Edward Trimnell

Neko ni Koban, that is, "giving gold coins to cats" alias "pearls unto swines".The book was intended as a collection of proverbs and saying for someone who is studying Japanese (as a language) and wants to know more about the culture. I hoped it would give me interesting stuff to write for my ShoDo study, instead. For the intended target, I can't judge (I am not studying Japanese) for my own plan, it's not really useful, even if I will try to get something out of it anyway. The 2 stars is because it looks like devoting a couple of sentences to each proverb is a bit too terse and the author tries to always use the closest English analogue when applicable, even changing words sometimes (example: "A fox who borrows a lion's authority" is used for "Tora no i o karu kitsune" - no evidence for the Lion kanjii in example, and Tora is tiger... in fact I can spot the Tiger Kanjii in it... nothing major - if you already know Japanese)… (mehr)