读 (dú): to read

Meanings

1 to read
2 to read aloud
3 to study (a subject); to attend (school)
4 to pronounce

Characters

读

dú

to read; to study

讠 (speech radical) + 卖 as graphic phonetic — speaking out written words.

Examples

你喜欢读什么书？

Nǐ xǐhuan dú shénme shū?

What books do you like to read?

请大声读课文。

Qǐng dàshēng dú kèwén.

Please read the text aloud.

我哥哥在北京大学读书。

Wǒ gēge zài Běijīng dàxué dúshū.

My older brother is studying at Peking University.

Tips

usage

读 often implies reading aloud or studying actively; 看 covers silent reading and looking at things in general. 读书 specifically means to study or pursue formal education, not just to read a book.

memory

Left 讠 (speech) + right 卖 (sell) — picture speaking written words aloud, like a market crier selling the text to listeners. The 卖 here is purely a sound carrier (simplified from a different historical phonetic), but the speech+sell image makes the meaning stick.

Components

radical

讠 yán

speech (radical form)

Left speech radical, the side-form of 言. Marks 读 as a verbal-act character: reading aloud, reciting, declaiming. The simplified speech radical compresses 言 into two strokes — a horizontal mark above an angled mouth-line. Same radical anchors 说, 语, 讲, and 课.

phonetic

卖 mài

to sell (graphic only)

Right-side 卖 supplies the sound: simplified from the traditional 讀, where the phonetic was an old hand-over graph reading yù. The shift from yù to dú is a large velar-to-dental drift, and the modern 'sell' meaning plays no role here — this is a graphic phonetic carrier only. The same phonetic anchors 续 (continue) and 犊 (calf).