Basic Chinese: A Grammar and Workbook (Routledge Grammar Workbooks)

I have used this book a great deal and found the information, vocab. and grammar to be really useful. The book pre-supposes a good knowledge of spoken Chinese, so although called 'Basic Chinese' it is not for a beginner. The book is suited to someone who already has a good knowledge of the spoken and written language. One issue I have with the book is the frequent inaccurate translations which can be misleading; otherwise excellent.

The book starts with the simplest principles, and actually continues to advanced topics such as the 'le' particle, by the end of the book. Therefore it gives a very solid grounding in Chinese grammar, supported by plenty of exercises ranging from the traditional prose translation type, to error-correction style activities. Full of detail presented very concisely, it's ideal for an ab initio uni student, or anyone interested in getting a good grasp on how the language works, rather than the casual holiday maker after a minimal working knowledge. Some of the example sentences are a bit odd - not that it's a bad thing, since a bit of humour (intended or otherwise) never did learning any harm! Try 'before she went to England she had never seen a squirrel'. Lovely! Now I know what a songshu is.

The chapters are concise and useful with lots of examples. The chapter on measure words is a particularly good reference which I wish I had at an early stage of study. I agree there are grammatical terms which are complex, but this doesn't spoil the overall value of this book.

This is totally misleading: it certainly is not basic. The approach taken is about a century behind the times and the book is of little help to the absolute beginner. It would be of some value as a reference work to students of both Chinese and linguistics but I found it really most unhelpful. There are exercises to try and reinforce the lessons being taught but the vocabulary is lacking to complete the exercises and I found that the only way to find, for example, 'dozen' was to look the answers up in the back of the book. I found it irritating that concepts were constantly introduced that belonged to later chapters - which either meant skipping ahead or remaining puzzled about what point the authors were trying to make.

A very clean copy of a classic Mandarin grammar text book. Has lots of exercises to understand the taught grammar points.

A lot of information here but easy to digest and the exercises help to reinforce learning. Worth the money.

Veery useful - makes you practice! Second edition is even better - with situations to work through

Buy the paperback version. You can actually read that. I'm extremely disappointed. Otherwise, a good grammar, deserving 5 stars. I think I'll be sticking to my paper copy, or getting my granny's magnifying glass out. It's about time publishers learned to cope with re-producing Chinese characters on Kindle. After all, we are in the 21st century, aren't we?

Very comprehensive. I have been learning Mandarin for over 1 year now and thought that I was learning "basic" Chinese, but there are some parts early on in the book I found challenging, so it would be helpful for anyone who purchases this book to have some knowledge of the language. However, a brave student, who has already learned the tones and pronunciation could manage to teach themself using this book. There is no shortage of exercises and examples. I also really enjoy that it is written with characters, pinyin and English. The only reason I give this book 4 stars instead of 5 is because there are a few errors. The book came with 2 erratum slips, but I found a couple more small errors ex: the answer to the exercise should have been "China", but it was "England" in the answer key. I also found one word had the wrong tone on the pinyin.

中国語の文法や語順には英語と共通するところが多々あると思ったので英語で勉強したほうがいいかな～と思い、これを買いました。 英語が得意な方であればそれほど難しい英語は使われていないので全然読めます。それとこの本のいいところは練習問題もかなり多くあるところ。ただ読むだけじゃ覚えたか不安なので、これは本当に使いやすい参考書だと思います。

I'm using this book as a guide in a college level independent study course on Chinese grammar. It is similar to the excellent "comprehensive" version by the same author, but divided into basic and intermediate level topics (separate volumes). The "workbook" aspect is very useful for testing your understanding, and establishing a standard if you're working with a teacher, tutor, mentor, etc.. I would recommend this, along with the second volume in the set, as the best starting point for anyone interested in this topic.

This is a grammar, not an instructional course, so it should be used as a supplement to other materials for language instruction. At minimum you will need a separate lesson course and dictionary. As such, it does a decent job of grammar exposition. It does a particularly good job making fine semantic distinctions, the idomatic differences between ' and ' for "two", for example. It contains plenty of exercises to practice and test yourself. Its section on measure words is the only clear explanation I have seen of the thinking habits that underlie them. At last, a treatment of measure words that doesn't resort a list ending in "etc". Other books might say "' for hills, large buildings, etc.". Hills, large buildings, and *what* else? This book gives the thinking: ' conveys the imposing-ness of such things. It is not organized to be a reference. Though conjugation and declension tables are not needed (Chinese doesn't decline or conjugate), my perfect grammatica would have tablular summaries of the material in an appendix for quick look-up. The second edition has added an index, which should help. If your core study material has a good treatment of grammar, you can probably get by without this book. Chinese grammar is not very complicated. Students on a budget may be better served buying vocabulary aids. 'Update: Amazon apparently can't display Chinese in reviews anymore. That's ' er4 and ' liang3 for "two" and ' zuo4 for the measure word example.)

it came a little bit bend