Page 37 - Japanese Character Writing for Dummies
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heart, mind
Kokoro is a complex word. It means heart, soul, spirit, or the essence of something. It does
SHIN/kokoro not imply the actual organ; for that, you would use shinzō, which is a kanji com-
pound word that literally means “heart organ.” Kokoro is an important kanji that is fre-
quently evoked in classical poetry. There are many expressions with kokoro. For example,
kokoro ga hiroi, which literally means “the heart is wide,” refers to someone
who is generous and broad-minded.
Radical: 心 Number of strokes: four
up, above, top
This kanji is used to show what is above or superior. For example, tsukue no
ue, literally means “on top of the desk,” so, above the desk. It also extends the mean-
JŌ, SHŌ/ue, ing to “high.” The compound word jōkyū means “advanced level.”
a(garu), nobo(ru) jōzu means “good at (something).” It can also mean “climb” or “ascend.” agaru
means “to go up,” and noboru means “to climb.” When you see this kanji, you
can guess it’s about something upward. In Japanese, the words that indicate spatial
relationships, such as top, bottom, inside, and so on, are typically nouns.
Radical: 一 Number of strokes: three
CHAPTER 3 105 Characters 31
