1.10 Characters 51–100 — Epoché
What you will be able to do Read, write and give the pinyin for characters 51 to 100 in the corpus frequency list. Name at least one two-character word built from each of them. Point to the semantic component in a character you have not met and say what field of meaning it puts the character in. Read a short sentence made only of the first hundred characters, and translate it without help. Prerequisites : 1.9, the first fifty characters. The fifty characters of the previous lesson have to be readable before this one is worth doing, and the components of 1.3 Characters and 1.4 Characters are what make this set look systematic rather than arbitrary. The first fifty characters were mostly structural — pronouns, particles, the verbs of being and having. This second fifty is where content starts. You will meet the verbs for eating, opening, giving and using; the nouns for country, book, car, electricity; and the characters for the year and the day. Because these carry meaning, they also carry components, and this is the lesson where the component work of 1.3 and 1.4 begins to pay. Where this list comes from The same corpus as before: 55,691 Mandarin sentences with English translations, 500,920 characters of running text, traditional forms folded into simplified before counting. Characters 51 to 100 add 11.2 percentage points of coverage on top of the first fifty, taking the running total from 44.4 per cent to 55.7 per cent . The curve is flattening, as it must, and it will keep flattening: the next fifty add 7.2 points, and lessons 1.13 to 1.17, at the start of the second phase, spend 250 more characters to gain another 18.2 points. As before, the list is simply the next fifty by frequency, so it can include characters already listed in earlier lessons; they appear again here without a note of where they first appeared. That flattening is the argument for doing frequency lists early and leaning on them less as you go. The first hundred characters cost you a fortnight and buy more than half of all running text. A hundred characters around the three-thousandth will cost the same fortnight of attention and buy a fraction of a percentage point. After the next lesson, what increasingly replaces the frequency list is reading, with five more lists, lessons 1.13 to 1.17 at the start of the second phase, running alongside it up to 400: characters arrive attached to something you wanted to know, which is a better way to meet them. The same caution as last lesson applies to the readings. The table gives the reading you will meet first, chosen by measurement rather than by taste, but fourteen of the characters in this set have a second reading in the dictionary, not counting the capitalised forms used in names. Where the third column shows a word whose pinyin does not match the first column, that is the second reading doing its other job. How to use the table Three columns again: character with its traditional form in brackets where they differ, then the bare meaning, then one or two ordinary words that use it. Work in blocks of ten. Say the syllable with its tone, write the character three times, then say the words. New in this lesson: before you write a character, find its component. Nineteen of these fifty have a different traditional form, against fifteen in the first fifty, and several of them are characters with a phonetic-plus-semantic structure, where simplification often shortened one half and left the structure in place. 语 is the speech radical plus a sound half; 话 is the same radical with a different sound half; 请 is the same radical again. Seeing that is worth more than three separate acts of memory. The characters Character Meaning Words that use it 做 zh zuò to do; to make 做饭 zuòfàn to cook (a meal) 做梦 zuòmèng to dream 车 zh chē （ 車 ） vehicle; car 自行车 zìxíngchē bicycle 车站 chēzhàn station; stop 语 zh yǔ （ 語 ） language; speech 语言 yǔyán language 成语 chéngyǔ idiom (usually of four characters) 对 zh duì （ 對 ） right; correct; towards; to 对不起 duìbuqǐ sorry 反对 fǎnduì to oppose 把 zh bǎ to hold; to grasp; (grammar) puts the object before the verb 把握 bǎwò to grasp; certainty 拖把 tuōbǎ mop 欢 zh huān （ 歡 ） joyful; glad 喜欢 xǐhuan to like 欢迎 huānyíng to welcome 给 zh gěi （ 給 ） to give; for; to 送给 sònggěi to give (as a present) 给予 jǐyǔ (formal) to give; to grant 喜 zh xǐ to like; happy; joyful 喜欢 xǐhuan to like 喜剧 xǐjù comedy 道 zh dào road; path; way; to say 知道 zhīdào to know 难道 nándào could it be that...? 开 zh kāi （ 開 ） to open; to switch on; to drive 开始 kāishǐ to start 开玩笑 kāi wánxiào to joke; to kid 事 zh shì matter; thing; affair 事情 shìqing matter; affair; thing 同事 tóngshì colleague 起 zh qǐ to rise; to get up; to start 对不起 duìbuqǐ sorry 一起 yīqǐ together 知 zh zhī to know 知道 zhīdào to know 知识 zhīshi knowledge 和 zh hé and; together with; peace 和平 hépíng peace 暖和 nuǎnhuo warm 吃 zh chī to eat 吃饭 chīfàn to eat; to have a meal 好吃 hǎochī delicious 地 zh dì earth; ground; place (read de: particle before a verb, like English -ly ) 地方 dìfang place 地铁 dìtiě underground railway; subway 话 zh huà （ 話 ） speech; words; what is said 废话 fèihuà nonsense 打电话 dǎ diànhuà to make a phone call 国 zh guó （ 國 ） country; nation 中国 Zhōngguó China 国家 guójiā country 自 zh zì self; oneself; from 自行车 zìxíngchē bicycle 自信 zìxìn confident; self-confidence 作 zh zuò to do; to make; to write 工作 gōngzuò to work; job 操作 cāozuò to operate 出 zh chū to go out; to come out 出租车 chūzūchē taxi 出现 chūxiàn to appear 本 zh běn root; origin; this; (measure word for books) 本来 běnlái originally 本科 běnkē undergraduate course 小 zh xiǎo small; young 小姐 xiǎojiě Miss; young lady 小说 xiǎoshuō novel 电 zh diàn （ 電 ） electricity; electric 电脑 diànnǎo computer 电影 diànyǐng film; movie 中 zh zhōng middle; centre; in; among 中国 Zhōngguó China 中午 zhōngwǔ noon 书 zh shū （ 書 ） book 图书馆 túshūguǎn library 秘书 mìshū secretary 请 zh qǐng （ 請 ） to ask; to invite; please 邀请 yāoqǐng to invite 申请 shēnqǐng to apply for 用 zh yòng to use 信用卡 xìnyòngkǎ credit card 费用 fèiyòng expense; cost 还 zh hái （ 還