I received this comment from Chris today:
I’m a year and a half into my (Chinese) studies at the moment, and I’m having a bit of a burnout. I’m not progressing as fast as I would have preferred, or even anticipated. Lately, I’ve been wanting to just “chill the fuck out”.
I learned English more or less by osmosis, reading a veritable ton of books, watching TV and films, and generally being amused by words. I haven’t the first clue as to grammar (though I have been trying, desperately, with Chinese – I’m just not wired to think in terms of grammar).
Are there any comics, intermediate level books or other types of 小说 in particular you would recommend?
I never seem to have any good answers for this sort of question, and so I’m hoping that others who have been through the intermediate Chinese stage can help Chris out and suggest content in the comments here.
One suggestion that I’ve made before and will offer up again now, though, is Hong Kong author Amy Cheung (张小娴 / 張小嫻 / Zhāng Xiǎoxián). Her novels fall very squarely into the realm of chick lit, but even for guys they’re good because they’re 1) written in a straightforward, easy to read manner; 2) have a lot of dialog; and 3) are simple enough that not understand big chunks of what’s written won’t take away too much from your understanding of the story as a whole. A bunch of her books are available from YesAsia, and of course they’re available in bookstores throughout the mainland, Hong Kong, and Taiwan.
If you have any other suggestions for Chris, please let him know in the comments!
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{ 9 comments… read them below or add one }
Hey Chris and and anyone else,
I am in a somewhat similar situation… just started my 3rd year in China, been studying off and on with the last year or so being “on.” I am definitely looking for stuff now to help me transition from can’t read anything and just learning some characters and words to maximizing my input with articles, comics, movies, t.v. shows etc on my way to hopefully some books in the future. I just got back from Shanghai and bought some stuff there, namely a few “Detective Conan” comics, “Graded Chinese Reader 3″ (bunch of short stories), and an abridged version (2,000 word level, through HSK B list) of Ba Jin’s “家”.
Mostly though, I recommend going to chinese-forums.com and browsing their “First Episode Project” thread for tv shows, and any other thread about reading material, podcasts, etc. (i.e. the one about scanlation manga online).
Nciku.com also has a translation of “Alice in Wonderland” chapter by chapter with pinyin and English original optional in a nice way after each paragraph.
Selfishly looking forward to seeing others’ recommendations
Same here. I’m very much enjoying Doraemon in Chinese. 哆啦A梦 as he is called here. The comics are very short and simple, but native material and interesting. I’m also reading the Ducktales comics. Those are harder, but I’ve always had a soft spot for them, and you can get them at any newspaper stand here in Beijing.
For TV shows the dub of ‘24′ has been a blast.
As for ‘real books’, the only one I’ve read so far (actually I’m still reading) is 球状闪电. I like it a lot, but it’s impossible to read (at my level) without Wenlin. Still, if anyone is into SF (and perhaps physics
), give it a try.
That’s it from me.. looking forward to other comments
In Taiwan, there are 漫畫店. It’s wall-to-wall comics/manga. You can rent or buy. You can also sit and read in comfy chairs, for a small membership fee. If you’re in Taiwan, go find a 漫畫店. **Do they have these in China?**
If not… check out Naruto or Bleach. Those are popular action/fighting comics. A previous poster mentioned Detective Conan, I’d second that recommendation as well. You might periodically try picking up a Chinese news article, paper or online makes no difference. Then, pick one article/story and translate. I usually pick the one I can already kind of understand. That way, I’m not completely lost.
Another option is television. If you like it, watch it. Finding material at a specific level is tricky. Word of warning.. Cartoons, while geared at children, are typically not as simple as one might expect.
don’t be afraid to find translated materials. I got great enjoyment reading a collection of english sci-fi (Ray Bradbury, George R.R. Martin, etc) that was translated into Chinese. It helped that I knew some of the stories beforehand. Also, I haven’t tried Harry Potter in Chinese yet, but I’m really enjoying it in German. If you’ve read it in English, then it’ll be extra easy for you in Chinese because you’ll know what to expect.
I would hawk our own stuff at Popup Chinese (http://popupchinese.com) if Chris wants audio materials, but if he’s just looking for books I’d agree with doviende. I personally started getting a lot more enjoyment out of being able to read Chinese when I stopped feeling guilty about not reading Chinese literature.
Found some great translations of Philip K. Dick at the Beijing 书城 and bought them all. Had never read them before so that was fun – especially A Scanner Darkly. The Tintin translations are also great at a lower level because while they’re technically still comics, the books are *very* text heavy. And far as Chinese authors go, my favorite has to be 三毛. Almost all of the stories in her “Restaurant in the Sahara” are worth going through. Very few have the obligation to solemnity that seems to mark most “serious” Chinese writing in the last century.
成都今夜请将我遗忘 by 慕容雪村 and 唐人街 by 林语堂 are a couple of novels with vastly different flavors which might be what you’re looking for. The first novel has plenty of slang, some dialogue, and what’s not dialogue is often not too tough to get through. The magazine 读者, and other similar ones, is at nearly every magazine stand on the mainland and it’s got plenty of Chinese articles and articles translated into Chinese.
Several Agatha Christie novels are available in the translation, and they tend to be good reading as well. It’s kind of weird to me that I found them easier reading than Harry Potter. Wudai novels have been slightly hard as well. Also, they’re not novels, but travel guides have also been good reading.
Thanks for all the help! I’m going to stock up on all sorts of these reading materials to take back home. I’ve been plonking through the Alice in Wonderland translation over at Nciku (great website), and find it great fun.
First of all, think of using various “clutches” to get you through tougher and more interesting material. I started reading Jia by Ba Jin quite early, using Wenlin. I had to look up quite a few words, but because Wenlin makes that so effortless, I was reading along, in a story I thoroughly enjoyed – rather than some textbook piece about sandstorms in Beijing. This also exposes you to all that’s out there – and there’s a lot! News, crazy tech blogs, political discussions, homemade erotical stories, everything you could think of.
I also got into Chinese soap operas. These are almost always subtitled, and same-language subtitling is god’s gift to the language learner! You can always pause the recording and look up an idiom in Wenlin etc. Verycd is a haven for all of this!
As for novels, I found early on that it’s _far_ easier to read novels that have tons of direct speech, ie.
- Hi.
- Hi!
- What’s going on?
- Is Xiao Lin coming on to me?
- I don’t think so? Why would he be interested in you?
etc
(usually it’s more like:
Peter said in a sultry voice: “Do you want some more lychee juice”? I answered haughtily: “In your dreams” – when I was first learning Chinese, I didn’t know all these adverbs, but I still understood _what_ they said.)
Much easier than “It was a cold and windy evening, as Mary carefully broached the subject of the world’s impending dissolution. Peter stared coldly at her flaccid body, before harrumphing in disgust.”
I never really got into reading translated books in Chinese – although I’ve often enjoyed doing so in other languages – because I hate the long transliterations of foreign names.