Douglas' Dictionary with Chinese Characters?

[Aurelio]

... Each Chinese word is accompanied by its English meaning and notes pertaining to proper pronunciation. Each word is also accompanied by its HAND WRITTEN Chinese symbol. Such hand finishing of a reference work is very unusual due to the many thousands of symbols theat need to be transcribed ... (!!!)

http://dogbert.abebooks.com/servlet/Sea ... ph=2&sts=t

Regards,
Aurelio

[%sig%]

[SimL]

... Each Chinese word is accompanied by its English meaning and notes pertaining to proper pronunciation. Each word is also accompanied by its HAND WRITTEN Chinese symbol. Such hand finishing of a reference work is very unusual due to the many thousands of symbols theat need to be transcribed ... (!!!)

http://dogbert.abebooks.com/servlet/Sea ... ph=2&sts=t

Regards,
Aurelio

Well, I just bought my (standard) copy of the 1873/1923 Douglas/Barclay, which (as a lot of people here know) has no characters in the Douglas main part, and characters in the Barclay supplement. I'm extremely enthusiastic about this dictionary, but wish that I could have characters for the main part too, so I looked into the possibility of getting the edition which Aurelio describes above.

Well, US$800+ is too much for me, so I wrote to another supplier listed with Abe Books, asking if their 1899 edition also had the characters, and, sadly, it doesn't.

I'm just posting this information here, so that people know that not EVERY 1899 edition has characters in the main part, apparently only this US$800+ edition.

Regards,
Sim.

[Yeleixingfeng]

Digging old threads... Haha..

Replying to Ah-Bin, I could even find the name Douglas Barclay on the net, and when I associate the name with 'Hokkien', I was brought to this thread by Google. So... Any way of getting my hands on a Douglas' Dictionary? (Digitised.)

[Ah-bin]

I'll consult with some of the people here who have computers. I think almost everyone has a copy of the searchable one with the characters now. I just have no idea how to send it to you, because the file is so big.

[Yeleixingfeng]

Which part of Penang do you live in? Maybe I could take a bus to your house and get the pendrive. (If you have a better way of proving Hokkien can be polite too, tell me. Or else, Im going!) I live around Bayan Baru. You won't kidnap me when I reach your house right? >.<

[SimL]

Hi Yeleixingfeng,

Sorry to disappoint you, but Ah-bin is a New Zealander who lives in Australia! You can see some youtubes of him and me at:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KBSD-jsHARA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uli5jUqIGu8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IF2o0cKHR10

He was visiting me in Amsterdam at the time.

[Yeleixingfeng]

Hi Yeleixingfeng,

Sorry to disappoint you, but Ah-bin is a New Zealander who lives in Australia! You can see some youtubes of him and me at:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KBSD-jsHARA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uli5jUqIGu8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IF2o0cKHR10

He was visiting me in Amsterdam at the time.

Wow..? This is overwhelming... Ah-Bin is not Chinese, and you are..? I always thought it was the other way round.. And to think I actually e-mailed him in Mandarin... Omg...

This is getting weirder and weirder... Really, take no offence, I am just expressing my curiosity very bluntly... But, why would Ah-Bin want to learn Hokkien when he is neither living in a Hokkien-speaking community nor a Chinese himself..? And you all discuss SO MUCH about Penang Hokkien, while you don't live in Penang... And, Amsterdam...? Lol, this really needs time for digesting...

By the way, regarding the dictionary, never mind. Ah-bin's dictionary is good enough. ^^

[SimL]

Hi Yeleixingfeng,

Well, the reasons that I am so interested in Hokkien are:
1) I speak Penang Hokkien natively (even if not very well / with limited vocabularly), and really *love* it as a language.
2) My mother's side speak Amoy-type Hokkien, so I'm familiar with it (can even sort of "fake" talk that way).

So, even though I haven't lived in Penang for about 40 years, I've always been quite interested in Hokkien, and (these days) it forms a very important part of my life (i.e. posting on this Forum).

If I may venture to partially answer for Ah-bin (I'm sure he'll give a more detailed answer himself): as far as I understand it, he learnt quite a bit of Taiwanese in Taiwan, but was disappointed in the "social conditions" of the language, i.e. many Taiwanese have a low opinion of the language, and many are not teaching and speaking it to their children any more. When he discovered that Penang was a place where Hokkien is still alive and kicking, he switched his energies to learning Penang Hokkien.

As for your mailing him in Mandarin, well, I mentioned on the Forum a couple of months ago (probably before you joined) that Ah-bin reads 15th century Chinese novels as "light reading" in the train(!), and speaks good Cantonese and basic Hakka as well, so I'm pretty sure he would have been totally comfortable (and pleased) with such a mail from you. [BTW, Ah-bin is a sinologist by profession, so it's not *totally* surprising he can do some of these things, but, even in this respect, he's quite remarkable, as most sinologists can only speak Mandarin, or at most one other variant.

[amhoanna]

Wow..? This is overwhelming... Ah-Bin is not Chinese, and you are..?

[SimL]

Wow..? This is overwhelming... Ah-Bin is not Chinese, and you are..?

Well, Ah-bin can be a "Hokkien by adoption" .