Chapter 12 Planning is important Planning is important
After confirming that her son wasn't going to commit suicide, Su Zhaoshi breathed a sigh of relief, yet at the same time, she felt a surge of worry. She stayed to advise him, "Silly boy, when your father was still alive, he often said things like, 'Hanging your head from a beam and piercing your thigh with a needle', are all lies. Scholars want to spread the word about their reputation. We should study, but we shouldn't torture ourselves like that."
Su Fengzhang felt that he must have lost his mind just now, otherwise how could he come up with such a stupid idea.
He quickly assured: "Mom, I won't do it again."
Su Zhaoshi was still worried and said, "I think there's still some clove oil that mother made last year. I'll go find it. It can also refresh the mind without causing any harm to the body. It's much better than those methods."
Su Zhao turned around and went to look for clove oil, and soon found it after rummaging through all the drawers and cabinets.
A small bottle of clove oil was brought to Su Fengzhang. When he opened it, he could smell the rich scent of cloves, with a hint of spiciness.
In fact, under normal circumstances, clove oil is used to treat abdominal pain, diarrhea, vomiting, etc. caused by spleen and stomach deficiency and cold. Cloves can be used to treat abdominal pain and diarrhea caused by excessive consumption of cold drinks and fruits in children in the summer. When Su Fengzhang's body was young, it was applied to the navel, and it was very effective.
"Thank you, Mom. I'll take care of it and use it." Su Fengzhang promised.
But after Su Zhaoshi left, he still reached out and put the clove oil aside. Firstly, it was a medicine after all. Secondly, he would have to study every day in the future. If he only relied on clove oil to stay awake, it would not be enough even if he planted lilac flowers on the two acres of land at home.
Su Fengzhang thought that he still had to change his mindset and adapt to the pace of reading in this world.
Su Fengzhang rubbed his temples, put the book away, spread out a piece of white paper on the table, and prepared to make a reading plan first.
Last year happened to be the year of the Autumn Examination. If nothing unexpected happened, he would be able to take part in the Tongshi first and then the Yuanshi after he was out of mourning three years later. If he was lucky, he would be able to take part in the Autumn Examination the following year.
Of course, all this was based on his successful imperial examinations.
If you want to have a chance, you must at least read and recite the Four Books and Five Classics, and understand them on this basis. You must also be able to write five-character and eight-rhyme poems, as well as how to write edicts, judgments, memorials, and imperial edicts. Finally, contemporary essays and policy papers are also of paramount importance.
What is contemporary writing? Everyone should be more familiar with the eight-legged essay, which is the eight-legged essay that has been criticized by later generations.
When Su Fengzhang came across the eight-legged essay from his memory, he wanted to die for a moment. He had been misled by TV dramas and had always believed that the eight-legged essay only existed during the Qing Dynasty, and he never expected that it also existed here.
However, after flipping through the book, Su Fengzhang felt relieved. The eight-part essay in this matter was just in its infancy and had not developed to the extreme strictness of later generations. Relatively speaking, it only had requirements on style and parallelism, which was relatively relaxed.
The original owner had studied for so many years and had barely finished the Zhongyong (The Mean) textbook. He couldn't even read and recite it, let alone poetry and songs. He hadn't even gotten started with the rest, and his current writing skills were only at the basic level.
Fortunately, the original owner had never learned it, but Su Dianli and Su Zongzhang, one born a juren and the other a scholar, had both learned it, and it was also recorded in the books they left behind.
If you want to earn one million, it is best to set a goal of ten million. This was Su Fengzhang's experience in his previous life. So even though he only wanted to pass the exam to become a scholar, when he set his goal, he set the goal of becoming a juren.
Study with the goal of becoming a juren, and you will have more energy to take the exam for a scholar when the time comes.
According to the original owner's learning progress, Su Fengzhang divided the day into four parts: one part for memorizing and reading, one part for studying eight-part essays, one part for practicing calligraphy, and one part for poetry. The last part took up the least time.
Based on these four major parts, he would fill in the progress bit by bit. If he wanted to be sure, he had to complete his studies in the first two years and use the last year to consolidate his improvement.
It took Su Fengzhang a whole morning to finish writing the plan. He waited patiently for the ink to dry before he pasted the large piece of paper on the wall of his study to remind himself at all times.
After doing all this, Su Fengzhang felt that his originally dizzy mind had become much clearer. As expected, as long as there is a plan, things will become much simpler.
Taking out the book again, he no longer felt embarrassed by the vertical version of the ancient Chinese text. In his eyes, this book was no longer a simple book, but just a small goal that he needed to complete.
There are not many tricks to memorizing. Just read more, read fluently, grasp the key words, remember the annotations and translations to understand them, and memorize according to your understanding and key words. This will be much easier.
If conditions permit, you can read aloud while writing with your hands, using multiple senses of the body to memorize more efficiently. He used this method to memorize the entire dictionary.
Thinking of this, Su Fengzhang opened his voice and began to recite. He read it three times and became fluent. He also highlighted the key points. He also understood the content more or less after looking at the annotations of Su Dianli and Su Zongzhang above. Only then did he really start to recite.
At the beginning, Su Fengzhang's voice was a little halting and he had to stop from time to time. It was not because he didn't know the characters, but because he didn't quite understand what the sentence meant and found it difficult to understand.
But after a few times, his voice became fluent. Even though he couldn't recite it yet, he could remember the second sentence in his mind when reading the first sentence. This was a huge improvement.
This change was so significant that even Su Zhaoshi, who had never been to school, nodded repeatedly after hearing it. She said to Aunt Bai beside her, "I said Feng'er was a good student. Now she's doing quite well."
Aunt Bai also thought it was a good idea. She even grabbed Su Lanzhang and said, "Don't play around in the yard all the time. When Erlang is reading, just sit by the door and listen. If you listen more often, you might be able to memorize it."
Upon hearing this, Su Zhaoshi felt that if Su Lanzhang sat at the door of the study, she could help keep an eye on Erlang, lest he come up with ways to torture her while studying. She agreed, "That's right, Master also said before that studying requires cultivation."
"That's right. Go and educate him." Aunt Bai said, staring at her son.
Su Lanzhang's little arms couldn't bend his thighs, so he had to sit at the door in a depressed mood. It turned out that the place was sunny, and he felt sleepy listening to the sound of reading aloud. After a while, his little head nodded like a sparrow pecking at millet.
Aunt Bai was almost furious when she saw this. Others couldn't listen even if they wanted to, but her family had it all right.
She didn't dare to disturb Su Fengzhang from studying, but just glared at her son fiercely, trying to wake him up with her eyes.
Su Huihui happened to be working hard on her embroidery at this time. She looked up and whispered, "Auntie, I also want to go and listen to my second brother's study."
"What are you going to do?" Aunt Bai said unhappily, "A woman's virtue lies in her lack of talent. Finish your needlework first."
Su Huihui felt a little aggrieved, but she still lowered her head and kept silent.
Aunt Bai felt a little distressed when she saw her like this, but she still insisted, "I've never heard of a girl studying. If you want to learn to read, ask your third brother to come back and teach you in the evening."
Su Fengzhang read it again and felt his throat was smoking. Just as he was about to take a break, he saw his younger brother standing at the door as a door god.
"Lan Zhang, why are you sitting here?" Su Fengzhang found it funny to see him looking sleepy, but the weather was still cold and it was easy to catch a cold if he slept in the sun.
"Second brother!" Su Lanzhang woke up suddenly, and when he saw the look in Aunt Bai's eyes on the other side, he was so scared that his neck shrank.
Su Fengzhang understood immediately and shouted, "Auntie, please ask Huihui to come over. I'll teach them a few words."
Aunt Bai was stunned when she heard this, and said quickly, "Erlang, don't let them delay your studies."
"It won't delay me. My throat is dry after reading for so long. I'll just drink some water and take a break. It's no problem." Su Fengzhang said with a smile.
Aunt Bai was pleased in her heart and said with a smile, "Okay, you two have to be obedient. Erlang, I'll go get you a cup of hot water. Didn't Sanlang drink that cup just now?"
Su Fengzhang didn't refuse and walked in with the two little kids. Su Huihui was a little nervous. It was her first time entering a study. "Second brother, can I study too?"
"You are also a girl from our Su family, why can't you study?" Su Fengzhang said with a smile.
Su Lanzhang said, "But my sister is a woman, and women shouldn't study. My parents both say so."
"Why don't you learn to read together and see who learns faster. Let's see whether you, a man, learn better, or your sister, a little girl, learns faster. What do you think?" Su Fengzhang didn't explain those empty words to him and just said this.
"We'll compete once a month, and whoever wins gets to eat candy." Su Fengzhang also added chips.
Su Lanzhang's mouth was watering when he heard this. The price of sugar was not low these days. The county magistrate had sent a lot of candies before, all of which were top-quality goods, but they only ate a few of them. The rest were collected by Su Zhaoshi, who said they would be used to entertain guests in the future.
Su Lanzhang quickly said, "Okay, let's compete. I'm definitely much better than my sister."
Su Huihui was also a strong-willed person. She said, "That's not necessarily true. Auntie said I'm very smart."
Because Su Huihui had no basic skills, Su Fengzhang simply taught her from the beginning, but this time he didn't let them write directly.
After teaching a character, Su Fengzhang walked into the yard and wrote the character on the ground with a branch.
"Come, each of you take one side and write with a stick. Each person should write at least ten times. I'll come out and check later."
It's not that he couldn't bear to part with the paper and pen, but he just checked and found that there was not enough paper at home. He didn't even dare to copy and recite at the same time, so he kept it for practicing calligraphy. Paper is not cheap.
Fortunately, Su Lanzhang and Su Huihui did not dislike this simple learning environment and wrote carefully, stroke by stroke.
Su Lanzhang had learned this character before, and he wrote it obviously better than his sister. He felt quite proud of himself and wrote quickly.
Su Huihui pursed her lips and wrote every stroke very carefully, appearing neither arrogant nor impatient.
In fact, she also wanted to study before, even if it was just to learn to read like her third brother, but neither her father nor her eldest brother was willing to pay attention to her. Unexpectedly, her second brother treated them all equally.
Aunt Bai didn't think there was anything wrong with writing on the ground. In her opinion, being able to read and write was a great blessing.
She turned and walked into the main room. Su Zhaoshi was packing up her things. Seeing her, she said, "You've come just in time. Can you help me check if this thing is a little wrinkled?"
Aunt Bai took a look and found it was a piece of silk. It looked like it had been put away for a while and the edges were a little wrinkled. "Madam, how did you find this thing? I don't need it now."
Su Zhao sighed, glanced outside, and seeing no one was around, she said, "We only have two acres of land, which can't support so many people. I think this silk is a good thing, but it will lose its value if it is kept for a long time. Anyway, we can't use it now, so we might as well pawn it in the city and exchange it for silver to put our minds at ease."
Aunt Bai paused while she was cleaning up and said, "Madam, I have a few pieces of jewelry over there that are worth quite a bit."
When Su Zhaoshi heard this, she knew she had misunderstood and said with a smile, "It hasn't come to that yet. It's just that this silk won't keep well. If it fades and wrinkles after three years, it won't be worth it."
"Besides, I also want to ask someone to go to the county town. I guess there is not enough paper, so Erlang asked Sanlang to write on the ground."
"That's true. This silk is beautiful, but it gets damaged easily and can't be kept." Aunt Bai was relieved. She said that she had the hundred taels of silver given by the county magistrate, and the family didn't need to pawn anything.
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