Resolved For translators: Are Chinese light novels written in pinyin?

Discussion in 'Novel General' started by Illisaide, Sep 7, 2019.

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  1. Illisaide

    Illisaide ╰(✧∇✧╰) Venti!~

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    Because to be eligible for...something I want, I need to be at least conversationally fluent in speech in at least 5 languages. I’ve got 3 (English, Vietnamese, and Spanish) and am currently making my way in French. I’ve decided on Chinese Mandarin as the fifth language (apparently it’s the #1 language in the business world, even more so than English! Who knew!).

    But I’m also an avid fan of these translated novels, and thought: why not learn some additional reading/writing so I don’t have to MTL? (Cause seriously, some of those translations DON’T MAKE SENSE!) I’ve downloaded Rosetta Stone, but according to some accounts online, the default for it is pinyin and nothing else. And apparently the pinyin is a cheat? There’s a toggle somewhere so that the lessons include “true Chinese writing” (quoting from a blog) which I know is what the Names are generally written in. However, the toggle means “challenging” instead of “easy” mode.

    So here’s my situation: I don’t actually NEED to learn the writing system for my RL goals. I’m fine as long as I can orally converse. I want to because I’m tired of MTL. I’m not that far along, so I want to know if the novels are written in pinyin or a combination of pinyin and that other CN writing system so I can learn it correctly as needed from the very beginning.
     
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  2. GotDied

    GotDied Just a friendly rotten hermit~

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    Doomsday Wonderland

    Description:
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  3. IceLight303

    IceLight303 Well-Known Member

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    Um pinging is the phonetic spelling for foreigners. In reality, they are in in characters which each character represents to 2 to 3 letters. Then each character can have several meanings and you just have to kind of learn with each character connected with another character means.. So to answer your question no. Also as someone in the business world english is the main language used.
     
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  4. Illisaide

    Illisaide ╰(✧∇✧╰) Venti!~

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    Thanks!
     
  5. BurgerKong

    BurgerKong Well-Known Member

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    Chinese written in only pinyin would be incomprehensible even with tonal marks. I imagine they instead restrict the use of characters to those known by middle and high school students, same as Japanese.
     
  6. tides

    tides Well-Known Member

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    whut

    nothing is written in pinyin unless you're trying to teach foreigners how to pronounce your words
     
  7. Ai chan

    Ai chan Queen of Yuri, Devourer of Traps, Thrusted Witch

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    When Ai-chan read the title of the thread, Ai-chan thought "What? That question doesn't make sense!" But when Ai-chan considered that this question was most likely asked by a foreigner who doesn't know anything about Chinese, it is understandable.

    This is how Chinese novels look like: 漫画
    This is pinyin: màn huà
    This is English translation: cartoon

    It is almost impossible to see novels being written in pinyin, with the only possibility being children books aimed for children of foreigners.

    And also, 'light novel' (raito noberu) is a completely Japanese term, it's a legal and commercial term for Japanese young adults novel. For Chinese young adults novel, they're called 輕小說 (qing xiaoshuo), 'light fiction'. In English-speaking countries, 'light novel' is specifically and commercially referring to Japanese light novel only.
     
  8. Defiring

    Defiring Well-Known Member

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    Isn't Pinyin the equivalent of romaji, though? I don't think that will be of any use for writing, but it might help you learn the speaking part.
     
  9. ToastedRossi

    ToastedRossi Well-Known Member

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    Pinyin is closer to furigana in that it's taught to children as a tool to make it easier to learn Chinese characters and pronunciation. But it's not going to be like Japanese light novels which are mostly written in kana with any kanji being given their furigana forms as well. But while kanji are based on hanzi, they don't serve the same purpose so the use of pinyin outside of learning environments is going to be rare.

    Having said that, there was a time when it was seriously proposed that the PRC should adopt pinyin and replace hanzi with it entirely. That idea was dropped because it was completely unworkable.
     
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  10. nonononononono

    nonononononono NONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONO

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    Google translate can convert chapters into pure Pinyin, I'm not sure if this is what you want.
     

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