You need to know some practice methods and skills before learning Chinese characters writing. The first thing to do with any new Chinese characters is to carefully memorize the stroke order. Simple rules govern the order in which the strokes that make up a Chinese character must be written. It is very important to write with the correct stroke order, so pay careful attention to the order in what follows.

The tried and true method for practicing writing is to copy the characters of an accomplished calligrapher. While you are unsure of your technique, you may want to put a thin, transparent sheet of paper over the characters you are copying and trace them with your pen. Once you understand the rudiments, you should copy by first examining the model and then writing your Chinese character in exactly the same way. You should not look at one stroke at a time, write it, consider the next stroke, write it, and so on. Instead, you should look at the whole character, analyze its structure, turn your head away, and not look at the model character again until you have written all the strokes. When you have completed your Chinese character, you should compare it with the model, find out what mistakes you made, and try again. This is the only way to fix the picture of the Chinese character firmly in your mind and make rapid progress.

The principle behind this method of practicing has its roots deep in the Chinese aesthetic tradition. Chinese artists are expected to see the whole painting with their inner eye before beginning to work; then they simply paint what they see. This approach is called having a bamboo completed in your chest. Chinese watercolors and calligraphic works are often executed in a very short time the creative work is done before the artist touches the brush.

It is taboo to go back and alter a character while writing. If a stroke fails, begin the whole character over again.

Practice only three or four different characters a day, at least to begin with. Otherwise, you do not have time to learn them thoroughly enough, and you grow too tired to analyze what you are doing right and what you are doing wrong. You learn the characters in a sloppy way and do not really improve your writing.

Write each character at least a hundred times. Save everything you write and date the papers. Just as with all learning, there will be times when you do not feel as though you are making any progress. It can be heartening to look at the characters that you wrote a month or two earlier. You will be surprised at the difference.

Sit correctly at a desk or table that is not too high. You should be able to rest your arms comfortably on the tabletop. Put the paper straight in front of you and do not slant it too much. Many learners slant the paper and bend over when writing. Don’t do either when you write Chinese characters. Hold the pen between thumb and forefinger, letting it rest gently on your curved middle finger. The tip of the pen should point forward on the paper and should form a forty-five-degree angle with it. Sit back in the chair so the chair-back supports your lower back as much as possible. Be as upright as possible without tensing your back and shoulders.

Try to practice on a daily basis. It is much better to practice for fifteen minutes every day than not to practice for a while and then suddenly sit for hours on end at the writing table.

If you want to learn to write Chinese, you need to prepare a fountain pen, ink and paper at first. Let’s begin by discussing how to practice and then talk about how to form Chinese characters that are pleasing to the eye.

Use a fountain pen with a round tip. The special pens for calligraphy that are available in the United States, Europe, and elsewhere usually have flat tips and are therefore not suitable for writing Chinese characters. The best pens are the ones whose shaft covers nearly the entire tip, giving it firm support. This is the kind of fountain pen most common in China, and you should be able to find one in a good stationery store in your neighborhood as well.

Chinese carbon ink is the ideal choice if you can find it. The ink is a deeper black than most inks used outside China, in keeping with the Chinese calligraphic tradition of “black Chinese characters on white paper.” The high contrast makes it easy to spot errors. Also, it is almost waterproof after it dries. If you cannot find carbon ink, use any black ink.

The paper should be crosshatched or marked off in squares, with each square big enough to contain a whole character. Squares make it easier for the beginner to produce characters of uniform size. The paper should be glossy enough that the ink dries with sharp edges and does not run. Never put the paper directly on a hard table when writing-satisfactory strokes are extremely difficult to produce. Instead, put several pieces of paper under the paper you are writing on.

Even though Chinese characters are one of the most fascinating aspects of the Chinese language, most of people who learn Chinese characters aren’t very good at writing them. Translators and scholars who know the language well sometimes have embarrassingly sloppy handwriting. It is a pity that the art of writing has been so little stressed in the teaching of the language. Not only is writing beautiful characters fun, but good handwriting is of much greater importance in learning Chinese than in learning a Western language. There are several reasons for this.

The Chinese characters may seem chaotic to the novice, but their structure is not at all haphazard. Over the millennia they have developed from easily recognizable pictures of objects to highly stylized symbols of script. In the course of this development they have also been standardized to facilitate speed and comfort in writing. Not only must the strokes that make up each character be written in a certain rigidly specified order; they must also be written in a special way, which we will deal with in this book. The technique of writing is thus closely linked to the structure of Chinese characters. By focusing on good handwriting, learners more quickly acquire a feeling for the logic of the Chinese characters, making them easier to remember. Schoolteachers in China pay great attention to the subject of writing.

Most handwritten Chinese characters (in letters and on menus and shop signs, for example) are written in cursive script, where the separate strokes are linked for quick writing. Such Chinese characters are much harder to read than the printed forms that beginners learn. Because they are shorthand versions derived from the same roots as the standard forms, the way they are written is closely linked to the way standard Chinese characters are written. In developing correct handwriting, you will gain a natural feel for the characters that makes them easier to decipher, even when they are in the cursive style. Actually, it is almost impossible for someone who lacks an adequate foundation in the art of writing to interpret cursive Chinese characters.

For anyone who wants to learn how to write cursive script, reasonable proficiency in standard Chinese characters is absolutely essential.

Calligraphy, the art of Chinese characters writing, is considered in China the noblest of the fine arts. At a very early stage in history it became an abstract and expressionist art form, where meaning is of secondary importance and aesthetic expression the prime concern. Many Chinese hold that calligraphy prolongs the writers’ lives, sharpens their senses, and enhances their general well-being. By practicing calligraphy you can achieve a glimpse into Chinese aesthetics and philosophy and learn to appreciate an abstract art form.

There are two principal ways to learn Chinese calligraphy. You can begin in the traditional way, with a brush. This calls for long practice, infinite patience, and a good teacher. By practicing with a brush you emphasize the artistic rather than the practical, for few modern Chinese use the brush in everyday life.

There are few good teachers of traditional Chinese calligraphy outside China. My suggestion is to practice Chinese characters with a fountain pen. This has many advantages. The fountain pen is the writing tool used in present-day China, so you have a practical use for what you learn. The fountain pen is easier to use than the soft, pliable brush, so you can avoid spending time on technique and concentrate on writing neat Chinese characters. The principles for writing with a fountain pen hold equally well for pencil and ballpoint pen, though it is easier to form pleasing strokes with a fountain pen. Lastly, you can make do without a teacher. Fountain pens are readily available, and ordinary paper can be used. For brush calligraphy, special Chinese writing paper is preferable.

Many teachers of Chinese hold the misconception that in learning calligraphy it is necessary to start practicing with a brush. As a result, many schools give makeshift courses in brush calligraphy or, more commonly, offer hardly any instruction in the subject at all. In fact, fountain pen calligraphy is becoming more and more popular in the whole Chinese-speaking world; there are many books offering model characters and aesthetic guidance, as well as regular exhibitions and competitions. Practicing with a pen is as good a way to learn the characters as practicing with a brush. To understand and appreciate Chinese characters requires some historical background and a simple analysis of the structure and aesthetics of the script.

I hope Learn Chinese Website can help all learners of Chinese. I hope this website can also attract anyone with an interest in Chinese language and Chinese culture. I will introduce some methods to write Chinese characters from now on. I hope the suggestions in this website let you learn Chinese characters more easily.

Pinyin, “Chinese spelling system”, it is necessary to note, however, that the Pinyin “Chinese spelling system” is currently not used in place of Chinese writing in China. Instead, it is a romanized system functioning to annotate standard Chinese pronunciation with Roman letters. Since 1958, the Pinyin system has become very useful for foreigners to learn to speak Chinese and it is now most widely adopted by teachers instructing foreign students in Chinese. The success of Pinyin overseas is partially because of its similarities with English letters that make it much easier for students who already know English not only to commit the Chinese phonetic symbols to memory, but also to type Chinese text into English-enabled computers.

In fact Chinese Pinyin is just like the phonetic symbol of English. It is only a supplementary means of learning Chinese, but not final purpose. Moreover, learning Pinyin spelling will increase burden of memory. If you want to learn Chinese fast, I don’t advise you to learn Pinyin. I will teach some good methods to learn Chinese in the future.

Chinese characters are the longest history characters that are still used now. The earliest Chinese characters that we can see now are the inscriptions on bones or tortoise shells more than 3000 years ago. Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics is one of the earliest characters of mankind, but it died out. Sumerian arrowhead characters have a history of 5000 years, but it also died out after A.D. 330. Other famous characters had also died out in the history of mankind, such as Maya, Brahmi, etc. However, Chinese characters not only don’t decline, but also develop constantly. Why is this? I summarize the following reasons. Let us experience the glamour of Chinese characters together.

1. Chinese characters pronunciation is the most beautiful.

Each Chinese characters has one sound, each sound is divided into four tones. So it is loud and clear to read; there are rhythms; just like beautiful music; especially Chinese poems. The Chinese poems stress antithesis, the level and oblique tones, so Chinese poems are very neat, and rhythm is very bright, it is very suitable for reading.

Chinese characters pronunciation is loud and clear, without voiceless consonant, so Chinese characters have obvious advantage in “man-machine dialogue”.

2. Chinese characters have the most graceful shape.

How graceful are Chinese characters? Chinese characters have already become a kind of art — Calligraphy art. Calligraphy art of Chinese characters is that any other characters can’t compare. The ancient Chinese calligraphy works are the priceless treasure.

3. Chinese characters are the easiest to discern.

Do a test first: See the following two kinds of array ways, which can know its amount more quickly?

①

●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●

②

●●●●

●●●●

●●●●

●●●●

The answer is certainly the second. Because the human eyes visual field is always one surface, but not a line. The former is linear array, it is difficult to recognize; the latter arranges into a square, it is very easy to recognize. The former is equivalent to an alphabetic writing — Linear characters; the latter is equivalent to Chinese characters — Square characters. Therefore we can draw the conclusion: Chinese characters have higher efficiency of reading than the alphabetic writing.

4. The meaning of Chinese characters is the easiest to understand.

Please compare the following Chinese and English words group:

Though these six English words meaning all relate to ox, write and pronunciation are different. If you want to know them, must learn one by one, there isn’t any rule. However, perhaps you have found these Chinese characters words all include a Chinese character “牛”.”牛”meaning is “ox”. Therefore, you can know all words that include”牛”relate with “ox”. Therefore, if you know certain amounts of Chinese characters (2500 - 3000), can know countless Chinese characters.

Hope my analysis can stimulate your interest in learning Chinese. Furthermore, hope you can like Chinese characters; feel Chinese characters glamour with heart!

Chinese characters are one of the oldest characters in the world. It is the writing symbol which records Chinese language. The shape of Chinese characters changes from figure to square symbol gradually, so Chinese characters are known as “Block word”. Chinese characters integrate image, sound and meaning. This characteristic is unique in all characters of the world.

Chinese characters are a gem of Chinese nation’s culture of several thousand years. Chinese characters can cause our nice imagination. It can give people beautiful enjoyment.

Chinese characters are made up of one or several word roots in a square through two-dimension way (Indo-European is one-dimension characters).

The biggest characteristic of Chinese characters is that each Chinese character represents a meaning. The information density is very high in the single Chinese characters. It can express more information with shorter length, so the reading efficiency of Chinese characters is very high!

Each regular Chinese character occupies the same space. The minimum unit of Chinese characters is strokes. The order of strokes Chinese characters is regular. Generally speaking, the law of strokes of Chinese characters is: Write horizontal stroke first, and then write vertical stroke; write left-falling stroke first, and then write right-falling stroke; from top to bottom; from left to right; from outside to inside; from middle to both sides.

The quantity of Chinese characters is nearly 100,000. However, there are only thousands of daily Chinese characters used. In fact you only need to learn 2500 - 3000 Chinese characters. It is enough, because 3000 Chinese characters can cover 99% of writing material.

It is a very interesting thing to learn Chinese characters. If you really want to learn Chinese characters, I will teach 3000 frequently-used Chinese characters to everybody one by one in this website in the future!

Chinese characters are the characters which record Chinese language; it has already had a history of more than 5,000 years. As the tool of recording, keeping and spreading knowledge, Chinese characters are an indispensable part in Chinese civilization.

Cang Jie (仓颉) is the founder of Chinese characters in the ancient mythical legend of China. Certainly Chinese characters can’t be created alone by Cang Jie, but created by a lot of people. What we pay attention to isn’t who create Chinese characters, but the far-reaching historical significance of Chinese characters. The appearance of Chinese characters indicated China’s history entered the era recorded by characters. It has important influence to China’s history.

Chinese characters constitute one of the oldest forms of writing in the world. Archaeologists making excavations since the 1970s have discovered that characters were already in use in the Stone Age, even though the symbols can probably not be considered script in the true sense of the word. When scholars consider the early history of the characters, they often focus on the Shang dynasty because of the rich historical material from the period.

Since the sixth century A.D., old pieces of bone, called Loong bones, reputedly possessed of beneficial medical powers, have been sold in pharmacies in northern China. In 1899 a Beijing scientist noticed that the bones had inscriptions; and when the symbols were investigated, some could be interpreted as ancient forms of modern Chinese characters. Their place of origin turned out to be the remains of a Shang dynasty capital, and its excavation some thirty years after the discovery yielded tens of thousands of the inscribed Loong bones.

The bones are the remains of Shang soothsayers’ archives. The Shang people collected turtle shells or shoulder blades from oxen, drilled shallow holes at certain points, and stuck red-hot bronze rods into the indentations. The resulting cracks in the shells and bones were interpreted by the court soothsayers. The prophecies were carved beside the cracks, and the bones were filed in vast archives in the capital. The characters on the bones are called oracle bone characters. Their uniformity and the wide vocabulary employed suggest that even three thousand years ago they may already have had a long history. About one-third of the oracle bone characters in the archives have been deciphered. The structure of the oracle bone characters shows that they are forerunners of modern Chinese script.

Oracle bones are not our only clues to the origins of Chinese characters. Another source of knowledge is inscriptions on bronze vessels used for sacrifices and other rituals. Despite the abundant material, however, the origins of many characters remain unclear. Only a small number of characters have had their heritage unequivocally elucidated.

In older times there was no standardized way of writing, and the same character would appear in any number of variants. Later, characters gradually became more uniform. The changes were determined in part by new writing materials (brush, silk, paper) and practical considerations (decreasing the number of strokes to make the characters easier to write), but also by determined efforts of the authorities.

When the First Emperor of Qin Dynasty united China in the third century B.C., he standardized the characters and created what is now called the small seal script. This script is a simplified form of the style that had been in common use earlier, which we call the great seal script. The small seal script is still used in carving the stone seals with which the Chinese stamp scrolls and documents. It retains many features of the script on the ancient oracle bones.

The development of clerical script ran parallel with that of seal script. Clerical script was an even more simplified form of writing, employed at first only for unofficial business.

To write faster than is possible with clerical script, a highly simplified cursive script was developed. In this style, which became known as Caoshu, many separate strokes may be shortened into a single one, and whole parts of a character may be omitted. Strong personal variation makes it hard for the uninitiated to read, as is the case with English shorthand today. Caoshu is one of the three styles used by modern Chinese in their everyday life.

The two other styles commonly used in present-day China are Kaishu and Xingshu, Kaishu, or standard script, is the most important. It developed in the second century A.D. as a mixture of standardized Caoshu and clerical script. The major features of Kaishu are distinctness and legibility-every character has a definite form, and only minor variations are allowed. Kaishii is the model for the printed characters in books, magazines, and newspapers, and it is the style learned by Chinese schoolchildren. Therefore, it is the style that we will practice in this book.

Xingshu, like Caoshu, is a sort of cursive script that is quicker to write than Kaishu, but it is not as extremely personal as Caoshu and is therefore easier to read. An adult Chinese usually writes in a mixture of Xingshu and Caoshu, much as those of us comfortable with a Latin alphabet usually write in cursive script rather than print script.

For nearly two thousand years Kaishu has, without significant alterations, served as the standard Chinese script. To promote literacy and increase the efficiency of writing, the Chinese government undertook a script reform in 1956. A new set of simplified characters was set down as the standard for the whole country, and are used now.

Chinese language is a language system that has the longest history in the world. It is sign and achievement of the eastern civilization. Chinese language is an indispensable composition of Chinese civilization. Chinese language is also the most abundant and most developed language in the world. Chinese is one of the common languages of the United Nations.

As the mother tongue of a nation, Chinese language is one of the main languages in the world. Undoubtedly Chinese language is spoken by the largest number of people in the world; 1/5 of people take Chinese as the mother tongue in the world. Chinese language once had profound and important influences on languages of countries around China. For example keep a large number of Chinese characters in Japanese, Korean and Vietnamese.

Chinese language takes the north dialect of China as the basic dialect, and regards Beijing pronunciation as the standard pronunciation. As the unique pictograph language, Chinese language has unified and standardized grammar and characters. The writing of Chinese language is a kind of hieroglyph character. A lot of people think that it is difficult to learn Chinese, in fact Chinese language is very simple. There is no shifting of tenses in Chinese; there is no shifting of verb and adjective too; Chinese language is terse; it is clear to pronounce; Chinese language speed is slow. Chinese language is a kind of language very easy to learn. In fact it is difficult to learn Chinese characters.

In order to help everyone to overcome the obstacle to learn Chinese language and Chinese characters, I set up Learn Chinese Website. Hope everyone can benefit from this website.