著 (ichijiru(shii): remarkable)
I had never seen this kanji, and its composition (grass, 
, over person, 者) struck me as odd, so I consulted Henshall.
The etymology is far too complicated and obscure to detail here, but I did find a cool whale-fish example in Henshall. The character 著 can mean “to write a book,” which is its meaning in 著者 (chosha: author, to write a book + person).
Some other useful compounds with 著:
著作する (chosaku suru: to write, to author) to write
+ to compose (a literary or musical work)
著作権 (chosakuken: copyright) to write + to
compose (a literary or musical work) + right
三島由紀夫著 (Mishima Yukio–cho: authored by Mishima Yukio) 3 + island + reason + narrative + man +
suffix meaning “authored by”I also found that in addition to having the on-yomi of CHO and the kun-yomi of ichijiru(shii), 著 has the kun-yomi of arawa(su). In that case, the kanji means “to write, to publish.” As you may know, two other kanji have the same kun-yomi:
現 (to appear, become visible, come into view, be revealed, materialize)
表 (to express)All these versions of arawa(su) must have sprung from the same source, becoming more differentiated over the course of time. It’s wonderful to think of publishing as another way to make things visible and to make ideas materialize. And of course publishing relates directly to the concept of “expressing” something. So it’s as if 著 lies directly between the meanings of 現 and 表, constituting a missing link.
I had planned to write a blog about 著 and 現, so if I make good on that intention, we’ll revisit these concepts in the future.
Meanwhile, we can say this:
著者は著しい名著を著しました。
Chosha wa ichijirushii meicho o arawashimashita.
The author wrote a remarkable masterpiece.名著 (meicho: masterpiece)
prominence + literary workHere we see that 著 has yet another meaning—”literary work.” The inverse of 名著 is 著名 (chomei: prominence, eminence, remarkable + prominence).
