If this is so, why is the title here "in the middle" then? Who can guess?
Wednesday, November 19, 2008
Japanese writing style confusion
Japanese traditionally write in columns top to bottom, from right to left, from the "back towards the front" of a book. Or more recently due to western infuence, in rows from left to right, from front to back. (Apparently once you master quick reading in one style, it's painful and slow to switch to another.)
If this is so, why is the title here "in the middle" then? Who can guess?
If this is so, why is the title here "in the middle" then? Who can guess?
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4 comments:
Going from what you said about books being read back to front, I guess the sign in divided into two pages, so you start from the right side. The large title is in Chinese characters (or Kanji) and is rewritten in Hiragana to the right of it.
I think the Hiragana is: Hi a n ka hi,
Hiankahi or maybe Hanakahi (with the first a having a long sound). Is it a place name?
I really like your photos, can you take some more of the autumn trees please? They look great!
Jaz sem pa mislila, da zato, ker je naslov, pa sem našla prvi komentar z natančno razlago. :) Boš presodila, kdo ima prav?
Tina res si odlična poročevalka iz daljne dežele, da o fotkah sploh ne zgubljam besed, super! Sem tvoja redna bralka. Lep pozdrav!
Well done Paul!!!
The title is on the right - both columns are a title. The big letters is title in Kanji, the small letters on it's right is title in Hiragana. Kanji are the complicated characters and there are thousands of them, so in some cases they need to write next to it in Hiragana (which only has 46 basic characters) to know how to read Kanji.
And then they have another "alphabet" Katakana, in which they write foreign words.
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