Chinese Dictionaries - The best dictionaries for the Chinese language
The best Chinese dictionaries to study Mandarin

Chinese Dictionaries - The best dictionaries for the Chinese language

When people begin learning Chinese, a common question is which dictionary is the best one. For beginners, the answer is simple. It is the small red Concise English-Chinese Chinese-English Dictionary published by Oxford University Press. It is small, convenient and still fairly comprehensive. Surely, there are mistakes. For example, the lack of the common Chinese word "taolun" (to discuss) from it. I could never understand that and I still think that it must be an accidental omission. But what matters the most for beginners is that even the English-Chinese side of the dictionary lists the pronunciation in pinyin. Also, the character lookup index is very convenient, which is a major help. In the years to come, you will have memorized the index numbers for most common radicals. If you are translating from Chinese to English, the second best choice for beginners would be the brown A Chinese-English Dictionary by the Commercial Press. Despite its relatively small size is

surprisingly comprehensive and accurate. A marked feature of this dictionary is the abundance of Communist propaganda among the sample sentences. However, the sentences today are more entertaining than annoying. Naturally, there are a lot more English-Chinese dictionaries but the above two are the ones that helped me the most when I started learning Chinese. One should mention John DeFrancis's ABC Chinese-English Comprehensive Dictionary which is special because it arranges the Chinese words solely based on their pronunciation rather than the characters. Thus you do not have to know which character a word is written with, you will still be able to find it in the dictionary. Another, somewhat obsolete dictionary is the Matthews Chinese-English Dictionary from 1931. Its main use today is for classical Chinese but the romanization system it uses can be confusing for modern students. You should not use Matthews dictionary for learning Mandarin Chinese. Stephen Bekes The Chinese alphabet: Where is it? Origins of Chinese writing Chinese letters Chinese symbols for tattoos Chinese Goddess of Mercy Funniest Chinese subtitles Writing Chinese names