Eno Robert. Introduction to Literary Chinese

2012, 2013 — 188 + 123 с.This set of readings comprises the first of a two-part online textbook in Literary Chinese (wényánwén 文言文) intended for students who have no prior background in the written language of traditional China. The lessons were developed for classroom use, but I imagine they could be helpful to a student studying individually.The two parts of the texts are designed for different purposes. In Part One, which has fourteen lessons, all but the last are presented so as to lay great emphasis on grammar. Most of these lessons are intended to introduce as much of the basic syntax of “Classical” Chinese – that is, the language of the Warring States and Former Hàn eras – as possible, as well as a broad range of basic vocabulary.For most lessons in Part One, the main text has been photocopied from traditional editions and minimal punctuation has been added (generally restricted to periods, commas, and colons). The text is followed by a glossary, and then, with the exception of the final lesson (which was added as a brief end-of-term exercise for classes that worked through the rest of the text more rapidly than anticipated), there is a grammar section and exercises (which are glossed, but the “answers” to which are not provided). A list of all grammatical patterns is included as Appendix I, and a compilation of the glossaries by stroke count appears in Appendix II.