Listen to the five records of Xiao Tower

Author: Gu Nong
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2004-08-01
Features: As one grows older, time seems to pass faster; perhaps it's because there are always so many things to do that I haven't devoted myself to reminiscing about the past—this kind of urgent task is not something I can handle when I'm busy. Since the past has passed, let it go. Now, according to the norms of this series of books, I must talk about my academic journey, which requires me to look back. I am very happy to seize this opportunity to tidy up and conclude nearly six decades of traces, which may be beneficial for me to move forward more clearly and fully.
A Dull Childhood
My family was a large one with six siblings, and I was the youngest. When I was young, our family rented a quiet alley in the northern part of Taizhou City, Jiangsu. The gate was not large, but inside were several courtyard-style houses, with two wells, two main gates, and a back gate—used by the landlord. We lived in the main hall and a few ear rooms, complete with an entrance gate, fire lane, flower hall, and a small garden, although it was not rented by our family and no outsiders came in. We had our own main gate and well, with two courtyards—one in the courtyard and a larger one between the entrance gate and the main gate. Sometimes my two older brothers would play soccer there. The entrance gate had a connecting hall, which was a good place to play chess or cool off. The landlord, surnamed Fang, was the owner of a flour mill and had a foreign accent. He had only one daughter. The father and daughter lived in thirty or forty rooms, which was too quiet; our family had three generations and many children. It was said that the old lady, Fang, rented to us because she liked the liveliness of our family and my father had a good reputation. The rent was not expensive.
Our family was indeed lively before. The older sisters were all outstanding—good at studies, public speaking, and acting. My second older sister was particularly skilled in writing and even ran a student literary magazine. However, I was too young to understand these things at the time. I was seven years younger than my second older brother and even older by more than ten years compared to the older sisters. When I was young, I was quite foolish and could hardly remember anything, but I noticed that they were always busy and had little time to play with me. The only things that left a strong impression on me were two: one was that when I was about four years old, I was sent to a private academy for study. It was opposite our house, and the teacher, surnamed Gao, had a white beard and was very kind. He had a grandson who was the same age as me, and we often played together in the middle of the alley, where the stone slabs were paved and clean. During the day, when my older siblings went to school, I was bored at home and would ask my mother to tell stories. Unfortunately, she was often sick and had few interesting stories to tell, mostly the ones I had heard before. So, my father decided to send me to Gao's academy, saying, "Let him stay there for half a day."
This study was quite free—I could go whenever I wanted. After arriving, I would first grind ink. The teacher required me to grind it for half an hour, using force and keeping the ink stick straight so it wouldn’t be crooked. After grinding the ink, I would sit at my desk and trace characters— in the morning and one in the afternoon. After finishing the afternoon tracing, I would give both to Gao to check. He would ask me to read each character aloud, and if I read it correctly, he would pat my head. If he didn’t pat my head, I knew I had made a mistake and would have to read it again. If I still got it wrong, the teacher would say, "You’ve gotten confused again!" and then tell me what the character was and where it appeared in a sentence. Next, he would assign the next day’s tracing and explain each character to me, having me repeat after him. After finishing, I could go home. If I wanted to stay and play a bit longer, I could.
There was a long time between finishing the morning tracing and lunchtime. Gao allowed me to play in his courtyard—watching ants move, playing with a ball, rolling copper coins—but I wasn’t allowed to talk loudly. In reality, I was the only one there, so there was nothing to talk about. I could also read picture books at my seat, but only by myself—I wasn’t allowed to let other students read them, as they were older and had more homework, so they shouldn’t be distracted. I could go home anytime for drinking water, urinating, or washing my hands. I mainly went home to wash my hands, as grinding ink and writing often got my hands and even my face dirty. Every time I went home, my grandmother would help me wash, saying, "Look at how dirty you are, and you’ve learned so much!" After washing, she would give me something to eat and send me back to "the academy to study." It was perhaps around this time that my "studies" really began.
After a year, Gao taught me arithmetic, all done orally without writing or homework. My grandmother was very kind to me and was also a great cook, much better than my mother. She was always busy, and the older sisters would urge her to rest or help her, but she would say, "Your mother was too hard when she was young and ruined her health. I’ll do it. This is nothing compared to what you do!"
Another memorable thing was a lively evening when all my older siblings returned home after dinner. We gathered at two tables, lit by large kerosene lamps, to do homework. The rooms were bright and warm. My father was also in his room reading or writing something. It was better not to go to his room, as he would write a few characters to test me, whether he had taught them to Gao or not. If I didn’t go, he wouldn’t ask or teach me any new characters. Occasionally, my two older brothers would fight, and he would scold them severely. I would move between the two homework tables, asking questions and asking them to draw pictures for me, like the ones in the picture books. When they got tired of me, my second older sister would usually lead the others to give me some of their pocket money to buy peanuts and candy from the street. I was happy to run this errand, tasting a little first and then dividing it into six portions—my share was always the largest. After eating, I would feel relieved and sleepy, going to sleep. I didn’t know when they went to sleep, but they were already at school the next morning. Eating before bed often led to my teeth getting bad early, and now I have very few "direct descendants," mostly useless "heterogeneous elements."
Unfortunately, this interesting and lively time was short. After 1949, things changed quickly. First, my second older sister suddenly left home and couldn’t be found. My father was frantic, constantly scolding everyone, and my mother lay down, crying endlessly. Only my grandmother wasn’t too worried, saying, "Second sister is smart; she won’t get into trouble. Let’s wait and see." Later, we learned that she had secretly followed the People’s Liberation Army across the river and became a reporter for a revolutionary newspaper in Zhenjiang. A while later, she sent back photos—wearing an eight-pointed military cap, looking beautiful and heroic. Not long after, my first older sister went to university in Shanghai; my third older sister also went to university, supposedly a revolutionary one, different from ordinary universities, and didn’t stay long before going to Korea to fight the Americans. When I learned that my second older sister had secretly left home to revolutionize, my father was quite angry, saying that girls shouldn’t be revolutionaries and should go to a proper university, where she would achieve something. But he quickly changed his mind when my third older sister went to a revolutionary university, and he didn’t object. He knew that opposing it was useless; it was just another one leaving.
My two older brothers, the "twin troubles" (the eldest and second eldest), often fought. My father decided to separate them, sending the second eldest to high school in Zhenjiang, under the care of my second older sister. The eldest, though attending high school in Taizhou, insisted on boarding, so he wasn’t home often, only coming back on weekends. This was in 1951. That year, the private academy closed, and I was seven years old, so I went to elementary school. Because I knew many characters, wrote well, and was good at arithmetic, I was placed in the third grade. The homeroom teacher suggested I could go to the fourth grade, but my mother disagreed, saying I shouldn’t ruin my health by studying too hard. So, I started as a third-grader. Gao was very happy to hear this and often told people that none of his students were wrong.
From 1951, my life became very dull for about ten years. The house was quiet, and I went to school, did homework, ate, and slept. The only joy was reading picture books—I read every book at the rental stall and then picked the interesting ones to read again. Because there were fewer people, we moved to a smaller house, which still felt empty. My grandmother grew older, and my mother’s health worsened, passing away later. What was once a lively family was left with only my father and me, with no vitality at all. Because there were fewer people, I got a dedicated study room called "Xixuan," which was about ten square meters. It was supposed to be the western wing, but "Xixuan" clearly couldn’t be used. At that time, they still practiced burying coffins in the ground, and my mother’s coffin was left in the main room for several months without being buried. My father never explained why, and I didn’t ask. Some classmates who knew this asked me if I was scared, but I wasn’t—I was scared of my mother. My father grew older day by day, and his only joy was reading letters from my older siblings, especially the photos they sent. My second older brother was studying at the Dalian Naval Engineering College, wearing an officer’s uniform, looking very heroic. He sent many photos. I, on the other hand, collected a lot of good stamps, including foreign ones (Hungarian). My first older brother had studied English at Nankai for a year before being sent to study at the Roland University in Budapest, which was one of my father’s greatest joys.
In the evenings, I did homework while my father read his books. He usually only read bound books, and more than 90% of his collection was bound. When he came across something he liked, he would recite it in a special tone in a low voice, which sounded quite strange. He said that when he was in the private academy (he studied there for ten years, reading all the classics and histories), his teacher taught them to read this way. Reading is reading—it should be read aloud, and it’s even better if you can memorize it. My father never asked about my homework or looked at my report cards; he just had me read them to him. When I did well, he would stamp his favorite seal in the parent’s comments section—said to be made by a famous artist, though I didn’t remember the name; if I did poorly, he used a common one.
There wasn’t much homework then, and with nothing to do in the evenings, I would browse through his bookshelves and read randomly. I read all the novels in the house first, some of which corresponded to the picture books I had seen before, and I really felt the joy of reading. Later, I found some novels weren’t very interesting, so I switched to reading classics like "Essays on Ancient Literature," "Records of the Grand Historian," and "Collected Conversations of the Scholars." I also flipped through "The Selection of Refined Literature" and "Zhuangzi," but gave up because there were too many unfamiliar characters and sentences. When I didn’t understand something while reading the classics, I would ask my father, who would give me clear answers. Sometimes I doubted his answers, but he wouldn’t insist and would ask me to look them up in a dictionary or encyclopedia and study further. The "Kangxi Dictionary" and "Comprehensive Dictionary" were on his desk, and he often used them too. So, I read many books in this way, half understanding and half not, which made later classical Chinese in textbooks seem very simple. However, the teacher would analyze them in detail, turning over and over, as if it were unnecessary. So, I often secretly read other books in class. Once, I was caught and scolded for not being disciplined, even though I was a model student. The teacher also punished me by having me explain a passage, which wasn’t difficult for me. After finishing, the teacher said, "Good. But you can study it more deeply—learning is endless." I always remembered the serious look on his face when he said that.
By 1961, when I graduated from high school, both my homeroom teacher and my Chinese teacher recommended me to study at Peking University’s Department of Chinese Language, but I was determined to study journalism, like my second older sister—she was already a famous reporter for Xinhua News Agency. My father let me do as I wished, just asking my second older sister for advice on how to fill out the college application form. Since my mother passed away, he had a somewhat hands-off attitude. My second older sister said, of course, to study Chinese, as journalism had no academic value and articles only had one day of life. I believed her and ended up studying at Peking University’s Department of Chinese Language.
During my middle school years, I often felt very unhappy, unable to explain why, but life was very dull. So, I often went to the movies in the evenings. My father never objected, as he usually went to bed early and only slept after I came home. Sometimes he would ask how the movie was, and I would always say it was good, which made him happy. In reality, some movies weren’t very interesting. Sometimes after watching a movie, I also wanted to be a writer and write my own masterpiece, at least better than those boring novels and movies. After reading classics for three or four years, I became overly mature and lacking in vitality, unable to sing, swim, play cards, or do anything else. Since I couldn’t play, I didn’t want to play either. Relatives often praised me for being quiet, patient, and capable of studying; they had no idea how unhappy I was inside, and I didn’t say anything.