Kodansha's Compact Kanji Guide: A New Character Dictionary for Students and Businessmen (A Kodansha Dictionary) [Paperback]

Kodansha International (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 1992 | ISBN-10: 4770015534 | ISBN-13: 978-4770015532 | Edition: 1

A character dictionary that focuses on contemporary everyday usage. It includes 1945 "Joyo" (common use) characters, plus personal names, practical compounds, business terms, three indexes and stroke order.

Product Details

• Paperback: 928 pages
• Publisher: Kodansha International (JPN); 1 edition (April 1992)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 4770015534
• ISBN-13: 978-4770015532
• Product Dimensions: 7.6 x 5.5 x 1.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #781,667 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good Reference for Beginners, May 4, 2000

By 

"radagasty" - See all my reviews

This review is from: Kodansha's Compact Kanji Guide: A New Character Dictionary for Students and Businessmen (A Kodansha Dictionary) (Paperback)

Kodansha's Compact Kanji Guide is an excellent reference for beginners learning the Japanese written language. It contains all the Jooyou Kanji (the official list of 1,950 essential Kanjis of the Japanese Ministry of Education) and some 18,000 compounds, focussing particularly on those appearing frequently in Japanese mass media. In particular, great emphasis is laid on compounds pertaining to the business world. Beyond this, however, the scope of this book is fairly limited. It contains few literary words, and, in general, too few characters and compounds to be of any use to the advanced learner at all. In fact, the book is surprisingly large and heavy for the quantity of content it contains.

The On and Kun readings of the kanji are provided in kana; in particular, the On readings appear in katakana, so the reader must be familiar with this syllabary. Pronunciation of compounds are also given, with multiple or irregular readings indicated. The dictionary makes little use of romaji. Although the definitions provided are fairly useful, few usage notes are provided making the dictionary less useful for Japanese composition. Nevertheless, it is very handy for the beginning student to check the meanings of unfamiliar words.

The arrangement of the characters more-or-less follow the traditional Chinese arrangement according to radicals, although, unfortunately, certain variants usually considered to be the same radical are separated into different radicals in this dictionary, and, hence, some characters appear in a location different from that where one would find it in a traditional character dictionary. Three indices provided allows one to locate a given character by radical, stroke-count and pronunciation. Each kanji also has its stroke order displayed for the convenience of the learner.

The book is physically well produced, with a vinyl-type soft cover and fairly thick paper of high quality that takes wear fairly well. The print is clear, and the head characters are printed very large (about a centimetre square) so that its composition can be clearly seen. Although the book is by no means large, I would not myself have describe it as 'compact' as its title suggests.

A beginning learner of written Japanese could do worse than to acquire this book, although, as an intermediate learner myself, I find that the scope of the book is not really very sufficient, more often than not, the character or compound that I go to look up is not in the book. For those of us who are not businessmen, the Kanji Guide's focus on financial and business vocabulary would be somewhat annoying. In short, then, Kodansha's Compact Kanji Guide is great reference, but for beginners only.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Mainstay for the Serious Student, September 12, 1997

By 

Vincent Mattaliano Jr. "vmwrites" (Pompton Plains, NJ USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Kodansha's Compact Kanji Guide: A New Character Dictionary for Students and Businessmen (A Kodansha Dictionary) (Paperback)

This is a sine qua non for any serious student of Japanese. Arranged primarily by radical, the kanji are relatively easy to find (no dictionary has ever provided a truly easy way), stroke order is preserved, and meanings are provided for kanji compounds. The only drawback is that only combinations beginning with the selected kanji are included.

The guide is indexed by stroke count, primary radical and by pronunciation (both kun-yomi and on-yomi).

If you intend to make any real progress in your studies, this is a "must have."

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good All-Around Product, September 24, 2001

By 

Thomas F. Ogara (Jacksonville, FL USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Kodansha's Compact Kanji Guide: A New Character Dictionary for Students and Businessmen (A Kodansha Dictionary) (Paperback)

I have used this guide for some years now, and I find it to be the most useful Japanese dictionary that I have. While of course it cannot compete with Nelson on the number of entries, or kanji for that matter, it is a good deal smaller than Nelson and I can take it to work with me without problem. For business uses and the popular press in general I have rarely run across a word that I could not find in here. And it's so durable!

Some may balk at the traditional radical order of the Kanji, but it's what I was used to, more or less, so I find it convenient. I'm not so sure why the publishers felt it necessary to put the stroke order in - shouldn't you already know that if you're past Japanese 001? I'd recommend deleting it in the interest of adding more entries, but that's my only complaint.