Chapter 29: The Witch Who Teaches Literacy
The next day, Li Family Village.
"..."
Li Boyang gazed at the drizzling rain outside the window, falling into silence.
And just not far from Li Boyang on the wall, the Nine Chapters of Divination was spread out and hung on the wall.
This was done by Chen Yun after listening to Li Boyang and Big Girl when they came back the night before.
Not only that, Chen Yun also specially read through the content of the Nine Chapters of Divination in front of Li Boyang.
It was at that moment that Li Boyang was surprised to realize that Chen Yun could actually read?
Although Chen Yun, like Big Girl, didn’t know many characters.
But it was still better than Li Boyang fumbling around on his own.
Afterwards, when Li Yu returned, he also clumsily supplemented a few new characters.
Instead, he didn’t ask too many questions about what happened to Li Boyang and Big Girl.
Unconsciously, Li Yu and Chen Yun seemed to completely accept their child’s peculiarities and showed an attitude of "whatever".
Before going to bed last night, Li Boyang even overheard Li Yu and Chen Yun discussing whether they should consider letting him start school?
Unfortunately, scholars were really rare in this era.
Throughout the years Li Yu and Chen Yun lived, the only real literate tutor they knew was Big Girl’s father.
Unexpectedly, Li Boyang, who was eavesdropping on their conversation, had an unexpected harvest.
That is, about a hundred kilometers away from here, in a small town, there is a witch who specializes in teaching people to read.
Although the witch didn’t recognize many characters and might even have some mistakes.
But she only asked for a small amount of grain and held classes almost every day, which made her much more accessible than real tutors.
Of course, Li Boyang didn’t plan to become the witch’s disciple.
After all, although his parents accepted his supernatural traits, Li Boyang wasn’t foolish enough to broadcast it everywhere.
To let a newborn child follow a witch to learn to read.
Anyone who knew about it probably wouldn’t just dismiss it as a joke or rumor.
So, Li Boyang’s approach was to secretly open his Celestial Eye and stealthily learn by observing when the witch was teaching other children.
Fortunately, based on the descriptions from Li Yu and Chen Yun, it didn’t take Li Boyang much effort to find the witch’s residence.
Then, Li Boyang encountered an unforeseen problem.
[Without hearing the pronunciation, how am I supposed to learn the characters?]
Scratching his head in frustration, Li Boyang could only try to observe the witch’s and the children’s mouth shapes to discern the correct pronunciation.
[I have a feeling that once I learn to read, I’ll probably end up mastering lip-reading too.]
...........................
In a shabby courtyard behind the Earth God Temple in Gaotun Village.
Several children were sitting on the ground, using their twigs to draw characters on the sand in front of them.
In front of the children, an old granny, stooped and left with only a few teeth, was happily teaching them pronunciation.
Even though her own pronunciation was far from accurate, the granny was very strict in correcting the children’s pronunciation.
"Granny! We just learned this character yesterday! Why are we learning it again today?"
Raising her hand high, a little girl with a messy braid asked reluctantly.
"Just because you learned it yesterday, doesn’t mean you can’t learn it today."
"There are always new kids who haven’t learned it yet, we can’t let just you learn everything?"
"Recite it with me again: this is one, as in number one, as in one Big Money!"
Patting the little girl’s head, the granny chattered on with a smile.
"Huh? But aren’t I the newest kid?"
"Even I learned it, is there anyone here who hasn’t?"
Glancing around, the little girl muttered, puzzled, seeing that even the youngest here were a few years older than her.
"Granny, could you be confused?"
"Everyone knows it already, I know it too?"
The little girl was speaking the truth.
Because the older kids beside her were already bored and drawing doodles in the sand.
"You little one, why do you have so much to say?"
"Just learn when you’re told, it’s your foundation."
"Don’t blame me if you forget how to write when you actually need it."
Due to the rain, the witch’s lesson lasted a full two hours.
It was unclear if it was Li Boyang’s imagination.
He felt that when the class ended, the witch glanced in his direction intentionally or unintentionally.
[Were today’s teachings just basic characters? Or does she teach these every day?]
Furrowing his brow, recalling the very basic characters, Li Boyang realized that the witch’s teachings today were entry-level.
Even for someone like him who could only "see" to stealthily learn, it was easy to correct the pronunciation through mouth shapes and meanings.
The important thing was, the witch wasn’t asking the kids to memorize by rote.
Many times, Li Boyang saw the witch list a series of homophones.
From easy to hard, from simple to complex...
In this era without phonetic alphabet, Li Boyang even felt that true tutors might not teach as well as the witch.
After all, enlightenment and teaching are two different things.
The former does not require profound knowledge; being straightforward and easy to understand is key.
Think about the catchy Three Character Classic and Hundred Family Surnames from ancient times, and you realize what the standard for enlightenment is.
[Thinking about it, those mistakes might not really be mistakes...]
Looking again at the Nine Chapters of Divination on the wall.
Li Boyang saw those "mistakes" written by Big Girl and his mother.
Perhaps it was the difference in characters between a thousand years ago and now...
Or perhaps those characters had different writings in different regions...
[So, why can other transmigrators so easily grasp the language and writing after crossing over?]
[Have they never encountered such cases of character evolution?]
Thinking about the complex writing system before the Qin Dynasty unified China, Li Boyang felt a headache.
If this world also lacks a unified central script.
Then the characters from the Nine Chapters of Divination are likely ancient regional characters from near the Huai River.
This means Li Boyang’s difficulty in reading the Nine Chapters of Divination correctly has increased again.
The idea of losing a millimeter and missing by a thousand miles.
Is all too apparent in the field of translating characters and languages.
[Having a manual in hand, yet being blocked from it due to a language barrier, I guess only a transmigrator like me would encounter something like this, right?]
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