However many vocabulary books sit on the shelf, the ones that make it back onto the desk are more or less fixed. Eieiei Tango is one of them — a personal favourite I keep at hand and keep rotating. The reason is the cleanliness of its design. Each English word comes not with a Japanese translation, but with an English definition.
Because no translation intervenes, each word takes longer than with a Japanese–English book. But that weight of “learning while reading” is exactly what matters about this book.
What the English–English Format Is: The Definitions Themselves Become the Material
An ordinary vocabulary book has you learn a gloss, as in “intricate: intricately woven, complex.” This book shows the meaning in an English sentence: “intricate: having a large number of small parts or details” (an example from the Advanced volume).
In the Super-Advanced volume, for instance: “infiltrate: to slowly and secretly enter something in order to gain information or cause harm”.
Every headword has an English definition, with a Japanese translation alongside as support, so if you get stuck in English alone you can fall back on the Japanese. Synonyms, antonyms, derivatives and etymology notes are included too, and the design lets you grasp each word as a surface, not a point.
The effect of this format lies in the act of reading the definitions themselves. The definitions are written in plain English, so with every word you get practice in grasping the outline of an unknown word from combinations of words you know.
Learning by gloss stops at “I was able to convert it into Japanese,” but words learned by definition also lead, when you grope for words in conversation — “you know, the one that means…” — to the ability to explain things in English. The definitions for 1,000 words are, just as they are, 1,000 short English passages. That this series can be read as a slim reading text at the same time as a vocabulary book is part of its appeal.
Four Books, One Staircase: Choose Your First Book by Whether You Can Read the Definitions
The series has four volumes: Beginner, Intermediate, Advanced and Super-Advanced. Every volume has 1,000 headwords, in 10 stages of 100 words each, with a check at the end of each stage to confirm retention. As a guide, the Beginner volume is at the 2,000-word level (university entrance exams, Eiken Grade Pre-2 to Grade 2, TOEIC 350–600) and costs ¥1,980 (tax included).
The Intermediate volume is Eiken Grade 2 to Pre-1, TOEIC 600–800, at ¥2,310 (tax included). The Advanced volume is at the 9,000-word level (Eiken Grade Pre-1 to Grade 1, TOEFL iBT 80 and above) at ¥2,640 (tax included).
The Super-Advanced volume is at the 20,000-word level (Eiken Grade 1 and above, TOEFL iBT 100 and above) at ¥2,750 (tax included). The Advanced and Super-Advanced volumes came first, and in September 2020 the Beginner and Intermediate volumes were added, connecting the staircase all the way down.
| Volume | Vocabulary level | Eiken | TOEIC | TOEFL iBT | Price (incl. tax) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Beginner | 2,000-word level | Pre-2 to Grade 2 | 350–600 | — | ¥1,980 |
| Intermediate | — | Grade 2 to Pre-1 | 600–800 | — | ¥2,310 |
| Advanced | 9,000-word level | Pre-1 to Grade 1 | — | 80 and above | ¥2,640 |
| Super-Advanced | 20,000-word level | Grade 1 and above | — | 100 and above | ¥2,750 |
From here, a personal impression. The Super-Advanced volume does not feel as high as its stated “20,000-word level” suggests. Of course, it does contain words beyond that level too. But taken as a whole, the level feels just right for someone aiming at Eiken Grade 1. Shying away from it because the number intimidates you would be a waste, I think.
If you are unsure which level to start from, the table of contents and the first stage are more or less the answer. Every volume lists the headwords for each stage in its contents, so you can roughly read the difficulty from the line-up of headwords. The practical test is this. Open Stage 1 of the candidate volume, and read only the definitions, not the headwords.
Even if you don't know the headword, if you can read about 80% of the definitions without a dictionary, that volume is where you are now. If you keep stopping on words in the definitions, drop down one step. This book is decided not by “how hard the headwords are” but by “how readable the definitions are”. A volume bought on a stretch will, without exception, end up as shelf decoration.
No Competition with DUO 3.0 or Kikutan: Tools with Different Jobs
Japanese–English vocabulary books are tools for “rotating fast by gloss.” DUO 3.0 pours in large numbers of word-and-gloss pairs in a short time, example sentences and all; Kikutan does it riding on rhythm. Eieiei Tango, by contrast, is a tool for “grasping the outline of a meaning in English”, and it cannot win on speed.
So the clean order is: first rotate the foundation vocabulary once with a Japanese–English book, then enter the English–English format as the next book. Running them in parallel also works. If you split the roles — Kikutan in the morning for rotations, Eieiei Tango at night for close reading of definitions — they don't collide. Only in the phase right before a test, when you want to fill gloss gaps fast, is it right to set the English–English format aside for a while.
The Daily Rotation: 20 Words at a Time, Starting from the Definitions
The daily unit is 20 words. The procedure: first read the definition without looking at the Japanese translation, and guess the meaning in your head. If you got it, read the example sentence aloud once, glance over the synonyms and derivatives, and move on. 100 words close one stage, so you advance for 5 days and use day 6 for the end-of-stage check and for recovering only the words you dropped.
At this pace, one book of 1,000 words takes about 2 months for one pass. The second pass narrows down to only the words dropped in the checks, so it rotates in about 2 weeks. Because this is a book that spends time on each word, if you get greedy and do 50 words a day, the work of reading definitions degenerates into mere “skimming”. Protecting the density of 20 words is, in the end, faster.
Audio is provided for all volumes, available by download or through an audio app. Its use is less for checking headword pronunciation than as a model for reading the definitions aloud. The definitions are a run of short English sentences, so voicing them along with the audio leaves the very pattern of “explaining in English” in your mouth.
Definitions you can follow by ear also become faster to read. Closing the definitions with both eyes and ears is the finishing touch of how you rotate this book.
Just one companion for close listening. There is Rehear, a listening practice app made by the team behind this magazine.
It is an app for listening to material audio in fine, section-by-section repeats, and it pairs well with a use like testing “can I catch the definitions?” on this book's audio. If it interests you, give it a try. The book's study is complete without it.
It suits people who have finished one Japanese–English vocabulary book and want to move beyond gloss memorization, and people who have started reaching for English-newspaper and upper-Eiken vocabulary. It does not suit people whose junior-high-level vocabulary is not yet solid. If you stall on the definitions even in the Beginner volume, building the foundation first with a Japanese–English book is faster, detour though it looks.
If you buy, start with just the one volume that matches your test. There is no rush to complete all four — you can do that after rotating the first one through. From a collector's point of view, this is a series premised on climbing the staircase one step at a time, so you can also enjoy the feel of finished volumes accumulating on the shelf.
To buy, start with 『英英英単語』初級編（紙版）. If your current point is one step higher, 『英英英単語』中級編（紙版） is the one.
As an Amazon Associate, Gogaku Chudoku earns from qualifying purchases.