BUY IT! PERIOD. Ditto on what everyone else said. The examples are practical and the translations are very helpful. It goes into great depths about the grammer, explaining it clearly and COMPLETELY. If you're like me, you don't like all those basic-to-intermediate crap out there. There aren't enough advanced Japanese material out there. There is one gripe though, it's all in romaji! (gross)

There's been a lot of positive things said about this book. I'll have to join the crowd as well. The reasons why the book stands out become obvious once you start reading it.

This book groups similar words together and describes their meanings and pronunciations. This lets the reader remember a small number of rules to generate a very large number of words. By presenting many of the words in well organized tables, similarities and differences instantly become clear.

For example, there are 44 Japanese words that describe variations of this, that, which, like, etc. One "chapter" (a single page actually) shows how 4 basic words are modified in 11 nearly identical ways ways to yield all 44 words and their meanings. In addition to making it easy to remember the words, this makes the subtle differences between similar words perfectly clear.

Page after page is packed with information that is easy to digest, yet invaluable when learning the language. Whether you need to learn Japanese in a week, a month, or a year, you will probably benefit from this book. I found that Japanese Verbs and Essentials of Grammar helped me learn more words and their meanings with minimal effort and time.

If you are taking Japanese as a language course in College, or at any other educational level, you must get this book! The sections are broken down into concise chapters that detail the gram matical concepts and rules of the Japanese Language and facilitates in the easier understanding of Japanese. The book is broken down into two sections; the first covers verbs, their usage in the language structure, and accompanied by many handy charts ideal for quick referencing. The second section covers the essentials of Japanese grammer, to include particles, adverbs, etc., and explains the similarities as well as key deferences with the English language. Overall, the educational value of this book greatly exceeds its' cover price

This is one of the those (quite rare) books that actually deliver exactly what their title promises. It is a concise and well written summary of Japanese verb forms and grammer. As someone mentioned, it is not a stand alone guide to Japanese language, but it is a very good tool to get those tricky grammer issues sorted out. The only reason I did not give it 5 stars is that I prefer it had kana instead of romji. I would still recommend it both to the begginer and intermediate student of Japanese.

Though unable to stand on its own as a textbook, any student either taking a conventional course in Japanese or using a self-study course will find this a valuable source of information. My understanding of the Japanese verb was greatly enhanced through the use of this book, as its explanations are concise and to the point without difficult linguistics terminology.

This is one of the first books I bought when I started learning Japanese. I learned a lot from it, however, it would be great if it had exercises to practice the grammar it presents.

I am stationed in Okinawa, Japan. The language here is a little but different from mainstream Japanese, but this book has been a great help. The way this book describes verb types(Irregular, Jodon,etc) is different from the "Japanese for Busy People" series. In the college classes they offer on base here, that series is used, so it was good to get a different perspective.

The only thing I would take away from it, is that it didn't give a lot of examples for the various types of verbs. Overall though, a great book.

SGT Barrett, U.S. Army Signal Corps