I turned to online language gurus and friends for recommendations but found many of their suggestions inappropriate for my reading level. My next challenge was to attempt authentic Chinese novels, as opposed to translations. Although I have never been much of a bookworm in English, after reading several stories in Chinese I was sold on the benefits of novels for second language acquisition. Being constantly bombarded with new words and characters helped me to rapidly expand my vocabulary and increase my character recognition. For the first time I found myself properly immersed in long form reading material intended for native speakers rather than learners. Shortly afterwards I read two similar books, The Little Prince and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. I have written more about this process here.Īlthough my first Chinese book was a translation of a children’s novel, completing it felt like an important accomplishment.

Using websites like LingQ or a plugin browser makes it possible to read comfortably and extensively even when faced with a relatively high proportion (10-15%) of unknown words. Having found a digital copy of the book I imported in into LingQ where I could read it comfortably, clicking on any unknown words to instantly discover their meaning rather than looking up words in a dictionary. It’s important to mention that I didn’t read the paper version which would have been a far more painstaking process.

With the pandemic continuing to restrict many people’s ability to travel to China, taking advantage of this fact is a key language hack.Ī year ago, having spent the previous few months working on my reading using graded readers and short articles, I decided to tackle my first novel in Chinese: a translation of the Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe. A learner in the UK has just as much access to online reading materials as one based in Beijing. However, when it comes to reading there is no good reason why someone studying in China should have any advantage at all. This is especially true for speaking and listening, where being surrounded by the language and constantly interacting with native speakers is ideal for an intermediate learner. Those of us learning Chinese from abroad often struggle to replicate the levels of immersion students based in China take for granted.

Hack version of good novel