Top Scholar

Chapter 7 Could my son be a genius?
Su Youcai always felt that he hadn't fulfilled his duties as a father, so he never put on airs and was able to get along well with his sons.

"But jokes aside, laughter aside, one cannot be impatient in scholarship. You need three stakes to build a fence. You have to lay a solid foundation."

"Yes." Su Lu humbly accepted the instruction and then explained, "But didn't my son already memorize the Three Character Classic before?"

“Didn’t you only know up to ‘Mastering the classics and reading the histories’?” Su Youcai said.

“My son forgot a few lines, but he remembered them after reading them,” Su Lu said.

"Then recite it for me?" Su Youcai asked, still somewhat doubtful.

"Yes." Su Lu cleared his throat and recited in one breath from "At the beginning of life" to the last line, "Diligence brings success, play brings no benefit. Take heed, and strive diligently."

Su Youcai was stunned, never expecting his son to have such a good memory. Even if the boy had memorized the Three Character Classic at the clan school before, it had been several years since then.

If he picks it up again now and can recite it fluently from beginning to end, it proves that this kid is definitely smart...

"Father, is it alright now?" Su Lu asked again.

Su Youcai then came to his senses, coughed, and said, "Not only do you have to memorize the text, but you also have to understand its meaning, otherwise what's the point of memorizing it?"

"Isn't the meaning all there is to it?" Su Lu asked, puzzled. "How could anyone not understand?"

“That makes sense…” Su Youcai said in a muffled voice. Although the Three Character Classic only has a little over a thousand characters, it is a ‘mini-encyclopedia’ that covers everything from astronomy and geography to the past and present.

Many children in the ethnic minority schools can recite the texts fluently, but due to their limited knowledge, they mostly just skim through them without fully understanding their meaning. This is unavoidable; children in the mountains cannot compare to those in Luzhou or Chengdu.

"Then let me test you?" He didn't believe that Su Lu could master all the knowledge in the Three Character Classic.

"Okay." Su Lu nodded.

What does "'Xiang Jiuling, able to warm the bed' mean?"

"Huang Xiang of the Eastern Han Dynasty knew how to warm his father's bed when he was nine years old."

"What about 'gourd, clay, leather, wood, stone, metal, silk, and bamboo, which constitute the eight sounds'?"

"This refers to ancient musical instruments, which can be divided into the eight categories mentioned above according to their materials."

What is the meaning of "匏" (gāo), and what musical instruments can it be used to make?

"It means gourd, and it can be used to make sheng and yu."

"..." Su Youcai asked a few more obscure questions, which Su Lu answered accurately. This made Su Youcai look at him with new respect: "You know quite a lot, kid."

"I learned it all from my father through daily exposure," Su Lu said modestly.

"Haha..." Su Youcai was about to burst into laughter when he heard his eldest son snoring. He quickly lowered his voice and said, "Sigh, you seem to have the talent. I really shouldn't have neglected my studies back then."

"Yes, I deeply regret it. But regret is useless; I can only strive to catch up." Su Lu earnestly pleaded, "Father, please teach me more."

"Alright, I'll listen to you." Su Youcai had no choice but to change his methodical teaching plan and, as Su Lu wished, turned to the page in the calligraphy practice book that contained the "Hundred Family Surnames".

“This ‘Hundred Family Surnames’ really doesn’t mean much anymore. You just need to recognize all the surnames on it.” Su Youcai then instructed, “Read it once first and see if there are any characters you don’t recognize.”

"Yes." Su Lu then softly recited the Hundred Family Surnames, discovering that he didn't recognize five characters. They were:

The character 钭 in '甘钭厉戎'; the character 鬱 in '池乔阴鬱'; the character 亓 in '亓官司寇'; the character 仉 in '仉督子车'; and the character 笪 in '墨哈谯笪'.

Su Youcai was speechless with astonishment... He had assumed Su Lu could recite the Three Character Classic because he had memorized it. But this kid clearly hadn't been exposed to the Hundred Family Surnames much; out of 568 characters, he only didn't recognize five. His vocabulary was terrifying!
He had been feeling sleepy, but now he was wide awake, his eyes wide as he looked Su Lu up and down: "Weren't you supposed to be completely illiterate? How come you're like a completely different person?"

"Well..." Su Lu felt uneasy under his gaze. He had been focused on putting in his best effort, but he hadn't expected to slip up. He chuckled awkwardly and said, "I've been influenced by my father's presence all the time, so I don't need to study deliberately; I already know a lot of characters."

"Of course! That's what they call 'being influenced by one's surroundings.'" Su Youcai immediately became smug, then asked curiously, "Then why were you hiding your strength before? Did you not want to go back to school?"

"Yes, yes, yes!" Su Lu nodded repeatedly. Having a father who loves to overthink things is great; he doesn't have to rack his brains to come up with excuses. He then said with a look of regret, "I was ignorant before, I felt too restricted at school, and there was so much homework..."

"Sigh, everyone has moments when they don't know what's good for them. It's good that they can come to their senses." Su Youcai couldn't help but feel sorry. If this child had figured things out a few years earlier, he might have really made a name for himself in his studies.

He still felt it was too late for his son to start studying so hard. But as the saying goes, knowledge never fails, and learning is always better than not learning. Suppressing his regret, Su Youcai picked up his pen and wrote three smaller characters next to each of the five new characters:

钭——天口切; 鬱——纡物切; 亓——渠之切; 仉——诸两切; 笪——当麻切.

"Do you know what that means?" he asked Su Lu.

Su Lu shook his head, unable to figure it out for the moment. "This is called the fanqie phonetic notation method," Su Youcai then taught. "It involves cutting the pronunciation of a new character in half and using two common characters to annotate it. The first character has the same initial consonant as the character being cut, and the second character has the same final consonant and tone as the character being cut. When combined, they form the pronunciation of the character being cut."

He gave a wry smile and said, "This method sounds simple, but it's actually quite complicated. Many children have studied it for years and are still confused, unable to understand the thirty-six tones and two hundred and six rhymes, how to segment them, and how to combine them..."

"For example, do you know how to pronounce '天口切' when they're put together?" Su Youcai didn't expect Su Lu to give the correct answer; otherwise, what would be the point of having him as a teacher?
He planned to spend a month teaching Su Lu the basics of the fanqie phonetic notation method. Of course, this would be very difficult…

“Dou, special even dou.” Su Lu replied crisply.

"Haha, no..." Su Youcai was about to subconsciously say 'that's not right' when he realized what he was doing and stopped himself, saying, "Not bad. Kid, you're pretty good at guessing. Now try guessing the second one."

“鬱，衣乌鬱.” Su Lu suddenly realized that the character that the celestial master had drawn like a talisman was the traditional form of '郁'. Later generations often used this character to demonstrate the superiority of simplified characters…

“That’s interesting. Now, cut the last two.” Su Youcai’s teasing expression vanished.

“Qi, Qi Yi Qi. Zhang, Zhi Ang Zhang. Da, De A Da.” Su Lu answered fluently as always.

"You really mastered the reverse cutting technique in one go?" Su Youcai's jaw dropped to the ground for the umpteenth time. He stared at Su Lu incredulously and said, "Could it be that you're a genius?"

"It's all thanks to my father's excellent teaching," Su Lu said modestly. Using pinyin as a shortcut is really nothing to be proud of.

"Haha, could it be that I'm a genius too?" Su Youcai was overjoyed upon hearing this, but then his face fell. "But why can't those kids in the clan school learn no matter how I teach them? Are they hiding their talents too?"

"..." Su Lu didn't dare to speak, for fear of bringing trouble to his cousins ​​in the clan school.

~~
There wasn't much left to teach about the "Hundred Family Surnames" then. Seeing that there was still plenty of time, Su Youcai decided to teach the "Thousand Character Classic" as well.

He marked "杂色切" next to the "昃" in "日月盈昃". He marked "息救切" next to the "宿" in "辰宿列张".

“子恶昃，西柚宿.” Su Lu’s face flushed red. There were eight characters in total, and he didn’t recognize one or had made a mistake with the other. His knowledge was truly laughable.

He then straightened his posture and continued reciting as instructed: "Cold comes and heat goes, autumn harvests and winter stores. Leap years complete the year, musical scales harmonize the seasons. Clouds rise and bring rain, dew condenses into frost. Gold is produced in the Li River, jade comes from Kunlun Mountain..."

As a result, he read it all in one breath, but only mispronounced the word "輶" in the phrase "易輶攸畏，属耳垣墙"...

Su Youcai was completely numb and said weakly, "The pronunciation of this word is 'you'."

"Why isn't Father using the reverse-cutting technique anymore?" Su Lu asked curiously.

"With your limited literacy, you're still trying to write 'shovel' or 'cut'? That's like taking off your pants to fart!" Su Youcai said irritably. Teaching students had made him feel inferior; where could he possibly complain?
Fortunately, he remembered that the student was his son, and he asked with relief, "Does this mean we don't need to teach the Thousand Character Classic anymore?"

“I still need to trouble Father to explain.” Su Lu quickly said truthfully, “The Thousand Character Classic is not as easy to understand as the Three Character Classic. For example, I don’t know what the line ‘易輶攸畏，属耳垣墙’ means.”

"Okay, okay." Su Youcai nodded happily, though it was unclear what he was so happy about. He then explained to his son, "These two sentences mean that you should be careful when you switch to a lighter vehicle, and you should be careful not to be overheard while you're talking..."

"So '輶' means a light vehicle," Su Lu suddenly realized.

In the following time, at his request, Su Youcai explained the meaning of many difficult sentences, such as "The phoenix sings in the bamboo, the white colt grazes in the field," "The side of the house opens, the canopy faces the pillars," and "Leaving behind good plans, encourage them to be diligent and upright."

Once Su Lu had no further questions, Su Youcai let out a big yawn, glanced at the full moon outside the window, which had quietly moved to its zenith.

Before I knew it, it was the middle of the night...

"That's enough for tonight," Su Youcai said, ending his lesson. "We still have to go back to the fields tomorrow."

"Yes." Although Su Lu was still eager to continue, he had no choice but to stop.

"I'll give you ten days to memorize the 'Hundred Family Surnames' and the 'Thousand Character Classic'," Su Youcai assigned, adding, "Are you confident?"

"I'll give it a try," Su Lu said cautiously.

"Go to sleep quickly." Su Youcai rubbed Su Lu's head. "Reciting in the morning is the most effective way."

"Okay, I'll just take a couple more looks and then go to sleep," Su Lu replied, but didn't move from his seat.

Su Youcai ignored him, got up, lay down on the bed, and expertly embraced his "bamboo wife," reciting a line: "I have no beautiful women to entertain me at night, so I just need Qingnu to cool me down."

Then he went to sleep.

Su Lu added another piece of pine resin to the porcelain bowl, took Su Youcai's inkstone, ground ink like his father, picked up the patina-covered brush, and began copying the text he had just learned.

(End of this chapter)