Protect and Praise Strokes

Index » RtK Volume 1

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Reply #1 - 2008 July 03, 6:16 pm
windykat Member
From: Florida Registered: 2007-07-08 Posts: 12

Has anyone else noticed that the way Heisig draws protect (保) and praise (褒) is different from how it should be hand drawn (as far as I can tell)? According to the Yamasa kanji dictionary both kanji should have a hook at the bottom of the "wood" part:

http://www.yamasa.cc/members/ocjs/kanji … enDocument

http://www.yamasa.cc/members/ocjs/kanji … enDocument

Are there other times in RTK1 in which this happens? I was only looking there out of curiosity for the stroke order when I stumbled across that...

Reply #2 - 2008 July 03, 6:21 pm
windykat Member
From: Florida Registered: 2007-07-08 Posts: 12

There is actually the same issue in the kanji for prefecture as well : 県

http://www.yamasa.cc/members/ocjs/kanji … enDocument

Reply #3 - 2008 July 03, 8:18 pm
furrykef Member
From: Oklahoma City Registered: 2008-06-24 Posts: 191

Halpern's diagram doesn't draw it with a hook, and Halpern's diagrams use the brush writing variations of kanji (e.g. 令 ends with a diagonal instead of vertical stroke). My guess is the hook is optional.

Here's the diagram for the other one just for completeness.

Last edited by furrykef (2008 July 03, 8:21 pm)

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Reply #4 - 2008 July 03, 11:19 pm
Christoph Member
From: Susono, Japan Registered: 2006-08-14 Posts: 121 Website

The style that Yamasa is displaying on the right there is referred to as 行書体(ぎょうしょたい）or Semi-cursive script.
The other is 楷書体（かいしょたい） or Regular script.

If you were taking the Kanji Kentei it'd be a much safer bet to use the Regular script as Semi-cursive could be marked as incorrect.

Reply #5 - 2008 July 04, 1:41 am
raseru Member
From: california Registered: 2007-05-23 Posts: 159

I hate to burst your bubble but heisig seriously seems wrong 10% of the time, I would seriously recommend looking up the stroke order somewhere else whenever you learn a new radical or something unique

Reply #6 - 2008 July 04, 4:58 am
furrykef Member
From: Oklahoma City Registered: 2008-06-24 Posts: 191

Christoph wrote:

If you were taking the Kanji Kentei it'd be a much safer bet to use the Regular script as Semi-cursive could be marked as incorrect.

Both the regular and semi-cursive ones show the hook that was mentioned.

Also, it should be noted that both kanji use "wooden pole" instead of tree. Both Heisig and Halpern use "tree" for "protect" and "wooden pole" for "praise". Perhaps the one Yamasa has for "protect" is an accepted variant.


raseru wrote:

I hate to burst your bubble but heisig seriously seems wrong 10% of the time, I would seriously recommend looking up the stroke order somewhere else whenever you learn a new radical or something unique

I wouldn't say 10% of the time. I think there are probably fewer than 5 kanji that have incorrect stroke order in the entire book. I still prefer to know the correct order for all of them, though.

In any case, that's irrelevant here, because his diagrams for these two characters are correct.

- Kef

Last edited by furrykef (2008 July 04, 5:03 am)

Reply #7 - 2008 July 04, 6:52 am
woodwojr Member
From: Boston Registered: 2008-05-02 Posts: 530

I count nine in the Running Errata that I can conclusively determine to be incorrect (there are other alterations to the writings, but I'm not sure what's up with them). In my Fourth Edition book, somewhere in the vicinity of half of those hadn't been corrected yet.  That gives a 0.44% known error rate in the publication history of the book, with about 0.22% in the Fourth Edition. Of course, this is only counting the character itself--an accounting of how the error propagates into other characters might be rather less forgiving.

~J

Reply #8 - 2008 July 06, 11:04 pm
Christoph Member
From: Susono, Japan Registered: 2006-08-14 Posts: 121 Website

furrykef wrote:

Christoph wrote:

If you were taking the Kanji Kentei it'd be a much safer bet to use the Regular script as Semi-cursive could be marked as incorrect.

Both the regular and semi-cursive ones show the hook that was mentioned.

Lost me a bit there.. in all of the example links that windykat gave the two on the right are Semi-cursive and the one on the left is Regular.

The hook is denoting the semi-cursive script.

Reply #9 - 2008 July 08, 11:43 am
furrykef Member
From: Oklahoma City Registered: 2008-06-24 Posts: 191

I don't think the middle one is meant to depict semi-cursive forms. It does, however, depict handwritten/brush forms as opposed to typeset print forms. In all the kanji on that site, the middle image is always nice and neat, not somewhat "scribbly" like semi-cursive writing is.

Take this kanji for example. The middle column has it written very neatly, and the right column merges strokes 6-8 into one long zig-zaggy stroke.

- Kef

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