That’s a good way to get rusty quickly! 
I recommend you go ahead and write it yourself each time. Your speed will naturally pick up over time.[/quote]
I just feel like an idiot with my neat, yet blocky elementary school style characters. I wish I could write the “cursive” style adults use… 
Speaking of handwriting, at least I know how to write a 9 properly. Have you noticed how Taiwanese people all write their 9’s backwards? 
Bunch of heathens.
They write them like lollipops don’t they?
Don’t! Any foreigner able to write Chinese at all is already going to impress the natives (and other foreigners)! Plus, legibility is a good thing, in my book. Neat and blocky? That beats illegible cursive any day!
Semi-cursive, generally. True cursive is so illegible as to be confined to limited use among the literati in calligraphy. You can actually practice semi-cursive forms if you want, and write – a LOT. Supposedly semi-cursive will eventually come to you naturally if you write enough. Hasn’t happened for me, either.
Another option is to learn something like clerical script, and then transfer that style to your handwriting, which will remain ‘blocky’ but will take on an interesting, archaic flair.
[quote=“Dragonbones”] Supposedly semi-cursive will eventually come to you naturally if you write enough. Hasn’t happened for me, either.
.[/quote]
I’ll vouch for it coming naturally, has for me more or less. The bigger problem is remembering how to write the words 
Don’t! Any foreigner able to write Chinese at all is already going to impress the natives (and other foreigners)! Plus, legibility is a good thing, in my book. Neat and blocky? That beats illegible cursive any day![/quote]
Sure, I get compliments on the writing, but I always thought it was the same as when someone mutters, “Ni hao.” and everyone goes, “oooo Your Chinese is so good!” :loco:
Objectively, I think my writing looks fine, just childish IMVHO.
Semi-cursive, generally. True cursive is so illegible as to be confined to limited use among the literati in calligraphy. You can actually practice semi-cursive forms if you want, and write – a LOT. Supposedly semi-cursive will eventually come to you naturally if you write enough. Hasn’t happened for me, either.
Another option is to learn something like clerical script, and then transfer that style to your handwriting, which will remain ‘blocky’ but will take on an interesting, archaic flair.[/quote]
My Chinese teacher’s writing would probably make you very happy. His script looks kind of like the print they use for characters in the audio visual text book. Neat, legible and very beautiful. I would love to write like that.
That being said, I can take a hint! Thanks, I reckon I’ll try to do more of the chore (forms at shops etc…) writing myself. Repetition works, I guess.
And I fully agree, the full on cursive some adults use is very ineligible. Very hard to read!
[quote=“FransInTaiwan”]Sometimes, when in a naughty mood, I even do that with Police, when they stop me and ask me for my licence. 
:happybiker:[/quote]
When confronted by the law or pesky English Vampires I’m always Dutch.
bismark: That’s a very decent effort. I can’t write for crap in Chinese (though I don’t want to either). I wouldn’t say your writing looks like a little kid’s. It looks like what a lot of my junior high school kids produce and I’m sure many (the boys especially) will never improve a great deal from an aesthetic perspective, but then, look at how many native English speakers write English. It doesn’t look that much different to what they were producing as adolescents.
Bismarck, your handwriting is just fine. Honestly. It’s legible, and the proportions are generally quite good, often even perfect. Much better than that of most foreigners I’ve seen. Be proud of it! On the other hand, the fact that you’d like to improve it aesthetically means you are a very good candidate for studying calligraphy, IMO.
One way to improve it would be to leave it in kai3shu1 (neat printed) style, but add a stylish aspect like a clerical flair. Or you could look at and copy some semi-cursive script (again, avoid the very cursive or even wild cursive like Huai Su’s). Have a look at, say, 王羲之 Wang Xizhi’s 蘭亭敘 e.g. 王羲之 蘭亭敘<五種>,二玄社 at a local calligraphy shop, as well as “Chinese Cursive Script, An Introduction to Handwriting in Chinese” by Fang-yu Wang, Far Eastern Publications, Yale. There are also dictionaries of calligraphy so you can look up characters by bushou and see lots of examples in the different styles. Have fun with it!
That looks a lot better than my all out of proportion chicken scratch.
Agreed, your characters look really nice and well-proportioned, I can’t write as nicely.
Besides calligraphy, I’d try looking at normal handwriting, notes/letters and stuff, and trying to copy the forms. It’s fun actually.
It’s good handwriting, every character can fit in a square.
Now you only need a bit more practice and speed to get it more cursive. But some Taiwanese, especially women, keep basically the same neat style, only they are faster.
Dear all,
I noticed in Bismarck’s images of his character notes that he has “bull” as the first definition for 特 and thought “that’s the first definition?”.
Then I thought, surely, they don’t mean a “公牛”, a male cow, here specifically.
Entry from the revised Guoyu Cidian web site put out by the Republic of China (Taiwan)'s Ministry of Education:
That sense of the word “雄性的” would be the equivalent of “bull” in the English “bull elephant”, “bull moose”, “bull whale”, etc.
So it’s the second definition of “male animal” for “bull” and not the first definition of “male cow”. See below.
I did a Google search for “running of the bulls” “西班牙” for illumination.
Wikipedia entry for “Running of the Bulls”.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Running_of_the_bulls
It seems that they have the “Running of the Bulls” in parts of southern France and Mexico as well, but, they’re not as well known as the famous one held in San Fermin (tone 2) in Pamplona, Spain.
The Chinese-language version of Wikipedia’s entry for “奔牛節”
http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E5%A5%94%E7%89%9B%E7%AF%80
Google Search for “奔牛節”
http://www.google.com/search?q=%22%E5%A5%94%E7%89%9B%E7%AF%80%22&start=0&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8
Surprisingly they also had a “Running of the Bulls” festival in Taipei as well.
http://www.cowparade-taipei.com/
Did anyone go? Nobody gored, I hope.
Not exactly what “Papa” Hemingway had in mind.
Moo!!!
Kobo-Daishi, PLLA.
[quote=“Kobo-Daishi”]I noticed in Bismarck’s images of his character notes that he has “bull” as the first definition for 特 and thought “that’s the first definition?”…
Then I thought, surely, they don’t mean a “公牛”, a male cow, here specifically.
…
That sense of the word “雄性的” would be the equivalent of “bull” in the English “bull elephant”, “bull moose”, “bull whale”, etc.[/quote]
Shuowen gives 牛父也 and Hanyu Da Zidian (which lists by etymological history normally rather than by modern usage) gives male cattle as definition 1 and male animals in general as definition 2 (p759 c).
As for bismarck’s definition, if you’re interested in etymology and want to make sense of why there’s a bull semantic element (which also happens to be the dictionary bushou) on the left, then it’s fine to make a note that this originally meant ‘bull’, but if you’re studying modern Chinese, definitions from something like DeFrancis’s ABC Comprehensive (which don’t even mention ‘bull’ in this case) are going to be more valuable.
Dear all,
[quote=“Dragonbones”][quote=“Kobo-Daishi”]I noticed in Bismarck’s images of his character notes that he has “bull” as the first definition for 特 and thought “that’s the first definition?”…
Then I thought, surely, they don’t mean a “公牛”, a male cow, here specifically.
…
That sense of the word “雄性的” would be the equivalent of “bull” in the English “bull elephant”, “bull moose”, “bull whale”, etc.[/quote]
Shuowen gives 牛父也 and Hanyu Da Zidian (which lists by etymological history normally rather than by modern usage) gives male cattle as definition 1 and male animals in general as definition 2 (p759 c).
As for bismarck’s definition, if you’re interested in etymology and want to make sense of why there’s a bull semantic element (which also happens to be the dictionary bushou) on the left, then it’s fine to make a note that this originally meant ‘bull’, but if you’re studying modern Chinese, definitions from something like DeFrancis’s ABC Comprehensive (which don’t even mention ‘bull’ in this case) are going to be more valuable.[/quote]
Yes. I was thinking more in terms of the modern language.
My copy of Far East Chinese-English Dictionary does have “bull” but as the third definition for te4. It doesn’t specify whether they mean “male cow” or “male animal” though.
Or both?
Kobo-Daishi, PLLA.
[quote=“Dragonbones”]Bismarck, your handwriting is just fine. Honestly. It’s legible, and the proportions are generally quite good, often even perfect. Much better than that of most foreigners I’ve seen. Be proud of it! On the other hand, the fact that you’d like to improve it aesthetically means you are a very good candidate for studying calligraphy, IMO.
One way to improve it would be to leave it in kai3shu1 (neat printed) style, but add a stylish aspect like a clerical flair. Or you could look at and copy some semi-cursive script (again, avoid the very cursive or even wild cursive like Huai Su’s). Have a look at, say, 王羲之 Wang Xizhi’s 蘭亭敘 e.g. 王羲之 蘭亭敘<五種>,二玄社 at a local calligraphy shop, as well as “Chinese Cursive Script, An Introduction to Handwriting in Chinese” by Fang-yu Wang, Far Eastern Publications, Yale. There are also dictionaries of calligraphy so you can look up characters by bushou and see lots of examples in the different styles. Have fun with it![/quote]
Thanks, that’s some good advice. I’ll get into that and see what I can come up with.
Thanks for all the compliments… 
[quote=“Dragonbones”][quote=“Kobo-Daishi”]I noticed in Bismarck’s images of his character notes that he has “bull” as the first definition for 特 and thought “that’s the first definition?”…
Then I thought, surely, they don’t mean a “公牛”, a male cow, here specifically.
…
That sense of the word “雄性的” would be the equivalent of “bull” in the English “bull elephant”, “bull moose”, “bull whale”, etc.[/quote]
Shuowen gives 牛父也 and Hanyu Da Zidian (which lists by etymological history normally rather than by modern usage) gives male cattle as definition 1 and male animals in general as definition 2 (p759 c).
As for bismarck’s definition, if you’re interested in etymology and want to make sense of why there’s a bull semantic element (which also happens to be the dictionary bushou) on the left, then it’s fine to make a note that this originally meant ‘bull’, but if you’re studying modern Chinese, definitions from something like DeFrancis’s ABC Comprehensive (which don’t even mention ‘bull’ in this case) are going to be more valuable.[/quote]
Lol…I didn’t even notice that. Sometimes I just write a definition or two next to the character in my character exercise book, although I concentrate on the main definition from the text book (in my case, the Shi Da series). In most cases I do that to have a point of reference as to why two or three character combinations have a certain meaning. Sometimes it makes sense, sometimes it doesn’t.
Dear all,
Bismarck, for the character 特 (special), on the right side, you might make the top part of 寺 (temple) a 土 (earth) rather than a 士 (scholar).
Unless there’s a variant character (there probably is ) and you’re going for that look.
I’ve been downloading free out of copyright books on Chinese and China at the Google Books web site and found a copy of “Synoptical studies in the Chinese character” by Herbert Allen Giles. It’s of characters that look similar and might be easily confused.
http://books.google.com/books?id=ZQ1CAAAAIAAJ For those who might be interested.
For the character 房, do they make you write it specifically that way on Taiwan?
Usually it’s written like this from the 1999 edition of “Reading & Writing Chinese” by William McNaughton & Li Ying.
I’ve the older 1992 edition of the 1979 original, by McNaughton alone.
In that edition he writes it the same way as you do and his handwriting isn’t much better. Worse? I guess that’s why he took on Li Ying to do the writing in the newer versions of the book.
To practice handwriting, you might choose to copy the way the characters look using a font that looks more like brush or hand writing.
The last one is done in the style of a famous Chinese emperor but I forget his name.
Maybe try for one that looks like it was written with a fountain pen rather than a brush. Closer to a ball point pen.
Kobo-Daishi, PLLA.
[quote=“Kobo-Daishi”]
For the character 房, do they make you write it specifically that way on Taiwan?
Usually it’s written like this from the 1999 edition of “Reading & Writing Chinese” by William McNaughton & Li Ying.
I’ve the older 1992 edition of the 1979 original, by McNaughton alone.
[/quote]
I’ve never seen it written that way before. In a way it does look better. I write it the way the Audio-Visual Chinese books have it…
For what it’s worth to the original question, I have Chinese handwriting quite similar to bismarck’s (it’s very square and regular, but seems “boring” or “not authentic” to me compared to the handwriting of my classmates from grad school in Taiwan, for example), but they all admired it. Since we were past the point where they were trying to make me feel good about anything related to my Chinese (interpreting school brings out the inner bitch 
) they were probably serious.
I wouldn’t worry about changing your handwriting style. I think that any compliments you get from Chinese people are sincere. And your handwriting really does not look like a child’s Chinese handwriting; it’s obviously practiced and firm.
The one thing that’s worth practicing (according to people who have spoken to me about such things) is your signature. I tend to rush my signature/name in Chinese and it ends up looking not-so-good. This is considered quite important, I take it. Unfortunately my Chinese surname 蔡 always seems to end up looking weird when I write it which is kind of embarrassing after using it for nearly 30 years. (Maybe I should take my husband’s name? 華 is easier to write nicely.)
Thanks, Ironlady.
As far as names, I took my wife’s family name 甘which is easy to write. But people often ask us why we have the same family name, because this is unusual in Taiwan, because we might be related. :ohreally: This is the one instance where I ask, “You know I’m a foreigner, right?”
Stylistically in modern kaishu, yes, this is the norm, and the way you are communicating this to bismarck is of course appropriate. Variants with the first horizontal as long as but not longer than the second are common in clerical script. I’d replace ‘might’ with ‘should’ if focusing on the modern norm. As a predictably irritating pedantic aside for anyone interested (and you probably already know this but some others might find value here), etymologically, the top is neither tu3 ‘earth’ nor shi4 ‘scholar’ but the phonetic zhi1 (like a Z with a dot atop; now ‘of’; orig. ‘to go’); sorry, can’t type the char. on this PC I’m borrowing while mine is broken). The bottom is of course the semantic (orig. you4 ‘hand’ and soon altered to cun ‘hand’), this entire right side being the original of chi2 ‘to hold, grasp’ and later borrowed phonetically for ‘temple’.
Song Huizong’s Shou4jin1 (skinny gold) style. Never cared for it myself; it attracts the eye at first glance but is contrived, superficial and bony, lacks depth, complexity and comfort and VERY soon becomes wearisome. It lacks strength, natural variation and inner beauty.