About three weeks ago, I picked up James W. Heisig's Remembering the Kanji II at Half Price Books for $9.98, a bargain given that it lists for $37.00. I crossed my fingers, hoping I didn't have it at home already. But no, I had Volume I, which I bought 11 years ago, glanced over, and then abandoned.
I've decided to devote summer 2004 to learning all 1945 kanji for daily use (常用漢字「じょうようかんじ」). I started a couple of years ago, but my efforts stalled out around 600 kanji. Lately, while taking Japanese classes, my focus has been on grammar and vocabulary. Although knowing as much kanji as I did helped me learn new vocabulary, the reverse was not true. Learning new vocabulary did not add to my stock of kanji. I was covering the same material.
I first abandoned Heisig's method because my goals were not attuned to his. The first volume's full title is "Remembering the Kanji I: a Complete Course on How Not to Forget the Meaning and Writing of Japanese Characters". Meaning and Writing. Notice that no mention is made of reading or pronouncing the characters. This is not an oversight; it's the crux of the scheme. In the introduction, Heisig stresses, "the goal of the book is...to attain native proficiency in writing the Japanese characters and associating meaning with their form." When I realized that he expected me to devote up to six months of daily study (at the rate of 10 kanji a day) without learning a single Japanese word, I thought he was crazy. (Fellow Austinite, Chris Kern, says as much in his well-reasoned review on amazon.) However, now I'm ready to try it. Just think how much further along I'd be today, if I had followed through eleven years ago.
What Heisig does is assign each kanji or component of a kanji a keyword in English. He wants you to be able to think of a concept in English and be able to visualize and write the associated kanji. You can imagine (and one does a lot of that following his method) yourself following in the footsteps of the Japanese who assigned Japanese meanings to Chinese characters. After all, it would be just as easy and make about as much sense to transcribe English into Chinese characters.
Recognition is Not Reproduction
A multiple choice test is easier than a fill-in-the-blank test because recognition is always easier than reproduction. Reading kanji in context automatically narrows the choices between possible meanings. But it doesn't mean you know the kanji. And the more kanji you learn, the more you will start confusing those that are similar. Heisig stresses that to really learn kanji you must look at English flashcards and write the kanji, not look at kanji flashcards and read them. He's right. There are hundreds of kanji I recognize, but when I try to write a word, I might get as far as the radical, before having to look it up. Heisig's method enables me to visualize a kanji whenever I hear the concept.
Does Heisig's system work. Well, in three weeks, I completed Part One and can now write 276 kanji. Because Heisig doesn't organize his material based on kanji frequency, most of these kanji were new to me. What amazes me is that I can write them. And whenever I read the English word, or see the corresponding object or action, the kanji pops into mind.
Sounds Like
I can't endorse Heisig's book wholeheartedly because I dislike many of his keyword associations. I always have trouble with other people's mnemonics; I get bogged down trying to remember the memory device. Also I think he makes a mistake treating every kanji as an ideograph (several concepts combined to form a new concept: for example, 女＋子＝好き. woman + child = likable). About 80 percent of kanji have one component related to meaning, and one component to sound. This is like playing charades. "A body of water that sounds like 'e"." (水＋エ＝江; inlet or bay, the 'E' in 'Edo' 江戸). However, I do like his method (visualization and English-to-kanji association) and so far it's working for me. Double-checking Heisig's keywords against P. G. O'Neill's Essential Kanji and my huge Hadamitzky and Spahn kanji dictionary takes longer. But I've got all summer.
I find it interesting that the amazon reviews for Volume I are mixed, but for Volume II are 5-star. I'd be interested in hearing from anyone who has actually mastered their kanji--what method did you use. And can you write as well as read?
Progress Report: Kanji Studied
- 2002-03-15: 44 (Begin again. My baseline number.)
- 2002-12-31: 450
- 2003-12-31: 574
- 2004-05-12: 602 (before using Heisig's method)
- 2004-06-23: 858 (abandoning Heisig's method)
- 2004-12-31: 920 (one week into reading Harry Potter)
Posted by M Sinclair Stevens
June 07, 2004
Comments
M--
Thanks for this review. I too recently bought the Heisig book (part I) at a bargain price (only 500 yen, new), but have yet to get to it. I had read the introduction to that book online and had to admit to being, like you, skeptical about just tossing out the on/kun readings. But I remain intrigued and hearing your success so far just could be the kick I need to re-start my studies (but unlike you, I can't even console myself that while my kanji has floundered, my grammar/conversation is thriving -- it isn't!). All 1945 kanji in one summer! Wow, gambatte!
p.s. your "spam guard" isn't quite working.
Comment by: Kurt. Posted June 16, 2004 12:13 AM.
Kurt, I've already abandoned Heisig again in favor of Foerster and Tamura's "Kanji ABC: A Systematic Approach to Japanese Characters" (which I'll try to review soon). To be more precise, I've abandoned Heisig's stories and make up my own. I am, however, still faithful to the method. You do not have to write a kanji 1000 times to memorize it. (I've notebooks full of kanji scribbles, kanji I've forgotten.) You have to truly see each of its components and how they are put together. Then you have to be able to visualize the kanji.
If you don't know your radicals yet, then I would definitely recommend Heisig to provide a foundation in the method and the building blocks of the kanji themselves. I'm looking forward to comparing notes.
Comment by: M. Posted June 16, 2004 08:22 AM.
Wow!.. I just got done trolling through this site. And I must say you have answered my prayers. I have been looking for a coherent resource for a while now I finaly found it.*sniff*.. No seriously though. I love the site. Its well thought out and informitive. More over the cache of tools is more the worth my while. Thanks and keep it up.
Comment by: Bud. Posted December 9, 2004 06:47 PM.
Like many others I've started, stopped and restarted my Kanji stuides many times. This time I'm using Remembering the Kanji I and I'm very happy with it so far. One thing that has made a huge difference for me is finally finding a good support network on the the internet. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Remembering_The_Kanji/ The above link is for a Yahoo group of other people who are working through the method. Just being able to compare notes with other people from time to time makes it a lot easier to keep going.
Comment by: rizzo. Posted October 23, 2005 08:49 PM.
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Book Review: Remembering the Kanji I. James W. Heisig.