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+--- Thread: Japanese Reading Materials (/thread-2199.html)
Japanese Reading Materials - mentat_kgs - 2009-01-19
Currently I'm around the 50th page of the first 涼宮ハルヒ novel. 大変薦めます！
Japanese Reading Materials - snallygaster - 2009-01-19
I've been reading 星新一 (Shinichi Hoshi) lately; he's great. Really easy to read (within reach for those between JLPT3 & 2), very short stories (only a few pages each) and most importantly, entertaining. If you want something with language at about a Jr. high school level, but without fruity manga characters on the cover, spend a few hundred yen on one of his many paperback short story compilations.
Japanese Reading Materials - hknamida - 2009-01-19
I'm reading the マリア様がみてる novels right now. Slowly. I still tend to prefer manga for its short, instantly Anki-friendly sentences, but I can see that changing as my Japanese skills improve.
Japanese Reading Materials - woodwojr - 2009-01-19
Nothing like jumping in a month and a half late:
QuackingShoe Wrote:Did you just call me お前? Someone needs to read through http://forum.koohii.com/showthread.php?tid=2196 again!You probably want to go tell that to my lab at 会津大学, too, as they clearly haven't gotten the memo.
(I can't be sure, but from the degree to which casual use of 俺 and, to a lesser extent, お前 was accepted there, I suspect the implication that they aren't used much may be very Tokyo-centric.)
Regarding recommendations, there's always キノの旅, which is quite enjoyable.
~J
Japanese Reading Materials - mentat_kgs - 2009-01-19
I started キノの旅 a while ago, but I did not liked its obsession for english words.
Japanese Reading Materials - QuackingShoe - 2009-01-19
@woodwojr:
The comment was really just a joke about the quoted girls reaction to it in that other thread at the time, which I found really hilarious. I've refrained from creating any actual, personal ideas on the frequency with which any of these things are said because I have not actually been to Japan at this point.
Japanese Reading Materials - Transtic - 2009-01-19
woodwojr Wrote:Regarding recommendations, there's always キノの旅, which is quite enjoyable.Besides, it has an anime version which features some of the stories from the light novels. If you find the light novels too difficult, you can watch the anime and then read those chapters that correspond to the anime. Nice combo! =)
~J
Japanese Reading Materials - iSoron - 2009-01-19
I second woodwojr's recommendation of キノの旅 and mentat_kgs's recommendation of 涼宮ハルヒ. Both are great series. キノの旅 is very easy to read. Short sentences, short paragraphs. 涼宮ハルヒ is the complete opposite.
Other good light novels are バッカーノ, 紅 and NHKにようこそ.
Japanese Reading Materials - mentat_kgs - 2009-01-19
Yeah, haruhi has ultra long sentences. It is the hardest thing to read I've found until now, even if it does not require much vocabulary.
Japanese Reading Materials - woodwojr - 2009-01-19
mentat_kgs Wrote:I started キノの旅 a while ago, but I did not liked its obsession for english words.What obsession? I'm only at the beginning of the second book, but all I've seen are a few translations of stuff like throwaway quotes at the beginning and end of the books and, curiously, the fact that the afterword contains no spoilers (but "spoiler" is just transliterated as NETABARASHI, making it just odd), and the fact that each of the chapters is given an English name (substantively different from the Japanese, though).
Am I forgetting something, does it start later, or is that just sufficiently bothersome to you?
~J
Japanese Reading Materials - pm215 - 2009-01-19
snallygaster Wrote:I've been reading 星新一 (Shinichi Hoshi) lately; he's great.Thanks for the reminder -- I have one of his books in the to-read pile which I must have a look at. (Last time I was in Japan I bought a pile of second hand stuff from Book-off which I'm slowly working my way through...)
Japanese Reading Materials - iSoron - 2009-01-19
woodwojr Wrote:Am I forgetting something, does it start later, or is that just sufficiently bothersome to you?I think he means terms like 'motoraid', 'persuader', 'goggles', 'revolver', 'double action', etc.
Japanese Reading Materials - woodwojr - 2009-01-19
Oh. Well, Motorrad is German, and Persuader, while obviously derived from English, can't really be called English; the rest is about in line with the number of loan-words I've seen from pretty much any source. Your mileage may, of course, vary.
~J
Japanese Reading Materials - wccrawford - 2009-01-19
Kino no Tabi the anime was awesome. I really need to rewatch that again with subs, and then again without. I've already watched it twice, too. That was definitely one of my better buys. I'm going to have to seriously consider the light novels, even though I'm nowhere near to being able to read them. (Or the other ones already on my shelf, waiting for me.)
Japanese Reading Materials - KMarkP - 2009-02-27
I just started a new novel that might be interesting to those whose reading skills are still in the intermediate stage. The prize-winning mystery novel "Himitsu" by Higashino Keigo is surprisingly easy to read and very interesting. After reading a lot of Murakami Haruki and not finding much else that's on my level, this book is a welcome addition.
Give it a try?
Japanese Reading Materials - chamcham - 2009-02-27
Main Site
http://www.hiraganatimes.com
Subscription info
http://www.hiraganatimes.com/hp/magazine/subscrip/subscrip-E.html
If you like magazines, you can try "Hiragana Times", it's a monthly magazine
about news, culture and events in Japan. One of the key features is that ALL
articles are translated into English and Japanese. And ALL kanji have furigana (pronunciation) written right on top.
They also have MP3 audio files for certain articles in every issue.
A one-year subscription for the digital (PDF) version costs 6,000 yen (roughly $60 US dollars), which is about $5 a month.
I used to subscribe to the PDF version years ago and after a few months, they started sending the actual magazines to my apartment anyway. Not sure if they still do this.
PDF Samples for this month are here:
http://www.hiraganatimes.com/hp/magazine/sample/006.pdf
http://www.hiraganatimes.com/hp/magazine/sample/010.pdf
http://www.hiraganatimes.com/hp/magazine/sample/020.pdf
Audio samples:
http://www.hiraganatimes.com/hp/magazine/sample/sample_1.mp3
http://www.hiraganatimes.com/hp/magazine/sample/sample_2.mp3
http://www.hiraganatimes.com/hp/magazine/sample/sample_3.mp3
http://www.hiraganatimes.com/hp/magazine/sample/sample_4.mp3
http://www.hiraganatimes.com/hp/magazine/sample/sample_5.mp3
FYI, the kanji fonts appear to be vector-based. So they zoom
in infinitely and look incredibly clear.
Japanese Reading Materials - Serge - 2009-05-27
So is anyone reading the new Murakami's book "1Q84" yet? :-) I picked up volume one during lunch break this afternoon and started the first chapter.
I'm not a Murakami fan and am pretty certain I'll hate the story but it's the novelty factor of being one of the first, I guess. Also, the language is so deceptively easy...
Japanese Reading Materials - Jarvik7 - 2009-05-29
Out of boredom I perused some copies of Mangajin I had lying around. I don't get what the editor was going for. They use intermediate level language examples to explain what "sumimasen" and "yoroshiku onegai shimasu" mean for the first 5 pages or so of both issues I looked at. Anyone who can get anything out of the examples already knows the meaning.. There are also a ton of errors (one note explains how the を particle is left out in the example because it's casual speech, when the を particle is clearly present) and flat-out incorrect explanations (ex: explaining 修羅 as a famous battle in Buddhist history, when it's infact one of the six hells, where there is nonstop fighting).
other: There is almost no Japanese used other than in the manga panels. I have a feeling that they had no Japanese typesetting ability, so everything is in romaji. There are a few places where they are used, but they look like they were inserted as images.
other2: They repeatedly say "word x can also mean y", when they are infact two different words with different kanji, but same pronunciation. This probably stems from them relying on romaji.
It's mildly entertaining at least I guess..
Japanese Reading Materials - Evil_Dragon - 2009-05-29
I really enjoyed Umibe no Kafka by Murakami Haruki.. and I think I will enjoy his other books as well.
(already bought Norwegian Wood)
Japanese Reading Materials - bombpersons - 2009-05-30
I'm *trying* to read 撲殺天使ドクロちゃん at the moment =D
Japanese Reading Materials - Thora - 2009-05-30
Serge Wrote:So is anyone reading the new Murakami's book "1Q84" yet? :-) I picked up volume one during lunch break this afternoon and started the first chapter. I'm not a Murakami fan and am pretty certain I'll hate the story but it's the novelty factor of being one of the first, I guess. Also, the language is so deceptively easy...Wow, you are quick - I read it was being released in Japan on May 29! Let us know what you think of it. (You too Evil Dragon) Why you dislike Murakami, Serge? I've avoided him only because I'm new to Japanese literature and heard he writes in a unique English-translated-to-Japanese style.
"deceptively easy" - ugh, this is why I struggle with literature. There's a constant nagging feeling that I'm missing all the stuff that makes it great. I need annotations to uncover the hidden gems.
Here's a site some might like: Japanese literature
Japanese Reading Materials - Nukemarine - 2009-05-30
I'll be honest, I never bothered to find out what "Norwegian Wood" was all about till today. Now I feel like reading it.
Curse you informative thread.
Japanese Reading Materials - hknamida - 2009-05-30
I'm currently reading 不思議の国のアリス.
Japanese Reading Materials - Codexus - 2009-05-30
I'm reading the マジック・ツリーハウス series. Really great for beginners, it's fun and there is a lot of repetitions that make learning easier. The only problem is that it's a bit light on the kanji and I wish there were more to help me guess the meaning of some words.
Japanese Reading Materials - bombpersons - 2009-05-30
I just found a write up of the first volume of 撲殺天使ドクロちゃん =D http://209.85.229.132/search?q=cache:u-QKt7kK0lwJ:kbsxcx.hp.infoseek.co.jp/updown/cgi-bin/updown/updown2.cgi%3Fmode%3Ddownload%26id%3D66+%E2%80%9D%E7%B5%9E%E7%97%A3%E2%80%9D&cd=2&hl=ja&ct=clnk&client=firefox-a
If you ever want to find a script for a light novel, try searching google with a sentence from the book, you might find something =D