I hated those primitives as well... but I actually didn't do anything about it. Invariably is used seldomly so it's kind of easy to simply rote memorize which ones use it. Every I knew very well before starting the method since it's used so often as a stand alone kanji 毎日 etc. Since I knew every so well, I simply remembered whether a kanji used every (easy) or each (hard since I didn't know that primitive before).

As for "all".. I don't know. It comes up pretty seldomly in RtK and I've been fine so far, but it's certainly abstract enough to warrant attention.

Actually, the English keywords for those words aren't that important. Just replace them for common Japanese prompts that most probably you already know - or you will know rather soon anyway.

各　means それぞれの

皆 is the kanji used for みんな, like in 皆の日本語 (みんなのにほんご, which means "Japanese for all" and is the name of a famous textbook) or 皆さん like in 皆さん、こんにちは (good morning everybody)

毎 is used in words like 毎日、毎月、毎年、etc... (まいにち=everyday; まいつき=every month;まいとし=every year)

必 is the ひつ in 必要 (ひつよう=necessary), and is the kanji for 必ず(必ず= necessarily, invariably, without fail, etc...). I haven't seen that word written with kanji that much though.

Good luck.

Thanks for the advice people!

I prefer to stay away from Japanese keywords for now, but I definately think that it would work for people using that method.

Since my problem is not so much remembering the kanji themselves (e.g. I know which one to write when I see "every" in my review), but rather choosing the right primitive when writing the Kanji that contain them, I will focus on giving the primitives a more tangible meaning in the way that Katsuo suggested.
However I will just create a tangible meaning for 'invariably' (a serial killer named the hearth breaker, who invariably kills by slicing up hearths), and not for 'house & invariably' together. Once 'invariably' is taken care of, i don't need to combine it any further I think.

Wouldn't it be nice to have some sort of list that shows for each primitive or kanji how often it is used as a primitive for other kanji? It doesn't seem to be listed in the book.

pm215 wrote:

zwarte_kat wrote:

Wouldn't it be nice to have some sort of list that shows for each primitive or kanji how often it is used as a primitive for other kanji? It doesn't seem to be listed in the book.

Mmm. Then you could turn it into a graph, so you could easily see which primitives and kanji build on which others, which are used really often and which are hardly used at all, and so on...

It would be pretty complex though. I mean let's say a primitive is used in 5 kanji, another one is used in 20. But those 5 kanji are extremely common, let's say JLPT4 kanji. The other 20 are way more seldom, only 10 of them are even needed for JLPT1. Question would be, which primitive would you find most important?

Tobberoth wrote:

It would be pretty complex though. I mean let's say a primitive is used in 5 kanji, another one is used in 20. But those 5 kanji are extremely common, let's say JLPT4 kanji. The other 20 are way more seldom, only 10 of them are even needed for JLPT1. Question would be, which primitive would you find most important?

I just meant that it would be an interesting piece of data visualisation, not necessarily that it would be of practical relevance :-) But you possibly could use it to try to reorder the kanji into something which put more of the frequently-used kanji near the start of the list without breaking the 'kanji only when all primitives introduced' rule, if you liked.

For "honey", your story could be more intense.  Mine is:  "If you are kind to them and build them a nice house, you will invariably get honey from bees."  I guess you could still leave it out, but it's harder to because "invariably" is expressing the logical conclusion of the story -- it's "playing a role". 

But I agree that abstract keywords are hard (for me, verbs are hard as well), so I often replace them with a vivid noun.

For "invariably" (必) I use "a vampire" (stake through the heart); for "every" (毎) I sometimes use "Sigmund Freud" ("every man wants to lie down with his mother"); and for "formerly" (曽) I tried lots of things but eventually went with "the artist formerly known as Prince".

For "secret" and "secrecy", which are so close, I use one story:  There is intense secrecy around the exact location of the house of the vampire on Vampire Mountain.  The only thing known for sure about it is that there is a secret entrance in a wheat field.  (Imagine a vampire lurking furtively in a wheat field, looking for the secret entrance.)

Tobberoth wrote:

pm215 wrote:

zwarte_kat wrote:

Wouldn't it be nice to have some sort of list that shows for each primitive or kanji how often it is used as a primitive for other kanji? It doesn't seem to be listed in the book.

Mmm. Then you could turn it into a graph, so you could easily see which primitives and kanji build on which others, which are used really often and which are hardly used at all, and so on...

It would be pretty complex though. I mean let's say a primitive is used in 5 kanji, another one is used in 20. But those 5 kanji are extremely common, let's say JLPT4 kanji. The other 20 are way more seldom, only 10 of them are even needed for JLPT1. Question would be, which primitive would you find most important?

I meant it in the way that if you encounter a new kanji/primitive, and it doesn't have such a a strong meaning for stories, then it would be handy to see how much that kanji/primitive is used in future kanji. With that knowledge you could then decide if it is worth it to give it another meaning. If a kanji is not used as a primitive in the future, or maybe only once, then it would probably be unuseful to assign a different meaning to it, because it would just lead to confusion about that kanji and it's meaning, and it would cost you extra time. However, if you can see that it will be used 20 more times, then I think it's worth it to give it another meaning. The nice thing with a list or indication somewhere is: Everybody can then decide for themselves which one is more important, but at least they will have some information to make the decision.

A graph would be cool to look at and get an overal idea, but i would prefer a list, or maybe even an indication on the study page somewhere next to the kanji or as a popup:
example:

used in RTK1: 12x
used in RTK3: 4x

@joxn_costello
Thanks for your input. I also use the artist formely known as Prince

Last edited by zwarte_kat (2009 January 02, 10:36 pm)

liosama wrote:

Hmm i think  Transic pretty much answered the topic and answered what I would have most likely said.

I think that before topics like these are made the user should at least consult a Japanese dictionary first to see why heisig even chose those keywords in the first place. I don't know how you people survive without a dictionary :\

"all" meant nothing to me until i realised it was the mina in minasan, likewise for the others. Check a kanji dictionary first dude, look at common usages to get a feel of why heisig chose the keywords then dive in.

Thank you for your input. However, sometimes "us people" check a dictionary and still confuse primitives, and they would like to ask about stories in the "Stories request" forum. I think there was nothing wrong with my topic and I will decide for myself if I should make it or not dude.

liosama wrote:

Hmm i think  Transic pretty much answered the topic and answered what I would have most likely said.

That reply is helpful, but I don't think it directly addresses OP's main question. His/her main problem is not with the kanji (all, each, every, invariably) themselves, but with their later use as primitives in other characters.

Excuse my laziness, I did not read your post in full. I assumed it was another of those posts hence my reply.

I have never used invariably in any of my stories since it is far too abstract. I just use 'cross my heart' or something similar.

Every - i use as is - i'm lucky this kinda works for me.
階 is the only place where 'all' is ever used in jouyou kanji.

For secrecy, I have a vivid image of two kids sharing whatever secret it was crossing their hearts under a house then going to a mountain and burying their secret in the walls there. [If you watch Won Kar Wai movies you may know what im talking about ]

Its a recurring theme he does in his all his movies, but It was in Chungking Express i think. [He may have showed a flashback to that in In the mood for love, i'm not sure]