I´m reading posts in this forum quite often, posting myself doesn´t happen as often.
But I want to share this with everyone of you - today I met James W Heisig.
He has been existing only in script for such a long time, and now sitting face to face with him just felt unreal. He is the nicest man you can imagine, and it was altogether an overwhelming experience to acctually meet him.
I have very few idols, but James Heisig is one of those who qualifies into that list.
He have changed my life so dramatically that I simply can´t tell in words what his work has meant to me.

I´m only halfway through the third book, but seeing him in person makes me want to finish that book as quickly as I can. Just because it´s so simple and rewarding!
As he knows all about.

Can you please elaborate? Where did you meet and under what circumstances? What for?

How old is he and whait is he doing today? Thanks for sharing your experience.

Well first of all I´m being an exchange student at Nanzan University in Nagoya this semester. And that is the exact place where he is currently doing his work, he is a "researcher in the Nanzan Institute for Religion and Culture".

I met him simply because I mailed him and asked if I could do so. Being at the same university as him was just a chance that I couln´t afford to miss.

I work in Nagoya (大須 area) and my girlfriend goes to Nanzan. I've thought a few times that it would be pretty easy to meet Heisig if I wanted but I didn't really see a point.

Me: Hi, I learned some kanji using your book.
Heisig: Cool
Me: When is the next volume of RTH coming?
Heisig: Dunno
Me: Oh.. Well, bye.

Awesome!

For me it was definitely worth going to him in person just to say a simple thank you. I´m sure he is appreciateing a simple message as that. Of course we taked for a while, but that´s only because he is such a nice man. He never did what he did to earn money, he just did what he needed to do because of personal reasons, but still his work was revolutionary, and that is worth all the appreciation he can get.

There is plenty of shit you could talk to the man about, I personally think he doesn't give a flying ***** about kanji.

You could discuss with him Zen Buddhism and argue against his translations of Buddhist 'scholars' such as D.T.Suzuki and the like. He believes that many of the Kyoto school philosophers (a set of contrarian leftist/liberal scholars back in WW2) only said they believed in the 'Greater East Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere' 大東亜共栄圏
and whatever other bullshit fascist Japan proliferated back then in their works, was for their own safety, and that they were forced to do so by the academically oppressive 思想警察\特高警察 ('Higher Police'). And to 'misinterpret' their works, which is what most western sociologists and philosophers have done, according to Heisig, would be to misjudge their whole idea of zen philosophy.

I don't want to turn this into a religion thread, but we all know it is not uncommon, that is, using religion to proliferate and justify war/colonization/oppression/occupation/annexation list goes on...


Where I stand on the issue, I really have no idea. If you read a bunch of the translations Heisig has done you see some blatant shit. I'd have to have a reread of it all though, I'm working off memory 2 years ago now.

He'd be an interesting person to talk to none the less, all philosophers and sociologists are.

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Edit typo~

I do see your point in him not really caring so much about kanji in the end, since it came really easy to him and was just a matter of getting settled in the country as quickly and smoothly as possible, for other purposes.
But about those purposes I´ll let you argue with someone else reading this thread, my knowledge about his "real" work is very limited.

I don't know about you, but we criticize Britain quite a lot (in Sweden). We criticize all colonial empires because it's BS. In the end though, it's not worth it to criticize any country since one's own country definitely has some stuff in the past they can't be to proud about. It would for example be nice to see a table over how many people Swedish Vikings murdered and raped 1500 or so years ago.

As a Brit myself, I'd say we ourselves also criticise the Empire etc. quite a lot. We certainly weren't taught to regard much of our history positively in school, instead I felt they rather overdid the guilt-tripping, since, 'y know, none of us were even alive at the time.

Anyway, 'grats on getting to meet Heising-sensei, Murten. I'd definitely want to take the opportunity if it arose, simply to thank him for making me see Kanji as something other than a confusing mass of identical squiggles, and for showing me that one needn't be brought up with them to ever be able to make sense of them.

careful.................... Can we just turn this conversation back to Mr. Heisig? Before it becomes a complete flame-war cluster****?

[ファブリス]

ADMIN
Can we get back on topic please (yes, deleted two completely OOT posts).

vinniram: are you here to participate constructively on these boards? Admittedly liosama was a bit off topic, but your language doesn't invite any positive responses.

Please stay courteous and respectful to other forum members. Animosity towards others will not be tolerated, even in the Community forum.

Thank you.

How is his japanese

Yes did you chat in Japanese or English?

Does he really have a halo around his body? Can he really walk on water? ;D?


Cant you just say precisely about what you talked?

Well he´s been living in Nagoya for the last 30 years so you can guess his ability in japanese
Of course we chatted in english though, we talked mostly about his experiences in making the books, he showed me the first printing ever for example. Amazing to see things like that, in perfect condition too.

Murten Wrote:Well he´s been living in Nagoya for the last 30 years so you can guess his ability in japanese
Of course we chatted in english though, we talked mostly about his experiences in making the books, he showed me the first printing ever for example. Amazing to see things like that, in perfect condition too.

I wouldn't judge on how long someone lived in the country to know their ability with the language. I had a professor in 東京外国語大学 who lived in Japan for the past 23 years and didn't speak a word of the language. It was an embarrassment, really.

Also, I've always wanted to meet Heisig, so congrats on that! One of my professors at University worked with him a lot, and he was always flying to Japan to collaborate on project with him. I only found this out when I went to chat with him and casually mentioned I was doing Heisig's method of learning kanji, and suddenly he goes, "Oh you're using Jim's book? It's pretty good."

jmkeralis Wrote:I think it's really cool that you took the initiative to meet him and chat a bit. I bet it's nice to know that some of your work has impacted others in a positive way, even if it's not your "magnum opus," so to speak.

Thank you, I´m happy I took the chance to meet him when I had the chance, and I´m also sure that he appreciates whenever people are showing him gratitude for his work (may it not be his "magnus opus" as you said). That was really my point of the meeting, I just wanted to say thank you in person.

Ryuujin27 Wrote:I wouldn't judge on how long someone lived in the country to know their ability with the language. I had a professor in 東京外国語大学 who lived in Japan for the past 23 years and didn't speak a word of the language. It was an embarrassment, really.

True. But imagine his headstart with half of the language, after a month in Japan. And he also told me that all the kanji (at least from the first book, and most likely many more) are just japanese to him now. He never gave up learning the language.

Murten Wrote:

Ryuujin27 Wrote:I wouldn't judge on how long someone lived in the country to know their ability with the language. I had a professor in 東京外国語大学 who lived in Japan for the past 23 years and didn't speak a word of the language. It was an embarrassment, really.

True. But imagine his headstart with half of the language, after a month in Japan. And he also told me that all the kanji (at least from the first book, and most likely many more) are just japanese to him now. He never gave up learning the language.

Oh I'm sure he never gave up, and no doubt he's excellent. I just wanted to rant about people living in a place for many, many years and not learning any of the language, haha.

Ryuujin27 Wrote:

Murten Wrote:

Ryuujin27 Wrote:I wouldn't judge on how long someone lived in the country to know their ability with the language. I had a professor in 東京外国語大学 who lived in Japan for the past 23 years and didn't speak a word of the language. It was an embarrassment, really.

True. But imagine his headstart with half of the language, after a month in Japan. And he also told me that all the kanji (at least from the first book, and most likely many more) are just japanese to him now. He never gave up learning the language.

Oh I'm sure he never gave up, and no doubt he's excellent. I just wanted to rant about people living in a place for many, many years and not learning any of the language, haha.

I have to agree with you when I was in Japan. I met a lot of people that lived in Japan for 5 years, 10 years and did not know a word of Japanese! It's suprisingly common, overall it's still rare for a foreigner living in Japan that can speak, read and write!! But that's awesome that you met James Heisig he's one of my idols Esp, during a time where in the 70's where African-Americans and Foriengers were a rarity in Japan and we did not have all the resources like we do now to help improve and learn Japanese! I'm soo blessed to be living in this decade with all these resources!

Wow! That is really cool! I live in Shiga which is not very far from Nagoya and have always thought of taking a weekend to go out and look at the campus there.

Very jealous you got to talk to him about Kanji and Japanese. Sure you could have talked about other things, but if talking to him about Kanji and Japanese inspires you to keep going at Japanese, and he is more than happy to do it, then who cares ya know.