This dictionary lists about 5,000 carefully selected characters in their 10,000-odd current readings and almost 70,000 compounds in current use, all with concise English definitions. The entries have also been scientifically arranged by a logical extension of the traditional radical system to make finding any given character almost foolproof, saving hours of time.
Awarded the 1969 Prize for the Society of the Promotion of International Cultural Relations, this is the most comprehensive dictionary of its kind.
The Most Useful Academic Kanji Dictionary I Have Used This is the original kanji dictionary a lot of us who lived in Japan in the late 80s and early 90s used. I've compared it to other Japanese-English Kanji dictionaries, and I still think this one is the most useable (even better than its newer revision). The system for finding radicals and then locating the target kanji works well, and the more often I use it, the more the system becomes intuitive. I've used it for paid translation work when translation engineering documents, for translating martial arts texts, and for composing letters to my Japanese friends. Only rarely do I find that the target kanji is not included. This dictionary rocks!
new to japanese review I just finished japanese 1 at my college and my instructor suggested this dictionary for japanese 2. so as a beginner knowing very few kanji, i found this dictionary a breeze to use.
i have been using this for translating some of my manga and the biggest difficulty is probably counting the number of strokes in the kanji i was looking up; which was a problem with the manga, not the dictionary. even if that is a problem, you can look up the kanji by pronounciation in the back.
there are also a lot of cool features in the back: counters, kanji known by certain grade levels, and even history.
worth the money.
The Definitive Work A friend of mine purchased the nice red cloth bound edition for me as a present back in the early nineties and I foolishly sold it. I recently re-aquired it in the orange gloss cover.
Simply put, this is the definitive work. Though it is showing its age somewhat, and though it includes a large number of obscure and older kanji which can be a distraction to the intimidated, until someone does something astounding and delves deeply into the language to produce a work like it but informed by current trends, this is it.
Purchase with confidence, if you are serious about obtaining a solid reference work for the Japanese language.
The only weakness (and not a large one) is that though it addresses the use of a character in the first position, it does not address the use of a character in the second or subsequent postion, as does Spahn and Hadamitzky's also excellent work. To be fair, this would have increased the size of this work and made it a multiple volume affair, so this approach is understandable.
Only dictionary you'll need, unless you REALLY love kanji Great dictionary. I got this "classic" version when it was the current version (1993). I learned with it and used it and never needed another Kanji dic.
After becoming proficient with Nelson, I raced some friends with Wordtanks (an electronic dic). We tied. So this isn't the fastest method, but it is so much more complete than the Wordtank. Someone should test Nelson against an updated electronic dictionary, as my test was done in 1996 and electronics might be really good now.
Nelson is big and heavy, so don't plan on lugging it around campus or bringing it with you on your travels.
The pages are pretty thin so you won't want to make notes in it. The font is small so if you have bad eyesight you might think twice or get a mag-glass. These two "deficiencies" allow a LOT of information. There are tons of combinations here. Unfortunately, it's not all of them - and the best writers have a tendency to get creative with Kanji, so you still might not find one or two combos you would like to see. Nelson includes old and obsolete characters as well.
If you are a casual student, Nelson might be overkill.
Finally, it takes practice to learn how to use a Kanji dictionary. Here's how Nelson is used (There are complete lessons in the book):
First, determine the radical of the character. Nelson gives a lesson on how to do this, something like "all radical, only one radical, left, right, top, bottom, NE, SE, NW, SW,". It's tough until you get used to it, then it becomes second nature.
Second, determine the number of strokes in the radical. Again, there's a lesson how to do this. It is easy to do and you have to know it if you ever want to write.
Third, find the section number based on the number of strokes in the radical (section 5: five stroke radicals). It is easy to find as the number is printed in large text in the top corner.
Fourth, find the section with the correct radical. A list of all radicals with 5-strokes is listed vertically on every page of section 5. They are in character order, and the current radical is circled. Flip pages until you find the right one.
Fifth, now that you are in the section of the character's radical, count the number of remaining strokes in the character. If there are 10 more strokes, go to the section 10 under the current radical.
Finally, scroll down the section until you see your character.
It's easy, but you do need to get used to it. Thing is, you will need to go through a similar process for any Kanji dictionary, so don't be discouraged.
On the other hand - Nelson presents other ways to find characters. For example, if you know the sound of the character, you can look it up in the sound index, which will point you directly to the character's location in the book.
In summary, I have never seen a better Kanji dic, but it will take some time to figure out.
Anything Goes Trivia
Megaton Man
Trevor
