The Eater's Guide to Chinese Characters (Paperback)

by James D. McCawley (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Review
"Unlike some of the rest of us, McCawley can enter a Chinese restaurant secure in the knowledge that his digestion will not be impaired by the frustration of watching Chinese customers enjoy some succulent marvel whose name the management has not bothered to translate. . . . McCawley does not spend half the meal staring at his neighbor's bean curd with that particularly ugly combination of greed and envy so familiar to-well, to some of the rest of us. . . . McCawley endeavors to free the non-Chinese-speaking eater forever from the wretched constriction of the English menu." Calvin Trillin, New Yorker (Calvin Trillin New Yorker )

Product Description

Lauded by Calvin Trillin as a man who "does not have to make to with translations like 'Shredded Three Kinds' in Chinese restaurants," in The Eater's Guide to Chinese Characters, James D. McCawley offers everyone a guide to deciphering the mysteries of Chinese menus and the opportunity to enjoy new eating experiences. An accessible primer as well as a handy reference, this book shows how Chinese characters are written and referred to, both in script and in type. McCawley provides a guide to pronunciation and includes helpful exercises so users can practice ordering. His novel system of arranging the extensive glossary—which ranges from basics such as "rice" and "fish" to exotica like "Buddha Jumps Wall"—enables even the beginner to find characters quickly and surely. He also includes the nonstandard forms of characters that often turn up on menus.

With this guide in hand, English speakers hold the key to a world of tantalizing—and otherwise unavailable—Chinese dishes.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 248 pages
• Publisher: University Of Chicago Press; 1 edition (May 1, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0226555925
• ISBN-13: 978-0226555928
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.3 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #489,123 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars insight into Chinese menus, November 16, 2001

By	William J. Poser (Prince George, BC, Canada) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: The Eater's Guide to Chinese Characters (Hardcover)

This is a practical introduction to reading Chinese menus. McCawley explains the structure of typical Chinese menus, a variety of culinary terms, and even the conventions for writing prices while taking the reader through several real menus. Additional sample menus, including handwritten menus with printed equivalents, are provided as examples. The book includes a substantial Chinese character dictionary focussing on words likely to be used in menus, using an indexing system that non-specialists will likely find relatively easy to use. My only criticism is that pronounciations are given in Mandarin, with Cantonese only occasionally provided. In spite of the recent influx of Mandarin speakers, the staff of Chinese restaurants in North America are still likely to speak Cantonese.

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent system for reading Chinese menus, July 19, 2000

By	Stavros Macrakis (Cambridge, MA, USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: The Eater's Guide to Chinese Characters (Hardcover)

To really eat well in good Chinese restaurants, you need to be able to understand the Chinese-language menu: many dishes aren't included on the English menu, and many dishes are described vaguely in English, but precisely in Chinese.

Understanding the Chinese menu presents two great challenges: 1) looking up characters in an ordinary Chinese-English dictionary is very hard; 2) words have special meanings in a cooking context.

McCawley's Guide is a great help on both counts. His indexing scheme works directly off the appearance of the character. Conventional dictionaries rely on the character's 'radical' -- which is often not obvious and hard to recognize -- and how it is written. The definitions here are strictly geared to cooking and eating, and often include the names of dishes (not just ingredients or cooking methods), so you know exactly what is on the menu.

Still, you can't count on understanding a full menu quickly enough to stave off hunger -- a good idea to take one home for study if you can.

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Try it, August 31, 2001

By	groundhog (Chicago, IL USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Eater's Guide to Chinese Characters (Hardcover)

Disclaimer: Jim McCawley [...]was a dear friend of mine, a great dinner companion and chooser of restaurants off the beaten track, and the advisor for the Linguistics dissertation I never wrote.

I'm sorry this book is out of print, but glad to see what a used copy costs. Jim was a genius, passionate about language and food. If you've ever wondered what those characters on the Chinese menu mean, this is your Rosetta Stone. If you take this book seriously, you'll be able to order off the menu the Chinese customers get, not the skimpy English one.

And if there's any justice in the world, this book will be reprinted someday.